For the past few years a group of experts from different EU Member States has been conducting some research initiatives on the individualization of social rights. These research endeavors are carried out within different formal frameworks, e.g. within the SPECIAL Network project (Social Protection in Enlarged Europe) , among others. On the one hand, we examine those issues from the theoretical perspective, referring to the individualization of social rights as replacing the derived rights by individual rights, both with regard to family relationships and other personal relationships. On the other hand, we take into account the aspect of implementation, including, among others, documents, programs and objectives within the European Union legal framework, where individualization of social rights is referred to, or where some concrete plans for action were proposed (e.g. the announcement by the European Commission Modernization and Improvement in the field of social protection in the European Union, the open method of co-ordination, and others).
At the same time, it has been observed that European countries either engage in the debate on the individualization of social rights or actually introduce some legal solutions that embrace the tendency towards the individualization of social rights. The legal issues also have an important economic context: economic crisis is predicted either to motivate the introduction of new solutions in this area, or, on the contrary, to sustain and fossilize the status quo.
Another interesting dimension of the individualization of social rights refers to the category of European citizenship and its impact on the development of individual rights.
The 2010 Special Issue of "Polityka Społeczna" discusses the individualization of social rights with respect to rights granted on the basis of either work and economic activity or social citizenship. The problem is posed by the scope and legal nature of rights exercised by the EU citizens in relation to the functional relevance of their being a worker or economically active person.
In order to comprehend and research the context of the development of social rights the second paper focuses on the history of the legal frameworks endorsing the process of the individualization of social rights at the international level. The conceptual scope of individualization is discussed in the light of human rights de lege lata, social rights provided by the ILO Conventions, the Council of Europe and the European Union legislation. The changing background of the process is evoked as EU citizenship allows for the European Court of Justice to re-think a number of rights and subsequently re-define them as individual social rights. The jurisprudence of ECJ has supported the tendency towards the individualization of social rights to a large extent, particularly through insistence that the freedom of movement of the EU citizens entails individual social rights. The Community declarative documents and their vital role in designating individualization as a tool enabling modernization of social policy and ensuring better social protection across the EU is also reflected in the paper.
The question of the scope of individualization of social rights under the European Social Charter, in particular Article 16, is under consideration in the successive paper. The author maintains that support is provided to both individual persons and/or all the family members, which proves that legislator proposed individualized rights available to individual persons. This example illustrates well that the rights guaranteed by the Charter and catalogued as human rights are individualized and protected as universally applicable.
On the whole, the process of individualization of social rights reacts to the evolving conditions of the functioning of social security schemes which multiply challenges and necessitate reforms. The EU bodies appear to act as norm-setters and balance-seekers consistently refraining from imposing a single direction within the EU legal framework. Consequently, as the author of the subsequent paper confirms, elastic measures are preferred, such as the open method of coordination, which allows for the Member States to implement selectively and set the tempo of the reforms according to their own needs and resources. Objectives are articulated in general terms, albeit they generally fit the strategy of blending security with economic flexibility under the so-called "flexicurity" policy, within which individualization of social rights ought to occupy a central place.
In the further parts of this issue social security legislation of selected Member States is presented in the context of individualization of social rights. Exemplarily, the Finish scheme provides for universal and individualized rights to benefits and services. All the inhabitants are covered by the social protection scheme, independently of contributions or their status as economically active or inactive persons. The decisive role is played by their needs. Nonetheless, not all benefits are individualized in their character: some are provided for a family. In such cases it is the needs and resources of family as a whole that is taken into consideration.
The authors analyzing the scope of individualization in the Finish scheme evaluate its efficacy, adding also that individualization is not a sufficient guarantee of social protection fully supplying the wellbeing and rights of an individual. Those can and ought to be realized also through other available methods. Still, however, it remains clearly emphasized that ideological difference between the derived rights based on the fact of being a family member, a spouse or a child of an insured person and the individualized rights granted to a person as an individual or citizen cannot be eradicated and should not be overlooked. On a related note, they point to a shift in the paradigm towards "familism", i.e. a growing accentuation of responsibility on the part of family for the wellbeing of an individual, while the role of the state and the role of an individual himself or herself are underplayed.
In Hungary the problem of individualization of social rights has not been explicitly considered as a legal or social issue (as a practical or theoretical problem). As the author proclaims, solutions in line with what is defined as individualization of social rights are introduced as products of legislative actions that do not consciously have as their aim individualization of social rights. The paper focuses on the derived rights and the personal links as well as on the entitlements not issuing from the contributory obligations. The problems presented refer mostly to the derived rights in the pension and health care schemes and unemployment benefits.
In the Bulgarian legislative framework the definition or any specification of the individualization of social rights is notably absent, both in the general sense and with reference to the social security rights. Such rights are usually discussed in legal studies and legal acts as universal human rights. The author undertakes an analysis of social security entitlements in Bulgarian scheme while taking into account the newly introduced pension scheme. She also enlists a number of problems stemming from the application of the derived and individual rights.
In the Polish scheme, which is analyzed in the subsequent paper, there has been no legislative action explicitly addressing the problem of individualization of social rights. Also theoretical considerations and research rarely touched the problem. The right to social security is based on employment (economic activity). In some cases the entitlement depends on personal links, family situation, marriage. Polish scheme is based on both derived and individual rights. The two categories of rights complete each other in order to provide for social protection covering the risks enlisted under the social security legislation. In some cases it seems worthwhile to reconsider replacing the derived rights with individual rights. For instance, individual right to health care benefits for children would improve the adequacy and efficiency of the scheme. Some derived rights could be exercised more freely if the definition of family underwent necessary modifications within the social security legislation.
In the concluding remarks some general conclusions drawn from the material presented by the contributing analysts and researchers have been included. Those call for further theoretical study and implementation research and discussion.
I wish to give my thanks to all the contributors for their devoted research and informed writing included in this special issue of the Polish journal on social policy devoted to the important topic of the individualization of social rights.

WHAT DO WE MEAN BY "INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL RIGHTS" - Nicole Kerschen
LEGAL ASPECTS OF THE INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL RIGHTS - AN ANALYSIS ON THE INTERNATIONAL LEVEL - Gertruda Uścińska
INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL RIGHTS IN THE LIGHT OF THE EUROPEAN SOCIAL CHARTERS - Andrzej Marian Świątkowski
INDIVIDUALISATION OF ENTITLEMENTS TO BENEFITS AGAINST THE BACKGROUND OF CHANGES AND REGULATIONS IN THE EUROPEAN UNION - Zofia Czepulis-Rutkowska
INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS AND FAMILY MATTERS. NATIONAL LEGISLATION AND THE CONCEPT OF THE INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL RIGHTS. AN EXAMPLE OF FINLAND - Laura Kalliomaa-Puha, Maija Faurie
UNCONSCIOUS INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL SECURITY RIGHTS IN HUNGARY - József Hajdú
INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL SECURITY RIGHTS IN BULGARIA - Krassimira Sredkowa
SOCIAL RIGHTS IN THE POLISH SOCIAL SECURITY SCHEME. THE SCOPE OF INDIVIDUALISATION - Gertruda Uścińska
INDIVIDUALISATION OF SOCIAL RIGHTS - CONCLUSION REMARKS - Gertruda Uścińska

ZOFIA CZEPULIS-RUTKOWSKA (PhD.) is a senior researcher in the Institute of Labour and Social Studies (ILSS). She is also the director of International Cooperation Department in the Polish Social Insurance Institution. She also worked as a lecturer and a vice dean in the College of Insurance in Banking in Warsaw. Her research interests focus on social security economics as well as European Law, particularly in the field of pensions and long term care issues. She has participated in several international comparative projects on social security and has also published on these subjects.

MAIJA FAURIE (LL.M) is a researcher at the Research Department of the Social Insurance Institution of Finland where her research focuses, inter alia, on the constitutional and human rights aspect of social security. Currently she is studying the status of the Sami people in social security legislation. She is additionally involved in the national coordination of the Electronic Exchange of Social Security Information (EESSI), having assisted in the drafting of national legislation concerning the application of the Regulation (EC) No 883/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the coordination of social security schemes. Maija is also a contributor for Oxford Reports on International Law in Domestic Courts, an online service of Oxford University Press. She reports on the application of international law in Finnish courts.

JÓZSEF HAJDÚ is a professor of law and Head of the Department of Labour Law and Social Security at Szeged University. He is also the head of the Institute for Industrial Relations and Social Security at the Faculty of Law of Szeged University. He was vice-president of the International Society for Labour Law and Social Security between 2006-2009. He has extensive knowledge of national labour law and social security systems and of their coordination at Community level. He has published numerous books and articles on these subject matters. Jozsef Hajdu has been national expert in the MISSCEEC II project. He is a member of the Project Directorate of the trESS project. In that context, he is also national expert for Hungary. He was national expert for numerous EU projects on labour law, industrial relations and social security.

LAURA KALLIOMAA-PUHA (LL.D) is a researcher at the Research Department of the Social Insurance Institution of Finland where her research focuses mainly on social security law, elderly care and law, preventive and proactive law as well as contractualism. She has worked in a research project Women's law and NordFruJus 1994-1997, in an Academy of Finland project Welfare State Expectations, Privatisation and Private Law, in 1995-2000, and the Life Span and Dignity project, 2001-2003, all in the Faculty of Law at the University of Helsinki. Her dissertation was on "Informal Care Agreements as an Instrument for Organising Care", Kela Helsinki 2007. She has also written on elderlies rights or contracts as a new means to organize social security in the paper "Contracts as usual? Pros and cons of the new social sector contracts".

NICOLE KERSCHEN is a senior researcher at CNRS, University Paris West Nanterre La Defense/E.N.S. Cachan. She conducts research on European governance, European Employment Strategy (EES), "Open Method of Coordination" (OMC) applied to social inclusion and pensions as well as the role played by the social partners and civil society in the construction of the European social model. She also researched Europeanization of social policy. She is a member of the tress network financed by the European Commission and a member of the research project 'Civil society and Europeanization of social policy' financed by the French Research Agency (ANR). Her recent publications include "La strategie europeenne pour l'emploi: un exemple de rencontre entre une politique europeenne et le droit communautaire? Droit social, N°2, 'Towards individualization of social rights in a European perspective' (Polish monthly Polityka Społeczna) and "Vers une individualisation des droits sociaux: approche europeenne et modeles nationaux", Droit social N°2.

KRASSIMIRA SREDKOVA is a professor and head of the Department for Labour Law and Social Security in Sofia University "St. Kliment Ochridski". Teaching courses: Labour Law; Social Security Law; International Labour Law; Social Law of the European Community. Editor-in-chief of the "Contemporary Law" Journal. Member of the International Association for Legislation. Specializations in Moscow State University "M.V. Lomonossov" (USSR), University of Szeged (Hungary), University of Vienna (Austria), "Max Planck" Institute for International and Foreign Private Law in Hamburg (Germany), University of Hamburg (Germany), University of Leuven la Neuve (Belgium). Legal advisor of the President of the Republic; Practicing Lawyer, Sofia Bar Association; Specific relevant project experience: The Phare Bulgarian social dialogue program; Consensus II-ZZ-9710-0016 project; Consensus II project; Consensus I project "Glossary and Dictionary of Social Protection Terms"; International Bank for Reconstruction and Development "Bulgaria Child Welfare Reform" Project; also a head of and expert in a number of ILO projects and numerous academic and research projects. An author of 181 books, studies and articles in Bulgaria, Germany, Russia, Switzerland and the USA on Labor law, Social Security Law, International Labor Law, Comparative Labor and Social Security Law, Social Law of the European Council.

ANDRZEJ MARIAN ŚWIĄTKOWSKI is a Jean Monnet Professor of European Labour Law and Social Security and Head of the Chair of Labour Law and Social Policy, Faculty of Law and Administration, Jagiellonian University in Cracow. First Vice-president of the European Committee of Social Rights, Council of Europe, Strasbourg. Member of the advisory board of editors of the International Encyclopaedia of Laws, Kluwer Law International. Author of more than thirty books, two hundred and fifty articles in the field of Polish, European and international labour law, social security law and social policy. His latest books include: "Charter of Social Rights of the Council of Europe", Studies in Employment Law and Social Policy, Kluwer Law International 2006; "Carta de Los Derechos Sociales Europeos", Editorial de la Universidad Nacional de Tres de Febrero, Buenos Aires 2007; Międzynarodowe prawo pracy [International labour law], Volume I of the Międzynarodowe publiczne prawo pracy [International public labour law], C.H. Beck, Warsaw 2008.

GERTRUDA UŚCIŃSKA is a professor and member of the Department of Labour Law and Social Security at the Institute of Labour and Social Studies (ILSS), Warsaw and of the Institute of Social Policy at the Warsaw University. She specialises in Polish and European social security law and has conducted a number of comparative studies in the field. Head of and expert to a number of research programs conducted at universities and research institutes in EU Member States. She is a national expert in the trESS project and the author of national reports on the implementation of EU regulations concerning the right to freedom of movement of workers and their families and the co-ordination of social security schemes. She has published a number of books and papers concerning social security, social insurance and social policy. She was a member of the workgroup for the ratification of the European Social Card of the Council of Europe. She has participated in works on the ratification of ILO Convention no. 102 on Minimum Standards in Social Security and was an expert in preparation works for the Polish accession to the European Union. She currently focuses on the European social security law. Member of the Committee of Labour and Social Policy Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences.