©  The Author(s) Journal Compilation ©  Blackwell Publishing Ltd,  Garsington Road, Oxford OX DQ , UK and  Main Street, Malden, MA , USA S P & A  0144–5596 V. 40, No. 1, F 2006, . 26–46 Blackwell Publishing Ltd Oxford, UK SPOL Social Policy & Administration - © Blackwell Publishing Ltd.  February    Original Article XX XX A Comparative Case Study of Care Systems for Frail Elderly People: Germany, Spain, France, Italy, United Kingdom and Sweden Blanche Le Bihan and Claude Martin Abstract Comparative studies of European social policies towards frail elderly people typically focus on the systems and their implementation. The study presented in this article, conducted in  in six European countries (Germany, Spain, Italy, France, the United Kingdom and Sweden) aims at comparing the rights of the individuals within the different care systems. The methodology used is a case study approach, which draws on a series of situations of dependent elderly people. There- fore, the analysis focuses on the public authorities’ responses – the care packages, which determine the type of care required and the financial contribution of the user – in each of the six countries, in relation to the concrete situations of frail elderly people. As local variations are important, in all the countries studied, local authorities have been chosen in each of the countries. This approach gives us interesting concrete elements on the services and financial help which can be given to frail elderly people, but it also enables us to understand precisely the national care systems organized in the different countries and the main difficulties encountered by public authorities in facing this problem of frail elderly people. Keywords Frail elderly people; Care systems; Comparative study; Europe Comparative studies of European social policies towards frail elderly people typically focus on the systems and their implementation, not on individual user rights. However, existing comparisons of care systems for elderly dependants (Lesemann and Martin ; OECD ; Jacobzone ; Assous and Ralle ) show that, although the range of proposed services is almost identical in each country, the patterns indicate that there is considerable variability – particularly at the local level. Various factors explain these variations: the differences between the social protection principles applied in each country, Address for correspondence: Professor Claude Martin, Ecole Nationale de la Santé Publique, Avenue du Professeur Léon Bernard,  Rennes Cedex, France. Email: Claude.Martin@ensp.fr