Globalization and the Future of the Welfare State focuses on the effects of globalization and free trade on social welfare policies in a variety of developing countries in Asia and Latin America.

The welfare state is still very much central in people’s everyday lives. The welfare state is at the same time contested and debated, and has often been argued to be in a crisis not only in the wake of the financial crisis. Welfare and welfare states used to be a national issue and prerogative. Today welfare and welfare states are influenced by national as well as regional and global decisions. However, nation states play a decisive role influenced by national preferences and ideas, and, in recent years, populism and welfare chauvinism. This book provides an overview of the central concepts through the lenses of the state, market and civil society. It also provides the reader with knowledge on distribution in societies and how this interacts and influences different groups and their position in society. There are also chapters dealing specifically with central sectors in the welfare states such as health, long-term care and education. The book uses a comparative approach as this better enables one to understand one’s own country's welfare, as well as helping to underline and see the linkages to the impact of global and regional issues on welfare states and their development. Finally, the book presents challenges and future perspectives for welfare states and their development. The book’s focus on core concepts and the variety of international welfare state regimes and mechanisms for delivering social policy provides a much-needed introduction to the rapidly changing concept of welfare for students on social policy, social studies, sociology and politics courses.

The welfare state plays a key role in people’s everyday lives in developed societies. At the same time, the welfare state is contested and there are constant discussions on how and to what degree the state should intervene, influence and have an impact on the development of society. Recent years have seen an accelerated transformation of the welfare state in the light of the global financial crisis, demographic change and changes in the perception of the state’s role in relation to social welfare. This raises fundamentally new issues related to social policy and welfare state analysis. This book provides: an introduction to the principles of welfare a conceptual framework necessary for understanding social policy at the macro-level a comparative approach to welfare states globally an overview of new ways to organise and steer welfare states an introduction to welfare state politics and underlying economic framework an account of equality and inequality in modern societies new directions for welfare states The book’s focus on core concepts and the variety of international welfare state regimes and mechanisms for delivering social policy provides a much needed introduction to the rapidly changing concept of welfare for students on social policy, social studies, sociology and politics courses.

European welfare states are currently under stress and the 'social contracts' that underpin them are being challenged. First, welfare spending has arguably 'grown to limits' in a number of countries while expanding everywhere in the 1990s in line with higher unemployment. Second, demographic change and the emergence of new patterns of family and working life are transforming the nature of 'needs'. Third, the economic context and the policy autonomy of nation states has been transformed by 'globalization'. This book considers the implications of these challenges for European welfare states at the end of the twentieth century with interdisciplinary contributions from first-rate political scientists, economists and sociologists including Paul Ormerod.

A common belief is that the European welfare states are in a position of crisis or heading towards one with the process of globalization removing any hopes of eventual worldwide welfare. This book challenges this assumption arguing that a proper understanding of the future role of the welfare state requires a broader social perspective that encompasses the interaction of economic, political and social processes. The Future of the Welfare State provides an interdisciplinary analysis of the practical and theoretical challenges which the welfare state (and progress towards world welfare) can and must meet in the future.

An analysis of the welfare state from a political economy perspective that examines the effects of aging populations, migration, and globalization on industrialized economies. In The Decline of the Welfare State, Assaf Razin and Efraim Sadka use a political economy framework to analyze the effects of aging populations, migration, and globalization on the deteriorating system of financing welfare state benefits as we know them. Their timely analysis, supported by a unified theoretical framework and empirical findings, demonstrates how the combined forces of demographic change and globalization will make it impossible for the welfare state to maintain itself on its present scale. In much of the developed world, the proportion of the population aged 60 and over is expected to rise dramatically over the coming years—from 35 percent in 2000 to a projected 66 percent in 2050 in the European Union and from 27 percent to 47 percent in the United States—which may necessitate higher tax burdens and greater public debt to maintain national pension systems at current levels. Low-skill migration produces additional strains on welfare-state financing because such migrants typically receive benefits that exceed what they pay in taxes. Higher capital taxation, which could potentially be used to finance welfare benefits, is made unlikely by international tax competition brought about by globalization of the capital market. Applying a political economy model and drawing on empirical data from the EU and the United States, the authors draw an unconventional and provocative conclusion from these developments. They argue that the political pressure from both aging and migrant populations indirectly generates political processes that favor trimming rather than expanding the welfare state. The combined pressures of aging, migration, and globalization will shift the balance of political power and generate public support from the majority of the voting population for cutting back traditional welfare state benefits.

De literatuur over welvaartsstaten richt zich vaak op beleidsveranderingsprocessen en de mechanismen die deze veranderingen veroorzaken of tegenwerken. De werkelijke verandering wordt vaak geïnterpreteerd als gevolg van externe crises of als gevolg van de meer geleidelijke beleidsveranderingsprocessen. Dit boek heeft een ander uitgangspunt: de auteurs onderzoeken de bewering dat de sociale en economische veranderingen als gevolg van de overgang naar een postindustriële samenleving de sociale fundamenten van de verzorgingsstaat hebben verzwakt.

Publisher Description

The world’s richer democracies all provide such public benefits as pensions and health care, but why are some far more generous than others? And why, in the face of globalization and fiscal pressures, has the welfare state not been replaced by another model? Reconsidering the myriad issues raised by such pressing questions, Clem Brooks and Jeff Manza contend here that public opinion has been an important, yet neglected, factor in shaping welfare states in recent decades. Analyzing data on sixteen countries, Brooks and Manza find that the preferences of citizens profoundly influence the welfare policies of their governments and the behavior of politicians in office. Shaped by slow-moving forces such as social institutions and collective memories, these preferences have counteracted global pressures that many commentators assumed would lead to the welfare state’s demise. Moreover, Brooks and Manza show that cross-national differences in popular support help explain why Scandinavian social democracies offer so much more than liberal democracies such as the United States and the United Kingdom. Significantly expanding our understanding of both public opinion and social policy in the world’s most developed countries, this landmark study will be essential reading for scholars of political economy, public opinion, and democratic theory.

In this book, Chris Pierson argues that we will need to think quite differently about the British welfare state after COVID-19. He looks back to the welfare state’s origins and development as well as forwards, unearthing some surprising solutions in unexpected places.