Economic openness and welfare state attitudes: A multilevel study across 67 countries

This article extends previous studies investigating economic globalisation and the welfare state by examining individual attitudes, ranging from a preference for individual responsibility (economic individualism) to public demand for government intervention (social equality), across a large number of countries. It formulates different hypotheses about the direct and moderating effects of economic openness on these attitudes. The multilevel analysis, investigating data from 99,663 citizens of 67 countries, leads to the following two conclusions. First, economic openness is associated with a stronger preference for economic individualism and less demand for government intervention. Second, groups benefiting from globalisation and right‐wing voters have a stronger preference for economic individualism if the economic openness of their country is higher. Key Practitioner Message: ● The results show that some vulnerable groups demand more social protection in economically more open countries.     

Social development and the status quo: professionalisation and Third Way co‐optation

Gray M. Social development and the status quo: professionalisation and Third Way co‐optation Int J Soc Welfare 2010: 19: 463–470 © 2010 The Author(s), Journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and International Journal of Social Welfare. Social development is a massive undertaking that has spawned a multitude of organisational forms. It nevertheless remains an ambiguous term and ill‐defined area of work, though some social development practitioners have succeeded in making small‐scale local differences in particular situations. While largely a tool of the status quo, some believe that social development has transformative potential and provides valuable space to confront inequalities and deprivation. In this article, I argue that in contemporary neoliberal environments social development is being co‐opted by Third Way politics and professionalisation processes. As it professionalises through the creation of professional structures and educational systems, it is becoming increasingly like social work, despite arguments that it is as an alternative approach to poverty and social exclusion. In the process, it is losing its transformative, critical edge, and morphing into a neoliberal, social investment approach that absolves government of its responsibility for the welfare of citizens.     

The Third Way and Social Welfare: The Myth of Post-emotionalism

The “passive” welfare state was accused of promoting a dependency culture. “Active” welfare and the “what works?” approach of Britain's New Labour government is allegedly implicated in an age of post‐emotionalism, in which people are largely indifferent to the needs of others and committed primarily to their personal well‐being. This article, first, seeks to extend recent debates about agency and motivation in social policy and relate them to the notion of post‐emotionalism. Second, it draws on a recent empirical study of popular and welfare provider discourses, which suggests that popular opinion can accommodate an appreciation of human interdependency, while welfare providers remain committed to a public service ethos. None the less, Third Way thinking is associated with a narrowing of solidaristic responsibilities. The problem for the future of health, social care and state welfare policies lies not with the imagined consequences of post‐emotionalism, so much as with an ideological context that perpetuates a distorted ethic of responsibility.     

British and European Influences on the "Australian Way" from the 1980s

Commonwealth countries share their British social policy legacy in a variety of ways. Autstralia attempted to adopt the postwar "new Fabian" welfare state model at the very time when international economic circumstances undermined its Keynesian foundation. With Labor governments in power from 1983 to 1996, Australia diverged significantly from the neo-liberal reform path adopted in the United Kingdom. Australian governments looked increasingly to European social democracies for alternative social policy models. In a manner anticipating the "Third Way", the tendency was towards mixing neo-liberal economics with social democratic welfare. The Australian "Third Way" which resulted proved unstable. Current social reformers, the paper proposes, ought to revisit a neglected but characteristically British emphasis on the need for a measure of "socialization of investment" to underpin redistributive strategies.     

建构北京市大福利制度的思考

我国现代福利制度体系建立在狭义的社会福利观上,这种小福利观已经不适应我国社会建设的需要,急需调整。要建构面向全球化、面向现代社会的福利制度,必须打破将社会福利等同于民政福利的观念,建设面向全体公民的大福利体制。     

Welfare and the unemployment crisis: Sweden in the 1990s

In the 1990s Sweden went through a deep economic recession accompanied by a massive increase in unemployment and a rapidly growing budget deficit. The crisis had large repercussions for the welfare of many citizens and it generated cutbacks in virtually all social policy programmes. This halted a welfare-state expansion that had been going on for decades. It also caused great concern about the state of welfare of the nation. In 1999 the Swedish Government appointed a 'Welfare Commission', a team of academic researchers who were assigned the task of drawing up a balance sheet for the development of welfare in the 1990s. The Commission delivered its final report in October 2001. This article is a condensed account of one of the more central issues for the Commission; namely, how the unemployment crisis affected already socially and economically vulnerable groups. Looking at the development over the entire decade, three groups stand out as particularly disadvantaged in terms of individual welfare resources: young adults, immigrants and single mothers. The downturn for these groups was especially accentuated in terms of employment and income. Young people and immigrants trying to get into the labour market during the crisis years faced the problems of newcomers to the systems of social protection. The poor economic development for single mothers could essentially be attributed to the shortage of work in general and of full-time work in particular that followed from the unemployment crisis. As a consequence, the importance of selective benefits increased and the relative size of all public transfers – despite rationing measures – stayed fairly unchanged. The results highlight the great influence of macroeconomic conditions and policy making for the welfare of vulnerable groups in society.     

The Foundations for Charitable Organization and Giving

This paper examines the moral foundations of the welfare functions of the major social institutions, motivations, and types of philanthropic giving by individuals and corporations, volunteering and corporate social responsibility. These non-state activities are essential building blocks and social capital for a dynamic caring civil society. However, they should only complement and not replace the state action of feasible arrangements for universal coverage in meeting the recognized social needs and contingencies of its citizens.     

Australian Welfare Reform: From Citizenship to Supervision

This paper examines the implications of welfare reform for the meaning of social citizenship in Australia. Australian welfare reform has been under way since the late 1980s, and reflects the themes of activity and participation that are shaping social policy in many advanced industrial nations. The paper suggests that Australian welfare reform is following a liberal trajectory of change which places a continuing emphasis on market and family as the preferred institutions for social support with a newly salient appeal to moral ideas about the responsibility of citizens to be self-sustaining. The paper argues that welfare is being transformed from a limited social right to support provided on condition, and from treating the claimant as a sovereign individual to a subject of paternalistic supervision. Together, these changes are redefining the meaning of equality in Australian social citizenship.     

Chinese seniors’ attitudes towards government responsibility for social welfare: Self‐interest,collectivism orientation and regional disparities

Government responsibility for social welfare remains a significant issue in the field of social welfare. Public welfare attitudes not only refer to the social needs of members of society, but also are viewed as the basis for government responsibility for social welfare. Data used in this study came from the Moderate Universalist Social Welfare Survey with a final sample of 1,166 seniors from four Chinese cities in 2012. This study examined seniors’ attitudes towards government responsibility for providing specific welfare and mixed welfare. It concluded that seniors’ welfare attitudes share the traits of self‐interest in general. Seniors’ perception of social rights and cities of residence were two important factors associated with welfare attitudes in both aspects of specific and mixed welfare. The stronger seniors’ social rights perception was the more favourable were the attitudes they held towards government responsibility for social welfare, indicating the collectivism orientation of their welfare attitudes.     

“The only equality is the pain”: An exploration of the Irish policy sphere's approach to “access” and “entitlement” in health care

This paper critically analyses how overarching policy goals and practices surrounding access and entitlement to health care (HC) have been dominated by a conflicting system of libertarian and equity-based principles. We examine how this mixed-motives system originated and the importance of policy legacies inherited from the Poor Laws era in shaping modern conceptions of access and entitlement to HC. We also considered how these determined the scope of state intervention in this policy domain. Drawing on empirical evidence and interviews with key stakeholders in Irish health policy, we explored the appetite to engage in meaningful HC reforms that address the growing gaps of inequity between higher and lower socio-economic groups in society. Rather than emulating European counterpartsapos; emphasis on universal coverage within an egalitarian paradigm, Irish policy actors have sought to instill a spirit of fairness in HC delivery. Under the guise of equality of opportunity and equity, the policy focus has centred on directing publicly funded HC towards lower-income groups and the most vulnerable in Irish society. However, we argue that the operation of the mixed-motives structure has also created conflict and policy ambiguity surrounding overarching goals which frame the governance and consumption of HC in Ireland. This is evidenced by the dysfunction and complexity of the two-tier system of public-versus-private access to HC services. Ultimately, we argue that the policy aspirations of equality that underpin the HC structures surrounding access and entitlement should be revisited to achieve greater health outcomes and create a more equal society.     

Fairness, Equality and Legitimacy: A Qualitative Comparative Study of Germany and the UK

The pressures of globalization and shifts towards post‐industrialism are producing policies that increasingly emphasize the common themes of activation and of individual responsibility for outcomes. Such approaches suggest normative principles of equality of opportunity rather than of outcome, and of individual rather than collective responsibility for the outcomes achieved. Does this imply a shift towards a common normative framework for European welfare states, with implications for future policy developments? This article reports a recent qualitative study examining ideas about fairness and social provision in the very different regimes of Germany and the UK. The analysis shows that while respondents in both countries value equality of opportunity as a normative principle, those in Germany are much more likely to argue that an equal opportunity approach requires government to guarantee equal access to basic services. They are also more likely to express concerns about market freedoms which allow those who can afford it better access to health care and education. Real differences in welfare values remain, loosely following differences of regime type, despite the greater emphasis on activation and individual responsibility across European welfare states.     

Religiosity,citizenship and attitudes to social policy issues

Many social policy objectives align with religious beliefs – poverty alleviation, compassion for the poor and addressing more generally the needs of the vulnerable and disadvantaged in society. Yet there are also conflicting views about means, including the role of the state in redistributing resources from the rich and powerful to the poor and powerless. Redistribution and poverty alleviation are central goals of the welfare state, although ideological and other differences mean that views about the need for, as well as the design, delivery and impact of social programs vary. Against this background, this paper reviews existing national and international studies that have examined how religious belief and practice are associated with the attitudes that underpin the welfare state: compassion, altruism, redistribution and egalitarianism, and the activities that are assumed to align with modern conceptions of ‘a good civic citizen‘: participation and engagement. The analysis draws on recent Australian survey data to examine whether the attitudes of those who actively practice their religious beliefs differ from other groups in society and, if so, whether those differences are consistent with the underlying goals of social policy.     

Deservingness in the eye of the beholder: A vignette study on the moderating role of cultural profiles in supporting activation policies

People support welfare policy if its beneficiaries are perceived as deserving of support. This study found that individuals’ cultural worldviews play a role in assessing the deservingness of welfare recipients. We investigated whether four different cultural profiles find some beneficiaries to be more deserving than others and how this relates to support for social rights (welfare benefit, retraining, job coach) and obligations (mandatory volunteering). A Dutch vignette experiment showed that reasons for supporting social rights differ between people with different cultural profiles: equality advocates grant support if beneficiaries are needy, while the centre and trusting groups do so when beneficiaries reciprocate. We found that irrespective of deservingness, people with equality‐advocating and trusting profiles tend to be more supportive of social rights, whereas socially discontented citizens tend to emphasise the importance of obligations. In general, obliging beneficiaries to do volunteer work was deemed appropriate by almost all respondents in the study, whereas their cultural values determined the ways in which they considered social rights to have been earned.     

试论正确处理弱势群体权利保护中的几种关系

在弱势群体权利保护过程中,弱势群体的利益是否会与公共利益发生冲突?公共权力能否干涉弱势群体的权利?救助弱势群体是否只是社会的责任?在宪政法治条件下是否需要法制强权?要解决这些问题,必须以构建社会主义“和谐社会”作为时代背景,正确处理弱势群体利益与公共利益的关系;弱势群体权利与公共权力的关系;自我救助与社会救助的关系;宪政法治与法制强权的关系。     

Mark Latham's Third Way: Income Support,Civic Renewal and Collectivism

The core aim of Mark Latham's Third Way‐style policy proposals is to promote the revivification of civil society as part of the renewed pursuit of the common good. I critically examine this core aim with reference to Mark Latham's proposed changes to income support. I claim that Latham's tendency to focus on disadvantaged communities as sites of normative dysfunction only reinforces the traditional conceptual division between deserving employed citizens and undeserving income recipients. It also neglects the real difficulties experienced by mainstream communities, such as the growing time deficit in working households. I conclude that Latham misses a real opportunity to re‐legitimise collective provision and revive the social sphere using a universal rather than a residual policy perspective that shows concern for the well‐being of all Australian citizens.     

Processes of conservation and change in Arab society in Israel: Implications for the health and welfare of the Arab population

Azaiza F. Processes of conservation and change in Arab society in Israel: Implications for the health and welfare of the Arab population This article reports on a study that examined how modernisation processes affect the Arab citizens of Israel on various levels and how the processes are reconciled with traditional ideals. Modernisation affects formal and informal support systems, affects family lifestyles, has resulted in changes in the treatment of elderly people and has seen modern ideas of health and wellness incorporated with traditional values and ideals. For the Arab citizens of Israel, the conflict of tradition versus modernisation is evident throughout society. Studying the processes of both modernisation and preservation and their implications allows us to better understand and address the needs of the Arab population in Israel. Based on the research presented in this review, processes of modernisation and conservation are conceptualised as a continuum along four dimensions: perceptions of self, sources of social support, health roles and gender roles. The implications of these changes are explored as they relate to various phenomena.     

Exploring Neglected Dimensions of Social Policy: The SDW, Fiscal Welfare and the Exemplar of Local Taxation in England

Titmuss's Social Division of Welfare (SDW) thesis is a vitally important but much neglected element of social policy analysis. This article seeks to explore the SDW, with a particular focus on fiscal welfare. Fiscal welfare has been described as forming a hidden welfare state, and while taxation is one of the main ways in which governments affect the lives of citizens, studies of welfare pay remarkably little attention to its impact. Fiscal welfare is examined by using, as an exemplar, local taxation in England, a subject that itself is neglected within social policy. Local taxation in England is of interest because it illustrates the impact of a system of taxation on different groups of citizens, and how this can operate to the benefit of rich over poor citizens. This is because the current system is highly regressive, meaning that those on low and middle incomes spend proportionately more of their income paying the tax than do those on high incomes. What is of further interest is how within the debate about reform of local taxation, concern with regressivity becomes obscured and ceases to be the focus of attention. We are thus provided with an example of how fiscal welfare remains a hidden issue. The article concludes by arguing that social policy analysis needs to move beyond the narrow confines of social welfare and develop a broader understanding of welfare, based on the SDW.     

Welfare Chauvinism in Populist Radical Right Platforms: The Role of Redistributive Justice Principles

Welfare chauvinism has become an important element in the agenda of the populist radical right. This article proposes a novel argument to explain variation in the strength of welfare chauvinist appeals across social policy programmes. It theorizes that the redistributive justice principles (equity, equality, and need) that underpin a social programme matter. Equality‐ and need‐based programmes are more likely to contradict a nativist worldview in principle or practice, whereas equity‐based schemes are less vulnerable to welfare chauvinistic appeals. As a consequence, welfare chauvinism should be targeted at social policies that provide universal or means‐tested benefits. Insurance‐based systems are more likely to be immune. This argument is tested through a qualitative content analysis of populist radical right election manifestos in four West European democracies. The results show that insurance‐based systems (pensions, unemployment) are less likely to attract welfare chauvinism, whereas universal healthcare and means‐tested social assistance programmes are more prone to draw nativist appeals. Universal family allowances, however, are less likely to attract welfare chauvinism than predicted by the theory.     

When 'Choice' and 'Choice' Are not the Same: Institutional Frameworks of Choice in the German Welfare System

The creation and strengthening of welfare markets in Germany means that citizens can increasingly choose among competing providers of welfare goods and services. However, the conditions under which citizens may exercise choice in various fields of social policy are quite different. A major reason for these differences can be found in the public institutions that frame citizens' choice in welfare markets. This article analyses welfare markets in German health care, long-term care, pensions and employment policies, paying special attention to the respective public institutional frameworks. It will be argued that differences between frameworks of choice can be categorized by means of four parameters representing different aspects of public involvement in welfare markets. Depending on the kind and the degree of public involvement, welfare markets may be compatible with 'traditional' notions of public responsibility for citizens' social security.