Social Policy from Olson to Ostrom: A Case Study of Dutch Disability Insurance

Social policy development and reform in corporatist welfare states often follows a pattern of subsequent collectivization and de‐collectivization. This has to do, the article argues, with the social problems these phases address. Early social policy development forms a response to Olson‐type collective action problems that organized actors (labour and employers' organizations) in the field experience: state‐obliged benefits solve free rider problems, while bipartite administration allows labour and employers' organizations to organize their constituencies. This solution to Olson‐type collective action problems, however, also constitutes an Ostrom‐type collective action problem. Such a system functions as a common pool resource. Individual benefit take‐up is experienced as free and the costs of benefit take‐up are collectivized in the common pool. The article illustrates this pattern with reference to Dutch disability insurance.     

The Decoupling of Social Policy Reforms in Romania

Social reforms in Romania have been, from the beginning of the 1990s and throughout the EU post‐accession phase, the battlefield for many domestic and international actors. The article identifies, from an historical institutionalist perspective, the international actors who decisively influenced reforms of social protection in Romania during the transition, with a special emphasis on the EU pre‐ and post‐accession stages. Further, the article attempts to understand the impact of the various external influences on the sustainability and effectiveness of domestic reforms, by assessing the convergence, or the decoupling, between the rationales – i.e. ideologies and values – that explicitly grounded social reforms in Romania and the domestic public rhetoric on social risks and values. Answers to these questions can provide important insights in regard to both the impact of the EU upon new member states and the challenges of EU enlargement for the EU and its core member states.     

社会工作职业化与社会政策

社会工作职业化目前在中国存在社会认同度不高、专业服务组织机构欠缺、社会工作职业制度不健全、高校人才培养与实际部门不衔接以及本土化的社会工作理论亟待建立等问题。社会政策作为支持弱势群体、解决社会问题、促进社会公正的制度化模式,从政府的政策性角色和社会立法这两个维度出发来解决社会工作职业化过程中面临的问题,在推进社会工作职业化进程中起着举足轻重的作用。     

社会政策的新范式:从规范性社会政策到发展型政策

本文提出发展型社会政策作为一种社会政策的新范式,是经历了规范性社会政策到发展型社会政策的转变而逐步确立。文章首先阐述了政策范式的概念,然后从对规范性社会政策的分析过渡到对发展型社会政策的阐释,阐释围绕有关发展型社会政策的理论视角和发展型社会政策的内容而展开,最后在对发展型社会政策的思考中结合我国实际简单论述了发展型社会政策对当前我国社会发展的启示。     

社会政策与社会工作的议题

社会政策与社会工作的研究共同点在于其目的是解决社会问题,从而改善和提高社会福利,一般的研究基于中国背景,更注重实务性;而本文则基于国外发展状况,旨在从理论层面探析影响二者发展的因素。     

Is There an Indian Policy Process? An Investigation into Two Social Policy Processes

India is a huge, poor, fast developing, centralized and increasingly unequal, democratic country. The core argument of this article is that these and other contextual factors have an impact on the way in which social policies are formulated and implemented. The focus of the article is on two such policies on food and primary education. Based on secondary material and own fieldwork, the shaping of these two policies is discussed and some major characteristics of the two social policy processes are highlighted. This analysis brings to light the existence of two paradoxes present in social policy processes in India: one related to the fact that social policies are important for regime legitimacy but nevertheless suffer from a lack of political commitment; the other related to the fact that centralized decision‐making goes together with the widespread involvement of local politicians in policy implementation. These two paradoxes, the article concludes, are the result of the wider context in which social policies are shaped and are hence not easily resolved.     

社会政策视角下的流浪儿童救助保护

我国政府历来重视对流浪儿童的救助保护,也取得了相当的成绩,但该领域的政策体系尚存缺陷与不足,难以满足社会发展的需要。立足现实,从社会政策的视角,探究流浪儿童救助保护政策的现状,并提出有关对策建议,以期建立健全该领域的社会政策框架。     

Social Policy in a Cold Climate: Health and Social Welfare in Russia

The Russian Federation faces multiple challenges for its health and welfare systems and for the development of social policy responses. This article provides a review of some of the key challenges for social policy in Russia and assesses the adequacy of the responses to date. The author surveys recent developments in health and social welfare and makes recommendations on priorities for Russia's policy‐makers and international funders. A range of public health challenges including drug and alcohol misuse, health in prisons and mental health is discussed; HIV/AIDS is singled out for particular attention. While Russia is increasingly attracting the attention of social scientists in the West, there is uncertainty about models and concepts suitable for the analysis of this complex society. Although empirical trends are largely discussed in this article, it is argued that theoretical development is required and some suggestions are made about concepts of the ‘middle range’ to assist in future analyses. Intermediate theories, such as those relating to the management of personal welfare, and development of resilience in a formerly collectivized context, are identified as having explanatory potential for this task.     

Globalization, Regionalism and Social Policy

This paper explores the implications of globalization for social policy, and teases out those elements of globalization which have impinged most on it. Then it explores the most important ways in which globalization has had an effect on social policy. Seven issues are explored—the way in which globalization has highlighted and/or created new problems, its contribution to hollowing out the state, the way in which it has altered the balance of power between capital and labour, its contribution to stimulating an ideology of competitiveness, its re-establishing of the importance of trade in discussions about social policy and, finally, the way in which it has helped to make the maintenance of social order a new priority. The paper then explores the possibilities for supranational or regional social policy. It examines the case for moving towards such a policy and the problems of so doing.     

Transformation: Canadian Social Policy Since 1985

This paper sets out to document and explain the major structural changes which have taken place in Canada's social security system since the mid-1980s. Most major programs have been cut back one way or another, in response to a combination of pressures. Foremost amongst these has been the commitment to reduce federal and provincial government deficits. In addition there have been the consequences of high unemployment and increasing job insecurity, demographic and social changes, and "tax fatigue" on the part of the public. The paper documents major recent changes of social policy both in general—with regard to the changed approach evident at federal level and its effect on social transfers to the provinces—and in respect of key programs, including unemployment/employment insurance, old age pensions/the Canada Pension Plan, and child benefits. The paper next identifies "currents and undercurrents" common to all of the developments commented on: the decline of universality, the practice of "social policy-making by stealth", the evidence of the contemporary Canadian public's "collective ambivalence and loss of memory" in respect of the major, historic social programs. It concludes by urging the case for social reinvestment in genuinely sustainable social policy, in the currently more favourable fiscal climate.     

The Search for Coordination: The Case of the Central Policy Review Staff and Social Policy Planning, 1971–77

The Central Policy Review Staff (CPRS) attempted to create an ambitious strategy for the horizontal coordination of social policy in the UK during the early 1970s. The attempt – inspired largely by planning, programming and budgeting systems – was a failure, and gave way to a much modified ‘joint framework for social policies’ in 1975. Recent research has compared the CPRS's joint framework approach to the Labour government's promotion of ‘joined‐up government’ (JUG) in the 2000s. This article provides a case study of the CPRS's work on social policy planning, using archival sources. The case study addresses themes that remain significant, particularly approaches to and the politics of horizontal coordination. Finally, the article makes a modest attempt to signal the differences between the 1970s' approach and ‘JUG’.     

Social Policy for Social Work: A Teaching Agenda

Though social justice is a central goal of the social work profession,the actual involvement of social workers in social change isvery limited. Moreover, training in social policy and policypractice in schools of social work is minimal. As such, practitionerslack the tools needed to analyse existing social problems andpolicies and to enable them to intervene in the policy processin order to better serve the needs of service users. This articleseeks to further social policy teaching within social work educationby engaging in a survey of the existing literature on the subjectand by offering a detailed programme for integrating this subjectinto the social work training system. The literature surveythat serves as a basis for this programme includes a reviewof studies on the dilemmas linked to social policy teaching,on the goals and content of social policy courses in socialwork and on preferred teaching methods in this field.     

Do-It-Yourself Social Policy: Searching for a New Paradigm?

One of the most significant trends of recent decades has been the growing importance of do-it-yourself social policy: i.e. individuals constructing their own welfare mix both within the public sector and in private markets. This paper argues that this challenges the traditional top-down bias of social policy studies and requires a shift of focus within the discipline. The implications for normative theory, research strategy and policy analysis are explored. Some of the arguments for and against choice as a guiding principle are sketched out; some existing research on benefit take-up and choice in education and health is reviewed and the case for moving away from the economist's simple model of rationality is put forward. Finally, we argue, there should be more emphasis in social policy on developing a better understanding of the way in which individuals take their decisions, the context of public policy within which they act and the interaction between the two.     

The New Social Policy in Britain

This paper starts from the proposition that approaches to crime and penal policy in contemporary Britain are of a piece with approaches to social policy across a number of fronts. "The New Social Policy" is examined in terms of "the stakeholder idea", its implications for how people are meant to behave, and the distance between this and socio-economic realities. The paper then explores various sectors of stakeholder social policy in their new order of importance—employment and training, education, health care, social care, housing, social security—before commenting on policies in respect of crime and crime prevention, in the light of the foregoing observations and with particular reference to the "lock-'em-up" tendency. The paper concludes that stakeholdership is no recipe for crime prevention.     

Social Policy in Greece: Rhetoric versus Reform

This paper reviews the major social policy developments in Greece during the 1980s and 1990s, focusing on social security, health and employment policies. It argues that the concept of social policy and the practice of politics have been distorted in this country. Social policy reflects the legacy of a heavily politicized and centralized policy‐making system, an impoverished administrative infrastructure and poorly developed social services. Its emergence is characterized by the pursuit of late and ineffective policies. It lacks continuity, planning and coordination, being oriented towards short‐term political expediency. It is largely insurance‐based, reproducing huge inequalities and institutional arrangements which are behind the times. It provides mainly cash benefits, low‐quality but rather expensive health services and marginal social welfare protection. Moreover, the lack of a minimum income safety net confirms the country's weak culture of universalism and social citizenship. By implication, complex policy and interlocking interest linkages have tarnished the “system” with a reputation for strong resistance to progressive change. At the same time, sources of change such as globalization, demographic developments, new household and family/gender patterns, unstable economic growth, fiscal imperatives, programme maturation, as well as persisting unemployment, changing labour markets and rising health care costs, have produced mounting pressures for welfare reform.     

发展型社会政策及其对我国政府政策制定的启示

20世纪90年代以来,社会政策的理念和实践模式发生了巨大的变化,这集中表现在发展型社会政策理论的形成和实践。发展型社会政策的核心理论是将社会政策看成是一种社会投资行为,注重对人力资本的投资,强调经济发展和社会发展的整合性。本文回顾了发展型社会政策产生的背景,指出发展型社会政策的重要理念,最后指出发展型社会政策对我国政府政策制定的启示。     

Social Policy & Administration: Journal and Discipline

‘Social Policy & Administration’ is the oldest British social policy journal. This article charts its evolution over the last 40 years in the wider context of British social policy. It presents a timeline of the journal and discipline, an analysis of articles in the journal, and presents its most‐cited articles and most‐published authors. It uses this material to inform some impressions of the journal and discipline.     

Social Politics and Policy in an Era of Globalization: Critical Reflections

This paper critically examines the ways in which social policy is said to be affected by globalization. The prevailing approach has been framed in terms of the impact of "external" economic forces on national welfare states. Globalization is said to undermine the economic and political conditions on which welfare states were built, erode national policy autonomy and force the marketization and residualization of welfare states. These predictions are found wanting on the grounds that they share many of the assumptions, and therefore also the faults, of "strong" globalization theory. A more nuanced account of the way in which social politics and social policy are affected by globalization is needed and a global governance perspective is outlined. This, it is argued, better captures the political and institutional environment in which social policy is formulated and implemented. It also recognizes the importance of "local" factors and their interaction with global ones in shaping political responses, including social policy, to globalization. The discussion highlights the enduring power of "local" forces—those which are at the level of and internal to states—and of politics and ideology in shaping the process of globalization and ultimately its implications for welfare states and social policies.     

Reorganizing Social Policies through Social Partnerships: Greece in European Perspective

In postwar Western Europe social policies in the wider sense relied in many countries on neo‐corporatist policies of implementation. Since the 1980s such policies have ceased to be as dominant as they used to be, being associated with what has been called “policy communities” and “policy networks”. As far as the reforms pursued by many countries in order to readjust their economies and labour markets are concerned, significant shifts of such a kind were observed. Illustrations of these trends are presented in a comparative section. We attempt to demonstrate the dual structures of social policy formation and implementation, i.e. neo‐corporatist and network/policy community policies, and to discuss the “how” of such policies, i.e. their “raison d’être” and their “real world” enforcement. Against a background of various semi‐corporatisms and adversarial trade union politics, Greece is trying at the moment to adopt this pattern in several social policy areas, though this is not yet quite visible. Neo‐corporatism is also enhanced. We attempt to show where neo‐corporatism is tried (e.g. certain “social dialogue” structures) and where policy communities are encouraged (e.g. public health, local social policies, etc.). Sometimes the boundaries between the two systems are blurred, with some social dialogue committees appearing as quasi‐policy communities. Finally we endeavour to examine the outcomes of such policies and to see their inner logic against the theoretical background. The concept of multilevel governance as a wider policy instrument which incorporates both the above systems is of special interest here.     

Social Policy in Singapore: Insights from a Social Work Perspective

Social work practice, irrespective of the location of practice, is shaped by local conditions, particularly the laws and policies applicable to the practice. Most governments adopt some form of institutional arrangements pertinent to local conditions to meet local needs, such arrangements in Western contexts commonly being described as the welfare state. In other contexts, notably the East Asian context, the Western welfare state has been deemed inappropriate for meeting local needs. In this discussion there will be a focus on arrangements developed in Singapore, a country in the East Asian region. Although Singapore has eschewed any notion of a welfare state, this discussion will demonstrate that it does have in place a range of policy responses to meet Singaporean needs and that these measures are consistent with the frameworks adopted by emerging Confucian welfare states.