The Western European Welfare State Beyond Christian and Social Democratic Ideology

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ido de Haan
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
European Welfare State ◽  
Conservative Christian ◽  
Democratic Ideology ◽  
Western European ◽  
The Welfare State ◽  
The Way

One of the most striking features of Europe's postwar history is the emergence of the welfare state. Even though the first social policies had already been introduced in the 1880s, and while many of the organisational forms that became entrenched after 1945 were initiated in the first half of the twentieth century, the size and impact of the postwar welfare state was unprecedented. Even more remarkable was the widespread consensus with which structural social and economic reforms were implemented. The deep political and social rifts of the 1920s and 1930s and the lack of trust in democratic means to overcome these confrontations had been replaced by the acceptance of an interventionist state and parliamentary democracy as the way to solve conflicts about the way in which this state distributed social goods. The swift and consensual growth of the welfare state is also remarkable because most western European countries were governed by conservative governments, or coalition governments in which Social Democrats had to share power with conservative Christian Democrats and Liberals.

scholarly journals Union économique et monétaire et État-Providence : la subsidiarité en question (Note)

2005 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadine Richez-Battesti
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Monetary Union ◽  
Fiscal Federalism ◽  
Social Regulation ◽  
Economic And Monetary Union ◽  
European Welfare State ◽  
The Social ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
The Welfare State

This article seeks to analyze the social impacts of the Economic and Monetary Union and to reflect on the new modalities for producing social norms within this new context. First, after pointing out limits to the nominal convergence that the treaty stipulates for the interim phase, we mil present the new forms of adjustment pursuant to the EMU and their impacts on the welfare state. We will then turn to the responses of some economists to the introduction of a single currency and coordination of budgetary policies, including fiscal federalism. We will try to show the desirability of a European welfare state that would introduce some coherence between the different levels (local, national, Europe-wide) and forms (legislative and union-management) of social regulation ; in essence, a reworking of the idea of social subsidiarity.

The Covenant Paradox

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul M. Sniderman ◽  
Michael Bang Petersen ◽  
Rune Slothuus ◽  
Rune Stubager
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Temporal Logic ◽  
Equal Treatment ◽  
Evaluative Judgments ◽  
The Welfare State ◽  
The Way

This chapter presents a theory of the covenant paradox, i.e., the moral covenant underpinning the welfare state that simultaneously promotes equal treatment for (some) immigrants and provides a platform for discrimination against (other) immigrants. It first discusses under what conditions and why the moral premises of the welfare state favor the equal treatment of immigrants. It then considers under what conditions and why the very same moral premises open the door to discrimination against immigrants. It shows that the key to these contradictory outcomes is the temporal logic of evaluative judgments. Prospective judgments of benefits and obligations favor equal treatment. Retrospective judgments, again of benefits and obligations, pave the way for discriminatory treatment.

Work and Welfare as Strategic Complements in Germany’s Postwar Economic Order

2020 ◽  
pp. 54-84
Author(s):  
Philip Manow
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Automobile Industry ◽  
Full Employment ◽  
High Growth ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
State Expansion ◽  
The North ◽  
Wage Coordination ◽  
The Welfare State

Chapter 4 argues that in the three high-growth postwar decades, the welfare state facilitated corporatist cooperation between labor and capital, specifically in the form of wage coordination, thereby avoiding inflation in periods of (almost) full employment. The period of high growth and full employment allowed, in turn, welfare state expansion which was always supported by a grand coalition of Christian and Social Democrats. The chapter reconstructs in more detail how industrial conflict in the metalworking sector—both in the north of Germany, in the shipyards, and in the south of Germany, in the automobile industry—over social rights instead of wages laid the ground for wage coordination (and moderation) German style. It also explains how the welfare state helped unions and employers’ associations to “police the bargain,” to stabilize an inherently unstable arrangement between capital and labor.

Reforming the Welfare State: German and European Experiences and Challenges

2001 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-87
Author(s):  
Bernhard Seliger
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Welfare Reform ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Reform Strategies ◽  
European Development ◽  
Western European ◽  
Special Respect ◽  
Second World ◽  
The Welfare State

The rise of the welfare state has been a characteristic feature of Western European development after the second world war, despite quite different economic models in Western European countries. However, dynamic implications of the welfare state made a reform increasingly necessary. Therefore, since the 1980s the reform of the welfare state has been an important topic for Western European states. This paper describes the development of the welfare state and analyzes possible welfare reform strategies with special respect to the case of Germany. It focuses on the interdependence of political and economic aspects of welfare reform on the national as well as international level.

Worker and the Welfare State in Imperial Germany

1991 ◽  
Vol 40 ◽  
pp. 18-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Steinmetz
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Social Insurance ◽  
Social Democratic Party ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Imperial Germany ◽  
The Social ◽  
Insurance Funds ◽  
The Welfare State

A complex relationship existed between working-class formation and the development of the welfare state in Imperial Germany between 1871 and 1914. In the 1880s, the Social Democratic party voted against the three major national social insurance law's, and many workers seemed to spurn the incipient welfare state. But by 1914, socialists were active in social policy-making and workers were participating in the operations of the welfare state. Tens of thousands of workers and social democrats held positions in the social insurance funds and offices, the labor courts and labor exchanges, and other institutions of the official welfare state. Hundreds of workers had even become “friendly visitors” in the traditional middle-class domain of municipal poor relief. This shift is interesting not only from the standpoint of working-class orientations; it also challenges the received image of the German working class as excluded from the state —an interpretation based on an overly narrow focus on national parliamentary politics.

scholarly journals Extreme Rechte in der Krise – Kämpfe ums Subjekt

2009 ◽  
Vol 39 (157) ◽  
pp. 577-588 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Kaindl
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
The State ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
The Social ◽  
Bail Out ◽  
Mode Of Production ◽  
The Welfare State

The success of right wing parties in Europe is closely linked to the lack of representation that went along with the neoliberal shift of the social democrats. Feelings of injustice going along with altering the trans-national mode of production, concepts of the welfare state and labour politics were taken into account by rightwing “critics” that fight globalization in fighting immigrants. The crisis and bail-out-politics enforced feelings of injustice but at the same time brought the state – and the unions – ‘back in’ e.g. in creating a ‘clash-for-clunkers’ project. That seems to have weakened right-wing parties in Germany and France presenting themselves as an authoritarian fordistic option, but at the same time strengthened racist campaigns in other countries.

scholarly journals ISLAM AND MUSLIM-CHRISTIAN RELATIONS IN NORWAY

2019 ◽  
pp. 225-240
Author(s):  
Leirvik Oddbjørn
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Gender Equality ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
Trust Building ◽  
Muslim Population ◽  
Majority Population ◽  
Close Observation ◽  
And Gender ◽  
The Welfare State ◽  
The Way

In this paper the author describes and analyzes central features of Islam and Muslim-Christian relations in Norway. By close observation of the tension between interreligious solidarity and aggressive identity politics, the author highlights some central features of the trust-building Christian-Muslim dialogue in Norway. He also notes how anti-Islamic sentiments in part of the majority population are reflected in radicalization among some Muslim youths. However, the situation in general is described in more optimistic terms. He also identifies two examples showing that the majority of the Muslim population seem to endorse strong values evident in society in general– such as the welfare state and gender equality. Finally, the author poses the question pertaining to the way in which Christians and Muslims may adopt a unified stance against extremism.

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