A REVIEW OF SOCIAL PROTECTION PROGRAMMES IN ZIMBABWE: LESSONS LEARNT

2017 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-383
Author(s):  
Oliver Mtapuri

This article makes an entrée into the social protection arena by exploring the political, technical, social, economic, legal and environmental dimensions of social protection using the ecology of human development as a foundation. As a point of departure, it argues that a clear understanding of the ‘total environment’ is critical in the design, formulation and implementation of social protection programmes. The method used for purposes of compiling this article is a desk study in which documents on social protection interventions used in Zimbabwe were reviewed. The key contribution of the article is a framework which may assist countries in the global south to understand social protection in general and to guide policy implementation and practice in particular. Some of the key lessons learnt from the Zimbabwean experience include the need to interrogate all interventions for feasibility, efficiency, effectiveness, dependency-reduction, appropriateness, sustain-ability, gender-sensitivity, incorruptibility, provision of exit mechanisms, administrative costs and adequacy of resources.

Author(s):  
Micheál L. Collins ◽  
Mary P. Murphy

The political economy of Irish work and welfare has dramatically changed over recent decades. Since the 1980s, Ireland has experienced two periods of high unemployment followed by two periods of full employment. Alongside this, we see considerable shifts in both the sectoral composition of the workforce and in the institutional architecture underpinning the labour market. Focusing on the last decade, this chapter contextualizes the Irish labour market in the Irish growth model, highlighting issues including occupational upgrading, low pay, gender composition, and migration. The chapter then explores links between this employment structure and Ireland’s changing welfare regime. It considers recent institutional changes, as the welfare regime shifted to a work-first form of activation, and the long-term sustainability of the social protection system. The chapter concludes by highlighting what we see as the core challenges for the political economy of work and welfare in Ireland.


2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 263
Author(s):  
Mônica de Castro Maia Senna ◽  
Aline Souto Maior Ferreira ◽  
Valentina Sofia Suarez Baldo

O artigo analisa como sistemas de proteção social na América Latina têm respondido à grave situação social decorrente da pandemia de COVID-19. Pautado em estudo exploratório, o artigo toma como foco as experiências da Argentina, Brasil e México. A perspectiva de análise considera que as respostas produzidas por esses três casos às demandas sociais postas pela pandemia decorrem da interseção entre o legado prévio e estrutura institucional dos sistemas de proteção social existentes em cada país, a orientação política dos governos em exercício e a dinâmica social e política diante do contexto da crise sanitária. Verifica que nos três países, a despeito de medidas protetivas de maior ou menor abrangência e magnitude, que reforçam a proteção social existente ou introduzem novos mecanismos – todos eles temporários – a crise social própria às formações sociais latino-americanas se agravou.LATIN AMERICAN SOCIAL PROTECTION SYSTEMS AND RESPONSES TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: Argentina, Brazil and MexicoAbstractThe article analyses how social protection systems in Latina America have responded to the serious social situation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Guided by an exploratory study, the paper focuses on the experiences of Argentina, Brazil and Mexico. The analysis considers that the responses produced by the three cases results from the intersection between the institutional structure’s previous legacy of the social protection systems existing in each country, the political orientation of the governments in exercise and the social and political dynamics in the sanitary crisis context. It seems that, despite protective measures of greater or lesser scope and magnitude, which either reinforce the existing social protections or introduce new mechanisms – all of them temporary – the social crisis specific to Latin American social formations has worsened in the countries studied.Keywords: Social protection. COVID-19. Brazil. México. Argentina


Author(s):  
Ana Rita Ferreira ◽  
Daniel Carolo ◽  
Mariana Trigo Pereira ◽  
Pedro Adão e Silva

This article discusses the ways in which the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic has embodied to the political choices made during the process of creating and defining a democratic welfare state and how the various constitutional principles are reflected in the architecture of the system and have gradually changed over the years. The authors argue that when Portugal transitioned to democracy, unlike other areas of the country’s social policies the social security system retained some of its earlier organising principles. Having said this, this resilience on the part of the Portuguese system’s Bismarckian template has not prevented social protection from expanding here in accordance with universal principles, and has given successive governments manoeuvring room in which to define programmatically distinct policies and implement differentiated reformist strategies. The paper concludes by arguing that while the Constitution has not placed an insurmountable limit on governments’ political action, it has served as a point of veto, namely by means of the way in which the Constitutional Court has defended the right to social protection, be it in the form of social insurance, be it in the imposition of certain social minima.


2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (9) ◽  
pp. 1947-1966
Author(s):  
Michael Kaplan

Drawing on the century-long preoccupation with premodern or “primitive” economic forms that has shaped the social sciences, this essay argues that the political economy of social networking platforms is structured like a potlatch. Understanding this structure and its dynamics is indispensable for grasping the social, economic and cultural preconditions and implications of communicative capitalism.


2005 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-158
Author(s):  
Michael C. Dawson ◽  
Lawrence D. Bobo

By the time you read this issue of the Du Bois Review, it will be nearly a year after the disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina swept the Gulf Coast and roiled the nation. While this issue does not concentrate on the disaster, (the next issue of the DBR will be devoted solely to research on the social, economic, and political ramifications of the Katrina disaster), the editors would be amiss if we did not comment on an event that once again exposed the deadly fault lines of the American racial order. The loss of the lives of nearly 1500 citizens, the many more tens of thousands whose lives were wrecked, and the destruction of a major American city as we know it, all had clear racial overtones as the story unfolded. Indeed, the racial story of the disaster does not end with the tragic loss of life, the disruption of hundred of thousands of lives, nor the physical, social, economic, and political collapse of an American urban jewel. The political map of the city of New Orleans, the state of Louisiana (and probably Texas), and the region is being rewritten as the large Black and overwhelmingly Democratic population of New Orleans was dispersed out of Louisiana, with states such as Texas becoming the perhaps permanent recipients of a large share of the evacuees.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-5
Author(s):  
Siavash Rokni

Where to begin? Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and the social restrictions that followed, our perceptions of and relationship to work have been shaken to their core. Indeed, we live in a society where consistent and constant production is part of our daily reality. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has acted as a mirror, showing us our obsession with productivity and exacerbating the dangers associated with a system that has been known to be dysfunctional for several decades: capitalism. The pandemic and what has followed have also resulted in the whole world living an experience of collective ambiguity. This experience of ambiguity is felt differently depending on our privileges, be they social, economic, political, or racial. Despite this ambiguity, our politicians across the political spectrum have continued to insist on the relaunching of the economy and incited the population to continue to produce in order to ultimately to save the capitalist system. Even at university, we continue to adapt—for good or bad—to this new reality that is supposedly “temporary”.


2021 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 343-359 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Mofijur ◽  
I.M. Rizwanul Fattah ◽  
Md Asraful Alam ◽  
A.B.M. Saiful Islam ◽  
Hwai Chyuan Ong ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
R. B. Bernstein

The founding fathers were born into a remarkable variety of families, occupations, religious loyalties, and geographic settings: from landed gentry destined to join the ruling elite, to middling or common sorts who chose the law or medicine as a professional path to distinction, or immigrants from other parts of the British Empire. They lived within and were shaped by three interlocking contexts—the intellectual world of the transatlantic Enlightenment; the political context within which Americans sought to preserve and improve the best of the Anglo-American constitutional heritage; and the social, economic, and cultural context formed as a result of their living on the Atlantic world’s periphery.


Author(s):  
Reinaldo Pacheco da Costa

In the 1980s, coinciding with the struggle for Brazil's re-democratisation, the Solidarity Economy movement emerged as an alternative to an economic plan that resulted in massive unemployment and economic stagnation. In this context, workers organizations based in self-management principles arose as a comprehensive economic, political and social movement. The Social Economic Incubators (SEI) support the creation of solidarity economic ventures (SEVs) in low-income communities through an incubation process conducted by universities to help generating income and jobs. This chapter gives an overview of these incubators, starting with a discussion of their historical evolution and political scene; presenting the political and pedagogical process adopted within the incubators and its methodology regarding the social economic ventures; and showing how these incubators were supported by the government and the civil society. Finally, the chapter discusses the results and benefits of the incubation process, not only in economic terms, but also in its educational, cultural and political nature.


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