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Books > Social sciences > Sociology, social studies > Social welfare & social services > Welfare & benefit systems
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The Future of the Welfare State - Crisis Myths and Crisis Realities (Hardcover, New)
Loot Price: R4,557
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The Future of the Welfare State - Crisis Myths and Crisis Realities (Hardcover, New)
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Written by one of the world's leading policy researchers, this book
seeks to assess the threat posed to modern welfare states by
globalization and demographic change. Using empirical methods, and
bringing together insights from across the social sciences, Castles
interrogates a range of theories suggesting that the welfare state
is in crisis. Systematically using data for 21 advanced OECD
nations, he distinguishes crisis myths from crisis realities,
locating, in the process, likely trajectories of welfare state
development in coming decades.
The findings of this book confront many of the basic assumptions
of contemporary scholarship. Economic globalization has not led to
a 'race to the bottom'. Analogous processes within the European
Community have not led to a 'downward harmonization' of social
spending. There is no 'new politics of the welfare state', with the
Left still outspending the Right. Over the past two decades,
spending has been increasing and converging across the OECD. Rather
than being in a state of crisis, western welfare states have
achieved a steady state.
The supposed impact of population aging on social welfare budgets
also turns out to be myth, with differences in spending actually
being a function of the structure of welfare systems, not of any
demographic imperative. The only potentially real threat is of
rapidly declining fertility, but Castles argues that welfare state
spending in the form of family-friendly public policy is, in fact,
our best defense against this problem.
This is a book with significant policy implications. It identifies
the factors likely to mould welfare state growth and decline in
future years, and the diverse problems and challenges confronting
welfare state policymakers in different families of nations. It is
a book for those who like assessing evidence before jumping to
unwarranted conclusions, and a book for those who wish to see 'the
shape of things to come'.
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