User:LANXIHUANG/Welfare

1.     Definition：Generally, Welfare can be used to describe the supporting benefits from family, private or public organizations, religion or other cultural organizations, profitable or non-profitable organizations organization…Nowdays, welfare is the specific term, indicating the material support from public sectors in the welfare states, related to social policy, public insurance and social security[1]. Welfare covers a broad range, including medication, education, housing, pension, public insurance, working condition, maternity…[2]

The welfare state concerns the distribution and redistribution in society, thus it emphasis on two aspects of values: security and equality, which can also be seen as the tension between meritocratic and egalitarian values.[3][4] The general term ‘welfare state’ is a label for a certain class of democratic industrial capitalist societies, characterized by certain properties (i.e. social citizenship or the fact that more or less extensive welfare provisions are legally provided, or, in still other words, the fact that the state plays a principal part in the welfare mix alongside the market, civil society, and the family)[5]. The welfare state today is defined as a range of state programmes that provide for all social contingencies and try to redress market-produced inequalities. The welfare states comprises of statutory or public arrangements that absorb life risks such as – illness, unemployment, old-age, poverty, - and public programmes that provide the provision of housing, education, personal social services and social care to citizens[6].

Typical measure of welfare effort and generosity is Gross Public Social Expenditure index measured as a proportion of public social expenditures of GDP.[7] There is another index -- Net Total Social Expenditure (NTSE), which represents the most rigorous and comprehensive index of social spending to date.[8]

2.     History :

Originally the term welfare state was used to sustain morale and discipline of British people during a period of wartime crisis; the social benefits that democratic governments hoped to offer once the war was over. The term welfare state became popular after the Second World War (Beveridge´s Report in 1942) and refers to the responsibility of the state for the well-being of its citizens and the promotion of the “common good”[9].

Social scientists attributed the emergence of the welfare state to the fundamental changes in society and economy brought about by industrialization[10]. As Esping-Anderson analysed, industrialization and capitalization leads the commercialization of labours, which is as a consequence of the ineffectiveness of traditional welfare provided by family, contract, master and slave relation, and religions. Therefore, the welfare state acts as the adjustment or compromise for the social conflicts during the capitalism development.In welfare states, welfare is seen as a fundamental right as the same important as legal right and political right, protected by law, which contributes to the decommercialization of labour. [11]

In 1601, the first poor law in the whole world – the Elizabeth Poor Law, which clarified the principle of pension provision: gratuitous and universal. Later, Bismarckian social policy model is based on social insurance. There are provided earnings-related benefits for employees. Entitlements are conditional upon a contributory record. Financing is mainly based on employer/employee contributions. Beveridgean social policy model is characterised by universal provision, entitlements are based on residence and need. Benefits are typically flat rate and are financed through general taxation.[12]

3.     Typology

The first, and simplest, categorisation was made in the two - type conceptualisation of Wilensky and Lebeaux (1958). They divided the welfare systems into residual and institutional conceptualisations.[13]

The most wellknow categorisation comes from Esping-Aderson, who devides the welfare states into 3 main category: The liberal welfare regimes provide minimum state interference with the market, prioritize self-help and provide only residual, often means-tested benefits. The conservative regimes, in contrast, are heavily based on social insurance schemes linked to a citizens´ labour market status, and therefore tend to preserve status differentials (maintenance, stability, status inequality). The social-democratic model provides universal benefits based on citizenship status, is largely financed from general revenues and promotes social equality.[14]

There are also many scholars trying to refine the typology of welfare states or welfare regimes. They have proposed additional types, like the Latin-Rim one for Italy, Portugal, Spain and Greece (Bonolli, Ferrera), the Antipodean one for Australia and New Zealand (Castles and Mitchell), and he East-Asian or Confucian type of the welfare state (Kwon, Jones)[15].

[1] Castles, F. G., Leibfried, S., Lewis, J., Obinger, H., & Pierson, C. (Eds.). (2012). The Oxford handbook of the welfare state. OUP Oxford.

[2] Croll, E. J. (1999). Social welfare reform: Trends and tensions. The China Quarterly, (159), 684-699.

[3] Castles, F. G., Leibfried, S., Lewis, J., Obinger, H., & Pierson, C. (Eds.). (2012). The Oxford handbook of the welfare state. OUP Oxford.

[4] Wilensky, H. L. (1974). The welfare state and equality: Structural and ideological roots of public expenditures (Vol. 140). Univ of California Press.

[5] Swenarton, M., Avermaete, T., & van den Heuvel, D. (Eds.). (2014). Architecture and the welfare state. Routledge.

[6] Flora, P., & Heidenheimer, A. J. (Eds.). (1981). The development of welfare states in Europe and America. Transaction Publishers.

[7] https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/e02dd0a9-en.pdf?expires=1619814837&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=41B9C53C40957EC2BCF9A5E25195FEA1

[8] https://www.oecd.org/social/expenditure.htm

[9] Briggs, A. (1961). The welfare state in historical perspective. European Journal of Sociology/Archives Européennes de Sociologie/Europäisches Archiv für Soziologie, 2(2), 221-258.

[10] Castles, F. G., Leibfried, S., Lewis, J., Obinger, H., & Pierson, C. (Eds.). (2012). The Oxford handbook of the welfare state. OUP Oxford.

[11] Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The three worlds of welfare capitalism. Princeton University Press.

[12] Bonoli, G. “Classifying Welfare States: a Two-dimension Approach”, Journal of Social Policy, 1997, 26, 3, pp 351-372

[13] Wilensky, H. L., & Lebeaux, C. N. (1958). Industrial society and social welfare: the impact of industrialization on the supply and organ. of social welfare services in the United States.

[14] Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The three worlds of welfare capitalism. Princeton University Press.

[15] Fenger, M. (2007). Welfare regimes in Central and Eastern Europe: Incorporating post-communist countries in a welfare regime typology. Contemporary issues and ideas in social sciences, 3(2), 1-30.