Contemporary accounts of welfare state change have produced conflicting findings and incompatible theoretical explanations. By discussing the most salient aspects of the 'dependent variable problem', this work offers suggestions as to how the problem might be tackled within empirical cross-national analyses of modern welfare states.

The welfare state in all its many forms has had a profound role in many countries around the world since at least the Second World War. The Routledge Handbook of the Welfare State explores the classical issues around the welfare state, but also investigates its key concepts, along with how these can be used and analysed. This book provides expert analysis of the core issues related to the welfare state, including regional depictions of welfare states around the globe. The book combines essays on methodologies, core concepts and central policy areas to produce a comprehensive picture of what 'the welfare state' means around the world. In the midst of the credit crunch, this book addresses some of the many questions about the welfare state. This book is suitable for students and scholars throughout the social sciences, particularly in sociology, social policy, public policy, international relations, politics, and gender studies.

Weighing in on the euro-austerity debate, this book uses case studies from three countries to evaluate the distinctive politics of fiscal policy and welfare state reform during a key period in Europe.

This Handbook provides a comprehensive global survey of the policy process. Written by an outstanding line up of distinguished scholars and practitioners, the Handbook covers all aspects of the policy process including: Theory - from rational choice to the new institutionalism; Frameworks - network theory, advocacy coalition and development models; Key stages in the process - formulation, implementation and evaluation; Agenda setting and decision making; The roles of key actors and institutions. This is an invaluable resource for all scholars, graduate students and practitioners in public policy and policy analysis.-- Publisher description.

Developing countries may not have full-fledged welfare states like those we find in Europe, but certainly they have welfare state systems. For comparative social policy research the term "welfare state systems" has many advantages, as there are numerous different types/models of welfare state systems around the world. This path-breaking book, edited by Christian Aspalter, brings together leading experts to discuss social policy in 25 countries/regions around the world. From the most advanced welfare state systems in Scandinavia and Western Central Europe to the developing powers of Brazil, China, India, Russia, Mexico and Indonesia, each country-specific chapter provides a historical overview, discusses major characteristics of the welfare state system, analyzes country-specific problems, as well as critical current and future trends for further discussions, while also providing one additional major focal point/issue for greater in-depth analysis. This book breaks new ground in ideal-typical welfare regime theory, identifying now in total 10 worlds of welfare capitalism. It provides broad perspectives on critical challenges which welfare state systems in the developing and developed world alike must address now and in the future. It will be of great interest to all scholars and students of social policy, social development, development and health economists, public policy, health policy, sociology, social work and social policy makers and administrators. This book is a reference book for researchers and social policy administrators; it can also serve as a textbook for courses on comparative social policy, international social policy and international social development.

With welfare to work programmes under intense scrutiny, this book reviews a wide range of existing and future policies across Europe. Seventeen contributors provide case studies and legal, sociological and philosophical perspectives from around the continent, building a rich picture of welfare to work policies and their impact. They show how many schemes do not adequately address social rights and lived experiences, and consider alternatives based on theories of non-domination. For anyone interested in the justice of welfare to work, this book is an important step along the path towards more fair and adequate legislation.

Welfare reforms in post-communist countries are determined by economic and social hardship, democratization of the political systems and rapid structural change. This groundbreaking book provides a comprehensive and systematic empirical assessment of the Central and Eastern European post-communist welfare states in the context of their Western European counterparts. Basing the study on new data on welfare entitlements and cluster analysis, Kati Kuitto systematically compares 26 European welfare states across three empirical dimensions. The author employs a multidimensional framework to analyze patterns of welfare policies and highlight spending priorities, financing and the generosity of welfare entitlements. Kati Kuitto thus sheds light on the hybrid patterns of welfare policies in post-communist countries as they have emerged after the period of transformation and discusses their future challenges. Unique and comprehensive, this is essential reading for researchers in the fields of comparative welfare state research and Central and Eastern European studies, as well as students and practitioners of social policy, social security and political economy.

Forty-five contributions from renowned international specialists in the field provide readers with expert analysis of the core issues related to the welfare state, including regional depictions of welfare states around the globe. The second edition of the Routledge Handbook of the Welfare State combines essays on methodologies, core concepts and central policy areas to produce a comprehensive understanding of what ‘the welfare state’ means around the world. In the aftermath of the credit crunch, the Handbook addresses some of the many questions about the welfare state. This second edition has been thoroughly revised and updated to include an in-depth analysis of societal changes in recent years. New articles can be found on topics such as: the impact of ideas, well-being, migration, globalisation, India, welfare typologies, homelessness and long-term care. This volume will be an invaluable reference book for students and scholars throughout the social sciences, particularly in sociology, social policy, public policy, international relations, politics and gender studies.

This pathbreaking book investigates welfare state change in the area of health care- a field widely neglected by comparative welfare state research. While some work on health care expenditure exists, health care rights have not been systematically studied since social rights have exclusively focused on entitlement to cash benefits. Addressing this research gap, Böhm analyses in what way the social right to health care has been modified in the course of general welfare state transformation since the late 1970s. Taking England and Germany as examples, she assesses how health care reforms conducted under the conditions of constrained budgets, demographic ageing, and rapid medical progress, have altered access to and generosity of public health care systems over the past 35 years. The book’s findings significantly increase our understanding of social rights and reveals fundamental differences of approach: while Germany provides absolute and enforceable rights to health care for each (entitled) individual, English social health care rights are directed towards the population as a whole and contingent upon the availability of resources, i.e. they are not absolute and not enforceable. This distinction between individual and collective social rights will be an important contribution to the theory of social rights given its applicability to other types of social rights and its usefulness in tracing changes in social rights over time.

How can we best analyse contemporary welfare state change? And how can we explain and understand the politics of it? This book contributes to these questions both empirically and theoretically by concentrating on one of the least likely cases for welfare state transformation in Europe. It analyzes in detail how and why institutional change has taken Germany’s welfare state from a conservative towards a new work-first regime. Christof Schiller introduces a novel analytical framework to make sense of the politics of welfare state transformation by providing the missing link: the capacity of the core executive over time. Examining the policy making process in labour market policy in the period between 1980 and 2010, he identifies three different policy making episodes and analyses their interaction with developments and changes in such policy areas as pension policy, family policy, labour law, tax policy and social assistance. The book advances existing efforts aimed at conceptualizing and measuring welfare state change by proposing a clear-cut conceptualization of social policy regime change and introduces a comprehensive analysis of the transformation of the welfare-work nexus between 1980 and 2010 in Germany. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of social policy, comparative welfare state reform, welfare politics, government, governance, public policy, German politics, European politics, political economy, sociology and history.