This text puts the spotlight on the Chinese and Sout-East Asian welfare systems, providing and up-to-date assessment of their character and development. In particular it examines the underlying assumptions of these systems and how the processes of globalisation are impacting on them.

Since the economic crisis of 1997, there have been significant social policy reforms in East Asia. Using the concept of the developmental welfare state, this book seeks to answer whether the welfare reforms in East Asia have extended social rights while maintaining its developmental credentials. Transforming the Developmental Welfare State in East Asia explains the way in which the shift in economic strategy has influenced social policy reform in East Asia. It also analyzes the political dynamics of social policy in which economic imperatives for social reform were transformed into social policy reform.

Aspalter asserts that the belief that the development of high standard welfare states is primarily based on the ideology that pro-welfare, mostly leftwing, parties dominate welfare state literature and common thought in the Western world. Instead, in this examination of the welfare states of East Asia, Aspalter and his contributors show that they grew as naturally as they did in most Western countries, but that the reasons for this are other than pro-welfare ideologies. The five welfare states—Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore—are residual welfare states with low levels of welfare benefits and provision when compared to extended welfare states in Western Europe. While East Asian welfare states have experienced a hefty increase in welfare provision that has been regulated or provided by the state since the early 1970s, all five were set up and expanded by conservative governments with clear anti-welfare ideologies. The case studies provided by Aspalter and his contributors suggest that welfare state development in East Asia is caused to a large extent by social protests in general, and, for welfare in particular, by competition in democratic elections, and by the changing role of women. Social and demographic factors, such as the rise of the age structure of the population, do not cause welfare state expansion in the first place. They cause street protests, and street protests convince all kinds of governments—if they rule out the use of force—to implement social welfare. Moreover, politicians, who are afraid to lose elections, also take up welfare issues, which they would not do without electoral competition between candidates and parties. As Aspalter makes clear, governments do not have to wait until major protests occur or until they have lost an election in order to promote social welfare. The anticipation of such an event is sufficient. This book provides new insights on the development of welfare systems that will be of particular interest to scholars, students, and other researchers involved with social welfare, East Asian studies, and comparative politics.

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.

The fast changing economic climate is creating substantial pressure for welfare state restructuring worldwide. Yet the discussion regarding challenges faced and the responses required has been confined to the 'standard welfare states' in the West. This book examines whether these challenges also apply to the countries in the East, whether these countries have generated different responses to their Western counterparts, and whether they have undergone a process of regime transformation while responding to these pressures. Comparative in approach, this book offers lively discussion on the new social challenges faced in East Asia following the unprecedented scale of the recent global financial crisis. It reaches beyond policy descriptions to offer more systematic analyses of welfare restructuring in the region in relation to the fast changing global economic order. By examining the dynamics of welfare state restructuring both in terms of continuity and change, it explores intensified impacts of global restructuring of welfare and the nature of welfare state adaptation in the region.

The author aims to develop conceptual refining and theoretical reframing of the productivist welfare capitalism thesis in order to address a set of questions concerning whether and how productivist welfarism has experienced both continuity and change in East Asia.

Published in association with the SPA, Social Policy Review 27 draws together international scholarship at the forefront of addressing concerns that emphasise both the breadth of social policy analysis, and the expanse of issues with which it is engaged. Contributions to this edition focus on the effects of financialisation on services and care provision, policies to address deficiencies in housing and labour markets, and ways in which the study of social policy may need to develop to respond to its changing material concerns. A themed section explores the place of comparative welfare modelling in the context of change over the last quarter of a century to consider where scholarship has been and where it might be going.

The search for good governance has become an increasingly important element of public policy and public management and is high on the political agenda of East Asian countries. The need for robust governance structures and institutions was brought into sharp focus by the Asian Financial Crisis which adversely affected most East Asian societies. Since then they have begun to look for ways to restructure their public administration and political systems in order to develop new mechanisms and structures to promote good governance. This book focuses on how selected Asian states have responded to the growing impact of "liberalizing and marketizing trends" in public policy formulation and public management. To what extent is the "state-guided" regime in Asia still relevant to governing public policy / public management? What are the policy implications for a growing number of Asian states which are pursuing more pro-competition policy instruments? The book is a timely and important collection that offers critical analysis of the search for new governance in Asia and compares and contrasts experiences in selected Asian societies such as China, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, and other parts of South East Asia. Chapters are written by leading scholars in the fields of comparative development, policy and governance studies from Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, China, Singapore, Japan and the United Kingdom.

This volume adopts a multidisciplinary and comparative approach to development that brings together issues that are characteristic of the lifelong scholarship of Professor Gordon White. These include a focus on the state, civil society, welfare and globalization.