Synopses & Reviews
The future of the welfare state is, for many people, the key social, economic and political issues for the new millennium. Drawing on the very best and most influential writing on welfare of the past fifty years, and featuring the work of more than thirty key authors,
The Welfare State Reader shows how, why and for whom the politics of welfare has attained this newly central status.
The book brings together in a single volume texts from a wide range of sources – some of which are now either out of print or difficult to obtain. It includes work from the earliest years of postwar welfare state growth right through to the very latest debates about ageing, competitiveness and globalization. It encompasses both the most important theoretical approaches to welfare and the very latest comparative empirical research. The final section marks out the terrain on which the next battles over welfare will be fought.
Throughout the book, the emphasis is upon welfare debates. The extraordinary range of contrasting opinions and judgements in this volume demonstrate why welfare is such a crucial and contested topic. Selected and edited by two internationally respected researchers and teachers in the field, The Welfare State Reader is the essential guide to the debate.
Review
"In this second and updated version of their Welfare State Reader, Pierson and Castles have collated a masterful compendium of classic texts and important recent contributions to the contemporary and comparative analysis of welfare states. Preceded by useful introductions to each section, the volume covers traditional theories and perspectives, evolving debates and new political responses to enduring and recent challenges to maintaining social policy provision at a large scale. The result is an essential and invaluable resource for students, teachers and researchers interested in the development and the future of modern welfare states."
Jochen Clasen, University of Edinburgh
Review
‘Pierson and Castles have compiles a gem of a reader. It presents a true panorama of the opochal writings on Western welfare states, ranging from Thomas Paine to postmodernism. Between these two covers, the reader will find the most influential theoretical and analytical contributions on the causes and consequences of welfare state evolution, diversity and convergence. The collection succeeds brilliantly in bringing out the core controversies and debates. Any student or scholar or social policy will find this book invaluable in the studies.’ – Gøsta Esping-Andersen, University of Trento
Synopsis
- Second edition of a widely used, and highly respected, reader
- Comprehensively overhauled to make sure content remains at cutting edge of current arguments about welfare
- Also retains all the classic readings, serving to give students a complete overview of the whole range of debates
- Each section is now set in context by an editorial introduction, in addition to the overall introduction to the text.
- Priced competitively
- Can be used alongside Piersons third edition of Beyond the Welfare State?
About the Author
Christopher Pierson is Professor of Politics at the University of Nottingham and Francis Castles is Professor of Political Science in the Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University, Canberra.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements.
Editors' Note.
Editors' Introduction to the Second Edition.
Part I Approaches to Welfare.
The First Welfare State? (Thomas Paine).
‘Classical’.
The Welfare State in Historical Perspective. (Asa Briggs).
Citizenship and Social Class. (T.H. Marshall).
Universalism versus Selection. (Richard Titmuss).
Perspec tives on the Left.
What is Social Justice? (Commission on Social Justice).
The Fiscal Crisis of the State. (James O’Connor).
Some Contradictions of the Modern Welfare State. (Claus Offe).
The Power Resources Model. (Walter Korpi).
Responses from the Right.
The Meaning of the Welfare State. (Friedrich von Hayek).
The Two Wars against Poverty. (Charles Murray).
The New Politics of the New Poverty. (Lawrence M. Mead).
Feminism.
Feminism and Social Policy. (Mary McIntosh).
The Patriarchal Welfare State. (Carole Pateman).
Part II Debates and Issues.
Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. (Gosta Esping-Anderson).
Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism or More? A State-of-the-Art Report. (Wil Arts and John Gelissen).
Globalization.
Globalization, Economic Change and the Welfare State: The ‘Vexatious Inquisition of Taxation? (Colin Hay).
Negative Integration: States and the Loss of Boundary Control. (Fritaz Scharpf).
A Race to the Bottom. (Francis G. Castles).
Europaenization.
Welfare-State Regress in Western Europe: Politics, Institutions, Globilization, and Europeanization. (Walter Korpi).
Deliberative Governance and EU Social Policy. (Paul Teague).
The Open Method of Co-ordination and the European Welfare State. (Damian Chalmers and Martin Lodge).
Demographic Challenges to the Welfare State.
Population Ageing: An Unavoidable Future. (David Coleman).
The Evolving Concept of ‘Retirement’: Lokking Forward to th Year 2050. (James H. Schulz).
The Global Retirement Crisis. (Richard Jackson).
Gender Equity in Theories of Fertility Transition. (Peter McDonald).
Political Challenges.
The New Politics of the Welfare State. (Paul Pierson).
Beyond Retrenchment: Four Problems in Current Welfare State Research and One Suggestion on How to Overcome Them. (Bruno Palier).
Part III The Futures of Welfare.
A New Worl of Welfare.
Positive Welfare. (Anthony Giddens).
The Politics of the New Social Policies: Providing Coverage against New Social Risks in Mature Welfare States. (Giuliano Bonoli).
Beyond Universalism and 2articularism: Rethinking Contemporary Welfare Theory. (Nick Ellison).
Ways Ahead?.
A Welfare State for the Twenty-First Century. (GostaEsping-Andersen).
Investing in the Citizenship and the State under New Labour. (Ruth Lister).
Basic Income and the Two Dilemmas of the Welfare State. (Philippe van Parjis).
Index.