This paper assesses the place of EU accession among the determinants of the changes taking place in the Czech social policy after 1989. Compulsory social and health insurance were re-introduced in the early 1990s, along with a guaranteed subsistence minimum for all, and an institutionalized state employment policy. This paper argues that EU-derived policies have had only a limited impact on Czech social-policy reform, focusing mostly on institution building. This phenomenon can be attributed to the apparent discrepancy between Copenhagen criteria of accession (1993) and the Lisbon Strategy, which was accepted as a policy guideline in 2002. Thus, the main concept able to explain Czech social-policy development after 1989 is that of institutional and behavioural path dependency as the country exhibited resistance to change coupled with a strong adherence to the Bismarckian, corporatist, welfare state. This makes the Czech Republic a special case compared to the other Visegrad countries, where the pressure from neo-liberal public-policy concepts of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund found its expression in the introduction of more residual social policies.

The goal of this paper is twofold: to present a description of the most important institutional changes taking place in Czech social policy after 1989, and to offer the explanation of these changes in a broader cultural, economic and political framework. The significant economic, social and cultural conditions of the country, in which social policy operates, comprise the disposable economic resources, the concept and realization of economic reform including changes in ownership rights, the capacity of public administration, the way political democratization is designed and implemented, and political priorities and concepts of the political elite actually in power. Recent developments in the labour market and the new patterns of employment policy are discussed in more detail. After that, the incidence of poverty and the ongoing social and economic stratification are associated with the new approaches to the construction of a social security system which has been composed of three main tiers (or "pillars"): social insurance, state social support, and social assistance. As a conclusion, the sensitive points of the present state of Czech social policy, along with crucial decisions to be taken in the future, are identified. Czechoslovak social policy before 1989A fter the end of the First World War, the relatively affluent Czech lands became part of Czechoslovakia. Between the two world wars, Czechoslovakia was an island of relative -though limited -political freedom, whereas authoritarian regimes were common in neighbouring countries. The modernization of the social security system was successfully realized in the 1920s. The Czechs were an industrially developed and politically aware people when they -partly through deliberation, partially through coercion -joined the communist camp in 1948. The communists had no

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Th e Czech Republic, as many other countries of Central and Eastern Europe, faced and is still facing a pension-reform challenge. Th e diversifi cation of pension pillars led to the massive displacements of participant contributions from the public PAYG pension pillars to the newly constructed private, defi ned-contribution, fully-funded pillars. In the Czech Republic, the adoption of the relevant law was preceded by serious political confl ict between supporters and opponents of this step (both among diff erent political actors and among professionals). In an analysis of the confl ict we critically apply the Advocacy Coalition Framework. We work mainly with the analysis of policy documents, public statements of the individual actors and an analysis of voting on the relevant law in both chambers of the Czech Parliament towards the identifi cation of the crystallization process of two clear-cut coalitions between actors from both sides of the spectrum. Th e Advocacy Coalition Framework in exploring the dynamics of the public-policy process proved to be able to explain situations where there is sharp political confl ict. Th rough the lens of the devil-shift of both camps (advocacy coalitions with diff erent beliefs), each fell into extreme positions within the coalition to affi rm the correctness of their arguments and positions.

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