States and Social Policies

Skocpol, Theda; Amenta, Edwin

doi:10.1146/annurev.so.12.080186.001023

Cited by 346 publications

(137 citation statements)

References 87 publications

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“…Finally, they are marked by the limits imposed by the rules of the game, with these understood as the political arena's operational norms (e.g., constitutional provisions, relevant legislation, etc.). ToQQ these three factors is added the importance of legacies, understood as the real conditions under which public policies' have to be implemented given the policies carried out in previous administrations (Skocpol and Amenta, 1986;Pierson, 1994).…”

Section: Political Determinants Of Social Policiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Institutional Constraints, Parties and Political Competition in Brazilian States, 1987-2006

Sátyro

2013

Rev. cienc. polít. (Santiago)

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This study analyzes the impact of politics on governmental efforts to promote social policies, more specifically Education and Culture, and Health and Sanitation policies. The paper aims to explain the variation in Brazilian states' standards of social policy provision during the five governmental administrations following re-democratization. Our explanation focuses on political and institutional factors during the 1987-2006 period. Our aim is to assess the impact of political competition, the party system, the legacy of public policy, and economic and institutional constraints on social policy provision since the end of the military dictatorship. Our empirical analysis is conducted through estimates of Prais-Winsten regression models with panel corrected standard error model (PCSE-AR1). The results of this analysis show that the majority of parties in government do not differ in their social expenditures and that political competition loses its predictive capacity when faced with institutional constraints arising from the central government.Key words: Social policy, party system, subnational governments, political competition. RESUMEN Este estudio analiza el impacto de la competencia política en el esfuerzo de los gobiernos federados por la prestación de políticas sociales, específicamente en los sectores de educación, cultura, salud y saneamiento. Buscamos explicar la variación en los estándares de prestación de estas políticas sociales sectoriales implementadas por los estados federados brasileños durante las cinco administraciones posteriores a la redemocratización. Nuestra dimensión explicativa tiene por foco el análisis de los factores políticos e institucionales durante el período comprendido

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Section: Political Determinants Of Social Policiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Institutional Constraints, Parties and Political Competition in Brazilian States, 1987-2006

Sátyro

2013

Rev. cienc. polít. (Santiago)

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“…As regards social policy, Wilensky (1975), Cameron (1978), Skocpol/Amenta (1986), Immergut (1992), Huber et al (1993), Pierson (1995), Schmidt (1996), Castles (1999b) and Huber/Stephens (2001a) Limits on partisan action capacity are also imposed by the nature of the party system, which in turn is shaped by electoral institutions. In fragmented party systems, parties are typically forced to form coalition governments.…”

Section: Politics and The Welfare State: Theoretical Accountsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Political parties, institutions, and the dynamics of social expenditure in times of austerity

2003

Journal of European Public Policy

201

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The containment of social expenditure growth has been (and still is) a core issue of public policy in advanced industrial countries since the 1980s and has received much academic attention during that period. Among the most extensively discussed explanatory factors of social expenditure are partisan politics and political institutions, as well as the dependency of the real impact of the former on the latter. The paper distinguishes five competing theoretical perspectives and explores their power to explain the empirical variation in the period 1982-1997 in 21 OECD countries. The empirical analysis of short-term dynamics is performed in a time-series cross-section framework while long-term level effects are explored in a cross-sectional setting. By using an interactive model specification the authors show that there is empirical evidence for this conditional effect, albeit it is neither thoroughly convincing nor leading to lasting long-term level effects. Extensive specification tests show that the 1990s witnessed a weakening of partisan effects which were still present in the 1980s. In total, the evidence tends to give most support to the "growth-to-limits" and the "new politics" perspectives.

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“…This seems at best incom-plete. Strike activity has little influence on social spending in the states (Amenta and Poulsen 1992), for instance, and the evidence about the impact of other forms of mass disruption is uneven (see Skocpol and Amenta 1986). …”

Section: What This Kind Of Research Cannot Domentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This work has brought an expansion of the number of cases and thus the degrees of freedom available to test simultaneously numerous propositions. This informational territory has often resembled a battlefield, with researchers sending waves of hypotheses across it, hoping to claim sovereignty for one theory or another (see Skocpol and Amenta 1986). Typically, the rule of left-wing or "social democratic" political parties has emerged triumphant with the greatest explanatory power from regression tests (see, e. g., Shalev 1983).…”

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confidence: 99%

The State of the Art in Welfare State Research on Social Spending Efforts in Capitalist Democracies Since 1960

Amenta¹

1993

American Journal of Sociology

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In the last generation, social scientists have made great advances in understanding the forces behind the welfare state-or public social spending and provision. Scholars have asked why those aided by the state get what they do in the ways that they do for a number of circumstances affecting income and life chances. Typically, the object of study has been the state's efforts through spending or services to ameliorate routine and foreseeable predicaments that threaten income, such as those caused by old age, unemployment, ill health, disability, and industrial accidents. Often scholars have widened the focus to include programs aiding persons with family obligations and citizens having served in the military. Sometimes housing, nutritional, and educational needs have been included, expanding the definition of the welfare state to encompass almost all domestic public spending.Researchers have explored many empirical settings to derive and appraise arguments about public social provision. Influential early work (e.g., Marshall 1963; Titmuss 1958; Peacock and Wiseman 1961) focused on post-World War I1 Britain's adoption of comprehensive public social provision and the term the "welfare state." These studies argued that the inevitable expansion of citizen rights or, alternatively, social solidarities forged in war promoted public social provision. Soon, however, social scientists began quantitative, cross-sectional studies of all the countries of the post-World War I1 world (e.g., Cutright 1965;Wilensky 1975) and typically found that socioeconomic "modernization," notably industrialization and the aging of the population, underlay social spending progress. In addition, U.S. states were used as laboratories to test propositions about social policy-mainly whether economic modernization or ' For comments and advice, I

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States and Social Policies

Cited by 346 publications

References 87 publications

Institutional Constraints, Parties and Political Competition in Brazilian States, 1987-2006

Institutional Constraints, Parties and Political Competition in Brazilian States, 1987-2006

Political parties, institutions, and the dynamics of social expenditure in times of austerity

The State of the Art in Welfare State Research on Social Spending Efforts in Capitalist Democracies Since 1960

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