The Politics of Postindustrial Social Policy

Fleckenstein, Timo; Lee, Soohyun Christine

doi:10.1177/0010414012451564

Cited by 70 publications

(53 citation statements)

References 61 publications

(79 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The role of political parties needs more studies and much work remains to be done regarding the role of institutions, values and other social actors, in particular the social partners and women's movements (e.g. Bloksgaard, 2009;Eydal & Gíslason, 2008;Fleckenstein & Lee, 2014;Fleckenstein & Seeleib-Kaiser, 2011;Haas & Rostgaard, 2011;LammiTaskula & Takala, 2009;Salmi & Lammi-Taskula, 2015), however, in this article the focus is on the political parties.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in parental leave in the Nordic countries: has the forward march of gender equality halted?

Eydal

Gíslason

Rostgaard

et al. 2015

Community, Work & Family

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The aim of this article is to provide an overview of the development of parental leave in the Nordic countries in the last decade or so and explain the different approaches taken by individual countries in this regard. Focusing on recent developments, though mainly on the provision of a father's quota, we discuss whether we are actually witnessing a paradigm shift in some of these countries, i.e. a movement away from an emphasis on the dual earner/dual carer model and a reverting back to a more traditional family model approach where the mother is seen as the main parent. This change is commonly presented under the guise of it respecting the 'free choice' of individual families. Furthermore, the article asks why the changes in question have taken place and examines the positions of different political parties towards the issue. The article shows that the Nordic countries are developing somewhat different policies and the intra-Nordic gap in both policies and politics seems to be increasing rather than narrowing.El objetivo de este artículo es el de proporcionar una panorámica sobre el desarrollo de los permisos parentales en los países nórdicos a lo largo de la última década, así como explicar los diferentes enfoques sobre esta materia adoptados por cada uno de ellos individualmente. Centrándonos en los desarrollos recientes, básicamente a través de la introducción de la cuota para el padre, analizamos en qué medida somos testigos en la actualidad de un desplazamiento del paradigma en algunos de estos países; es decir, un movimiento fuera del énfasis en el modelo de doble ingreso / cuidados compartidos, con un retroceso hacia un modelo de familia más tradicional en donde la madre es considerada como la progenitora principal. Este cambio se presenta con frecuencia bajo el disfraz de respetar la 'libre elección' de las familias. Asimismo el artículo se pregunta por qué se han producido estos cambios y examina los puntos de vista de los diferentes partidos políticos sobre esta cuestión. El artículo pone de manifiesto que los diversos países nórdicos están desarrollando unas políticas en cierta medida diferentes y que la brecha intra-nórdica, tanto en las políticas como en el ámbito de la política, parece estar acrecentándose más que estrechándose.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in parental leave in the Nordic countries: has the forward march of gender equality halted?

Eydal

Gíslason

Rostgaard

et al. 2015

Community, Work & Family

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Although there might be good economic reasons for new social policies (especially because of their human capital dimension), it needs to be noted that employers (who should have the greatest interest in social policies supporting economic development) expressed the strongest opposition to family policy expansion (S. C. Lee, 2012;Seeleib-Kaiser & Toivonen, 2011;Tsai, 2011), making it difficult to observe genuine cross-class support. Thus, in family policy, employers in three countries (though widely considered coordinate market economies [CMEs]) displayed policy preferences we find in liberal market economies rather than CMEs, where businesses in Sweden and Germany, for instance, supported employment-oriented family policy expansion (Fleckenstein & Lee, 2014;Fleckenstein & Seeleib-Kaiser, 2011). Organized labour did not show much "enthusiasm" for family policy expansion either, but prioritized the interests of male workers in accordance with the insider/outsider model.…”

Section: Post-industrialization Democratization and The Rise Of Fammentioning

confidence: 70%

Democratization, post-industrialization, and East Asian welfare capitalism: the politics of welfare state reform in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan

Fleckenstein

Lee

2017

J. int. comp. soc. policy

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This review article provides an overview of the scholarship on the establishment and reform of East Asian welfare capitalism. The developmental welfare state theory and the related productivist welfare regime approach have dominated the study of welfare states in the region. This essay, however, shows that a growing body of research challenges the dominant literature. We identify two key driving factors of welfare reform in East Asia, namely democratization and post-industrialization; and discuss how these two drivers have undermined the political and functional underpinnings of the post-war equilibrium of the East Asian welfare/production regime. Its unfolding transformation and the new politics of social policy in the region challenge the notion of "East Asian exceptionalism", and we suggest that recent welfare reforms call for a better integration of the region into the literature of advanced political economies to allow for cross-fertilization between Eastern and Western literatures.Keywords: Democratization, Post-Industrialization, Welfare Capitalism, Developmentalism, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan.East Asian welfare states have experienced comprehensive reforms in the last two decades.Following the regional "pioneer" of Japan, the neighbouring South Korea and Taiwan have introduced unemployment protection schemes, and have universalized health-care provision and old-age security. Also observed has been increased state intervention in child and longterm care in the region, including Japan. Welfare state expansion in the three countries, with the rise of social citizenship, challenges perceived wisdom in the literature. According to de-3 velopmental welfare state theory, and the related productivist welfare regime approach, social policy (driven by technocrats) is strictly subordinated to the primary policy goal of economic development, and therefore social welfare provision is confined to "productive" parts of the population (in particular, regular workers in key industries). However, recent policy expansion benefited presumably "non-productive" parts of the population as well (such as the unemployed, women, children, and the elderly), whilst the deregulation of employment protection undermined the developmentalist "welfare-through-work" system. This article reviews the literature on the establishment and reform of East Asian welfare capitalism. In so doing, we focus on the research examining the political and socio-economic drivers of the unfolding transformation of East Asian welfare capitalism; with a focus on Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. We show how democratization (that is, the end of authoritarianism in Korea and Taiwan, and the end of one-party dominance in Japan) and post-industrialization (that is, both labour market and family changes, such as the rise in female employment and the decline of traditional families) have undermined the post-war equilibrium of the East Asian welfare/production regime. Democratization has allowed the rise of political parties and societal actors in social policy-maki...

show abstract

“…The latter sees parties as representatives of social constituencies (mostly industrial classes), and as bearers of clear ideological stances for social democratic or conservative welfare policies. Instrumentalist political parties can best be seen as vote and office seekers rather than driven by deep ideological commitment (Fleckenstein and Lee, 2012). By contrast, Häusermann and colleagues argue, the institutional context, party system and party competition matter for the kind of welfare policies individual parties advocate.…”

Section: Family Policy and Party Competitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Scholars argue that the policy drivers of the work-family policy of the 'golden age' of pioneering welfare states differ from the political environment of family policy 'latecomers' (Fleckenstein and Lee, 2012). In contrast to the golden age, party competition is key to understanding family policy modernisation and institutional change among the 'latecomers' (ibid.).…”

Section: Family Policy and Party Competitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The aim here is to investigate the role of political parties as drivers of policy change and stability. In explaining policy drivers, I relate to recent work on the role of party competition in welfare state/family policy development (e.g., Fleckenstein and Lee, 2012;Häusermann et al, 2013;Morgan, 2013;Seeleib-Kaiser, 2010). They entail competition over what are considered core values, probably more so than in many other policy fields (Fleckenstein, 2011;Lewis, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Nordic Earner–Carer Models – Why Stability and Instability?

Ellingsæter

2014

J. Soc. Pol.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Earner-carer policy models aiming at the engagement of mothers and fathers in both paid and unpaid work are a hallmark of the Nordic welfare states. But they have not become uncontested policy equilibriums. Examining family policy development through the theoretical lenses of party competition and incremental change helps uncover underlying tensions and ongoing struggles. In contrast to convergence and stability in regard to moderately long parental leave at high replacement rates and in the provision of universal publicly-funded childcare services, daddy quotas, i.e., earmarked leave for fathers, and cash-for-care benefits are contested and in flux. Policy stability is associated with layering of policy elements that satisfy multiple policy rationales, elements that are also vital in working parents' organisation of everyday life. By contrast, the main source of instability, including policy displacement, is party competition over values of 'equal parenthood' versus 'parental choice', largely following a left-right divide.

show abstract

The Politics of Postindustrial Social Policy

Cited by 70 publications

References 61 publications

Trends in parental leave in the Nordic countries: has the forward march of gender equality halted?

Trends in parental leave in the Nordic countries: has the forward march of gender equality halted?

Democratization, post-industrialization, and East Asian welfare capitalism: the politics of welfare state reform in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan

Nordic Earner–Carer Models – Why Stability and Instability?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About