The electoral consequences of welfare state changes: a sober look at theory and evidence

2022/07/12 by Leo Ahrens, Frank Bandau · 1 voice
Social Sciences · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · #Electoral Systems and Political Participation #Social Policy and Reform Studies #Fiscal Policies and Political Economy

paper · doi:10.1080/13501763.2022.2096669

openalex publication_date 2022/07/12 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/02

Abstract

The expectation that welfare retrenchment and expansion have electoral consequences for governing parties is widespread in welfare state research. Previous research either argues that welfare state change has electoral consequences across the board or that this is at least the case under certain conditions, such as a left party in government. In this study, we synthesize existing theoretical approaches into a stylized theoretical model and discuss why the assumptions underlying the electoral consequences argument may be questionable. We then conduct an empirical analysis of the electoral fates of government parties in 20 European countries. A wide range of statistical specifications provide practically no evidence for electoral consequences of welfare state changes even under favorable conditions. The importance of welfare changes for electoral outcomes may therefore be overstated.

Citations

• The Politics of Blame Avoidance
• Framing Deservingness to Win Support for Welfare State Retrenchment
• Clarity of responsibility: How government cohesion conditions performance voting
• The social division of welfare knowledge: policy stratification and perceptions of welfare reform in Australia

Discussions

• It is also interesting that, in the sister piece on welfare, we found literally zero evidence for electoral consequences after social policy changes. This is different for tax changes.   doi.org/10.10 [bsky, 0 points, 1 comments]