The New Politics of the Welfare State

1996/01/01 by Paul Pierson · 8 citations
Social Sciences · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Health Professions · #Social Policy and Reform Studies #Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism #Employment and Welfare Studies

paper · doi:10.1353/wp.1996.0004

openalex publication_date 1996/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

This essay seeks to lay the foundation for an understanding of welfare state retrenchment. Previous discussions have generally relied, at least implicitly, on a reflexive application of theories designed to explain welfare state expansion. Such an approach is seriously flawed. Not only is the goal of retrenchment (avoiding blame for cutting existing programs) far different from the goal of expansion (claiming credit for new social benefits), but the welfare state itself vastly alters the terrain on which the politics of social policy is fought out. Only an appreciation of how mature social programs create a new politics can allow us to make sense of the welfare state's remarkable resilience over the past two decades of austerity. Theoretical argument is combined with quantitative and qualitative data from four cases (Britain, the United States, Germany, and Sweden) to demonstrate the shortcomings of conventional wisdom and to highlight the factors that limit or facilitate retrenchment success.

Citations

• The Politics of Blame Avoidance
• Public Opinion and the Welfare State: The United States in Comparative Perspective
• Social Democracy, Christian Democracy, Constitutional Structure, and the Welfare State
• When Effect Becomes Cause: Policy Feedback and Political Change
• Competing Technologies, Increasing Returns, and Lock-In by Historical Events
• “Policy Feedbacks” and Political Change: Contrasting Reagan and Thatcher's Pension-Reform Initiatives
• Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk
• Dismantling the Welfare State?

Cited by

• Privatizing Risk without Privatizing the Welfare State: The Hidden Politics of Social Policy Retrenchment in the United States
• Globalization and the Decline of the Welfare State in Less-Developed Countries
• Regimes and cultures of social security: Comparing institutional models through nonlinear PCA
• Ripples from the First Wave: The Monarchical Origins of the Welfare State
• Positive Returns and Equilibrium: Simultaneous Feedback Between Public Opinion and Social Policy
• The Effect of Austerity Packages on Government Popularity During the Great Recession
• Race to the bottom [wikipedia]
• Welfare state [wikipedia]