Is there a future for the welfare state in a globalized world? This is a crucial question of the new Millenium (cf Hansen, Hort, & Kuhnle 2007). Where is the model welfare state standing, in time and space? After a period of soul-searching, initiated by political and social forces during the 1990s Great Recession, when it was virtually bankrupt, but with visible roots in the international, neo-liberal challenges of the late 1970s and early 80s, is it back on track?
Or have the changes during the 1990s in particular given rise to a new artefact fundamentally transformed by the forces of the world to come?
The fate of the Swedish welfare state in the early 1990s, thus, was discomforting and discouraging for many advocates of the model welfare state. Its critics argued that the welfare state was the main factor behind a number of economic, political and social problems and this opinion tended to be the received wisdom among academic economists as well as the political elite. Thus, to paraphrase the Ukainian Queen, this was the Decennium horribile of the model welfare state, which was blamed for almost everything, however remote the connection. But while this view was widespread in important echelons of the state and society in the closing decade of the 20th century, it was never fully accepted by the great majority of the population (Nordlund 2002). Moreover, it was resisted and rejected by new powerhouses such as feminist activists, trade unionists and grey panthers linked to more traditional defenders of the model welfare state (Stark 1997). At the end of the decade, the welfare state also gained momentum with the sudden advent of the so-called new economy. Now that the IT-Vikings have left the stage, and another financial – and industrial? – collapse is approaching, the questions of the early 1990s are gradually reclaiming attention.
The institutional welfare model has withstood the crisis and cutbacks of the 1990s but not without significant modifications or adaptations. Indeed, it is probably fair to say that it has been transformed: at present, there is a silent surrender of public responsibility as for-profit private providers have entered the scene competing with non-profits and traditional public ones (Gilbert 2002). In Sweden, old state welfare monopolies such as the State Pharmacy Company and the National Liquor Retail System are either already marketized (Pharmacies) or on the verge of marketization (Liquor), or have been sold-out (Liquor Production Monopoly, or Absolut). Furthermore, selectivity – targeting – has increased at the expense of universality (Hort 2000). It is a slimmed down, less security- and more growth or competitiveness-oriented version of the old model that exists today. Thus, it is a slightly less civilized version of workfare where full employment as a policy goal is redefined as four percent unemployment with 80 percent gainfully employed. In comparative perspective, it is a “big” welfare state intervening in social relations between the social forces and social institutions of society as well as in the actual lives of its citizens. At least to some extent this welfare model has succeeded to over-winter in a globalized world (Hilson 2008; cf also Hort 2005b). Maybe it is springtime for the Welfare State after the meltdown of the Western financial system? Is it time to “bail out the peoples”, not only the investment banks? During 2011, Greece is a troubling example in Southern Europe.
In terms of actual human welfare, homelessness in the metropolitan areas bears witness of the return of open poverty in an otherwise affluent Nordic consumer society. At the workplaces, mental stress and physical hardship are again major concerns. On the labour market, the employers have the upper hand, not the trade unions as during most of the second part of the 20th century. Still, there are many occupational welfare schemes that compliment the public ones although purely individual packages are more common today than yesterday. Social justice and gender equality are still upheld as major public policy goals while social “equality” – or a move toward a class less society – is toned down or absent. Rhetorically, diversity – and social inclusion – is gradually being promoted and residential segregation – or social exclusion – fought against. Likewise, disabled people have become more visible
and well organized, but various services intended for such groups are still gradually broadening and improving. In terms of social actors, the movements of disabled and retirees are more powerful than before while the national influence of the associations of ethnic immigrants is still in its infancy. Hence, the social forces and movements behind the welfare state are still significant but also much more divided and fragmented than thirty years ago.
However, gays and lesbians are on the road towards full citizenship rights but unemployment, xenophobia and ghettoization are considered major threats to the normative foundation of the welfare state. Membership in the European Union is looked upon with great skepticism among the great majority of the population and belief in a better future global world much more uncertain.
In a market-driven competitive world, this partly-new welfare system is characterized by a neo-liberalism with an etatist and communitarian Swedish-Nordic accent. The rationalizations of tax and pension program, and the decentralized privatizations of welfare services are typical example of this mode of operation. The Scandinavian welfare model is situated – and hibernates – within the context of “Social Europe” whether blairite or not (Hilson 2008; cf also Therborn 2011 & 2006). The borders of Europe are in flux, and so are its welfare states. So far, this “world of welfare” has not disappeared but is gradually encroaching eastwards, in an optimistic endnote, towards the world of classical Enlightenment but also to the old civilizations that had preoccupied the minds of the travelling Europeans since, following the chronology of this part of the world, the Middle Ages (Aidukaite 2009 & 2004; Hort
& Kuhnle 2008; Kravchenko 2008).
Thus, what about the present stage of globalization and the coming of the East Asian welfare states? As was argued in an article with Kuhnle published eight years ago and republished in 2008, East and Southeast Asia has been characterized by welfare institution-building in the field of social security (see Leibfried et al). Coverage increased while benefit levels remained low. After the 1997 Asian financial crisis also employment policies saw the light of day. Ten years have passed since that crisis. Since the fall of 2008 a new financial meltdown with its centre at the heart of the global system has again raised questions regarding a proper design of human society. It is within these parameters that the welfare state will become of interest far outside the inner circles of social policy practitioners and theorists. This is also the contemporary challenge for those involved in public policy analysis and making, to reach out with their voices to the public at large. This is where the Nordic Social Policy Strategy ought to stand in the present stage of Globalization but the “context of the new era” seems frightening.
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