Research by political scientists on the modern welfare state focuses on its historical development and on the emergence of distinctive welfare state regimes. Research conducted in the past decade has also been concerned with the implications for the welfare state of the recurrent crises which have afflicted western economies since the late 1970's. However, while the politics of building welfare states are now better understood, there remains little systematic study of the politics of their retrenchment, a phenomenon which has been under way for the past two decades in most advanced capitalist states. This study examines the politics of retrenchment in Canada over the period 1978 to 1993. Focusing on three categories of federal income security programmes (family benefits, retirement income programmes, and Unemployment Insurance), the thesis describes a gradual shift in programme design away from universality and toward greater selectivity. Concomitant with this development was an increasing reliance on the tax system as an instrument of social policy. Applying Gosta Esping-Andersen's analysis of welfare state regimes, the thesis contends that the cumulative effect of programme retrenchment during this period was to reinforce the liberal-residualist character of Canada's welfare state at the expense of its social democratic aspects. In an effort to explain the process of welfare state retrenchment in Canada, within and between different categories of income security programmes, the thesis tests hypotheses associated with three major approaches to the study of public policy: class analysis, institutionalism, and pluralism. The thesis concludes that retrenchment in Canada was broadly facilitated by a decline in the political power resources of labour in relation to those of business. Because of the weakness of the relevant non-class pressure groups, pluralism is of limited value in explaining retrenchment outcomes. Insights into more specific patterns of retrenchment are gained from two institutionalist perspectives. The first of these, a state-centred approach, draws attention to the larger role in social policy-making that was assumed by the Department of Finance, the chief fiscal guardian of the Federal Government. The second perspective, a rational choice theory developed by Paul Pierson, provides insight into the manner in which certain retrenchment measures were formulated. Based on Kent Weaver's blame-avoidance thesis, Pierson's model provides a persuasive explanation for the reliance of Canadian governments on arcane changes to tax rules and indexation formulae as an instrument of retrenchment. Since each of the analyses provides at best only a partial explanation for the politics of welfare state retrenchment, the thesis proposes the scheme of an integrated approach which incorporates the explanatory power of class analysis and institutionalism.

Research by political scientists on the modern welfare state focuses on its historical development and on the emergence of distinctive welfare state regimes. Research conducted in the past decade has also been concerned with the implications for the welfare state of the recurrent crises which have afflicted western economies since the late 1970's. However, while the politics of building welfare states are now better understood, there remains little systematic study of the politics of their retrenchment, a phenomenon which has been under way for the past two decades in most advanced capitalist states. This study examines the politics of retrenchment in Canada over the period 1978 to 1993. Focusing on three categories of federal income security programmes (family benefits, retirement income programmes, and Unemployment Insurance), the thesis describes a gradual shift in programme design away from universality and toward greater selectivity. Concomitant with this development was an increasing reliance on the tax system as an instrument of social policy. Applying Gosta Esping-Andersen's analysis of welfare state regimes, the thesis contends that the cumulative effect of programme retrenchment during this period was to reinforce the liberal-residualist character of Canada's welfare state at the expense of its social democratic aspects. In an effort to explain the process of welfare state retrenchment in Canada, within and between different categories of income security programmes, the thesis tests hypotheses associated with three major approaches to the study of public policy: class analysis, institutionalism, and pluralism. The thesis concludes that retrenchment in Canada was broadly facilitated by a decline in the political power resources of labour in relation to those of business. Because of the weakness of the relevant non-class pressure groups, pluralism is of limited value in explaining retrenchment outcomes. Insights into more specific patterns of retrenchment are gained from two institutionalist perspectives. The first of these, a state-centred approach, draws attention to the larger role in social policy-making that was assumed by the Department of Finance, the chief fiscal guardian of the Federal Government. The second perspective, a rational choice theory developed by Paul Pierson, provides insight into the manner in which certain retrenchment measures were formulated. Based on Kent Weaver's blame-avoidance thesis, Pierson's model provides a persuasive explanation for the reliance of Canadian governments on arcane changes to tax rules and indexation formulae as an instrument of retrenchment. Since each of the analyses provides at best only a partial explanation for the politics of welfare state retrenchment, the thesis proposes the scheme of an integrated approach which incorporates the explanatory power of class analysis and institutionalism. / Arts, Faculty of / Political Science, Department of / Graduate