A central theme in the comparative political economy of the welfare state is the complementaries between political institutions, social policy, and labour markets. Yet little has been written to uncover this political-economic nexus in China, the world’s second largest economy. This thesis partly addresses this gap by studying the country’s public pension arrangement, the most expensive component of the Chinese welfare state. It reveals the working of the political-economic nexus in contemporary China by showing how it leads to two puzzling characteristics of the Chinese pension system, namely the rapid expansion in the absence of electoral pressures and the persistent regional fragmentation despite an authoritarian central government. It argues that the decentralised authoritarianism, in which China’s authoritarian central state delegates to regional governments and motivates them to achieve its developmental goals, drives municipal authorities to compete with each other in generating economic growth. In the inter-municipal economic competition, local leaders adopt an expansionary yet localising pension policy. This facilitates the formation of specific industrial skills, which are productive for particular local industries, and the retention of skilled industrial workers. All of this is important to local economic development in a context of industrial upgrading and labour market tightening. It is argued this is the political-economic logic of China’s pension system.

Zugl.: Heidelberg, Univ., Diss.

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2016-10-06T18:15:13Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tiagorattesdeandrade.pdf: 501169 bytes, checksum: b22e93b41450624676880cc6121651f7 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2016-10-07T12:16:13Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 tiagorattesdeandrade.pdf: 501169 bytes, checksum: b22e93b41450624676880cc6121651f7 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-10-07T12:16:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 tiagorattesdeandrade.pdf: 501169 bytes, checksum: b22e93b41450624676880cc6121651f7 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-10-14 / O presente trabalho tem como primeiro objetivo analisar as transformações históricas da política de Assistência Social no Brasil desde a década de 1930, quando se estrutura no Brasil um particular regime de welfare state. Em decorrência de uma série de lutas políticas e transformações institucionais um novo modelo de assistência emerge com a constituição de 1988 e ganha regulamentação com a Lei Orgânica de Assistência Social de 1993. Dessas transformações inicia-se a partir de 2003 a criação e implantação do Sistema Único de Assistência Social no Brasil. O segundo objetivo deste trabalho é analisar o processo de implantação deste sistema no município de Juiz de Fora – MG. Para isso foram analisados estudos pré-existentes acerca da rede social do município e foi realizado um estudo de caso, através da analise de atas das reuniões do Conselho Municipal de Assistência Social e de um conjunto de entrevistas em profundidade com atores envolvidos neste processo a fim de analisar os desafios colocados para realização desta tarefa. / This dissertation wants to analyze the historic transformations of social works policy in Brasil since 1930, when is structured a unique system of welfare state. Due to a series of political struggles and institutional changes after 1988 Constitution and Social Work Organic Law regulation, in 1993, a new model of Social Assistance born. These changes will effectively start in 2003 with the creation and implementation of Social Assistance Unic System, called SUAS, in Brazil. Besides that, this dissertation analyzes the implementation of this system in a city, Juiz de Fora. Were analyzed the pre-existing knowledge of the social network in the city and performed a case study through the analysis of minutes of meetings of the Municipal Social Welfare and a set of deep interviews with actors involved in this process in order examine the challenges to this task.

The EU is faced with problems related to the unrestricted access to national welfare states of mobile EU workers. These problems are mainly framed by the growing opposition to the free movement of workers. The strongest contributing factor to these negative attitudes has commonly said to be actor-based, i.e. the media or political elites. However, more recent research has been shifting the focus to institutions as explanatory factor. I raise the question of to what extent individuals’ attitudes towards the free movement of workers are associated with their exposure to different welfare state institutional contexts. More specifically I explore the role of “earnings-relatedness” in specific social insurances for the attitudes of potential benefit claimants. Analyzing 12 EU/EFTA countries who are net receivers of mobile EU workers I find that in welfare state contexts with a high degree of earnings-relatedness the opposition to free movement is significantly lower than otherwise among the unemployed. Furthermore, I discover that these observations seem to vary depending on what part of the social insurance system one is analyzing.

The aim of this dissertation is to shed light on how life can turn out for individuals with long term social assistance and afterwards when it has ceased. The primary objective of the dissertation is to study the changes that have occurred during the life course and the impact of those changes on the life course at large. A key question of this dissertation is the development of selfsufficiency and work-life patterns in a longitudinal perspective. The dissertation consists of a longitudinal study based on qualitative interviews with an interval of 20 years. The empirical data is composed of interviews with 11 recipients of social assistance – seven of which have been interviewed again in 2008/2009. A life course perspective is employed in the data analysis as a comprehensive approach and analytical tool. Other analytical approaches are related to the impact of the welfare state on the life course and to the term marginality. The situation of the interviewed group regarding self-sufficiency, employment and social conditions is viewed from a one-year perspective, a 20- year perspective and a life course perspective. The different time perspectives generated widely diverse pictures and nowledge. Not everyone worked at the point of the last interview but all were in a better social and economical position. No one remained on social assistance. One conclusion is that the notion of social problems being reinforced and exacerbated over time is simplistic. Another conclusion is that it appears that social assistance and social services have little importance from a life course perspective. A concluding result is that cross-sectional studies of individuals in a vulnerable situation are of limited value. A brief look at a person’s life does not say much of what the rest of his or her life will look like. Keywords: Life course, long term social assistance, social welfare services, human agency, timing, social integration, notions of social problems, welfare state, marginality.

Despite considerable research efforts, the relationship between inequality and demand for redistribution remains a highly contested topic within comparative political economy. This paper argues that a central yet widely overlooked mechanism linking macro-level income inequality to preferences for redistribution has to with the micro-level implications of certain externalities of inequality. Focusing on fear of crime, as one such externality, I argue that because (i) in- equality and crime are positively related, and (ii) because crime and fear of crime have a negative effect in individual utility, it follows that increasing in- equality should have a positive effect on support for redistribution. Importantly, however, the argument of this paper also recognises that redistribution is but one of several means through which a concern about crime can be addressed, with the most relevant alternatives being increased policing and harsher punitive measures. Drawing on literatures in criminology and political sociology, I theorise that a key determinant of this choice | between redistribution and policing/punishment as alternative approaches to dealing with crime | is the level of ethnic heterogeneity in the population. Taken together, therefore, this paper's argument implies that inequality will have differential effects on support for redistribution in different contexts: in cases where the population is homogenous, fear of crime - and by consequence inequality - will boost demand for redistribution, whilst no such effects will follow in contexts of high heterogeneity. Using a two-step statistical methodology, I analyse Eurobarometer and ESS data from 21 OECD countries and find persuasive empirical support for my theoretical expectations. Fear of crime is more strongly associated to support for redistribution when the level of population heterogeneity remains low, whilst the opposite holds true for the relationship between fear of crime and support for policing and punishment.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the causes of welfare state expansion, specifically the causes of welfare state expenditure of active labor market policy (ALMP). ALMP aims at reducing unemployment and increasing participation in the labor market. The field of political economy has long asked the question of why certain welfare states are characterized by generous social policy, while others are not. Several theories have been presented over the years, each providing new perspectives. The two theories that could be considered to be the most prominent are the Power Resource Theory, which centers on the importance of power resources of major classes, and the Varieties of Capitalism, which is more focused on the different needs of capitalists.The specific interest of this paper is the varying orientations of ALMP. It is argued that ALMP should not be understood as a homogenous concept, but instead as a category of policy which consists of a range of tools from which a government can choose. Analyzing the expenditure of these tools separately is thus of great importance for the development of a deeper understanding of the welfare state.Using regression analysis, I analyze which of the theories mentioned above is most strongly correlated to increased expenditure of ALMP. I use a total expenditure of ALMP, as is customary within the field, but I also include two other measures for specific tools of ALMP; incentive reinforcement programs and training programs.The results indicate that when looking at the total expenditure of ALMP the VoC approach appears to better explain the cause of welfare state expenditure. However, when including the measures for the specific tools of ALMP, the classic notion of VoC is confirmed only regarding incentive reinforcement programs, and contradicted regarding training programs. Moreover, the classic notion of PRT is confirmed regarding the expenditure of training programs, albeit with quite limited evidence. Also, the classic notion within PRT finds little support in the analysis of total expenditure of ALMP and the expenditure of incentive reinforcement programs. Only making a distinction between large and small welfare states is thus argued to be a simplification. Welfare states with similar levels of social expenditure might in fact differ significantly regarding actual policy preference.It is concluded that the continued disaggregation of ALMP is necessary in order to further the research field. Acknowledging the highly heterogeneous nature of ALMP is essential when understanding its expenditure.

Unter all den denkbaren Effekten von Sozialpolitik auf Politik untersuche ich hier die Möglichkeit, dass Sozialpolitik den Handlungsspielraum von Politik absichert; dass Sozialpolitik Erfolgsvoraussetzung von Politik ist. Es geht also um die Frage, in welcher Weise staatliche Sozialpolitik eine Voraussetzung für Politik ist, um die Frage der sozialpolitischen Selbstermöglichung von Politik. Solch ein Zugang muß den gewohnten Blick auf Staat und Sozialpolitik irritieren. Denn üblicherweise werden sozialpolitische Verpflichtungen des Staates als Beeinträchtigung, als Überforderung staatlicher Handlungsfähigkeit gesehen. Zuerst werde ich kurz auf die Entwicklung des sozialwissenschaftlichen Verständnisses der gesellschaftlichen Bedingtheit staatlicher Politik eingehen. Dann werde ich ein grundsätzliches Dilemma staatlicher Steuerung darstellen. Anschließend werde ich dieses anhand der aktuellen Schwierigkeiten mehrerer politischer Großprojekte veranschaulichen. Dann werde ich nach einem Theoriemuster zur Interpretation dieser Schwierigkeiten suchen, mit dem sich zeigen läßt, wie Sozialpolitik einpassbar ist. Und schließlich werde ich Konsequenzen diskutieren, die sich aus der Integration von Sozialpolitik in eine soziologische Theorie der Gesellschaft ergeben.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Does ethnic fragmentation negatively affect social expenditure? In this thesis, I examine why this research question, only partially tackled by the political economy literature, is also central for the social policy field. Using a sample of 156 countries, and controlling for variables that social policy theory postulate as essential to explain welfare provision, I offer evidence that higher levels of ethnic fragmentation lead to lower levels of social expenditure. On that basis, I present a theoretical framework that explores how this relationship can be explained. Ethnic fragmentation is presented as a variable that complicates the development of social solidarity and the notions of shared identity, and shifts social mobilisation from issues of economic redistribution towards ethno-cultural recognition. I also conduct a second series of statistical analysis that show that there is evidence to support the previous propositions. Additionally, using a different confirmatory test, I explore the correspondence between the levels of de-commodification that 18 welfare states provide, and the principles of blood descent (jus sanguinis) or civic ties (jus solis) that their respective national laws favour. The findings show that the welfare regimes with the most de-commodifying provision tend to favour ethno-cultural principles. Finally, I emphasize that the probable effects of ethnic fragmentation in an increasingly multicultural world, with its tendencies to put social integration and differentiation issues back on the agenda, are not a prediction of erosion of the welfare state, but an important element to take into account in the creation and robustness of shared identities and notions of common belonging when designing social policy.