The Three Political Economies Of The Welfare State

The text focuses on the evolution of the welfare state by examining its core elements from a political economy standpoint as well as in the modern welfare state debate. As features of a welfare state, the text focuses on decommodification, social stratification, and the private-public mix.

What is the major point or question that this author is attempting to answer? The author sought to establish the underlying factors behind the development of a welfare state and whether the welfare state can alter a capitalist society.

What is the author’s main argument? That the welfare state can be described as collection of various types of regimes whose its development can be explained interactively.

What important concepts and theories are presented? The author brought up the concepts of contemporary neo-liberalism and the contributions of classical liberal political economy to study the concept of classism as an attribute of the welfare state.

What relevance does this text have to the other readings for the week, or themes presented in this course? This text expounds on the concept of women, the state and welfare, with the focus being on the role of women moving to generate historiographies of the formation of state.

Does the author discuss an explicit methodology to answer their questions? If so, what? Indeed, the author did present an all-inclusive methodology to study the development of a welfare state. The methodology involved the examining the two existing theoretical explanations namely structuralist or systemic and institutional or actor-oriented.

Does the author effectively convey their argument? What are the weaknesses of the article/chapter? What are its strengths? The author did present an effective argument with his major area of strength being the explosive materials that he collected from the many pieces of literature. Ultimately, the author managed to offer conclusive answers to the causes of welfare state development, which has been eluded by most of the past researchers. The weakness of this research, however, was its overreliance on quantitative data to analyze some of the complex issues arising from the study.

Identify 2 questions for a class discussion How have welfare states made efforts to mitigate socioeconomic inequalities in primary income dissemination?

Discuss the major characteristics of welfare regimes?