We hope that the following book will be of interest to your
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Transformation of the Welfare State:
The Silent Surrender of Public Responsibility
NEIL GILBERT
$29.95, Oxford University Press
0195140745
Since the early 1970s, debate has raged over the "crisis
of the welfare state." As the United States successfully exported
its bootstrap brand of capitalism and an ever-broadening range
ofpublic activity came to be viewed through the prism of profit and
loss, suspicion of social welfare policies increased worldwide.
Welfare was no longer a means to remedy the inherent and
inescapable flaws of capitalism, but rather was recast as part of
the very problem it was designed to solve. At the same time, the
glaring systemic deficiencies of extant welfare systems--and the
psychological toll of welfare dependency--became increasingly
apparent, even to welfare's supporters.
How much has really changed in the world of welfare? A great
deal, according to Neil Gilbert, one of our most deeply engaged
and thoughtful analysts of social welfare policy. In this panoramic
inquiry, Gilbert spans the globe to assess, in provocative yet
dispassionate fashion, what welfare looks like in a free market
world. From Sweden to New Zealand, in Germany and England
and throughout Europe, Gilbert finds a fundamental transformation
in the welfare state--a turn away from broad-based entitlements
and automatic benefits to a new, "enabling" approach defined by
policies that encourage private activity and selective support
based on income and behavior. He provides tangible evidence of
how these new systems promote work and responsibility over
protection and how they thicken the glue of civil society by
diluting the pervasive role of government. Translating the new
language of solidarity, activation, and social inclusion that has
accompanied these changes, Gilbert reveals surprisingly
broad-based support for the shifts. Traditional welfare supporters
on the Left are implementing reforms long associated with the
policy agenda of the Right.
Gilbert concludes with policy recommendations intended to temper
thr harder, unforgiving edges of this new social protection
mentality with pragmatic assistance for those left behind.
Illuminating a fundamental shift in the design of modern welfare
systems, this landmark work is a must-read for anyone concerned
with social policy today.
"An age of watersheds is the age for grand
syntheses: Newpolitics of the welfare state, three worlds of
welfare capitalism, transformation of the welfare state, limits to
globalization. Neil Gilbert's 'enabling state' contributes superbly to
this OECD-wide discussion. Promoting work, subsidizing private
activity as well as share-holder claims on private markets, and
targeting benefits - this is Gilbert's common Western core of the
new market-oriented social policies." --Stephan Leibfried,
Professor of Social Policy,
University of Bremen, Germany
New and recent titles of related interest:
Sociology & Social Work
Political Science
Neil Gilbert is Chernin Professor of Social Welfare
and Social
Service at the University of California, Berkeley. His
publications
include: The Enabling State: Modern Welfare
Capitalism in
America and, most recently, Welfare Justice:
Restoring Social
Equity.
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