Welfare and the Great Recession: A Comparative Study
Stefán Ólafsson, Mary Daly, Olli Kangas, and Joakim Palme
Abstract
This book surveys and analyses the welfare consequences of the Great Recession in Europe and investigates how the burdens of the crisis were shared—between countries, between different socio-economic groups across Europe, and within individual countries. The studies are based on broad comparisons of 30 countries and deeper analyses of 9 country cases. The approach is grounded in classical theories about crisis responses and relates financial hardship to institutional characteristics—such as welfare regimes, currency regimes, socio-political patterns, affluence levels, public debt, and policy r ... More
This book surveys and analyses the welfare consequences of the Great Recession in Europe and investigates how the burdens of the crisis were shared—between countries, between different socio-economic groups across Europe, and within individual countries. The studies are based on broad comparisons of 30 countries and deeper analyses of 9 country cases. The approach is grounded in classical theories about crisis responses and relates financial hardship to institutional characteristics—such as welfare regimes, currency regimes, socio-political patterns, affluence levels, public debt, and policy reactions during the crisis period—for example, stimulus versus austerity, the degree of social protection emphasis, the commitment to redistribution, and the significance of activation. Welfare and the Great Recession offers new evidence on and demonstrates the importance of the welfare state and government policies with regard to sheltering populations from the level of living consequences of serious economic contraction and distributing burdens in a crisis situation. The book offers various lessons from the crisis experience in Europe and ends with a discussion about welfare futures in a globalized, crisis-prone environment.
Keywords:
welfare,
recession,
distributing burdens,
policies,
lessons
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2019 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780198830962 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: February 2019 |
DOI:10.1093/oso/9780198830962.001.0001 |
Authors
Affiliations are at time of print publication.
Stefán Ólafsson, editor
Professor of Sociology, The University of Iceland
Mary Daly, editor
Professor of Sociology and Social Policy, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford, UK
Olli Kangas, editor
Professor of Practice, University of Turku, Finland
Joakim Palme, editor
Professor of Political Science, University of Uppsala, Sweden
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