商品詳細

European welfare states are currently under stress and the 'social contracts' that underpin them are being challenged. First, welfare spending has arguably 'grown to limits' in a number of countries while expanding everywhere in the 1990s in line with higher unemployment. Second, demographic change and the emergence of new patterns of family and working life are transforming the nature of 'needs'. Third, the economic context and the policy autonomy of nation states has been transformed by 'globalization'. The book seeks to examine several dimensions of the current welfare state impasse: how we should interpret the contemporary shortfalls of European welfare states (the persistence of unemployment, poverty and social exclusion); whether and to what extent existing systems of social protection are under stress from domestic pressures; how global pressures and constraints are affecting the process of change and limiting options for reform; and finally, the problems of reforming Europe's social contract.