7. The Role of Welfare Attitudes in Welfare State Change

Conveners: Jani Erola, Mikko Niemelä

7.A. Cross-national perspectives

Edlund Jonas and Svallfors Stefan ( Umeå University, SE)
Towards one world of welfare attitudes? Convergence, generations, and the changing influence of institutional specificities

Dallinger Ursula (University of Trier, DE)
Increasing income inequalities - and public support for redistribution

Kulin Kjoakim (Umeå University, SE)
Values, support for institutionalized distributive justice principles and attitudes towards welfare state redistribution in a European context

Ervasti Heikki (University of Turku, FI)
Immigration, trust and support for the welfare state: Multilevel analysis of 22 European nations

7.B. Northern European Perspectives

Kroll Christian and Blomberg Helena (University of Helsinki, FI)
Social work-fare? Nordic social workers' views on the poor, the unemployed and workfare-related measures in social work

Goul Andersen Jorgen ( Aalborg University, DK )
Reform and resistance: Framing, persuasion and ambivalent attitudes in two Danish welfare reforms

Raven Judith and Achterberg Peter (Erasmus University Rotterdam, NL )
An institutional embeddedness of welfare opinions? The linkage between public opinion and social policy in the Netherlands (1970-2005)

van Oorschot Wim and Meuleman Bart ( Tilburg University, NL)
Welfarism and the multidimensionality of welfare state legitimacy. Evidence from The Netherlands 2006 based on Confirmatory Factor Analyses

Distributed papers

Dahlberg Matz and Edmark Karin (Uppsala University, SE)
Ethnic diversity and preferences for redistribution

Pfau-Effinger Birgit (University of Hamburg, DE )
The cultural dimension of welfare state change

Ferragina Emanuele (University of Oxford, UK)
Social capital and European regions: a possible paradigm shift?

For a number of years, attitudes have been a major field of study in the comparative welfare state literature. The researchers are increasingly aware of the relevance of citizens' attitudes for the development of the welfare states. The attitudes reflect the normative background assumptions or ideas shared by public. These sentiments constrain decision-making and institutional change by limiting or enabling the range of programmes that decision-making elites are likely to perceive as acceptable and legitimate to both their constituents and themselves. On the other hand, the type of welfare policy or the institutional architecture of the welfare state can influence citizens' attitudes and explain the cross-national variation in attitudes toward the welfare state.

This stream addresses the questions related to the causal relationship between welfare states and attitudes especially in the European context. How attitudes shape welfare states and, vice versa, how welfare states shape the normative ideas shared by the public? How do these relationships affect each other? What is the role of welfare state attitudes in changing Europe and to what extent their role differs in different institutional arrangements and/or in different countries. Does Europeanization have an impact in these processes? What kind of implications the rising social and ethnic diversity and the immigration in the New Europe have to the legitimacy of the (national) welfare state and European Social Model?

We would especially welcome contributions which combine both empirical and theoretical approaches, applying existing literature on institutional change and welfare attitudes to novel empirical applications for a better understanding the links between attitudes and policy changes. Comparative papers (i.e. analysing different policies and/or different countries) are particularly welcome.

The previous studies have shown that the variation in attitudes is linked with both cross-national  institutional differences as well as individual-level socio-economic factors, such as economic interest shared by people in similar social and economic situations. That is why the stream convenors welcome papers applying multi-level modelling techniques, combining institutional and individual-level data. In this perspective, papers which focus on the regional variation in attitudes within country are also welcomed.

Conference theme

The Annual ESPAnet Conference 2009 focuses on the future of the welfare state. More precisely it will address paths of social policy innovation highlighting existing constraints, path dependencies and opportunities of social policy change. The conference provides a forum to address theoretical and methodological questions, to reflect on inter- and multi-disciplinarity in social policy research and to discuss new analytical trends. It will also deal with changing paradigms in the concept of the welfare state and in the actual configuration of social policy innovation in Europe and beyond. Shifts in underlying basic principles will also be addressed, ideas or objectives, and factors which might drive such changes and what directions they might indicate for the future of the welfare state.

ImPORTANT DATES

15 March 2009 = deadline for abstract submission
27 April 2009 = Notification of selected abstracts
2 May 2009 = registrations open
15 Jun 2009 = Early bird registration and deadline for (some) hotel options
15 August 2009 = Deadline for paper submission
1 September 2009 = Papers online
17-19 September 2009 = Conference