The social question and the welfare state in the modern world-system (Great Britain, Germany, Sweden, United States)

The dissertation focused on the rise and current crisis of the welfare state. One condition widely believed to have been essential to the rise of the welfare state is proletarianization. This work agrees that the welfare state required the existence of a substantial proletariat separated from the ownership of the means of production as well as dependency on wages and salaries. It is not by accident that the welfare state is in large part essentially a core and semi-periphery phenomenon. Peripheral areas with a substantial reliance on subsistence production were theoretically less suitable.; Although this work shares the thesis that proletarianization has been a crucial condition, this work pointed to the historical paradox that despite its unsurpassed extent of proletarianization during the 19th century, and in addition being the driving force in generalizing the factory structure, Great Britain, the most advanced capitalist country nevertheless, failed to point the way to the modern welfare state.; An important question raised in the dissertation is why Great Britain, despite these features failed to initiate the development of the welfare state model and why it was Germany together with the Nordic countries which took the lead instead?; Welfare institutions were characteristically a feature of high income core and semiperipheral areas. As long as economic expansion increased while economic growth and employment were kept low, the welfare state had a secure place in high income areas. The economic downturn which started in the 1960s, the restructuring of industries to low income areas, and the resulting rise of unemployment affected the welfare state of the core and semi-periphery. As a result, the post-war welfare consensus weakened during the 1970s. Western democratic governments were suffering under the burden of overload.; There were generally two answers to the challenge the welfare state faced during the world-economic decline after 1967/73. On the one hand, there were those areas—e.g. Great Britain and the U.S.—where attempts were made to substantially roll-back the welfare state. Other areas—e.g. Sweden and Germany—held on to the welfare state. Great Britain not only experienced an economic crisis but also suffered from the disappearance of its hegemonic remnants. The effects of this decline were severe. Thatcherism, joined by Reaganism were the most significant core states to retreat from the trilateral coalition between business enterprise, the state, and labor. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...