Journal of European Social Policy

http://esp.sagepub.com

Sustaining State Welfare in Hard Times: Who Will Foot the Bill?
Peter Taylor-Gooby
Journal of European Social Policy 2001; 11; 133
DOI: 10.1177/095892870101100203

The online version of this article can be found at:

http://esp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/11/2/133

Published by:

http://www.sagepublications.com

Additional services and information for Journal of European Social Policy can be found at:

Email Alerts: http://esp.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts

Subscriptions: http://esp.sagepub.com/subscriptions

Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav

Permissions: http://www.sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav

Citations http://esp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/refs/11/2/133

Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009

 ARTICLE
Sustaining state welfare in hard times: who will foot the bill?
Peter Taylor-Gooby, University of Kent, UK
Summary
Recent studies of how European welfare
systems are responding to current pressures
agree that welfare states display remarkable
resilience. They are being reformed rather
than dismantled. New policies are concerned
to contain costs and to promote activation,
stressing the contribution of welfare to eco-
nomic competitiveness. Will people support
cost constraint? This paper analyses attitude
survey data from the 1980s and 1990s to
show that approval of the main welfare serv-
ices is high, but, in contrast to the findings of
earlier studies, there is now some evidence of
declining support. Attitudes are not structured
according to the accounts of the new politics
of welfare (which imply that each regime will
produce its own pattern of interests in relation
to the groups whose interests are entrenched
by current arrangements) but reflect broad
lines of income, age and gender, cross-cutting
national differences. There is little support for
cuts in social services, but an equally low level
of willingness to pay the extra taxes and social
contributions required to maintain current
standards of provision in the face of rising
pressures on welfare. An agenda of activation
is likely to prove more acceptable politically
than one of cost constraint in all regimes. The
implication is that European welfare states
face a straitened future, between increasing
demands and constrained resources, which
may lead public opinion support to dwindle
further.
Key words
attitudes, politics of welfare, retrenchment,
welfare state reform
Journal of European Social Policy 0958-9287 (200105)11:2 Copyright 2001 SAGE Publications, London, Thousand
Oaks and New Delhi, Vol 11 (2): 133147; 017012
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
Rsum
Les tudes rcentes sur la manire dont les
Etats Providence rpondent aux pressions
actuelles ont en commun quelles aboutissent
constater que ceux-ci font montre dune
remarquable rsistance. Ils sont en train dtre
non pas dmantels mais bien plus dtre
rforms. Les nouvelles politiques se concen-
trent sur la limitation des cots et lactivation
ainsi que sur la mise en vidence de lapport
de la protection sociale la comptitivit
conomique. Est-ce quil existe un appui
cette limitation des cots? Cet article analyse
les donnes denqutes dopinion des annes
1980 et 1990. Il montre que lapprobation
envers les principaux services est leve mais
contrairement aux rsultats dtudes
antrieures il existe quelques signes dun
dclin de cet appui. Les attitudes ne sont pas
distribues tels que prvues par les tenants des
nouvelles politiques du Welfare (selon
lesquels chaque rgime produit sa propre
structure dintrts lis aux groupes dont les
intrts sont consolids par les arrangements
en vigueur) mais refltent les diffrences de
revenus, dge et de genre, de nationalits.
Il ny a que peu dappui pour des coupes
dans les services mais galement pour payer
des taxes ou des contributions supplmen-
taires afin de maintenir les niveaux atteints
face aux pressions croissantes. Un agenda
dactivation est plus acceptable politiquement
dans tous les rgimes quune de rduction des
cots. Limplication est que les systmes de
protection sociale europens se trouvent
coincs. entre des demandes croissantes et des
rductions supplmentaires des cots; ce qui
peut conduire une nouvelle diminution du
soutien de lopinion publique.
134 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
Welfare under altered circumstances
The European welfare state provides a distinc-
tive solution to the problem of securing social
integration within competitive capitalism. It
developed during the three decades of secure
growth following the Second World War. The
stability and sustainability of the welfare set-
tlement now face major challenges as the labour
market and family structures which it was
designed to support undergo rapid change, as
increasing numbers of older people confi-
dently expect better pensions, health and social
care; as globalization undermines the author-
ity of the national state; and as the parallel
expansion of the EU creates an increasingly
unified and competitive market in Western
Europe with further prospects of expansion to
the East and around the Mediterranean basin.
It is likely that the cost of sustaining current
levels of provision, let alone achieving the
improvements that many people accept as
normal in the market sector of the economy,
will rise. This paper discusses the implications
of welfare values for the future development
of European social provision, using as evidence
surveys of public attitudes which reflect those
values. Public opinion is generally supportive
of state welfare in principle. However, attitudes
may be moving against state welfare in the
1990s. When questions about the finance of
services are examined, citizens are equivocal
in their endorsement of higher taxes and con-
tributions. This raises questions about the well-
documented public support for state welfare.
As the cost of maintaining pensions and health
care rises, will citizens be happy to foot the bill?
We review recent developments and analyse
attitude survey data in the light of theories
about the new (and old) politics of welfare.
Recent developments in welfare states
Resilience
The current problems of state welfare attract
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
much attention. Analysis supports three main
points. First, despite the concerns of the 1980s
and early 1990s, the European welfare state is
resilient in its response to current pressures. It
is not contracting, nor is it obsolete. Indeed
the clear and sober message is that survival
is possible and likely and desirable, as
Kuhnle concludes his study of the 1990s in
Europe (2000a: 237). Similarly Beck and col-
leagues stress the essential value and viability
of the European solution to the problem of
achieving a measure of social justice within a
capitalist market system (Beck et al., 1998).
Ferrera and Rhodes also conclude from the
work of the 1999 European University Institute
Forum, Recasting the European Welfare State,
that the welfare state is a largely successful
solution to the problem of reconciling growth
with social cohesion (Ferrera and Rhodes,
2000: 279). The evidence that state provision
is maintained or expanded is typically rein-
forced with evidence of public approval from
attitude surveys (see for example, Pierson,
1996: 162, 165; Rhodes, 1996: 308; Ross,
2000: Footnote 39; van Kersbergen, 2000:
23). However, almost all the surveys cited
analyse data from the 1980s and early 1990s
and do not cover recent developments.
Second, resilience is often driven by the
entrenched interests of particular groups who
are advantaged by current arrangements. As
Pierson (1994) puts it the welfare state now
represents the status quo. Governments find
it electorally unsatisfying to confront citizens
with cuts in valued services. The risk is that,
as Esping-Andersen concludes in a recent
major study, current arrangements lead to
median voter support for anachronistic
modes of welfare production (1999: 184).
Welfare policy making must proceed by indi-
rection, and by achieving systematic reforms
which reduce the capacity of particular inter-
ests to mobilize the defence of existing policies
(see, for example, Freeman and Moran, 2000;
Goul Andersen, 2000; Merrien and Bonoli,
2000; Palier, 2000).
This approach produces a more sophisti-
cated account of resilience since it implies that
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E
the mechanisms of resilience differ in different
contexts. Differences in the nature of welfare
provision and in the extent to which different
interests are able to exert an influence lead to
differing reform agendas, although welfare
states are confronted with broadly similar
pressures. For example, Fritz Scharpf con-
cludes a major analysis of the impact of glob-
alization on welfare systems: while there is no
reason to think that economic viability should
be incompatible with [welfare] aspirations,
still welfare states differ greatly in their vul-
nerability to international economic pressures
in the specific problems they need to
address and in the policy options that they
could reach under the constraints of existing
policy legacies and the institutional con-
straints of existing veto positions (1999:
389).
Third, current reforms and restructurings
do not involve convergence but include com-
mon themes of cost control and activation.
For example, Jens Alber and Guy Standing
report from a major study of social dumping
that there was neither convergence in the
sense of catch-up processes, nor polarisation
in recent years although at best we can iden-
tify certain regional clusters (Alber and
Standing, 2000: 107, 112; see also Daly,
1997). Although welfare states do not march
in step down the same highway, there are a
number of common trends. The European
Commissions official biennial report sums
these up under two general headings cost
containment and activating policy to reduce
the number of people dependent on social
transfers (CEC, 1998: 19). Ferrera and
Rhodes decompose these: cost control
involves adjustments in response to socio-
demographic developments, mainly in pen-
sions and health care, and also a trend to
more accurate targeting of resources on those
in need. Activation policies include the general
shift from a passive to an active approach in
the management of unemployment and the
modification of financial arrangements to
promote competitiveness by containing labour
costs (2000: 47). Kuhnle (2000a: 2345) and
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
IN HARD TIMES 135
others identify similar developments. It is
worth noting two trends conspicuous by their
absence: although the virtues of greater indi-
vidual responsibility are commonly endorsed
there is no overall transfer of provision to the
private sector (except in isolated instances
where the market already plays a major role,
such as UK pensions policy), although policies
to provide incentives for private provision are
developing in a number of countries; nor to
the family, although welfare state support for
social care varies greatly. Private pensions may
play a more important role at some stage in
the future as policies to encourage their
expansion have a greater impact, but state
provision is currently of very much greater
importance in almost all European countries.
These points add up to the suggestion that
welfare systems are successful in adjusting to a
changed environment in ways that reflect dif-
ferences in their current structure and organi-
zation, and the political and cultural
characteristics of the national context in
which they developed. Welfare is being recali-
brated, recast, is in transition, restructur-
ing, evolving or being modified, as recent
titles suggest. The welfare state in Europe is
doing well under difficult circumstances.
However, most commentators agree that the
political processes that drive current reforms
differ from those that underlay the earlier
growth of state welfare. Will social values set
limits to successful adaptation?
The new politics of welfare
A number of approaches suggest that support
for the welfare state will decline, whether as a
result of increasing affluence (Inglehart,
1997), a transition to a post-Fordist politi-
cal economy (Jessop, 2000), sharper social
divisions (Galbraith 1993; Wilensky, 1975)
or new patterns of experience and social
interests reinforced by greater individual self-
confidence (Beck et al., 1994; Giddens, 1994;
2000). Such theories do not appear to give a
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
136 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
Table 1 Welfare cleavages in particular regimes
Social Democratic (Sweden)
Conservative/Corporatist (Germany)
Liberal (UK)
satisfactory account of resilience, which is the
focus of the current paper (for a full discus-
sion, see Bonoli et al., 2000: Ch. 4). They tend
to refer to holistic social change affecting all
of society (post-materialism, post-Fordism,
affluence, globalization or social reflexivity).
The new politics approach (Pierson, 1994)
stresses the part played by different interests
in changing social contexts. Since these inter-
ests may conflict with each other, but have a
primary defensive orientation, the new politics
is distinct both from the traditional politics of
growth, in which all interests can be satisfied
as the welfare state expands, and the neo-
liberal politics of cuts and marketization,
which confronts welfare directly but offers
voters lower taxes (see Ross, 2000: 1518).
The key point is that any attempt to dismantle
the welfare state confronts entrenched inter-
ests and will therefore provoke unpopularity,
so governments which wish to contain spend-
ing must act indirectly. Welfare systems
display path-dependency (Hall and Taylor,
1996; Immergut, 1998): all things being equal,
current arrangements, by the very fact of their
existence, inhibit change. They resist cutbacks,
but also run the risk of becoming increasingly
inappropriate to new needs as they develop.
This leads to a structured diversity in
response to similar pressures, since different
welfare systems entrench different interests
and offer different degrees of openness to
emergent demands for provision and services.
The new politics approach thus identifies dif-
ferent social interests as relevant in the era of
welfare retrenchment from those that domi-
nated expansion. As welfare systems grew, the
basic conflicts were between those who
believed they would have to pay and those
who believed they would be net gainers. Thus
welfare politics was structured on class lines,
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
Market position Gender State sector Insider/outsider
X X
X X
X
or between political Right and Left, and the
realization by the middle class that horizontal
redistribution enabled better-off groups to
gain greater security from state welfare was a
pivotal development in assembling a mass
constituency in support of social spending
(Baldwin, 1990).
Conflicts about retrenchment are seen to
relate more finely to the detail of welfare state
design. To simplify a complex debate (see
Esping-Andersen, 1990; 1996; 1999; Pierson,
1996), the social democratic regime with its
large state sector offering substantial job
opportunities to women risks conflicts in rela-
tion to gender and sector, but not so much in
relation to market position, since it is univer-
salistic and inclusive; the market-based liberal
regime involves conflict between those who
are strong or weak in the market, but is indif-
ferent to gender and labour market position,
and has a small state sector; the conservative
corporatist regime generates conflict between
labour market insiders and outsiders and
also on lines of gender, but market and sector
conflicts are secondary. The pattern is summa-
rized in Table 1, although since individual
welfare states do not conform exactly to a
particular regime type the role played by par-
ticular cleavages in practice is likely to be a
matter of degree rather than of absolute dis-
tinction.
Policy making and value-frameworks:
cultures of welfare
Policy-making structures operate within cul-
tural frameworks which associate particular
values with state, market, occupational and
family welfare. Three core values are identi-
fied as important in relation to European
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E
welfare traditions broadly corresponding to
Esping-Andersens three worlds (1990) citi-
zenship, need and desert. The first implies a
value-commitment to state universalism at a
generous level, designed to promote an inte-
grative social equality and summed up in the
Swedish concept of state welfare as providing
the peoples home. This approach is most
clearly expressed in Nordic welfare states. It
does not imply that generous support is avail-
able on request, but is linked to the belief that
social inclusion also implies a contribution to
society, typically through paid work. The
work line has become stronger in recent years
(Eitrheim and Kuhnle, 2000; Kosonen, 2000).
The second approach is the contrary, the
liberal market ideology of welfare state mini-
malism with the assumption that benefits will
only be provided at subsistence level for those
unable to survive in the market. The morality
of independence from state welfare is strongly
enforced. Such values are most clearly
expressed in the Anglo-Saxon model, found in
Europe in the Irish and UK systems. The
approach reinforces a work ethic by a differ-
ent route, since work and private property are
more legitimate bases for a claim on resources
than need, and welfare must be organized to
reinforce work incentives.
The third value-orientation is associated
with the Catholic/Christian Democrat princi-
ple of subsidiarity (Spicker, 1991). Needs
should be met at the appropriate level by the
appropriate agency, and sources of support
are conceived in a hierarchy of family, firm
and state. The more distant institutions are
only appropriate when those closest to the
individual cannot meet needs. This principle
influences the European Christian Democrat
approach which links welfare to family and
occupational systems in Germany, Italy,
Switzerland and to some extent France and
Spain (van Kersbergen, 1995). In practice,
social insurance has become the most impor-
tant system for meeting welfare needs, so that
work and welfare are linked, again by a differ-
ent route, since it is a work-based contribu-
tion record that guarantees entitlement.
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
IN HARD TIMES 137
The expected contribution of worker-
citizens in Nordic countries, the limits on
benefits in a context where welfare must not
conflict with the labour market in Anglo-
Saxon countries and the work-linked sub-
sidiarity of corporatist welfare ensure that
work legitimates entitlement everywhere. The
importance of the family ethic varies, with
corporatist Christian Democrat and
Mediterranean countries displaying more
familism than universalist Nordic countries
and with the Anglo-Saxon countries in an
intermediate position. The implication is that,
of the two main policy directions in welfare
state reform identified earlier, activation
towards a more competitive and work-linked
structure can find a ready correspondence
with welfare values across different types of
country. However, cost containment as a strat-
egy involves rather different issues in different
welfare states. In social democratic countries,
it may provoke concerns about the adequacy
of more meagre provision, in Christian
Democrat countries where there are strong
associations between status and receipt it may
conflict with the expectations that groups
regard as legitimate. Only within the Anglo-
Saxon market ethos with its limited assump-
tions about entitlement is it likely to gain an
accepted place on the agenda.
This may go some way to explaining recent
policy developments: attempts to cut back
provision generally meet with more serious
(and usually effective) opposition than do
measures to activate benefits for unemployed
people (Bonoli et al., 2000: Ch. 2). For
example, the 1999 pension reform in
Germany generated a major party controversy
in the run-up to the 1998 election which
marked the end of the tradition of consensus
pension policy making, and was one of the
factors associated with the Kohl defeat. The
stricter requirements for availability for work
in the 1993 Federal Assistance Act and the
benefit cuts in the 1996 Unemployment
Assistance Reform Act were opposed by social
democrats, but provoked less controversy and
the bulk of the shift towards workfare
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
138 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
remains untouched. The Nordic countries
have overcome the crisis of the early 1990s
with welfare state institutions and pro-
grammes largely intact (Kuhnle, 2000b: 225).
The main change is the stricter imposition of
the work line (Eitrheim and Kuhnle, 2000:
56). Only in the UK, with its distinctive elec-
toral system which gives exceptional power to
the party of government, do reforms in both
directions proceed. The New Labour
Government has made no move to reinstate
unemployment benefit (abolished under the
previous Government), but has instead estab-
lished a major workfare/trainfare programme.
At the same time the project of privatization
of the bulk of pension provision (initiated
under Thatcher) continues, with some modifi-
cations to protect poorer groups.
Values: the evidence of attitude
surveys
The accounts reviewed above in the three
areas of welfare resilience, new politics and
underlying social values offer good opportuni-
ties for the investigation of social attitudes to
welfare. Are attitudes structured as the theo-
ries of new politics and entrenched interests
imply? Do they endorse or contradict the
main themes in accounts of welfare state
recalibration?
Attitude survey data suffers from a number
of shortcomings and is used here in the
absence of other convenient ways of accessing
what people in different European welfare
states think about the future of welfare. The
results from different studies in different
national contexts and in the same country
over time show consistent patterns rather than
random fluctuations. It is thus reasonable to
assume that something which has a relation-
ship to social values is being measured (Evans,
1996: 202). The chief problems lie in three
areas.
First, the logic of the method as it is typi-
cally employed assumes summative democ-
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
racy that social attitudes are simply the sum
of individual attitudes. Social psychological
theories indicate that the processes which
produce collective attitudes are far more
complex than this implies. Second, there are
issues of technique. The pre-structured ques-
tions typically employed of necessity embody
a weak reflection of any individuals ideas. In
particular they do not take into account
reality as it faces policymakers (extra welfare
involves extra spending); and citizens (policies
are typically bundled together in party plat-
forms, so that individuals cannot make sepa-
rate electoral judgements on each). Third,
while scholars may think in terms of an
abstract welfare state, most people have
separate and possibly inconsistent views on
different services and benefits and on the
tax necessary to pay for them. The notion
of an attitude to the welfare state, as opposed
to attitudes to pensions, unemployment
insurance or assistance, itself requires investi-
gation.
In this paper we use the International Social
Survey Project (ISSP), a major multi-country
omnibus attitude survey with the advantage
that modules are repeated at five-year inter-
vals. Analysis includes the 1996 module which
was not available to the earlier, most fre-
quently quoted studies (Evans, 1996; Ferrera,
1993; Kaase and Newton, 1995; Papadakis
and Bean, 1993; Pettersen, 1995; Roller,
1995; Svallfors, 1997; Svallfors and Taylor-
Gooby, 1999). The research focuses on
Germany, Sweden and the UK, chosen as
examples of the value-frameworks discussed
earlier and because they have been used to
represent Esping-Andersens influential regime
types in Western Europe. Regimes are, of
course, ideal types, intended to capture the
big picture (Esping Andersen, 1990: 2) and
not nations with specific histories. Welfare
provision in all three countries (as elsewhere
in Europe) received severe but different shocks
during the period reviewed in Germany
associated with the costs and pressures of
reunification, in Sweden with the economic
crisis and devaluation in 1992, and in the
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E IN HARD TIMES 139

Table 2 Support for state welfare, 198596 (ISSP, %)

It is the states Germany Sweden UK
responsibility to provide: Definitely Probably Definitely Probably Definitely Probably
A decent standard of
living for the old
1985 56a 41 79 20
1990 62 37 79 20
1996 53 44 69 29 71 26
Health care for the sick
1985 54a 44 86 13
1990 64 36 85 15
1996 56 42 71 25 82 17
A decent standard of
living for the unemployed
1985 24a 62 45 41
1990 28 55 32 48
1996 24 60 52 38 28 49
And to reduce income
differences between rich
and poor
1985 26a 38 44 24
1990 29 40 42 32
1996 32 37 43 28 35 33
Note: a Former West Germany only.

UK from the crisis and effective devaluation
consequent on exit from EMU in 1992. These
and other factors influenced welfare debates.
Nonetheless, the broad framework of provi-
sion remains representative of corporatist,
universal citizenship and liberal-leaning
approaches respectively. This justifies the
examination of attitudes in these countries as
a guide to welfare values in the range of West
European settings.
Resilience
Attitude surveys have investigated two general
aspects of attitudes to welfare: attitudes to
state responsibility in the main areas of provi-
sion, and attitudes to redistribution. There is
considerable agreement across the main
studies on three points. First, there is general
support for the main areas of state provision.
Second, support for areas of state provision
which most people use (pensions, health
care) is stronger than support for provision
for minorities such as unemployment benefits
(whether because such benefits are less legiti-
mate, or because they command a weaker
constituency of self-interest). Support for
direct redistribution between better-off and
worse-off groups is also weaker. Third, there
are clear national variations Swedish social
democracy and the liberal UK are much
keener on state provision than Germany.
Possibly, UK enthusiasm is a response to weak
provision and Germanys growing coolness
reflects the costs of reunification.
Table 2 gives the proportion who definitely
support state provision in a range of areas
from 1985 (for Germany and the UK) to
1996. The pattern contrasts with that of other
studies which typically aggregate the view that
provision is definitely the states responsibility
with the view that it is probably the states
responsibility, to provide a combined measure
of support (which may mask declining convic-
tion), and the study was of necessity carried

Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)

Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009

140 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
out before the 1996 data became available.
This leads to another point the more recent
surveys provide some indication of a greater
hesitancy in support for state welfare. In most
cases, the percentage stating that the service is
definitely the states responsibility has fallen
between 1990 and 1996, with a correspon-
ding increase in the percentage describing it as
probably the states responsibility.
This pattern of answers begins to cast some
doubt on theories that suggest welfare state
resilience is rooted in public esteem, but does
not provide sufficiently decisive evidence of a
shift to undermine them. The main welfare
state services still receive the support of sub-
stantial majorities. None of the theories that
directly challenge resilience deals with the
clear differences between countries and areas
of provision found in the evidence. There are
also some further difficulties.
The arguments about the significance of
social divisions find some support, especially
in relation to attitudes to inequality and redis-
tribution, but class divisions are not suffi-
ciently strong to undermine overall support for
state welfare. The most thorough-going analy-
sis is by Svallfors (1997), who has developed
more accurately comparable class measures
than previous research and detects stronger
class differences (see, for example, Roller,
1995: 2204). Both class and gender vari-
ables have clear effects in all four countries.
Men and higher-level non-manuals are clearly
less supportive of government redistribution
than women and workers . The patterns, for
both class and non-class variables are very
similar across nations (Svallfors, 1997: 293).
Papadakis and Bean produce similar findings
from an analysis which focuses on attitudes to
the areas of legitimate government responsi-
bility and spending rather than redistribution:
class politics received the strongest support
(1993: 247). The social class divisions which
Wilensky (1975: 11619) and Galbraith
(1993: 1517) identify appear significant, and
divisions in relation to gender interests also
play a role. It is clear, however, that they do so
in a context where the overall direction is
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
towards, rather than away from, support for
the welfare state.
Overall support for state welfare shows
indications of a tendency to diminish in some
areas, and social divisions play a role.
However, the limited extent of the decline
does not correspond to the theories that
directly challenge the claims about the
resilience of the welfare state. If correct, they
are not true yet. How do attitude surveys
relate to the more sophisticated new politics
approach?
The new politics of welfare
The new politics perspective deals with
resistance to reform, and is in some ways the
converse of the traditional politics of welfare.
The most widely discussed approach identifies
relevant groups in relation to state or private-
sector employment, gender and social class
interests and goes on to analyse the particular
structures of interest division in particular
regime types, discussed earlier in relation to
Table 1. Table 3 provides a general overview
of attitudes to the welfare state in the three
countries, covering the areas of state responsi-
bility for provision for pensioners (a service
which most people might expect to use as part
of a normal life-course) and unemployed
people (benefits which may apply to a minor-
ity) and also redistribution between rich and
poor (direct vertical rather than horizontal
redistribution). The table says nothing about
how state responsibility should be discharged
or (beyond the reference to a decent standard
of living) the level of provision or the degree
of redistribution. As in the other regressions in
the paper, the model reported is a best fit
model, including the variables predicted by
theory which show a significant relationship
to the dependent variable. The statistics are
odds ratios, which allow the reader to
compare the extent to which members of the
group are more likely to have the characteris-
tic of the dependent variable.
The most striking feature is the similarity
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E IN HARD TIMES 141

Table 3 Support for state welfare (logistic regressions, odds ratios, best fit models, ISSP, 1996)
It should definitely be the governments responsibility to
(a) provide a decent standard of living for the old
Germany Sweden UK
Woman 1.28a 1.30b 1.29c
Older 1.37a 1.82a 1.45a
High income 0.64a 0.70a 0.65a
% correct predictions 55.9 66.3 69.5
Model chi squared 71.2a 36.8a 20.6a
(b) provide a decent standard of living for the unemployed
Germany Sweden UK
Full-time worker 0.67a 0.54a 0.54a
Woman 1.56a
High income 0.43a 0.57a 0.63a
% correct predictions 77.6 63.0 73.5
Model chi squared 90.0a 78.2a 29.1a
(c) reduce income differences between the rich and the poor
Germany Sweden UK
Govt employee 1.47a 0.72c
Full-time worker 0.68a
Woman 1.21b 1.37a
Older 1.36a 1.96a
Younger 0.60a
High income 0.42a 0.34a 0.28a
% correct predictions 69.9 63.9 67.8
Model chi squared 107.4a 112.3a 77.1a
Notes:
a Significant at 1% level.
b Significant at 5% level.
c Significant at 7% level.

rather than the differences between the coun-
tries. Gender, old age and income make a dif-
ference to attitudes to pensions and being a
full-time worker and income (and in Sweden,
gender) to attitudes to benefits for unem-
ployed people. While income is again signifi-
cant in relation to redistribution, and age
emerges in all the countries, there is some
indication of national differences. Full-time
employment is associated with opposition to
redistribution in the UK, gender in Germany
and Sweden and government employment in
Sweden and the UK. The combined role of
gender and state employment in this case is
the only aspect of the pattern of attitudes that
fits neatly with a simplified version of the pre-
dictions of regime theory. Most of the other
relationships correspond to a crude notion of
traditional self-interest (higher income people
oppose state welfare, full-time workers do not
support the unemployed, older women bear
the impact of shortcomings in pension provi-
sion).
Attitudes to the welfare state in general
reflect the broad social patterns identified by
Papadakis and Bean and Svallfors rather than
regime differences. They do not fit the cleav-
ages posited by new politics theorists, but
rather follow the traditions of the old politics
of welfare based on the most general social

Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)

Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009

142 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
Table 4 Support for cuts to help the economy and willingness to pay for better welfare (ISSP, 1996, %)
(a) Endorse spending cuts to help the economy
(b) Endorse tax cuts even though social services cut
% of those who endorse (a) who also endorse (b)
N 3470
divisions. Of course, patterns of attitudes do
not necessarily correspond to the capacity for
political mobilization. However, it is interest-
ing that government employees do not identify
with state welfare more closely in Sweden, or
those full time in the labour market in
Germany.
Regime theory provides an account of sta-
bility rather than of the response to pressures
for change. We go on to examine popular atti-
tudes to the policies currently developing to
meet the challenges to the welfare state.
Value-frameworks: putting your money
where your mouth is versus having your
cake and eating it
The discussion above identified three main
European value-frameworks, loosely corre-
sponding to the principal welfare regimes. The
different value-frameworks all leave an open
door to activation reforms but differ in their
response to cost constraint. We focus here on
the latter issue.
Debates about welfare reform involve both
the finance and the provision of services and
benefits. Political discourse, the experience of
citizens and the questions asked in attitude
surveys all tend to divorce the two. However,
endorsement of current patterns of welfare
provision entails support for the taxes and
social contributions required to sustain them.
Given that demographic shifts and higher
unemployment (let alone the service improve-
ments needed to match the improving per-
formance of the private sector) will involve
more spending, the question arises of who is
willing to pay to maintain welfare standards.
Responses to questions about attitudes to
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
Germany Sweden UK
84 58 45
44 44 22
46 59 29
1360 996
tax and spending depend on the context in
which they are asked. A question in the
section of the questionnaire that deals with
things the government might do for the
economy asks if respondents are in favour of
or oppose government spending cuts in
general. A separate question asked in the
welfare section sets taxation directly against
welfare spending (If the government had a
choice between reducing taxes or spending
more on social services, which do you think it
should do? We mean all taxes together includ-
ing wage deductions, income tax, taxes on
goods and services and all the rest). Both the
cost constraint and the activation agenda
pursue spending constraint on economic
grounds, but public opinion tends to favour
the welfare state for its own sake. When cuts
are presented in an economic context, they
receive stronger support, particularly marked
in Germany (Table 4). Willingness to support
service cuts is weak in the UK. There is a clear
inconsistency in the patterns of answers
brought out in the third row of the table. Only
in Sweden do more than half of those who
endorse economic cuts also accept cuts in
services, and the proportion is less than a
quarter in the UK.
The implication that patterns of attitudes
may produce real difficulties for a government
that seeks to marshal support for welfare
retrenchment in order to aid the economy is
strengthened when attitudes to financing and
receiving particular welfare state services are
examined. Table 5 gives a cross-tabulation of
support for more spending on a particular
service and support for lower taxes rather
than more state spending. Substantial
numbers want lower taxes and more expen-
sive services an individually rational but
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E IN HARD TIMES 143

Table 5 Contradictory attitudes: those who want more spent on a particular service who also state a
preference for reductions in tax and contributions to more social spending (1996, %)
Germany Sweden UK
Health 53 51 27
Education 54 52 25
Pensions 54 51 25
Unemployment benefits 45 45 15

collectively impractical approach in As with support for welfare as a state

Germany and Sweden, and rather fewer in the
UK, where support for increased spending
rather than tax cuts is stronger.
The extent to which different groups of
voters will endorse or reject social spending
cuts is central to the success of the cost con-
straint policies discussed earlier. We examined
patterns of support for cuts to help the
economy and as a policy choice through logis-
tic regressions (Tables 6 and 7).
responsibility (see Table 3), income and age
play a strong role in support for cuts across
countries and in both tables. Other factors
vary. In Germany, support for cuts to help the
economy is associated with full-time worker
status, and opposition to social service cuts
with government employment and gender. In
Sweden, support in the first area with full-
time worker status and not being a state-
sector worker, and in the second with gender.

Table 6 Support for state spending cuts to help the economy (logistic regressions)
Germany Sweden UK
Govt employee 0.62a
Full-time worker 1.30b 1.31b
Older 1.36b
Younger 0.75a
High income 1.33a
Low income 1.50b
% correct predictions 83.4 57.2b 59.0
Model chi squared 10.0b 28.8b 13.0b
Notes:
a Significant at 5% level.
b Significant at 1% level.

Table 7 Reduce tax even if it means social service cuts (logistic regressions)
Germany Sweden UK
Govt employee 0.63b
Full-time worker 1.22b
Woman 0.83a 0.72b
Younger 0.86a 1.23c 1.77b
High income 1.77b 1.70b
Low income 0.68a
% correct predictions 58.4 58.0 78.1
Model chi squared 78.5b 27.7b 18.63b
Notes:
a Significant at the 1% level.
b Significant at the 5% level.
c Significant at 8% level.

Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)

Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009

144 T AY L O R - G O O B Y

Table 8 Views on whether tax levels on members of different income groups are too low or too high
by those on low and high incomes (ISSP, 1996, %)
Germany Sweden UK
Quartiles Bottom Top Bottom Top Bottom Top
Tax on high income
Too high 12 16 12 36 23 20
Too low 64 58 67 46 46 41
N 784 647 236 293 169 203
Tax on middle income
Too high 49 50 40 53 36 31
Too low 5 3 6 1 11 9
N 799 667 234 296 176 207
Tax on low income
Too high 88 79 84 70 85 63
Too low 0 1 2 1 2 1
N 830 665 239 290 176 206
Total tax receipts % GDP 38 52 36
Highest income tax rate % 56 60 40
Source: Rows 15, 16 (OECD, 2000: 38).

Only in the UK are the same significant rela-
tionships found in both areas, with age and
income. However, the directions of the rela-
tionships differ. In Germany there is a signifi-
cant relationship between older age and
support for cuts for the economy, and also
between youth and willingness to see taxes
and services cut. In the UK, the association is
between youth and opposition to economic
cuts, but endorsement of social service cuts,
while low income is linked to support for eco-
nomic cuts but opposition to service cuts.
These findings indicate that patterns of atti-
tudes in relation to the issues closest to
current policy directions are complex and
likely to be affected by national political
issues. In Germany, older people may be most
concerned about the economy, while younger
people may feel that they bear the brunt of the
tax burden associated with reunification. In
the UK, younger people may see themselves as
net contributors to rather than beneficiaries
from social services, while those on low
incomes may feel that they would benefit from
a stronger economy, but lose out from service
cuts. The experience of cuts under the 1991
bourgeois and 1994 social democrat-led coali-
tion in Sweden may have generated a debate
that produces a more consistent pattern of
answers. The way issues are presented in ques-
tionnaires and also, presumably, in political
debate exerts a strong influence on the way
people understand and respond to them.
However, there is some consistency in the
factors associated with support for cuts and
those linked to support for state welfare.
The contradiction between simultaneous
calls for more welfare spending on a particu-
lar service and for cuts in all forms of taxation
and social contributions at the cost of lower
social spending in general raises the question
of where people think the extra money will
come from. One indication of possible sources
of finance for additional welfare spending lies
in views on where the tax burden lies heaviest.
Table 8 gives a cross-tabulation of such views
by income group. It shows that there is strong
agreement that tax on low-income people is
too high and on high-income people too low
in all three welfare states (although in Sweden,
where taxes are highest, there is a noticeable
group among the better-off who think their
own group pays too much tax). Tax on
middle-income people is seen as too high by
sizeable groups in Germany and Sweden, but
by a smaller group in the UK. This indicates

Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)

Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009

 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E
that it is going to be difficult to achieve a
political consensus on financing the extra
costs of state welfare through higher taxes or
contributions from lower or middle-income
people (with the possible exception of the UK,
which has a smaller welfare state and lower
taxes than the other two countries).
There is considerable agreement across the
income scale that taxes at the top are too low
in Germany and a measure of agreement in
Sweden, although also indications that the top
quartile themselves resist the idea. In the UK
there is little difference between better and
worse-off in their views, but just under half
think taxes at the top too low while about a
fifth think them too high. In short, when it
comes to paying for a more expensive welfare
system, the pattern of divisions about state
welfare is rather different from that displayed
in regime analysis: it is the corporatist regime
that reveals most consensus, while the social
democratic regime displays the possibility of
conflict and the liberal one that of inertia.
However, in none of the countries is it obvious
where support for extra spending is under-
pinned by an obvious willingness to pay the
cost. This returns us to the agenda of
retrenchment, where endorsement is highly
sensitive to the way policies are presented.
The data on attitudes to tax and spending
calls into question the link that is often drawn
between support for state welfare and the
resilience of the welfare state. Most people
favour the main state services. Majorities in
some countries are prepared to endorse spend-
ing cuts when these are presented as helpful to
the economy, but sizeable groups are also keen
on higher taxes for more welfare spending in
principle. Which groups will volunteer to pay
the taxes to support the maintenance of those
services is much less clear.
Conclusion
Public opinion everywhere has traditionally
endorsed the welfare state. Mass provision
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
IN HARD TIMES 145
and horizontal redistribution attract more
support than vertical redistribution. This is
entirely consonant with the postwar politics of
welfare state expansion. There is now some
evidence that support is in decline. However,
the structure of attitudes does not conform to
the regime-based patterns of group conflicts
most frequently identified in the new politics
of welfare. Rather the clearest divisions lie
between liberal Anglo-Saxon and other
systems, and follow the traditional divisions
of class, age and gender interests, cross-cutting
national differences in regime.
When attention turns from statements of
approval of state responsibilities and policies
to the finance of welfare provision, difficulties
emerge. It is simply not clear which social
groups are willing to pay for the services they
endorse. The real problems of reform may be
rather more similar between regimes than
theory predicts and may lie in getting voters to
accept either tax and contribution increases or
to acquiesce in retrenchment as much as in the
defeat of particular interest groups in conflicts
over welfare spending constraint. One impli-
cation is that the agenda of welfare state acti-
vation may be everywhere easier to advance
than the agenda of cost containment, and this
may be the future direction of policy.
Acknowledgements
The author gratefully acknowledges the
support of the ESRC in funding this research
under grant R000222914; and of the ZUMA
Archive at Cologne in making the ISSP data
available at short notice.
Appendix: variables used in the
regressions
Independent variables (reference 0)
Women: Female gender 1;
Low income: in bottom quartile of equivalized
family income distribution 1;
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
146 T AY L O R - G O O B Y
High income: in top quartile of equivalized family
income distribution 1;
Younger: in bottom third of age distribution 1;
Older: in top third of age distribution 1;
Government employee: government employee 1
(does not include nationalized industry workers);
Full-time worker: works 35 hours + (UK 30 hours
+) in main job 1.
References
Alber, J. and Standing, G. (2000) Social Dumping,
Catch-up or Convergence? Europe in a Com-
parative Global Context, Journal of European
Social Policy 10 (2): 99119.
Baldwin, P. (1990) The Politics of Social Solidarity,
Class Bases of the European Welfare State,
18751975. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Beck, U., Giddens, A. and Lash, S. (1994) Reflexive
Modernisation. Cambridge Polity Press.
Beck, W., van der Maesen, L. and Walker, A. (1998)
The Social Quality of Europe. Bristol: Policy Press.
Bonoli, G., George, V. and Taylor-Gooby, P. (2000)
European Welfare Futures. Cambridge: Polity
Press.
Commission of the European Community (CEC)
(1998) Social Protection in Europe, 1997, DGV.
Luxembourg: Office for the Official Publications
of the European Communities.
Daly, M. (1997) Welfare States under Pressure:
Cash Benefits in European Welfare States over
the Last Ten Years, Journal of European Social
Policy 7 (2): 12946.
Eitrheim, P. and Kuhnle, S. (2000) Nordic Welfare
States in the 1990s, in S. Kuhnle (ed.) Survival of
the European Welfare State. London: Routledge.
Esping-Andersen, G. (1990) Three Worlds of
Welfare Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Esping-Andersen, G. (ed.) (1996) Welfare States in
Transition. National Adaptations in Global
Economies. London: Sage.
Esping-Andersen, G. (1999) The Social Foundations
of Post-industrial Economies. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Evans, G. (1996) Cross-national Differences in
Support for Welfare and Redistribution, in
B. Taylor and K. Thomson (eds) Understanding
Change in Social Attitudes. Aldershot: CREST/
Dartmouth.
Ferrera, M. (1993) EC Citizens and Social
Protection. CEC Brussels, VE2.
Ferrera, M. and Rhodes, M. (2000) Recasting
European Welfare States, West European Politics
23 (2): 110.
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
Freeman, R. and Moran, M. (2000) Reforming
health care in Europe, West European Politics,
23 (2): 3558.
Galbraith, J. (1993) The Culture of Contentment.
London: Penguin.
Giddens, A. (1994) Beyond Left and Right.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Giddens, A. (2000) The Third Way and its Critics.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Goul Anderson, J. (2000) The welfare state crisis
and beyond, in S. Kuhnle (ed.) The Survival of
the European Welfare State. London: Routledge.
Hall, P. and Taylor, R. (1996) Political Science and
the Three New Institutionalisms, Political
Studies 44 (5): 93657.
Immergut, E. (1998) The Theoretical Core of the
New Institutionalism, Politics and Society 26 (1):
534.
Inglehart, R. (1997) Modernisation and
Postmodernization, Cultural, Economic, and
Political Change in 43 Societies. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Jessop, B. (2000), The Future of the Welfare State.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Kaase, M. and Newton, K. (1995) Beliefs in
Government. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Kosonen, P. (2000) Activation, Incentives and
Workfare in Nordic Welfare States, in MIRE
(ed.) Comparing Social Welfare Systems in
Nordic Europe and France. Paris: MSH Ange-
Guilpin.
Kuhnle, S. (ed) (2000a) The Survival of the
European Welfare State. London: Routledge.
Kuhnle, S. (2000b) The Scandinavian welfare state
in the 1990s, West European Politics, 23 (2):
20928.
Merrien, F.X. and Bonoli, G. (2000) Implementing
major welfare state reform a comparison of
France and Switzerland, in S. Kuhnle (ed.) The
Survival of the European Welfare State. London:
Routledge.
OECD (2000) OECD in Figures at
http://www.oecd.org/publications/figures/
Palier, B. (2000) Defrosting the French Welfare
State, West European Politics, 23 (2): 11336.
Papadakis, E. and Bean, C. (1993) Popular Support
for the Welfare State, Journal of Public Policy 13
(3): 22754.
Pettersen, P. (1995) The Welfare State: the Security
Dimension, in O. Borre and E. Scarborough
(eds) The Scope of Government. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Pierson, P. (1994) Dismantling the Welfare State?
Reagan, Thatcher and the Politics of Retrench-
ment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Pierson, P. (1996) The Politics of the New Welfare
State, World Politics 48 (2): 14379.
Rhodes, M. (1996) Globalisation and West
 S U S TA I N I N G S TAT E W E L FA R E
European Welfare States, Journal of European
Social Policy 6 (4): 30427.
Roller, E. (1995) The Welfare State: the Equality
Dimension, in O. Borre and E. Scarborough
(eds) The Scope of Government. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Ross, F. (2000) Interest and Choice in the Not
Quite so New Politics of Welfare, West Euro-
pean Politics 23 (2): 1134.
Scharpf, F. (1999) The Viability of Advanced
Welfare State in the International Economy:
Vulnerabilities and Options, Working Paper No.
99/9. Max Planck Institute for the Study of
Societies.
Spicker, P. (1991) The Principle of Subsidiarity and
the Social Policy of the European Community,
Journal of European Social Policy 1 (1): 314.
Downloaded from http://esp.sagepub.com by cutare cutarescu on October 29, 2009
IN HARD TIMES 147
Svallfors, S. (1997) Worlds of Welfare and
Attitudes to Distribution: a Comparison of Eight
Western Nations, European Sociological Review
13 (3): 283304.
Svallfors, S. and Taylor-Gooby, P. (eds) (1999) The
End of the Welfare State? London: Routledge.
van Kersbergen, K. (1995) Social Capitalism. A
Study of Christian Democracy and the Welfare
State. London: Routledge.
van Kersbergen, K. (2000) The declining resistance
of the welfare state to change, in S. Kuhnle (ed.)
The Survival of the European Welfare State.
London: Routledge.
Wilensky, H. (1975) The Welfare State and
Equality: Structural and Ideological Roots of
Public Expenditures. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
Journal of European Social Policy 2001 11 (2)