Welfare and Ideology by Vic George and Paul Wilding

Résumé du document

Political debates are often driven by what is called ideology. Nowadays we refer to ideology as a set of values and beliefs which influence individuals, politics, groups or even societies as a whole. The "critique of existing socio-economic systems, a view of the world, a vision of the future, and guidance to their adherents" are the main features of political ideologies, says Jones. These features will be the framework of our essay which aims to determine what the link between ideology and welfare is, and how each ideology influences social policies. Indeed, like every subject in social sciences, social policies have something to do with ideologies. Whereas the United States of America has moved towards a limited welfare state in which the well-being is linked to a rapid economic growth and to the market, the Nordic countries have emphasized the role of the state.

Extraits

[...] They are seeking a genuine balance between the economic system and social policies. Its development focuses on three points: maintaining social cohesion (equality of opportunity thanks to an efficient educational system), dealing with manifest ills (which is linked with the first point) and promoting values. It is a real mixed economy that deals with the problems of the state (mainly the fact that it is too much egalitarian and that it threatens the social order and that social expenditures keep growing) and with the problems of the market (too much focused on economic order and too much self-confident in the capacities of free market system to overcome social problems). [...]

[...] Second, we will briefly evoke the alternatives offered by Marxist theorists. The main idea is that the welfare state acts as a class state and its only aim is to “maintain the existing system of domination”2. The politicians who enact the social measures belong, generally, to the same class with a common cultural and economical background. That is why they are more likely to promote their own interests which are the same as those of the capitalist class. Moreover, the latter has a strong economic power and is always able to intervene in the governmental decisions process. [...]

[...] Globally, they have added a series of environmental criteria to the notion of welfare such as “deforestation, global warming, pollution, etc9.” That is why they argue for a Ibid., p Ibid., p Ibid., p.179 decentralising power which could both reduce the damages to the environment and improve social policies10. We saw above that each ideology tries to impose its ideas through a set of analysis and solutions which are sometimes based on left-right antagonism or sometimes on new ideological concerns such as feminism or Greenism. However, the arguments do often suffer from a lack of evidence. [...]

[...] Welfare and Ideology Welfare and Ideology Political debates are often driven by what we call ideology. Nowadays we refer to ideology as a set of values and beliefs which influence individuals, politics, groups or even societies as a whole. The “critique of existing socio-economic systems, [ ] a view of the world, [ ] a vision of the future and [ ] guidance to their adherents” are the main features of political ideologies, Jones says.1 These features will be the framework of our essay to determine what the link between ideology and welfare is and how each ideology influences social policies. [...]

[...] Since their diagnostic is different, the solutions are different too. The main solution may be summed up in the following expression: “private is better”. It is also important to focus on individual behaviours rather than on systems and institutions which create wasteful expenses and waste resources. It also means that the state should enable people to meet their needs but should not provide universal help to everyone. This quotation from Murray is enlightening: “Billions for equal opportunity, not one cent for equal outcome7”. [...]