The chapter studies Cold War the relationship between the Cold War and the corresponding rise of the welfare state. This study argues that the Cold War was not just a geopolitical contextual factor for welfare state developments after 1945. Rather, the Cold War directly influenced and shaped welfare state development. The chapter discusses the causal mechanisms that can contribute to explaining how the Cold War had an influence on the development and patterns of welfare states in both Western Europe/North America and Eastern Europe. It identifies a super-mechanism of systemic competition between two political systems, and their opposing social and economic models, and the associated battle for the ‘hearts and minds’ of West Europeans. Under this umbrella, the chapter then retraces five causal mechanisms by which the Cold War affected the emergence and development of social policy: the guns and butte trade-off; the welfare state as a third way between capitalism and collectivism; the role of communist parties as push factors for the western welfare states; the influence of anti-communism on the ideological realignment of parties and coalition-building processes; policy diffusion within and across the blocs.
Kalter Krieg und Wohlfahrtsstaat. Kausalmechanismen und Auswirkunge
Michele Mioni
2024-01-01
Abstract
The chapter studies Cold War the relationship between the Cold War and the corresponding rise of the welfare state. This study argues that the Cold War was not just a geopolitical contextual factor for welfare state developments after 1945. Rather, the Cold War directly influenced and shaped welfare state development. The chapter discusses the causal mechanisms that can contribute to explaining how the Cold War had an influence on the development and patterns of welfare states in both Western Europe/North America and Eastern Europe. It identifies a super-mechanism of systemic competition between two political systems, and their opposing social and economic models, and the associated battle for the ‘hearts and minds’ of West Europeans. Under this umbrella, the chapter then retraces five causal mechanisms by which the Cold War affected the emergence and development of social policy: the guns and butte trade-off; the welfare state as a third way between capitalism and collectivism; the role of communist parties as push factors for the western welfare states; the influence of anti-communism on the ideological realignment of parties and coalition-building processes; policy diffusion within and across the blocs.
I documenti in ARCA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
