3 East Asian welfare regimes

Abstract

This chapter is concerned with the uniqueness of East Asian welfare regimes. It starts with a discussion of the culturalist and the productivist perspectives which are widely applied to the study of these welfare regimes. By comparing Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and South Korea with 20 non-East Asian countries in terms of their relative labour participation rate, the gender wage gap and other indicators, it is found that the influence of the traditional male-breadwinner model that associated with the cultural perspective is not as strong as assumed. By reviewing data concerning the health care and education provisions in these four sites and the 20 countries outside East Asia, it is shown that the supported adult worker model associated with the productivist perspective is not as dominant as the current literature suggests. By considering the welfare issues commonly faced by both East Asian and non-East Asian countries and territories, this chapter concludes that East Asia should be treated as an important but not the only observation ground of government strategies on productivism.