Conclusion: The Marketization and Politicization of Welfare Services: Old and New Dynamics

Abstract

Welfare services understood in the broad sense, or services of general interest as labelled by the EU, are not often at the centre of political or academic debates. Yet, they constitute a key feature of welfare states across Europe. Besides benefits in terms of social transfers, welfare services are at the core of social policy, encompassing areas such as education, healthcare, the provision of basic goods like energy, telecommunications and transport, as well as providing support to various categories of people in need, including families and the elderly, jobseekers or the poorest fringe of society. Yet, they tend to be debated and dealt with merely in a fragmented manner in various policy fields, and specific sectoral and territorial contexts. This is particularly striking in the current era of austerity in Europe where welfare services have been a main adjustment variable under the pressure of fiscal discipline. Though occasionally vocal, sporadic protest failed to bring about responsiveness from decision makers. Nor has it triggered a broader political debate on how to maintain and modernize welfare services under the constraints of financial capitalism mediated by the EU regime. While welfare services have developed in various institutional forms and to varying extents—thus reflecting the European diversity of national traditions and histories—they constitute a key component of the European social model(s). From a normative point of view, a satisfactory provision of SGI is desirable because it mitigates the inequalities within societies. There is a wide consensus among European decision makers (including in the EU institutions) over the fact that welfare services contribute to a large extent to social cohesion in Europe. And as a matter of fact, they have played a great part in cushioning the effects of the recent financial crisis which has unfolded since 2008. From the point of view of economic efficiency, the level of quality of welfare services and of equality in access are positively correlated with high productivity, GDP per capita. A symbol of the post-war welfare state, the existence of collective management of services responding to society’s basic needs continues to be regarded as a key factor of progressive politics and policy making, not only in Europe: in USA, President Barack Obama has left his political imprint on a reform dubbed ObamaCare, which aims at ensuring that healthcare insurance is accessible and affordable for all Americans. In Europe, despite consensus on the need for accessible quality, most policy areas of general interest have been the target of policy reforms undertaken in most EU countries during the current era of austerity. This is in contradiction with the paradigm of social investment which has emerged as a way to envisage the modernization of European welfare states (Hemerijck 2011; Morel et al. 2011). Although the various philosophical foundations as well as political uses of social investment can be debated, it has the merit of trying to shift the focus from ex post distribution of benefits to ex ante investment in individuals’ capabilities through services. SGI, such as education and vocational training, childcare, healthcare and so on, has a key role to play in this regard. Yet, the overwhelming majority of EU countries are stuck in a blind strategy, coordinated at EU level, focused on fiscal discipline and deficit reduction, and thus obstructing the perspectives for modernization through social investment. What we observe cuts in public resources dedicated to welfare services and the implementation of policies which tend to accentuate their marketization through mechanisms such as liberalization, outsourcing or privatization.