Does the left still own social policies? The effect of incumbent partisanship on citizens’ perceptions of public spending in Spain

In social policy debates, there are fundamentally different views of links between such key variables as employment, low pay, social transfers and poverty. This paper reviews basic empirical evidence on the validity of these views and the policy prescriptions that follow from them, drawing mainly on cross-country comparative studies. These reveal that clear and striking cross-country correlations prevail, but not, as is often so readily suggested, between low pay (wage compression) and employment performance, or between employment performance and poverty. Instead, results indicate a strong but negative cross-country correlation between the level of social spending and the incidence of poverty, as well as a strong and positive cross-country correlation between the incidence of low pay and the incidence of relative poverty. While the former correlation has become part of the received wisdom in social policy research, the latter is more surprising, as the correlation is not due to a strong link between low pay and poverty at the individual level. In addition, the incidence of low wage employment and social expenditure are also strongly and (negatively) related. We examine these correlations in more depth, particularly the link between the level of social spending and poverty. Since there is such a clear and strong negative link between the level of social expenditure and the level of poverty, it is tempting to think that more social spending offers an easy means of reducing poverty. However, a simple simulation exercise using Luxemburg Income Study data from the mid 90's suggests that putting more money into social transfer systems as they currently exist in the EU would not have a positive outcome on poverty rates in all countries. In the final section of the paper, we briefly summarise the results, and put forward a recommendation for further research.

In recent years a heated debate has been taking place (and is still going on) whether the development of social (security) policies influences the general economic growth in a positive or negative way. Whereas Korpi (1985) finds a positive relationship and Rothschild (1982, 580) concludes, “that there are at the present no signs that Welfare State activities have by themselves net harmful effects on economic efficiency or economic growth”, Bernholz (1982, 584) asks, “can modern Western democracies survive with an expanding system of social welfare?” In his latest study (1985) Bernholz is quite sceptical in his answer, where he is in line with most other studies. They all reach more or less the same conclusion that, due to the rapid increase of social expenditures after the Second World War, welfare state activities have at least reached an absolute maxium or have even passed their limits so that the negative consequences (e.g. like rising disincentives to work, a low savings rate, increasing shadow activities), outbalance the benefits1. That social expenditures have increased quite drastically over the last 25 years in most Western democracies (see Table 1) should impress any observer. But to conclude from these developments that one should simply reduce state activities and the negative consequences will diminish may be quite misleading2. Before suggestions are proposed, e.g. to cut drastically social expenditures, it should be considered that “social policy has become an essential element in the political economy of all modern industrial states” (Rothschild 1982, 579). Therefore, first a positive analysis of the political institutions should be made in which social policies take place and which set the frame where the most important actors (voters/taxpayers, government, interest groups) operate3. When we know how voters/taxpayers and important interest groups will react to government policy proposals, we are able to evaluate how successful changes in social policies can be achieved.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0212944.].

<i>Ministers at War: Winston Churchill and His War Cabinet</i>. By Jonathan Schneer.New York: Basic Books, 2014. Pp. xxiv+324. $29.99.

Poverty alleviation is an important policy objective in developed welfare states. This paper analyzes the effect of social transfer policies on poverty. A vast literature claims that high social effort goes along with low poverty levels across countries. This paper systematically analyzes this claim. We employ several social expenditure ratios (as a proxy for social effort) and correct for the impact of the tax system and for private social arrangements, using OECD methodology. Also, we control for emographic and macro-economic differences across countries. We performed several tests with the most recent data (LIS, OECD, and SOCX) for the period 1985-2005. Our results are less clear-cut than earlier findings. We still find quite a strong negative relationship between the level of public social expenditure and poverty among 28 OECD countries. However, for non-EU15 countries this relationship is stronger than for the EU15. The results alter considerably if private social expenditures are included as well. For non-EU15 countries in our sample, we do not find evidence for a negative correlation between the level of total social spending and the incidence of poverty. In contrast, for the group of EU15 countries private social arrangements do matter as far as poverty alleviation is concerned. Demographic and macro-economic (control) variables are important as well. We developed and employed multiple linear regression models to control for these complex interrelationships. Our results point at one direction: gross social spending is the driving force as far as differences in poverty levels across countries are concerned, although the ageing of the population and unemployment rates have some explanatory power, both for non-EU15 countries and for EU15 countries. Our analyses captures another effect as well. It is essential to control for the impact of taxes on the social expenditure ratios used. By doing so, the linkage between social effort and poverty levels across countries becomes insignificant. In view of the fact that with these corrections on expenditure statistics, we have a much better - although still not perfect - measure of what governments really devote to social spending, the familiar claim that higher social expenditure goes along with lower poverty levels does not hold across the 28 examined countries examined. We believe that our comparison of the impact of several social expenditure ratios on poverty levels has emphasized that taking into account both the public/private-mix and the impact of the tax system on social expenditure ratios really matters for comparative welfare state research and for policy makers who want to reduce poverty.

Since the onset of the global financial crisis a decade ago, social policy reforms have become increasingly prominent in EU governance and policy debate. The severe decline in annual growth rates of social expenditures in EU-28 indicates a clear retrenchment bias in implementing respective reforms after 2008. Whereas the increasing salience of the seemingly necessity of austerity policies and structural reforms is widely acknowledged, the causes and consequences of these developments remain fiercely contested. While some see the EU as a catalyzer of the debasing of national welfare states, mainly driven by the imperative of fiscal discipline, others stress the broad scope of action left to national decision makers. Many member states have undertaken more or less far-reaching social and employment policy reforms, which they have often sought to justify by reference to EU requirements and recommendations. The article seeks to identify and to discuss specific trajectories and causalities explaining the retrenchment and deregulation bias, which goes along with the post-crisis architecture of fiscal and macroeconomic policy coordination, including Economic Adjustment Programs and Memoranda of Understandings (MoUs) imposed on fiscally distressed countries. Therefore, an econometric analysis provides an examination of the impact of financial assistance programs (ESM/EFSF) and/or of the Excessive Deficit Procedure (EDP) on countries’ social expenditure rates for the period 2008 to 2013. In addition, the correlation between the ideological base of parties in government and the social expenditure ratios is tested.

South Africa’s social sector has evolved from simple and disjointed nonstate initiatives into a complex set of interventions, institutions, programs and services. The review presented in this paper shows that the development of social policy and institutions in South Africa has been shaped by the political and economic situation both locally and internationally. Like social policy in many other countries around the world, the state was initially reluctant to accept responsibility for the provision of social welfare services; most of the services were provided in a fragmented way by nonstate actors, including the Church. But from the 1920s, the state started to gradually accept the responsibility to provide social services including education, health care, housing and social welfare. Although different South African governments have, from colonial times to the 21st century, consistently rejected the idea of making South Africa a welfare state, the state has, with time, increasingly taken on greater responsibility, not only in terms of regulating all social services but also the provision of all public services in the country. Of all the social services, it is the cash transfer program (social grants) that currently attracts political and public attention in the country. However, it is the provision of education services that has consistently accounted for the largest share of public expenditure since the beginning of the democratic dispensation in 1994. For instance, in the 2022 to 2023 national budget, education services accounted for 20.4 percent of total public expenditures, followed by social development (social welfare) at 16.9 percent, and health care services at 12 percent. Social policy expenditure together accounts for almost half of government expenditure, which is roughly about 14 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). The social policy scholarship in the country has historically focused on social welfare, a situation that gives the impression that social policy is synonymous with social welfare policy. Although this article focuses on the history of social welfare policy in South Africa, it is important to note that social policy is a broader field of public policy that includes education, health care, and social welfare (which in South Africa is also referred to as social development). One of the fundamental features that defines the history of social policy in South Africa is racial discrimination; institutionalized during colonial and apartheid periods, it has continued to shape and reproduce racial disparities in access to social services even thirty years after the fall of apartheid. While the democratic South African government has increasingly accepted and taken greater responsibility to provide social services, social policy in the country is characterized by a persistent tension arising from the commitment to neoliberal principles of fiscal discipline and austerity on one hand and espousing social democratic principles which emphasize the provision of meaningful support to citizens both as a form of social investment, as well as an instrument for addressing the legacies of colonialism and apartheid on the other. Since the dawn of democracy, this tension has been exacerbated by the growing calls to address racial injustices of the past, as evident in the number of protests, against the background of persistently weak economic growth since 2010.

Theoretical approaches and place-specific solutions are required to face with the intrinsic linkage between social welfare and macroeconomic stability in advanced economies, especially in Europe. In this regard, the 2007 recession has influenced extensively the wide spectrum of social policies applicable in the European Community. New socioeconomic divides emerged and fiscal austerity urged Member States to resettle policy discourses, advancing social needs in a more effective way. In line with this evidence, our commentary discusses recent literature and it outlines policy implications of different political, institutional and socioeconomic settings. By analyzing cross-country variations in the shape and extent of welfare policies at the European level, our study evaluates apparent (and latent) performances of welfare systems in a comparative perspective, with a specific focus on Southern European countries. The existence of a latent relationship between social policy expenditures (SPE) and per-capita GDP was demonstrated. However, social expenditures may differ for a given level of income: for instance, Latvia had a lower level of social expenditures given its income level. Italy, Greece, Spain and Portugal were clustered together displaying a lower share of social spending in the total GDP in respect with the remaining European countries. This comparison suggests how Mediterranean countries are institutionally fragile and with a moderately higher level of corruption in respect with North-western countries. The results of this work contribute to bridge the semantic dichotomy between theoretical approaches and empirical findings in socioeconomic policy impact analysis.

This paper addresses the question of the social policy harmonization in the European Union. In adopting a common monetary policy, Europe is faced with structural and fiscal concerns, as national growth levels differ. Another possible factor in output shocks are the levels of various social expenditures in the member countries. OECD data on the level of social program expenditures in four EU countries will be compared to fluctuations in GDP growth to identify existing relationships. Significant relationships between independent social expenditure policy and GDP growth shocks suggest structural harmonization as an improvement if Europe is to take full advantage of the common market. However, the effects of expenditure levels may be easier to identify and predict than the dynamic effects of policy change. As the effects of future policy changes are more difficult to ascertain, harmonization may not consistently appear to be a Pareto-optimum solution to asymmetric shocks.

We construct a model of speculative trading to examine how the mean and volatility of stock prices is affected both by government partisanship and by traders' expectations of electoral victory by the right-wing or left-wing party. Our model predicts that rational expectations of higher inflation under left-wing administrations lowers the volume of stocks traded in the stock market. The decline in trading volume leads to a decrease in the mean and volatility of stock prices not only during the incumbency of left-wing governments, but also when traders expect the left-wing party to win elections. Conversely, expectation of lower inflation under right-wing administrations leads to higher trading volume. This leads to an increase in the mean and volatility of stock prices during the tenure of right-wing governments and when traders anticipate the right-wing party to win elections. Daily and monthly data from U.S. and British equity markets between 1930 and 2000 statistically corroborate the predictions from our formal model.

The purpose of this article was to examine the level and variability of budgetary expenditures directed to the Agricultural Social Insurance Fund (ASIF) in Poland in the form of subsidies to the Farmers’ Pension Fund in the period 2004–2024, i.e., after Poland’s accession to the European Union (EU). The aim of the study was also to determine the share of subsidies to the farmers’ social insurance fund in the total expenditures of the Polish agricultural budget, as well as the relationship of ASIF expenditures to state budget expenditures and GDP dynamics. The authors attempted to estimate the trend function for these time series and the degree of fit of the equations describing them. The formation of the nominal and real level of budget expenditures on the ASIF in 2004–2024 was evaluated. It was assumed that spending on the ASIF is an element of agricultural policy, realising its redistributive and social objectives, but indirectly also pro-development objectives by supporting generational change in agriculture. The research showed that the real level of spending on ASIF declined during Poland’s EU membership, as did the share of this spending in the total agricultural budget. The subsidy to the social security system also did not follow the changes in GDP and state budget expenditure proportionally, showing much less dynamism over the period studied. This means that budget support for farmers’ social security is losing its importance as an instrument of agricultural policy. It has been shown that the economic and social components of agricultural expenditure have not grown in harmony. The changes in the level of spending on the ASIF in the period 2004–2024 were also analysed in relation to demographic changes, i.e., the number of farmers insured in the ASIF and recipients of agricultural pensions. It has been shown that, despite a significant decrease in the number of farmers receiving pensions from the ASIF, there remains a large disparity between the average pension benefits of farmers and those of the general social insurance system (Social Insurance Institution—SII). The reduction in this disparity is not served by a real reduction in subsidies to the ASIF.

Objective/context: In Latin America, access to abortion is one of the most significant expressions of gender or class inequalities. Because of its contentious nature, it is challenging to enact such policies. The literature suggests that passing pro-abortion legislation requires secular contexts and, in particular, strong feminist movements allied with left-wing parties in government. However, the mechanisms by which these factors interact have been understudied. This article examines the case of Bolivia; theoretically, one would not expect decriminalization to occur there due to the country’s strong conservatism and the relative weakness of its feminist movement. Nevertheless, in 2017, the Bolivian Parliament approved a reform that decriminalized abortion under various grounds. Methodology: This article draws on original fieldwork that included in-depth interviews with feminist activists and legislators, as well as a systematic review of documents and press coverage. Conclusions: This study shows that, within a party structure where decision-making is guided by deliberation—such as in the Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS)—party legislators occupying key positions and maintaining ties with the feminist movement played a critical role in the reform, persuading leaders and other members of the party to support it. Originality: This article fills a gap in the literature by offering a deeper understanding of the kinds of links between feminist movements and left-wing parties that make it possible to advance contentious agendas such as legal abortion.

ABSTRACTIn semi-open list systems, parties present pre-selected pools of candidates to the electorate. Candidates’ assigned ranks on the lists heavily influence their election odds and may reflect party leaders’ preferences, notably a possible gender bias. To strengthen women's representation, parties’ choices are increasingly subject to legal quotas. These quotas are expected to be less binding for left-wing parties, which tend to be more women-friendly. Analyzing 854 party lists presented to Flemish voters in the 2012 local elections, this study finds that right-wing party leadership discriminate in favor of women by offering them higher positions on the party lists. For leftist parties, the study finds discrimination in favor of men. Importantly, parties offering higher positions to women tend to do so in parts of the party list certain to lead to either election (left-wing parties) or non-election (right-wing parties). For positions with critical election-odds, no gender bias is identified.HIGHLIGHTS• Women's representation is a major concern in today's politics.• Gender quotas in elections are meant to ensure women's presence on ballots.• In the 2012 Flemish elections, women candidates were on average positioned higher on party ballots than they would be if positioning were based on anticipated electoral success.• Left-wing parties advantage women in positions with high chances of election. Right-wing parties advance women only in positions with low chances of success.• For positions with critical election odds, rankings across all parties are based on expected electoral success in terms of preferential votes, irrespective of candidate gender.• Assigned ballot positions may reflect underlying gender preferences or power balance within the party leadership. Gender biases may be neutralized more effectively by placement mandates than by general quota rules.

This chapter examines how the effects of blaming on policy approval are conditioned by the source of the statements and its credibility. The authors conduct two experiments on two different policy areas, on restrictive migration policy, where right-wing parties are more credible sources, and on taxing the rich, where left-wing parties are more credible. The results indicate that source credibility matters but that its effect depends on the context. The chapter finds that a deservingness frame blaming migrants for claiming child benefits for children living in their home countries leads to a strong counter-reaction by participants and lower policy approval if the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) is the source of the communication. In contrast, policy approval was higher in the ‘taxing the rich’ experiment if left-wing parties were the source of the statement. Apparently, right-wing parties are not credible with strong calls for redistribution, which leads to lower acceptance of corresponding policies.

Parties and their elites play an important role in shaping public opinion towards European integration. As determinants of party support for European integration, the literature has identified ideological and strategic electoral motives. In this article, we examine the impact of economic factors on party support for European integration. We find that party support from right-wing parties is larger in countries with greater financial benefits from the EU budget. On the contrary, benefits from trade creation by the introduction of the euro as a common currency show no significant influence on party support. In the period after the introduction of the euro, we find that right-wing parties were much more Euro-sceptical than left-wing parties when their country did not fulfil the Maastricht debt or deficit criteria. We also observe more support for European integration by left-wing parties in countries that would benefit from welfare state convergence due to European integration. While our analysis indicates that different economic factors always have been important to explain party support for European integration, we also find that, in the period after the financial crisis in 2008, these motives have gained importance at the expense of the ideological motives.