European social citizenship and the privatisation of welfare state

Abstract

<p>The paper tries to outline the recent trends of privatization of public pension schemes in Europe and then to proceed to a critical appraisal of them. Market principles, such as competitiveness and the maximisation of cost efficiency, are becoming more prominent across Europe, contradicting those principles that have traditionally associated with social policy, like equity, solidarity, social justice. However, private and public sectors are not functionally equivalent. There are some roles, as, for instance, redistribution, that only the State can fulfil. Besides that, public values, such as citizenship, in the Marshallean sense, are not easily transferable in privatized environment</p>