Retrenchment, Reproduction, Modernization: Pension Politics and the Decline of the German Breadwinner Model

Abstract

The German welfare state in gendered welfare state analyses is widely recognized as a strong male breadwinner model: its institutions sup port the traditional division of labour and low female labour force participation. This article seeks to show that due to diminishing political support this model is eroding. The article starts from the assumption that the welfare state is a mediator between dy namic social and economic requirements. Therefore social policy regulations need to be adjusted continuously. This need has intensi fied over the last decade because of growing global economic competition and the collapse of the East German economy. The way social policymakers reacted to this pressure for reform shows no active support for the poli cies that help to maintain women's economic dependency on 'breadwinners'. This will be demonstrated by an analysis of the positions of the political actors involved in two major pension reforms, one in 1989 and one in 1997. According to their public statements these actors were motivated by three factors: firstly, they agreed that retrenchment measures were necessary; secondly, the intention to secure generational reproduction by improving carers' independent rights was dominant; thirdly, reforms were motivated by the inten tion to make the pension system more just. The direction of the reforms is to reduce the economic attractiveness of marriage and to create stronger incentives to be employed.