Persistence and change - Nordic social policy in the 1980s and 1990s

Many politicians, participants in the public debate and academic scholars have regarded comprehensive welfare states as incompatible with the policy environment of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. Nordic welfare states are, due to their post-war history, suitable for testing predictions of the durability of comprehensive welfare states. The first purpose of this article is to examine previous research and official statistics on Nordic welfare state development in order to evaluate the proposition that comprehensive welfare states have been or soon will be forced to dismantle or radically reform social programs. The analysis finds weak support for propositions that comprehensive welfare states have been or soon will be subject to sharp downsizing or radical reconstruction. The second purpose is to explore Pierson’s (2001) suggestion that cost containment and recalibration were salient dimensions of Nordic social policy-making in the 1980s and 1990s. The analysis finds support for Pierson’s arguments. However, empirical evidence also suggests that Pierson’s analysis does not sufficiently incorporate reorganization of services.