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\"This book is a guide to claims about the proper role of government and markets in a global economy\"--Provided by publisher.

This book is a guide to claims about the proper role of government and markets in a global economy. Moving between systematic comparison of nineteen rich democracies and debate about what the United States can do to restore a more civilized, egalitarian and fair society, Harold L. Wilensky tells us how six of these countries got on a low road to economic progress and which components of their labor-crunch strategy are uniquely American. He provides an overview of the impact of major dimensions of globalization, only one of which – the interaction of the internationalization of finance and the rapid increase in the autonomy of central banks – undermines either national sovereignty or job security, labor standards, and the welfare state. Although Wilensky views American policy and politics through the lens of globalization, he concludes that the nation-state remains the center of personal identity, social solidarity and political action.

In this landmark work, the culmination of 30 years of systematic, comprehensive comparison of 19 rich democracies, Wilensky answers two basic questions: (1) What is distinctly modern about modern societies--in what ways are they becoming alike? (2) How do variations in types of political economy shape system performance? He specifies similarities and differences in the structure and interplay of government, political parties, the mass media, industry, labor, professions, agriculture, churches, and voluntary associations. He then demonstrates how differences in bargaining arrangements among these groups lead to contrasting policy profiles and patterns of taxing and spending, which in turn explain a large number of outcomes: economic performance, political legitimacy, equality, job security, safety and risk, real health, the reduction of poverty and environmental threats, and the effectiveness and fairness of regulatory regimes. Drawing on quantitative data and case studies covering the last 50 years and more than 400 interviews he conducted with top decision-makers and advisors, Wilensky provides a richly detailed account of the common social, economic, and labor problems modern governments confront and their contrasting styles of conflict resolution. The result is new light on the likely paths of development of rich democracies as they become richer. Assessing alternative theories, Wilensky offers a powerful critique of such images of modern society as \"post-industrial\" or \"high-tech,\" \"the information age\" or the alleged dominance of \"globalization.\" Because he systematically compares all of the rich democracies with at least three million population, Wilensky can specify what is truly exceptional about the United States, what it shares with Britain and Britain abroad (Canada, Australia, New Zealand) and what it shares with all or almost all of the West European democracies, Israel, and Japan. He gives careful attention to which successful social and labor policies are transferable across nations and which are not.Rich Democracieswill interest both scholars and practitioners. It combines the perspectives of political economy (the interplay of markets and politics) and political sociology (the social bases of politics). It will be especially useful in courses on comparative political economy, comparative politics, European politics, public policy, political sociology, the welfare state, American government, advanced industrial societies, and industrial relations.

Drawing on research analyzing similarities and differences among 19 rich democracies, this article compares the economic performance of big spenders and lean spenders at a similar economic level from 1950 to the late 1990s. Going beyond aggregate public spending, it shows the contrasting effects of particular types of spending and taxing and particular social policies. I highlight the extraordinary continuity of the contrasting institutions and policy directions of these countries. I find that there is not one road to good economic performance, but several. I specify five types of political economy, each with its own costs and gains in people's well-being, both economic and noneconomic. A final summary compares extremes: the confrontational \"low road\" pursued by the USA and the \"high road\" pursued by the strongest consensual democracies of Continental Europe, where social partners have negotiated real reforms in expensive social policies while preserving social cohesion. /// Réfléchissant sur les recherches qui analysent les similitudes et différences de 19 riches démocraties, cet article compare la performance économique des États très dépensiers et faiblement dépensiers dans le même secteur économique, de 1950 à la fin des années 1990. Allant au-delà des dépenses publiques globales, il montre les effets contrastés de types particuliers de dépense et d'impôt, et de politiques sociales spécifiques. Je mets en évidence la continuité extraordinaire des diverses institutions et orientations politiques de ces pays. Je constate qu'il n'y a pas une voie de la bonne performance économique, mais plusieurs. J'indique cinq types d'économie politique, aux coûts et gains propres au regard du bien-être des personnes, tant au plan économique que non économique. Un résumé final compare des extrêmes: la \"voie basse\" conflictuelle poursuivie par les États-Unis et la \"voie haute\" poursuivie par les plus fortes démocraties consensuelles d'Europe continentale, où les partenaires sociaux ont négocié de vraies réformes des coûteuses politiques sociales tout en préservant la cohésion sociale.

It is tempting to oversell the practical value of applied research. A hard look at the effects of U.S. social science on public policy in areas such as active labor market policies (training, job creation, placement, etc.), crime prevention, fiscal policy, poverty reduction, and health care reform suggests an inverse relationship between social science consensus and policy and budgetary decisions. Fragmented and decentralized political economies (e.g., the United States) foster policy segmentation and isolated, short-run single-issue research-often politicized and misleading. More corporatist democracies (such as Sweden, Norway, Austria, and Germany) evidence a tighter relation between knowledge and power in which a wider range of issues is connected, longer-range effects are sometimes considered, and research is more often actually used for planning and implementation. Even in less hospitable societies, however, social science does make its way in the long run. Favorable conditions and examples are discussed.

Although America leads the world in conducting social scientific evaluations of public policies, in the end, social science contributes less to policymaking here than it does in most of Western Europe and Japan. Instead, our research has little bearing on whether a government program lives or dies. Intellectuals typically have tense relationships with men and women of power, but the disconnect between research and policy is most extreme in the United States.

In the stormy political climate and tight economic circumstances of the early 1980s, a recurrent problem in social theory acquires new urgency: the relative effectiveness of markets, governments, and voluntary associations in coping with social issues – the question of what each sector can do well or badly or not at all. As they tackle this question, American social scientists and policy analysts have given us an abundance of ideological passion, a minimum of serious analysis, and few cross-national comparisons. Their work has inspired a vast confusion in political language and action. In the 1970s, Governor Jerry Brown of California initially

Consensual Democracies vs. Confrontational DemocraciesSee Wilensky, 1976: 21–25, 48, 50–51, for measures of degree of corporatism, and pp. 56–68 for measures of political effects; and Wilensky, 1983, for elaboration of the types of corporatism and their policy effects. For earlier theoretical work on the concept “corporatism,” see Schmitter, 1974. My model of democratic corporatism accents four interrelated criteria: (1) bargaining channels for the interaction of strongly organized, usually centralized economic blocs, especially labor, employer, and professional associations with centralized or moderately centralized government obliged to consider their advice; (2) a blurring of old distinctions between public and private; (3) a broad scope of national bargaining going beyond labor-market issues and resulting in; (4) the integration of social and economic policy and a greater chance to reach consensus and implement policy. Germany is an ambiguous case of corporatism; Switzerland, a marginal case of corporatism without labor (see Wilensky, 1976: 51, and 1981: 379, n. 42; and Pempel and Tsunekawa, 1979). The numerical scores for corporatism used in regressions are slightly different from the types of corporatism in Tables 2, 7, and 8, especially for France, Japan, and Switzerland.“Democracy” is a system in which people choose leaders through competitive elections made possible by a rule of law and freedom of association and related civil liberties (cf. Schumpeter, 1942: 250–302; Dahl, 1989). “Pluralism” is defined as a polity in which many relatively autonomous groups representing a real division of values and interests compete for power within a nation-state. All democracies are pluralist. But authoritarian regimes often have elements of pluralism; they tolerate a degree of autonomy for selected groups such as the church, the monarchy, the military, or industry. Pluralism is thus not the same as democracy. Finally, “democratic corporatism” is a subtype of democracy focused on differences among democracies in their national bargaining structures. It is distinguished from the authoritarian version of corporatism of Mussolini, Franco, or Peron. And, of course, both democracy and authoritarian regimes are distinguished from totalitarian systems, which aim to eliminate all independent associations, all zones of privacy – Nazi Germany, Stalinist USSR (Linz, 1975), North Korea.

Preface and IntroductionOne should really never say, “the state does this or that.” It is always important to recognize who or whose interest it is that sets the machine of the state in motion and speaks through it.Joseph Schumpeter (1918)Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Soon or late, it is ideas, not vested interests, which are dangerous for good or evil.John Maynard Keynes (1936)“Globalization” has become the all-purpose cause of our troubles and opportunities. Among the basic questions about its impact on public policy and human welfare, two are of great interest to both scholars and policy makers:Is the nation-state eroding as a unit of social-science analysis and as the center of political action?Do capital and labor flows across national boundaries threaten the social and labor policies of the rich democracies – especially job protection and good earnings and welfare-state benefits, such as government-guaranteed universal pensions and health insurance?Because these questions assume that globalization gives countries with low labor costs and lean social policies a competitive advantage over their rivals, we must give an estimate regarding a third question:Leaving aside the net contribution of the welfare state and labor policies to such values as dignity, security, equality, family well-being, social integration, and political legitimacy, what are the net effects of the welfare state, social policies, and job protection on productivity and economic performance?