A growing scholarship has documented changes in welfare policy in twenty-first-century Latin America, but no study yet has offered a systematic assessment, using a welfare regime approach, that captures the main trends across countries and over time. For a sample of 17 countries, this study offers a comprehensive tool to measure shifts in social policy regimes, highlighting three dimensions of welfare – inclusion, generosity, and equity – across four policy areas: transfers, health care, education, and family policies. Countries made significant progress in generosity and inclusion, but none improved equity. A cluster analysis based on the three dimensions of welfare offers a new, more precise classification of Latin American countries in welfare regimes in 2002 and 2017. Although the analysis shows minor shifts in country groupings, an increasing reliance on social assistance policies, particularly among the most advanced countries, marks a shift towards what I call compensatory regimes.

Over the last 10 years, to no small degree, thanks to the work of the outgoing editors Zoë Irving and Kevin Farnsworth, the Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy (hereafter: the Journal) has positioned itself among the leading outlets for international and comparative social policy research.

The ideas, practicalities, and challenges of establishing effective social protection in Africa are steadily, if somewhat slowly, gaining notice in both policy-making forums and mainstream social policy analysis. The world’s second largest and populous continent, Africa is also its poorest region, with chronic poverty, vulnerabilities, and preventable hardship. Despite some significant developments in social welfare interventions and outcomes since the turn of the century, the policy agenda and dynamics in most countries remain complex and tenuous, arguably more so than other lower and middle income (LMIC) regions. This special edition contributes to a critical analysis of the challenges and opportunities facing social protection systems in Africa. It also seeks to examine the extent to which the staple explanatory concepts of welfare dynamics in the northern and western hemispheres – the role of actors, ideas, and institutions – need to be modified or adapted when analysing welfare dynamics in Africa. The focus is on Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) rather than the more diverse and heterogeneous Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. While, it is important to acknowledge that SSA nations are also distinct and varied; nevertheless, they share important characteristics in terms of historical contexts, average incomes, development outcomes, and most relevant for the purpose of this analysis, social policy strategies, and challenges.

There has been an increasing interest in exploring the different types of welfare regimes in middle- and low-income countries. However, most of the studies so far seem to neglect the importance of illicit groups as welfare providers. Illicit groups can be so powerful in many of these societies, that they can create extensive social safety nets embedded in parallel governance orders. Considering their importance as fundamental actors in the Global South, it is required to acknowledge their role as welfare deliverers as a missing piece in the literature. Hence I discuss the nature of what I call “clandestine welfare” and three specific forms of social protection provided by illicit groups: direct, involuntary, and forced. In the first form, the illicit groups provide directly to society by delivering goods or services that the formal state fails to provide. In the second, the illicit group’s activities have involuntary but positive spill-overs over society in terms of welfare. In the last one, the illicit groups use violence to force other social actors to provide social protection. By bringing illustrative examples from Latin America, I aim to show that the action of illicit groups represents a tangible source of welfare for a large segment of the population that goes beyond charity.

Social policy scholars seeking to understand the dynamics of social protection arrangements have advocated for an actor-centric approach. However, when seeking to understand the impact of colonialism on social policymaking, most scholars have focused not on actors but on ideas and institutions. To address this gap, this paper develops an actor-centric framework for understanding the introduction of social policies in colonial contexts. We identify and compare actor constellations of relevance to the introduction of social policies in two colonies of French West Africa that differ with respect to precolonial population density: Dahomey (present-day Benin), with a relatively high precolonial population density, and Côte d’Ivoire, with a relatively low precolonial population density. Despite evidence that precolonial population density can shape colonial strategies and policies, the results provide no supporting evidence that precolonial population density is a driver of meaningful variation in the introduction of social policies or in the composition of the actor constellations from which they originate. Instead, the results point to the key role of transnational and regional actors in the introduction of social policies in colonial contexts. They also highlight the domestic economic and societal arenas as sites where: i) heterogeneity emerges in the social policy actor constellations; and ii) local actors mediate tensions arising from imperially driven social transformations.

This article examines with empirical evidence the social protection measures implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic in ten welfare states in the Global North. We analysed the potential similarities and differences in responses by welfare regimes. The comparative study was conducted with data from 169 measures, collected from domestic sources as well as from COVID-19 response databases and reports. In qualitative terms, we redeveloped Hall’s theory on the distinction between first-, second- and third-order changes. In accordance with the path-dependence thesis, we show systematically that the majority of the studied changes (91%) relied on a pre-pandemic tool demonstrating flexibility within social security systems. The relative share of completely new instruments was notable but modest (9%). Thematically, the social protection measures converged beyond traditional welfare regimes, particularly among the European welfare states. Somewhat surprisingly, the changes to social security systems related not just to emergency aid to mitigate traditional risks but, to a greater extent, also to prevent new risks from being actualised.

Although there is a growing literature on transnational ideational processes in sub-Saharan Africa, the linkages between local, national, and transnational actors and ideas in African social policy would gain from more systematic mapping. In this paper, we explore what we call the “scales of ideational policy influence” by sketching a multi-level, actor-centric, and institutionalist perspective on ideational policy influence at the local, national, and transnational scales. This discussion leads to analysis of how these scales interact in terms of specific ideas and how both governmental and non-governmental actors seek to impact social policy decisions in sub-Saharan Africa. To illustrate the three scales of ideational influence and their interaction, the paper turns to the making of poverty reduction policies in Ghana. We show how policy ideas move from the global level to a national and subnational level using ideational mechanisms aided by the institutional position of actors and material factors.

The aim of this article was to use an interpretivist approach to analyse the state–citizen nexus in general and the conflict between civil and social rights imposing restrictions on people’s freedom of movement during the COVID-19 pandemic in the Nordic countries: Sweden (restrictions were voluntary and relied on nudging and individual implementation), Norway (restrictions of movement were for everyone and was enforced by authorities), and Finland (restrictions of movement were for the capital region and was enforced by authorities). Sweden focused more on upholding the civil rights vis-à-vis social rights whereas in Norway and Finland social rights have trumped civil rights in the face of the pandemic. Thus, the analysis suggests that the Nordic countries cannot be understood as monoliths in all respects. The article thereby contributes to a greater understanding of how the Nordic governments prioritise civil and social rights differently when they are forced to choose.

This study examines which poverty attributions are present in Guyana, a developing country in South America, and tests which variables explain these attributions in a non-Western context by linking them to structural characteristics, feelings of resentment, and values. First, using survey data from the Values and Poverty Study in Guyana (N = 1,557), we find that the traditional three-tier model does not adequately capture Guyanese attributions of poverty. Instead, confirmatory factor analysis identifies some subdimensions of structural attributions that refer to both social and economic structure, a hybrid dimension linking poverty to family breakup, and explanations related to social and individual fate. Second, we examine the impact of feelings of resentment on poverty attributions. In particular, experiences of powerlessness foster structural, fatalistic, and family attributions of poverty, illustrating the role of a lack of external locus of control. Finally, our study shows that ideological values and egalitarianism have the strongest predictive power.

Poverty, inequality and climate change are profoundly interconnected issues and represent grave threats to the future of our planet and civilization. Failure in one will result in failure in the other; thus, government responses to such threats must be meticulously coordinated, especially across environmental and welfare state programs. In recent years, a growing body of research has examined the links between these two domains, lauding the eco-welfare state as a viable path forward. As the literature on the eco-welfare state is at an early stage, this study proposes two essential theoretical and empirical contributions. First, it examines the most prominent theoretical interpretations of the concept of eco-welfare state and proposes a refined understanding. Second, using model-based cluster analysis for 42 countries, this study empirically unveils a global shift towards and the existence of an eco-welfare state.

It has become universal to claim a relationship between social cohesion and quality public childcare. The more we invest in our children, the better the return later in life. We explore how childcare is used to strengthen social life by comparing the state role in civilising childcare as described in policy and educational guidelines. At one level, we find that policy intentions are framed by the idea of using childcare to reduce inequalities between people and social groups, and at another by the idea of civilising children to adapt to existing social structures. The analysis unfolds these two sets of intentions by showing how pedagogical ideas of child development become linked to the ways two very different states – Brazil and Denmark – formulate and organise ECEC policies as well as using childcare to bridge between people and social groups, and to civilising children to adapt to existing social structures.

Social protection has expanded unevenly across Africa because of variations in both the initial adoption of programmes and their subsequent ‘institutionalisation’ through government-funded expansions in coverage. The case of Zambia illustrates how policy coalitions promoting the institutionalisation of social protection compete with other claimants over prioritisation in public spending. Even when faced with competitive elections, incumbent governments may prioritise other programmes over social protection. In Zambia, the incumbent government announced and budgeted for a massive government-funded expansion of social protection but failed to allocate the necessary funding – with the result that benefits were not paid to registered beneficiaries. If ‘institutionalisation’ is understood as entailing the political irreversibility of expansion, then the rhetoric of institutionalisation belied the reality (for several years) of retrenchment. The weakened policy coalition supporting social protection was unable to prevent government defunding as scarce government resources were allocated to competing programmes.

Charities are long-established and increasingly prominent non-state actors in social policy. However, these organisations remain understudied within social policy research, particularly their presence in the delivery of global social policy. This paper provides new cross-national evidence about charities operating internationally. It makes use of a comprehensive administrative dataset covering the country of operation of every overseas charity registered in England and Wales, Australia, and Canada. The international connections of charities are extensive, and these organisations are much more likely to work in countries with shared colonial and linguistic ties, and less likely to work in those with poor governance or high levels of corruption. This paper goes beyond a binary focus on either “developing” or “developed” country contexts, and provides insight into the international connections of “non-elite” as well as “elite” social policy actors.

Child nutrition, health and development are closely tied to maternal nutrition, health and well-being. The underlying drivers of poor maternal and child nutritional outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa are structural in nature. These risks include social, economic, and environmental factors that together compound vulnerability to poor outcomes. Poverty, as a driver of poor maternal and child health outcomes, is an important determinant that is both a cause and a consequence of malnutrition. The United Nations’ Children’s Fund (UNICEF)’s conceptual model for determinants of maternal and child nutrition outcomes released in 2020, is the agency’s latest iteration of child nutrition frameworks. The model identifies the underlying causes of malnutrition as extending beyond food and diets, to include household level dynamics, maternal factors, and the external environment. The manuscript discusses UNICEF’s conceptual model and its applicability in sub-Saharan Africa. It also considers the evidence on interventions aimed at addressing maternal and child nutrition in the region and the location of social protection among these policy tools, with a special focus on the extent to which these resonate with the conceptual model. It concludes by considering the conditions required for social protection instruments to work in the region and similar settings in the Global South. In this way, the manuscript provides a critical reflection about the role of social protection as a nutrition-sensitive instrument in sub-Saharan Africa, in the context of maternal and child nutrition outcomes.

Little is known about government policies that regulate economic transfers between separated parents (child support) outside of high-income countries. This paper provides the first broad overview of child support policy and its outcomes in 37 middle- and low-income countries. Using a systematic literature review, we provide information on child support policies in these countries, considering institutional arrangements, procedures for determining how much child support is due and how obligations are enforced. Using descriptive statistics on individual-level data from the Luxembourg Income Study Database, we show that poverty rates are high among lone-mother families and that fewer than one-third of lone mothers receive child support. Among those who receive, however, amounts average over $3,600 US$/year, making child support an important income source for some. We discuss how current policies and their estimated outcomes are similar to (or differ from) the previous work that focused on high-income countries.

The role of external actors has now been widely acknowledged in shaping social policy processes in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet, the social policy roles and influence of philanthropic donors have been less recognised and examined. As various countries in the region seek to expand social policy implementation and delivery and revitalise the development of national welfare systems, it is important to better understand the roles and functions of philanthropic donor agencies in the processes of agenda-setting, financing, and delivery of social policy. This article discusses the complex social policy functions held by philanthropic donor agencies in sub-Saharan Africa through the lens of the “welfare mix,” drawing attention to the divergencies and convergences between Western philanthropic donors and their African counterparts, while reflecting on the direction of future research agendas.

Facing ageing challenges, long-term care (LTC) has become a focus of policymaking and policy analysis in China. However, the burgeoning literature obscures a lack of understanding of LTC policymaking, implying a linear and neutral process. This depoliticisation is unrealistic and contributes little to understanding the diversity of LTC policies and improving inclusive LTC provision. Focusing on the core institutional arrangement, LTC insurance (LTCI), this article explores a highly politicised policymaking process and reveals complex political deliberations behind different LTCI choices across regions. Underpinned by the multiple streams approach, which supports a systematic comparison of the policy process, this article identifies four key factors from a relational perspective that influence LTCI policymaking, including the tension between evidence and politics in the construction of LTC issues, the tension between policy effectiveness and stability in the assessment of policy options, strong or weak political will, and the presence or absence of municipal government.

This article aimed to explore the individual-level determinants of current and previous trade union memberships and to question if certain patterns are prevalent among European countries. Accordingly, repeated logit models across 15 European countries are applied drawing on the ninth round of the European Social Survey data. Variables are selected primarily considering the supply–demand theory, which explains the union membership based on the idea that employees are seeking to maximise the utility through cost and benefit analysis. In this context, this article offers a comprehensive analysis of the determinants of trade union membership with findings suggesting that personal, occupational and workplace characteristics affect current membership while occupational and workplace characteristics have effects with inverse directions on current membership and previous membership.

Nigeria is home to a significant and growing “youth” population, over a third of it below 24 years of age. The demographic potential for productivity and growth this group represents occurs alongside large-scale unemployment among young people of working age. The “unemployment crisis” has deep historical roots and exists within a wider context of poor governance, insecurity, conflict, and poverty. Policy norms and practices to address youth unemployment in Nigeria largely centre on skill development and job creation, with complementary schemes selectively targeted to specific groups of vulnerable and poor individuals. Measures are typically ad hoc, detached from a coherent programme of sustainable reform. Pre-existing structural factors and capacity constraints also shape the effectiveness of these programmes. While a productivist focus within current policy is potentially empowering in giving young Nigerians “worker” status, it also detracts from attending to deep-rooted structural problems seen to affect young people in disproportionate ways. Securing meaningful choices and lives for Nigerian youth requires reframing youth unemployment beyond labour markets alone, and embedded in ideas of equality and collective action.