This book traces the origins of the German welfare state. The author, formerly director at the Max-Planck-Institute for European Legal History, Frankfurt, provides a perceptive overview of the history of social security and social welfare in Germany from early modern times to the end of World War II, including Bismarck's pioneering introduction of social insurance in the 1880s. The author unravels "layers" of social security that have piled up in the course of history and, so he argues, still linger in the present-day welfare state. The account begins with the first efforts by public...

This book investigates the history of the post-war welfare state in Germany and its normative foundations, with special emphasis on constitutional issues. The author, formerly Director of the Max-Planck-Institute for Foreign and International Social Law, Munich, and President of the Max-Planck-Society, argues that social policy - not only in Germany - is about struggles over the "social." The "social" is an open and changing concept that reflects the modern quest for equality, voiced in semantics like justice, participation, inclusion and security. The "social" and the "social state" (the...

This book investigates the history of the post-war welfare state in Germany and its normative foundations, with special emphasis on constitutional issues. The author, formerly Director of the Max-Planck-Institute for Foreign and International Social Law, Munich, and President of the Max-Planck-Society, argues that social policy - not only in Germany - is about struggles over the "social." The "social" is an open and changing concept that reflects the modern quest for equality, voiced in semantics like justice, participation, inclusion and security. The "social" and the "social state" (the...

This book traces the origins of the German welfare state. The author, formerly director at the Max-Planck-Institute for European Legal History, Frankfurt, provides a perceptive overview of the history of social security and social welfare in Germany from early modern times to the end of World War II, including Bismarck's pioneering introduction of social insurance in the 1880s. The author unravels "layers" of social security that have piled up in the course of history and, so he argues, still linger in the present-day welfare state. The account begins with the first efforts by public...

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of social policy in the German Democratic Republic (GDR, 1949-1990), followed by an analysis of the "Social Union," the transformation of social policy in the process of German unification in 1990. Schmidt's analysis of the GDR also depicts commonalities and differences between the welfare state in East and West Germany as well as in other East European and Western countries. He concludes that the GDR was unable to cope with the trade-off between ambitious social policy goals and a deteriorating economic performance. Ritter embeds his analysis of...

In the burgeoning literature on welfare regimes and typologies, this comparative study offers a stimulating new perspective. Kaufmann, the doyen of the sociology of social policy in Germany, emphasizes norms, culture and history, in contrast to political economy approaches. Comparing Britain, Sweden, France and Germany, Kaufmann highlights the idiosyncrasy of each welfare state: countries are compared with regard to their state traditions and the relationship between state and civil society; their national social questions; their economic systems, including the unions and labour law; social...