ABOUT THIS BOOK

In Recasting Welfare Capitalism, Mark Vail employs a sophisticated and original theoretical approach to compare welfare states and political-economic adjustment in Germany and France. He examines how and why institutional change takes place and what factors characterize economic evolution when moving from times of prosperity to more austere periods and back again. Covering the 1970s to the present, Vail analyzes social and economic reforms, including labor policy, social-insurance, and anti-poverty programs. He focuses on the tactics and actions of key political players, and demolishes the stagnation argument that suggests that France and Germany have largely frozen political economies, incapable of reform.

Vail finds that these respective evolutions involve interrelated changes in social and economic policies and are characterized by political relationships that are continuously renegotiated—often in unpredictable ways. In the process, he presents a compelling reconceptualization of change in both the welfare state and the broader political economy during an age of globalization.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Mark I. Vail is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Tulane University. He is a contributor to The State after Statism, edited by Jonah D. Levy, and has published work in Comparative Politics, The Journal of European Political Research, and West European Politics, among other venues.

REVIEWS

“This is an important and extremely well written book. Vail challenges the dominant theoretical approaches within comparative political economy. Recasting Welfare Capitalism is a comprehensive account, well researched, and exceptionally clear. It will reshape academic discussions of welfare state change.”—Chris Howell, Department of Politics, Oberlin College

"Recasting Welfare Capitalism presents very illuminating and detailed analysis of contemporary political and economic adjustment strategies in Germany and France. In so doing, it debunks the widely shared perception that these countries have been moribund and plagued by political stalemate. Vail's insights stem from a creative theoretical shift away from contemporary institutionalism in political economic analysis to an emphasis on informal relational dynamics and ideas. His persuasive argument about the emergence of new relations and dynamics is grounded in elegant and historically informed case studies of crucial policy and relational realms."
—Gary Herrigel, Department of Political Science, University of Chicago

"Mark Vail’s Recasting Welfare Capitalism shows how French and German political actors navigated the difficult and contentious transitions from rapid postwar economic growth to the slower growth of the past three decades. By linking the usual welfare-state analytic categories to broader economic management issues, he highlights how actors and their ideas mattered for the gradual transformation of both sides of the welfare-capitalism model in France and Germany. This is one of the rare studies offering a comprehensive and insightful analysis of structures, actors, and policy changes across the whole postwar era."
—Herman Schwartz, Department of Politics, University of Virginia

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Tables
Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction: Recasting Welfare Capitalism in an Age of Austerity
1. The Politics of Austerity in Advanced Industrial Democracies
2. The Rise and Fall of the Postwar Golden Age and the Development of French and German Welfare Capitalism
3. Recasting France’s Political-Economic Order: The Demise of Dirigisme and the Turn to the Market
4. German Reunifi cation and the Economic and Social Incorporation of Eastern Germany
5. Modernizing the French and German Labor Markets in an Age of Austerity
6. The Shifting Politics of French and German Social-Insurance Reform
7. New Social Rights in France and Germany
Conclusion: French and German Welfare-Capitalist Adjustment in Historical and Comparative Perspective
Notes
Index

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