The Divided Welfare State

Lapidus, John

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-24784-3_1

Cited by 4 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Between 1986 and 1991, social democrats decentralized and dismantled much of government regulatory control of central state agencies that were handed down to the regional and municipality level. Public funding became available to nonprofit providers in 1984 and onwards to increase the share of parental cooperatives, staff cooperatives, and nonprofit foundations in Swedish welfare (Blomqvist 2004; Lapidus 2019: 194).…”

Section: Structural Changes In Regulation Ownership and Welfare 1980 ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the virtual absence of vocal anti-hegemonic forces, many social democratic leaders have limited criticism against welfare profits as much as possible throughout most of the last decades. On the contrary, Sweden’s neoliberalized welfare model has received open support from several political elites tied to the social democratic party, as well as from the white-collar unions, one of the largest blue-collar union, and affluent citizens that benefit from exclusive private welfare access (Lapidus 2019: 174–175, 187–188, 195; Svallfors & Tyllström 2019: 758–759).…”

Section: New Regulation Of the Welfare Model Through Accumulation By ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Financialized accumulation, neoliberal hegemony, and the transformation of the Swedish Welfare Model, 1980–2020

et al. 2022

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Drawing on a Gramscian Regulation Approach and Harvey’s accumulation by dispossession thesis, this article discusses the structural and hegemonic mechanisms of the neoliberal transformation of Sweden’s welfare sectors. Providing new longitudinal data on welfare retrenchment, corporate governance, wealth shares, and private economic power, the article further analyzes how the transformation of the Swedish post-war universal welfare model is related to class struggle and accumulation regime change in the Swedish economy. Following a decade-long countermobilization of Swedish capital and a severe economic crisis in the early 1990s, neoliberal economic common sense was cemented among social democratic policy elites that manifested itself in an institutionalized austerity polity, leading to a slow but steady dismantling of the Swedish welfare project. Roughly a fifth of employees in the three largest welfare sectors work in private welfare companies that generate tax-financed profits on politically created welfare markets. Welfare profits are in turn defended by a welfare–industrial complex and undergirded by a hegemonic bloc consisting of capital elites and sympathetic policymakers. In the virtual absence of vocal antihegemonic forces, many social democratic leaders have limited criticism against welfare profits throughout the last decades. On the contrary, austerity measures practiced by Swedish social democrats have thereto led to deteriorating social cohesion and spawned distrust among core social democratic voters.

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Section: Structural Changes In Regulation Ownership and Welfare 1980 ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: New Regulation Of the Welfare Model Through Accumulation By ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Financialized accumulation, neoliberal hegemony, and the transformation of the Swedish Welfare Model, 1980–2020

et al. 2022

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“…Yet, scholars continue to illuminate how the Swedish welfare system is incomplete (Inghe and Inghe, 1968; Swärd, 2017). While rich people turn to privatised welfare services (Lapidus, 2019), and marginalised groups cannot access the Swedish welfare system (de los Reyes, 2006), social charity organisations once again become important for alleviating inequality (Trägårdh et al, 2013).…”

Section: Food Practices Of Folkkök In Sweden: From Altruistic To Anar...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Political Imaginations of Community Kitchens in Sweden

Lundström

2022

Critical Sociology

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Whereas the sociology of food has drawn attention to differences between corporate and alternative foodways, the political imaginations underpinning the latter are often overlooked. This article distinguishes between different political imaginations of the community kitchen, a set of practices characterised by collective preparation and redistribution of food. The analysis builds on ethnographic and archive material in Sweden to outline how the folkkök (people’s kitchen) was once an institutional practice to address urban food insecurity, soon outsourced as altruistic soup kitchens, and then regenerated a century later by the anarchist movement. By distinguishing between altruistic and anarchistic imaginations in this analysis, the article adds another layer to the critical sociological study of alternative foodways.

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“…In Sweden, as in the other Nordic countries, the field of shadow education has recently been identified as an interesting research area and has attracted increased attention (Forsberg et al, 2019; Hallsén & Karlsson, 2019; Lapidus, 2019). How shadow education takes shape, as well as its consequences for individuals, nations, and mainstream education, is highly dependent on the context.…”

Section: Homework Support: the Swedish Form Of “Shadow Education”mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Subsidization of private welfare services is a relatively new phenomenon in Sweden but has been seen in a number of different welfare sectors in recent times. In a way, this way of trying to strengthen welfare is the opposite of the traditional Swedish model and it has been said that the “Swedish welfare model is gradually losing its characteristics” (Lapidus, 2019, p. 1). The political financial support for private homework support is an example of how this trend is put into practice.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Rise of Supplementary Education in Sweden: Arguments, Thought Styles, and Policy Enactment

Hallsén

2020

ECNU Review of Education

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Purpose: This article focuses on the development of supplementary education, evolving under the label “homework support,” in Sweden between 2006 and 2018. Particular attention is paid to the significance of the private market for national policy. Design/Approach/Methods: Through a theoretical model on policy enactment, the interaction between national policy and local practice is highlighted. By analyzing how the local practice appears in documents related to state-regulated decision-making, the study gains further insights in the development of homework support in Sweden. Findings: This article argues that when private companies, offering supplementary tutoring, were established on the outskirts of the educational landscape in Sweden, the political educational discourse changed. Even though homework support became a given part of the political discussion about the school, the situation became difficult for private companies. Originality/Value: The article adds to the international field of shadow education. It describes the establishment of the private tutoring market’s entry into the Swedish educational landscape, which in the long term has provided a basis for a further Scandinavian development. Furthermore, the article contributes to theory development by a model that focuses on the interaction between policy formulation and local enactment.

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The Divided Welfare State

Cited by 4 publications

References 22 publications

Financialized accumulation, neoliberal hegemony, and the transformation of the Swedish Welfare Model, 1980–2020

Financialized accumulation, neoliberal hegemony, and the transformation of the Swedish Welfare Model, 1980–2020

Political Imaginations of Community Kitchens in Sweden

The Rise of Supplementary Education in Sweden: Arguments, Thought Styles, and Policy Enactment

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