‘Welfare States’ and Social Policies in Eastern Europe and the Former USSR: Where Informality Fits In?

Polese, Abel; Morris, Jeremy; Kovács, Borbála; Harboe, Ida

doi:10.1080/14782804.2014.902368

Cited by 62 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…The great body of post-socialist literature, apart from emphasizing that countries of Eastern and Central Europe cannot be perceived as a homogeneous region with regard to the welfare state, points to the fact that they share certain commonalities either in withdrawal of the state, structural mutations or in the lack of a social state due to embracing the neoliberal paradigm (Szikra and Tomka 2009;Cook 2007;Polese et al 2014;Deacon 2000). My evidence, however, runs counter to this dominant argumentation.…”

Section: The Welfare Statementioning

confidence: 41%

“…In cases when "the state withdraws from the provision of protection from social risks that citizens expect or need, a bottomup process of welfare provision and financing replaces formal welfare provision, citizens 'creating' an informal system of welfare that is independent from the state, but which fulfils the functions that the state should perform" (Polese et al 2014, 186). Such informal welfare and safety mechanisms do not necessarily follow traditional forms but rather emerge as a transitional, sui generis phenomenon (Polese et al 2014).…”

Section: Debate On Crowding Out Informal Welfarementioning

confidence: 99%

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Gleaning: old name, new practice

Diković

2016

The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law

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The practice of gleaning is linked to the centuries-old custom embedded in the customary laws of many people, according to which the master of the land holds the right to allow the poor to follow harvesters in the field and to gather and glean the fallen spears of grain. In this article, the new meaning of the practice of gleaning is analyzed by using an example of one Serbian village in Vojvodina province, Gaj, which is still predominately agricultural. In a strict sense, the name of the old practice is kept, but the essence of the practice itself and its symbolism have changed radically. In previous times, the term "gleaning" referred to the reciprocal social, economic and political relationship between the poor and the landowner. Today, in the context of the village of Gaj, it is mostly used as a euphemism for field theft. The article analyzes this gradual shift in diachronic and social-anthropological perspectives, aiming to depict and explain crucial changes in informal and formal institutions that have contributed to this current understanding of gleaning. Gleaning: Old Name, New Practice Abstract: The practice of gleaning is linked to the centuries-old custom embedded in the customary laws of many peoples, according to which the master of the land holds the right to allow the poor to follow reapers in the field and to gather and glean the fallen spears of grain. In this paper, the new meaning of the practice of gleaning is analyzed by using an example of one Serbian village in Vojvodina province, Gaj, which is still predominately agricultural. In a strict sense, the name of the old practice is kept, but the essence of the practice itself and its symbolism have changed radically. In previous times, the term 'gleaning' referred to the reciprocal social, economic and political relationship between the poor and the landowner. Today, in the context of the village of Gaj, it is mostly used as a euphemism for field theft. The paper analyzes this gradual shift in diachronic and social-anthropological perspectives, aiming to depict and explain crucial changes in informal and formal institutions that have contributed to this current understanding of gleaning.

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Section: The Welfare Statementioning

confidence: 41%

Section: Debate On Crowding Out Informal Welfarementioning

confidence: 99%

Gleaning: old name, new practice

Diković

2016

The Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law

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“…Many of these strategies, including those that have to do with welfare provision, such as informal childcare by grandparents or support of the elderly by younger generations, are found all over the world (Polese et al, 2014;Strangleman, 2001). Here, I present a rather typical post-Soviet example of livelihood strategy of a family of two engineers, Nadir and Lena.…”

Section: 'Bricolage' Of Formal and Informal: Coping Strategies And A mentioning

confidence: 96%

Negotiating welfare with the informalizing state: Formal and informal practices among engineers in post-Soviet Azerbaijan

Sayfutdinova

2015

Journal of Eurasian Studies

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a b s t r a c tThis article discusses the use of informal practices in negotiating welfare with state institutions in Azerbaijan. One of the effects of transition to market economies in the postsocialist countries has been the partial withdrawal of the state from welfare provision and residualization of welfare. Recent research has shown that informal practices play an important role in "structuring welfare from below" (Morris & Polese, 2014b) across postsocialist realm. Based on in-depth interviews with engineers at different periods of their careers, namely mid-career, working pensioners, and engineering students, this article demonstrates how formal and informal institutions and practices are strategically used by individuals, families, and low level bureaucrats to achieve desired career and welfare goals. Rather than compensating for the deficiencies of formal rules and institutions, formal and informal are intertwined and merged and are actively employed both by the citizens and state institutions.

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“…Badescu, 2003;Delhey et al, 2011); second, Eastern Europe is marked simultaneously by large informal economies and by extensive informal welfare systems that complement and (often) replace government benefits (e.g. Kuitto, 2016: Polese et al, 2014Schneider et al, 2010). Table 1 (OA1) lists the number of observations in each case, as well as the wave years.…”

Section: Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

Dualized trust: risk, social trust and the welfare state

Kevins

2018

Socio-Economic Review

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This article examines how labour market vulnerability and social policy interact to shape generalized trust. Drawing insights from the literature on dualization, I suggest that: (1) labour market outsiders will have lower levels of generalized trust due to their increased risk exposure; and (2) active labour market policies, by conditioning labour market vulnerability, can reduce the impact of outsiderness on trust. Leveraging within-country cleavages between insiders and outsiders therefore allows us to assess one possible mechanism behind the welfare state’s generation of trust, while at the same time holding cultural context and broader trust levels constant. Analysis of data from the 2008–2014 waves of the European Social Survey then provides evidence of the impact of outsiderness on trust and the ability of social policy to moderate that effect. The investigation thus sheds light on both an additional consequence of dualization and a mechanism linking the welfare state to generalized trust.

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‘Welfare States’ and Social Policies in Eastern Europe and the Former USSR: Where Informality Fits In?

Cited by 62 publications

References 38 publications

Gleaning: old name, new practice

Gleaning: old name, new practice

Negotiating welfare with the informalizing state: Formal and informal practices among engineers in post-Soviet Azerbaijan

Dualized trust: risk, social trust and the welfare state

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