Welfare Regime in Taiwan： International Context

1. Welfare Regime in Taiwan：International Context Professor Yeun-wen Ku Department of Social Work National Taiwan University

2. Outline • Introduction • Welfare Studies in East Asia • East Asian Welfare Regime in Comparative Context • Possible Explanatory Factors • Concluding Remarks

3. Introduction • The 1990s: Growing Concerns on Welfare Development in East Asia • Is there a special model in East Asian welfare? • Democratization has been firmed in Taiwan. • The First Time of Ruling Party Change in 2000 • The DPP won again in 2004 • But unemployment and poverty remain • Regulation or Deregulation?

4. East Asian Welfare Regimes in Comparative Context

5. Welfare Studies in East Asia: A Two-Dimensional Model • 1. Cases: Single Case, East Asia as a Region, and Trans-regional Comparison • 2. Issues: Policy, System and Regime

7. Findings • 1. Policy Orientation: Family-centred, Reluctant State, Traditional Charity, Oikonomic Welfare States….. • 2. System Characteristic: Education Priority, Occupation-based, Means- tested Assistance….. • 3. Regime Interpretation: Conservative, Productivist, Developmentalist, Confucianism, Hybrid…..

8. Purposes • Extending the concept of three welfare regimes: liberal, conservative, and social democracy (Esping-Andersen,1990) • Empirically analyzing the regime types in East Asian countries • With special reference to Taiwan’s case

9. Productivist Welfare Capitalism • Growth-oriented state • Subordination of all aspects of state policy, including social policy, to economic/industrial objectives • The importance of education and family

10. What Has Been Done in This Study? • 20 countries included • Developing a set of 15 indicators • Collecting two sets of 1980s and 1990s indicators • Factor analysis • Cluster analysis • A new East Asian regime found

11. Indicators

12. Dimensions of Indicators • Demanding for welfare: labour union movement and modernisation . • Input of governmental efforts: governmental social expenditure, social investment, social consumption, and private pension. • Output of governmental efforts: non-coverage, self-reliance in retired life, the number of pension and health schemes and gender wage lag. • Welfare loading: contribution from employees, contribution from employers, and percentage of aged persons living with their child. • Politico-economic context for development: trade dependency and resource dependency.

13. Denmark Sweden Finland Norway United Kingdom Australia New Zealand Austria France Italy Germany Japan Canada United States Switzerland Belgium Netherlands Ireland South Korea Taiwan Figure 1. Welfare Regimes in Hierarchical Cluster (1980s)

14. Netherlands Switzerland United Kingdom United States Australia Canada Austria Italy France Germany Japan Denmark Finland Norway Sweden Belgium South Korea Taiwan Ireland New Zealand Figure 2. Welfare Regimes in Hierarchical Cluster（1990s）

15. Developmentalism Corporatist Country code：1. Australia, 2. Austria, 3. Belgium, 4. Canada, 5. Denmark, 6. Finland, 7. France, 8. Germany, 9. Ireland, 10. Italy, 11. Japan, 12. South Korea, 13.Taiwan, 14. Netherlands, 15. New Zealand, 16. Norway, 17. Sweden. 18. Switzerland, 19. United Kingdom, 20. United States. In Z Scale, come from Factor Analysis and for Hierarchical Cluster (1990s)

16. General Features of East Asian Welfare • Economic development is the core value in state policy and takes priority over social policy or income redistribution. • As social policy is underdeveloped, public expenditure on welfare does not take the same sort of role as in western countries; which means that low welfare expenditure should be regarded as a policy output, rather than due to any need for low welfare expenditure. • Lower welfare expenditure does not mean weak government, since state intervention is strong in the field of development. Thus East Asian countries should not be presumed to have large scale private welfare/pension markets, like the liberal welfare states. • Instead of the market, the family is required an expected to take more welfare responsibility for its individual members. • Regarding the distribution of welfare, universalism is hardly found and the effects of welfare stratification are common in East Asian countries. Welfare has been primarily distributed to governmental employees such as civil servants, teachers, and military servicemen.

17. Possible Explanatory Factors

18. Explaining Factors (5-1) • Values and Cultures ‘When we look at the substance of social policy, the difference is…that in the East Asian societies all the positions reflect a Confucian agenda, in the same way as in the West all the positions reflect an agenda informed by Judaeo-Christian values.’ Rieger and Leibfried, 2003: 334

19. Explaining Factors (5-2) • Nation-Building and Political Democratization ‘The experience of Korea and Taiwan have shown that democratization could be a crucial factor which influences social welfare development.’ Tang, 2000: 60

20. Explaining Factors (5-3) • Capitalist Development and Globalization ‘The low levels of social security expenditure and provision in the tigers show the way in which economic concerns – productivism – have been given priority over public responsibility for the meeting of social needs.’ Ku, 2003: 158

21. Explaining Factors (5-4) • Changing Social and Demographic Structure ‘…the old idea of a welfare society is becoming bankrupt…families can no longer afford to give care services to their members; the scale of the family becoming smaller and more women are increasing engaged in paid work…’ Uzuhashi, 2001: 123

22. Explaining Factors (5-5) • Institutional Arrangement ‘Political Institutions do not predetermine any specific policy outcome; rather, they construct a strategic context in which political actors make their choices.’ Immergut, 1992: 239

23. Questions Ahead • Main Features of Welfare Institutional Arrangement in East Asia • Major Changes since Then, and Why • Political Process to Set and Modify Policy Agenda • Political and Social Coalitions for and against Policy Innovations • The Involvement of External Actors, e.g. International Organizations

24. Concluding Remarks • Far Away from Conclusion • Welfare in Development • A More Comprehensive Framework for Comparison • New Paradigm and New Answers, e.g. Social Quality Approach.

25. Thank you for your comments.