ABSTRACT
As a social system, the post-World War II welfare state derived its meaning and wider historical significance from general theories of social development. Various ‘grand narratives’ or general interpretations of the development of Western society have sought to capture the ‘meaning’ or ‘essence’ of the welfare state by relating it to a wider pattern of social development (George and Wilding, 1976; Mishra, 1981; Room, 1979). Here we shall single out three overarching theories for attention: Marxism, social democracy or democratic transition to socialism, and neo-conservatism. It appears that through the 1980s and early 1990s we are witnessing a decline in the credibility of these theories, especially of their historicist and evolutionary assumptions. Moreover it is a decline which may well be terminal rather than episodic or cyclical. A series of changes-ideological and philosophical, aesthetic and cultural, economic and political-within Western society suggest the emergence of, or at least transition towards, a new situation or condition. A distinctive feature of this situation may
be said to be the exhaustion of social utopias. This echoes the notion of ‘postmodernity’, summed up by an acknowledged philosopher of postmodernity as ‘incredulity toward meta narratives’ (Lyotard 1984: xxiv).3
