ABSTRACT
This chapter examines three traditions of thought about welfare and freedom. It looks at the manifestations of these traditions, and compares their approaches to social problems. The chapter suggests that the ways in which the future development of welfare is related to key arguments about freedom and social obligation. It seems that each of these traditions has important insights to offer which are relevant to people in dilemmas. The chapter summarises the strengths and weaknesses of the analyses of freedom and welfare in each tradition. To contribute to a true Welfare State, the insights on freedom derived from nineteenth-century liberalism would have to be separated from its characteristic system of economics. A true Welfare State would have to achieve the separation of income from earnings, so that freedom to earn was seen as secondary to a basic right to an adequate income for all.
