ABSTRACT
The comparative differences are the product of unique macro- and micro-level structural conditions and nation-specific cultural experiences, which both contributed to structuration processes that pushed asbestos compensation in different directions. In Italy, asbestos compensation is also the result of a combination of workers' compensation payments and judicial awards for personal injuries. In Belgium, the bulk of asbestos compensation comes from workers' compensation payments and, more recently, an ad hoc mesothelioma compensation fund that compensates victims of any exposure to asbestos, occupational or not. The emergence of asbestos compensation is thus connected to the rise of the culture of total justice that pervaded the aftermath of the Second Industrial Revolution. The result of counter-hegemonic litigation was to redirect the focus of asbestos compensation mechanisms from workers' compensation and the welfare state to compensation and courts. Centennial history of asbestos compensation shows that cultural frameworks change over time and how structural change is produced and reproduced by the transformation of cultural schemas.
