ABSTRACT
In his recent discussions about the future of the welfare state, Esping-Andersen analyses the “three pillars” of welfare: markets, families, and governments. He then compares European countries in terms of which of the three is the main source of welfare, and how other pillars have to absorb “pillar-failures”: families and/or governments compensating for market failures; families and markets compensating for governmental failures; governments, and less often markets, absorbing family failures. “Where neither is capable of substituting for ‘failure’ in the two others, this is when we encounter an acute welfare deficit or crisis” (Esping-Andersen 2002, 12). In this model, the Scandinavian welfare system is characterised as being unique in its emphasis on the government pillar and its active “de-familiarisation” of welfare responsibilities. According to the author, this has been done with two aims in mind: to strengthen families by unburdening them of obligations, and to enhance individual independence and, I would add, gender equality. The general idea behind the model is to provide ample care services, and through them to solve (or at least lessen) the “incompatibility problem,” namely, the tension that women face between their responsibilities toward their children and being able to pursue a work career.
