The Dynamics of the European Social Model: An Evolving Polarisation?

In September 2001, a European MP submitted a written question to the European Commission over the continuity of the European model of social welfare or its replacement ‘by the American law-of-the jungle model’. In its answer, the Commission fully supported the European Social Model and its modernisation, based on a ‘dynamic and positive interaction between economic, employment and social policy’. ¹ This question and its answer show how the consideration of the European Social Model (ESM) remains a matter of lively debate within the context of the European integration process, and suggests the presence of an ideological polarisation. The very existence of the ESM is debated (Rodrigues, 2008) because of the diversity of the national social protection systems (Sykes and Alcock, 1998; Bazant and Schubert, 2009) and the lack of a European social policy proper (Wincott, 2003, p. 280; Goetschy, 2006, p. 48).