ABSTRACT
Welfare restructuring was introduced into state planning and political decision making by Social Democratic governments in Denmark in the early 1970s. Confronted with a severe economic crisis and high unemployment as a consequence of increasing oil prices, child care services became the object of cutbacks in the mid 1970s. Yet, the rhetoric of welfare retrenchment was stronger than the political practice. This was also the case during the reign of bourgeois governments in the 1980s, despite the fact that they launched a comprehensive modernization of the public sector, aiming at making it less costly and more effective. The issue of retrenchment reappeared on the political agenda in the 1990s under the Social Democratic governments. A major break with the previous passive approach to unemployment was adopted, and activation was launched as the primary policy goal. Claimants of social assistance became obliged to participate in job training, education, or sheltered employment. In relation to child care, steps toward encouraging more individualistic and private solutions of child care—for instance, in the form of parents caring themselves and contracting out—have been taken. Still, the distinctive features of Danish child care policy have not been challenged.
