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Waiting for Godot? Welfare Attitudes in Portugal before and after the Financial Crisis

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Repository DOI


Type

Article

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Authors

Brito Vieira, M 
Carreira da Silva, Filipe  ORCID logo  https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2459-0802
Pereira, CR 

Abstract

jats:p Do attitudes towards the welfare state change in response to economic crises? Addressing this question is sometimes difficult because of the lack of longitudinal data. This article deals with this empirical challenge using survey data from the 2008 European Social Survey and from our own follow-up survey of Spring 2013 to track welfare attitudes at the brink and at the peak of the socio-economic crisis in one of the hardest hit countries: Portugal. The literature on social policy preferences predicts an increased polarisation in opinions towards the welfare state between different groups within society – in particular between labour market insiders and outsiders. However, the prediction has scarcely been tested empirically. A notoriously dualised country, Portugal provides a critical setting in which to test this hypothesis. The results show attitudinal change, and this varies according to labour market vulnerability. However, we observe no polarisation and advance alternative explanations for why this is so. </jats:p>

Description

Keywords

welfare state, welfare attitudes, 2008 financial crisis, Portugal, social rights

Journal Title

Political Studies

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0032-3217
1467-9248

Volume Title

Publisher

SAGE Publications