On May 1st, 2004, the European Union (EU) carried out the most comprehensive enlargement since its establishment in 1957 with the accession of eight Central- and Eastern European Countries (CEEC) as well as Malta and Cyprus. Within this enlarged EU two major political aims were set up, namely...

The 2008 financial market crisis, followed by the Great Recession and sovereign debt crises in several EU countries have triggered drastic reforms of old-age security systems. They were supposed to ensure the financial viability of public pension schemes in the short and long run and/or to...

Der Beitrag analysiert die sozialpolitischen Krisenreaktionen in Deutschland auf die Finanzkrise von 2008 im Licht der historischen Entwicklung und der Befunde der international vergleichenden Wohlfahrtsstaatsforschung. Vier aufeinanderfolgende Konjunkturpakete enthielten eine Reihe wichtiger...

The question whether and how warfare has influenced the development of advanced Western welfare states is contested. So far, scholarly work either focused on the trade-off between military and social spending or on case studies of individual countries. What is missing, however, is a systematic...

Public policy shapes the lives of individuals, and even more so if they depend on state support. But to what extent can well-being differences between individuals living in different European states be traced back to the specific national public policy designs? This paper tests the intervening...

The paper investigates paid work beyond retirement age in Germany and the UK. This comprises a combination of work, payments from a pension (or several pensions) and old age which is counter to the assumed finality of retirement and the corresponding standardised passage from end of work into...

Politics takes place in public communication and is part of public communication. Today, public communication is substantially determined by the media. This is also the case for the field of global social policy. The following study addresses the question of how global social policy and, in...

Die Finanzmarktkrise von 2008 und in deren Gefolge die Große Rezession sowie Staatsschuldenkrisen in verschiedenen EU-Ländern haben einschneidende Reformen der Alterssicherungssysteme ausgelöst, die die Finanzierung der Renten kurz- und langfristig sicherstellen, fiskalischen...

Seit einigen Jahren steht die Krise (der Finanzmärkte, des Euro, der Staatsschulden) im Zentrum der öffentlichen Diskussion. Waren die zunächst eingetretenen (kurzfristigen) Effekte für die deutsche Wirtschaft und die Alterssicherungssysteme - insbesondere im Vergleich zu vielen anderen...

The Country Reports on the State of Social Policy Research are published from time to time in the Working Paper Series of the Center for Social Policy. An experienced scientist offers an overview of the central institutions and persons in comparative and national social policy research in his or...