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Is Social Policy Retrenchment Unpopular? How Welfare Reforms Affect Government Popularity

Bibliographic Data

ID2235546
AuthorsNathalie Giger (0000-0002-1030-8493, Mannheim Centre for European Social Research, corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume28
Issue5
Pages691-700
Publication date2012-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0266-7215 • E-ISSN: 1468-2672
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/esr/jcr039
OpenAlexW1987791140
LanguageEN
Citations received27
References cited26

This article investigates an established proposition in the welfare literature, namely whether retrenchment is indeed unpopular among the citizenry. Additional to the hypothesis that retrenchment has a negative impact on general government popularity, this article presents a more refined hypothesis: retrenchment is influential only for those citizens highly interested in social policy. This study analyses government performance data derived from election studies (CSES data) in a multilevel design and tests the influence of actual retrenchment initiatives. The findings indicate that retrenchment is not generally unpopular; however, it has a negative impact on the opinions of those interested in the topic.

Affect (linguistics) · Economics · Government (linguistics) · Political science · Politics · Popularity · Public economics · Retrenchment · Social policy · Social Welfare · Sociology · Welfare · Welfare reform · Welfare state · Electoral Systems and Political Participation · Fiscal Policies and Political Economy · Law · Public Administration · Social Policy and Reform Studies

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Unique citing works27
Citations per year2,25
Citation span2014 - 2025 (12)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 27

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