Reconstructing the American Welfare State

There is widespread agreement that the American welfare state is in crisis. Derived piecemeal from the New Deal, the welfare state is faced with numerous problems, including severe fiscal constraint, programmatic fragmentation, rigid bureaucratization and proceduralism which hinders effective service delivery, diminishing political and social legitimacy, disaffection among welfare recipients, and numerous other difficulties. The authors of this book argue that clinging to old and outmoded policy approaches do not offer workable remedies to the welfare crisis. They also believe that "new Right" policies for drastic welfare cuts are unrealistic and contrary to wider social interests. Instead, Reconstructing the American Welfare State offers innovative, imaginative, and pragmatic solutions. They argue that principles such as equity, economic and political feasibility, effectiveness, and productivity should guide a reconstructed welfare state, and advocate a paradigm emphasizing access to services, social choice, the revitalization of the private sector, voluntarization, community redevelopment, the rekindling of social obligations, and other policy approaches.