Neoliberals And The Radical Left Are In The Same Basic Income Boat: Is The Debate In Japan An Exception Or Is There A Universal Rationale Behind It?

By Toru Yamamori  
Around 2009, the debate over basic income in Japan reached not only academics  but also citizens, politicians, activists and the media. In spite of skepticism and opposition  from all political spectrum, support of the idea has come from two different political strands: the radical left and the Neoliberals. For a decade I have been researching radical grassroots activism for BI in Europe, and a concise introduction for BI that I published a year ago emphasized these roots for BI. This book was well received among some grassroots activists. So attention to BI from the radical left is not surprising for me, and internationally speaking, it is no surprise at all, even some academic proponents for BI in Japan dislike this connection (cf. Tateiwa and Saito 2010). 
In Korea, while, as in Japan, major proponents of BI also seem to come from the radical left, the debate differs from Japan in that there are not so many proponents from Neoliberals. So the fact some Neoliberals are influential ideologues of BI in Japan needs some explanation for a Korean audience. 
The purpose of this paper is to give a concise picture of the Japanese situation in order to discuss Neoliberals and BI.  
Employment insecurity after the financial crisis of 2007, finally destroyed the "We are all middle class" myth. Another result of the crisis was the defeat of the Liberal Democratic Party (the LDP). After over half a century as the majority party in the Diet, the LDP lost the 2009 election to the Democratic Party of Japan (the DPJ).  A prominent economist made the statement "The income security and household subsidies indicated in the DPJ's manifesto ultimately lead to the Basic Income discussed in Western Europe"(Ito, 2009). In this vein, the DPJ's Tax Policy Investigation Committee organized seminars on the topic of Basic Income in which I, and two other experts, gave presentations. 
However the DPJ has never officially endorsed the Basic Income policy. Media treatment of Basic Income is extremely rare, and, even among people knowledgeable of the policy, the majority is of the view that the guarantee is not in accordance with the traditional ethics of Japanese society.   
The first section will provide an overview of Japan's system of income security over the past half century and show the various causes of the current system's dysfunction. In the second section, following up on the situation just described in the first section, I will cover economic policy and political reality while analyzing the vocabulary to describe the situation. I will point out the lack of a vocabulary used to describe the new direction gradually being taken under the DPJ.  After briefly outlining the debate surrounding Basic Income in the third section, I will use the fourth section to propose using the vocabulary accumulated in the BI debate to fill the explanatory gap in discussions of current economic and social policies.

Work after Globalisation: Building Occupational Citizenship

By Guy Standing  
Drawing on a recent book, this will set out an agenda for a progressive social policy suitable for 21st century tertiary society.2 It starts from the premise that the financial shock of 2008-09 marked the end of globalisation as conceived by the neo-liberals and enshrined by policies advanced by the IMF and World Bank. 

The shock marked the crisis point of the disembedded phase of the Global Transformation, analogous to Karl Polanyi's Great Transformation. Whereas Polanyi's was about the forging of national markets, the current Transformation is about the painful forging of international markets. The period known as globalisation was the 'disembedded' phase involving the dismantling of the systems of regulation, redistribution and social protection that had suited to the industrial citizenship model underlying the Great Transformation's 'embedded' phase. It generated growing economic instability, chronic economic insecurity and widening inequalities that came to a head in the financial crisis of 2008-09.

This presentation will attempt to identify the primary challenges that have to be met if we are to move forward to an 'embedded' phase of the Global Transformation, one characterised by what the author calls occupational citizenship. It rests on identifying a progressive agenda that would appeal to the two emerging socio-economic 'classes', namely the proficians and the rapidly growing global precariat. The latter is the new dangerous class. Unless their fears, insecurities and aspirations are addressed, the sustainability of the economic system will be seriously jeopardised. In brief, a new social policy system will be needed to promote work rights and economic security, rather than labour security.  

Global Economic Downturn and Social Protection in East Asia: Coping crisis and reducing poverty

By Huck-ju Kwon  
1. Introduction

The global economic crisis that was triggered by the collapse of financial institutes in the US and Europe in 2008-9 poses a great risks to livelihood of the vulnerable people in the world. While people in the North are faced with tough economic prospect, citizens in the developing countries are exposed to high economic and social risks. In middle income countries, firms tightened their business activities that led to many lay-offs of workers. Jobs are lost not only in manufacturing and construction sectors, but also in tourism and service sectors. Regarding the poor in the Least Developed Countries (LDC) including Land-locked and Small Island Countries, the livelihood was already worsened by the hike in the food and oil price in 2007 before the global economic crisis took place. The global economic crisis poses a further serious threat that could derail the progress toward meeting the MDGs in the LDCs.

In relation to East Asia, it is the second crisis just over ten years, following the East Asian economic crisis in the 1997-8. Despite hefty social and economic cost, the East Asian countries hit by the previous crisis, such as Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and to less extent Hong Kong and Singapore came back with strong economic recovery and better social protection systems (Kwon, Mkandawire, and Palme 2009). Nevertheless, the current economic crisis is different in nature from the previous one in many ways. One of the most obvious differences of the current crisis is, firstly, that it did not originate from East Asia. The epicentre of the crisis was at the heart of the global capitalism: global financial institutions at the Wall Street. In the previous East Asia economic crisis those severely affected countries in the region could come out quickly by exporting goods and services to the vibrant markets in the North America and Europe. In contrast, given the weak consumer demand in these markets in the coming years, export to those markets would be weaker and, therefore, export-orient strategy may not be a path out of the crisis as effective as before. In order to avoid the situation of prolonged economic downturn, East Asia would need strong endogenous economic drivers for recovery.

If the economic downturn lasts long, it would hurt the most vulnerable hardest since their coping mechanism to economic and social risks is limited in choice and short in duration. Given that the poor people in East Asia had been hit by food and fuel crises in 2007 before the global economic crisis, their coping mechanisms of livelihood was already significantly weakened. Without adequate policy response to enable the poor to cope with social risks, it is feared that the progress made in poverty reduction in East Asia would be lost. 

Secondly, the immediate social impacts of the current economic crisis vary widely across East Asia and within each country. Those countries with strong economic links with the US and European economies have been affected immediately while the countries with economies less exposed to global economic risks have not felt the immediate impacts strongly. For example, Singapore's and Hong Kong's economic conditions which have shown great sensitivities to economic fluctuations of the US economy were the first group of economies that felt the financial crisis of the US economy. Another example is the Korean economy. As the liquidity fell short for the demand in the financial market in the US in an effort to deleverage borrowings in the late 2008, many international investors withdrew their money from the Korean market, which put strong pressure on the exchange rate of the Korean currency. Such immediate impacts on these economies alerted those governments, which produced a series of stimulus package as policy responses. China also reacted swiftly since its economic interest is very much linked to the fluctuation of the US economy. Those countries seem to be better prepared now than ten year ago (Mehrotra 2009).

In contrast, the developing countries such as Cambodia, Laos PDR and Myanmar did not experience immediate impacts of the global economic downturn, which led to lukewarm responses from the governments. Nevertheless, considering the scale of the crisis at the global level, there is little room to be complacent about the social impacts of the economic crisis on the poor in the developing countries. Migrant workers from these countries working other countries will send smaller amount of money to their homes and many of them may lose work and have no other options to come back. More importantly, these small and poor countries lack in effective instruments to influence global economic fluctuation.

As the impacts of the economic crisis vary, policy response for social protection should also be different in accordance to each country's social conditions and administrative capacity. In some countries, policy efforts to establish a institutional structure for social security might be a good solutions but in others short-term but immediate support such as cash transfer could be acutely in need. In other words, social protection in the wake of the global downturn should address the country specific needs while addressing universal human needs. In this context, this paper will examine the social protection mechanisms in East Asia from a comparative perspective and seek to find out the policy lessons that can improve their ability to provide the poor and vulnerable with adequate protection. 

In terms of the scope of analysis, this paper will select four East Asian countries, which represent different sets of countries in the region. First this paper will discuss the case of the Republic of Korea. As in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore, Korea has a welfare system that includes a range of social insurance and assistance programmes. It also belongs to the group of countries with relatively high level of per capita income (21,530 US$, see Table 1). In the previous East Asian economic crisis in 1997-8, Korea was one of the hardest countries but responded to the crisis with social policy reform that strengthened the welfare system. This paper will look into whether social policy programmes that had been instituted during the last East Asian crisis helped Korea dealt with the global economic crisis effectively. The second country under study is China, a fasting growing economy but with an inadequate social protection system. While China has reduced poverty in an impressed speed, inequality has been deepened between regions; different hukou holders; farmers and urban people. We will look into the social policy responses to the inequality in China as well as to the global economic crisis. Third, this paper will examine social policy evolution in Indonesia. Indonesia is one of the low-middle income countries with a size of 100 million populations. It was one of hardest hit countries during the East Asian economic crisis but responded with a range of assistant programmes including cash transfer programmes. There have been many policy evolutions with the cash transfer programmes. Lastly, we will pay attention to social protection system in Cambodia. The country is one of the poorest countries in the region with little social policy programmes like Laos PDR, and Myanmar. The country's ranking in the Human Development Index stands at 136th which belongs to the group of least developed countries (see Table 1). We will discuss the policy challenges and options for Cambodia in the context of the global economic crisis.


Mending the Chinese Welfare Net: Tool for Social Harmony or Regime Stability?

By Linda Wong  
China at the turn of the 21st century is gripped by waves of social discontent and popular protests. Surveys and reports regularly chronicle public frustration and anger over such problems as unfair income distribution, corruption, unemployment, urban rural disparity, environmental damage and social discrimination. Aggrieved groups like farmers, laid-off SOE workers, migrants, property owners, pensioners, and householders displaced by land resumption and urban development are becoming more vocal in rights talk and resistance action (Blue Book of China's Society 2008, 2009, 2010). Their tactics, both legal and non-legal, range from petitioning, protests, legal contest, and even collective rebellion (Zweig 2000, Hurst and O'Brien 2002, O'Brien and Li 2006, Goldman 2007, Lee 2007, Chen 2007, Chen 2008). It is plain that after three decades of stunning economic growth, Chinese society has become increasingly unequal and conflict ridden. Its social welfare system, an instrument to manage the social risks and failures of the market system, badly needs an overhaul. Among the key shortcomings are the lack of a safety net, a patchy social insurance system, exclusion from welfare of migrant workers, underdevelopment of non-state welfare, and unaffordable health care for the rural masses and the poor. These failures are acknowledged by the state. Since the late 1990s, the state has stepped up efforts to mend the Chinese welfare net. This paper discusses what these measures are and what drives the state to improve on welfare engineering. It begins by contextualizing welfare reform against the state agenda of enhancing social harmony. It then discusses policy innovation in five areas: introduction of social assistance; extension of social security; improving welfare provision for migrants; promoting, controlling, and assisting NGOs; and reforming health care to bring it accessible for all. In reviewing the drivers for welfare reform, the author argues that state welfare policies are mainly driven by concerns for social stability and regime preservation in an attempt to shore up the resilience of the authoritarian regime.


EADP: Welfare-Work Nexus Project

By Chan-ung Park, Raymond K. H. Chan  

Globalization and its socio-economic effects on nation-states have brought the importance of understanding welfare and employment as part of integrated issues. Recently, a central debate on Western welfare regimes has been to examine how each country has sought a way to link social welfare and labor market policies to deal with the negative effects of globalization. The debates on the Asian welfare policies have also examined the impacts of globalization on Asian welfare regimes. However, the lack of comparable dataset on recent economic and social policies in Asian countries has been a major obstacle to understand the conditions and outcomes of such welfare regimes. In this project, we seek to build a dataset on social welfare and labor market policies of East Asian countries (Korean, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and China), which can be eventually incorporated with existing dataset on Western countries. The key goal of the present dataset is to build comparative indicators of on how economic policies and welfare policies interact with each other in East Asian countries, which can promote divergence of different welfare regimes in these countries. We will collect the data on separate social welfare and labor market programs, but will focus on how each government seeks to link both domains of policies (hence, welfare-work nexus) as a way to deal with current socio-economic problems that can be common and divergent among the countries. In particular, the following will be the key contents of the dataset: labor market statistics; key social welfare programs (work injury, health, pension, and unemployment); labor market programs; expenditures on social welfare and labor market programs. Thus, the dataset will consist of two parts: contents of formal programs (labor market and social welfare) and actual expenditures for each type. We will present South Korea as an example of the dataset, and we will discuss the final direction of the dataset and related key indicators.

Is There an East Asian Pension Model? A Comparison of Pension Systems in Korea, China and Japan

By Yeon-Myung Kim  
The purpose of this paper is to compare public pension systems of Korea, China, and Japan in light of a principle of social solidarity. Despite the fact that Korea, Japan, and China have adopted pension systems rather recently compared to western countries, three nations have experienced drastic developments and modifications in their systems in short period of time. The Japanese and Korean pension systems achieved a universal pension coverage in the early 1960s and late 1990s respectively. China has adopted a new pension scheme to achieve a goal of universalism since the 1990s. At this point, we can try the comparisons of the pension schemes of these countries because all the basic structures of the schemes are in place.  Considering the importance of pension system in welfare provision system, the present research can ultimately serve as an important rationale in discussing the existence of a unifying principle of East Asian social welfare model. Pension systems can be examined from different frameworks. For example, the OECD report, Pension at a Glance, uses both multi-pillar framework and benefit type in classifying Asian pension systems. First, from a multi-pillar framework, pension system can be divided into the first-pillar that has redistributive factors and the second-pillar that has the insurance component. Second, they also classify the system based on how the benefits are determined, such as DB and DC. In this paper, we would like to focus on the social solidarity perspective in comparing the basic structure of Korean, Japanese and Chinese pension systems. Pension system is a collective endeavor that diversifies old-age income risks through social solidarity. Therefore, analysing the principles of social solidarity underlying each nation's pension system is of vital importance in understanding the characteristics of each nation's pension system. Furthermore, it can also provide us with an insight to see if these nations show similar patterns and would be categorized as having a similar pension model. That is, it gives us the key criteria of seeing whether there is a single pension system design in East Asia. This study has cast considerable doubt on the possible single East Asian welfare model from solidarity principles in the pensions systems.

How Much Has the Korean Developmental Welfare Regime Changed?: An Analysis of the Social Bases of the Korean Welfare State

By Moo-Kwon Chung and Mun-Soo Park  
This paper attempts to explore social bases of the Korean welfare state by analyzing the Korea's part of the ISSP(International Social Survey Program) data, an world-wide public opinion survey data. Until now most research on the East Asian welfare regimes have focused on the analysis of the formal institutional and program structures of the welfare system or public social expenditures, and their comparisons among countries. However, the recent inclusion of some East Asian countries to the ISSP survey data allows us to explore the people's ideas and perceptions about the various areas of the government roles including the economy and social welfare, helping explore certain aspects of the social bases of the welfare system based on the individual cognitive level.
It has been argued that one of a plausible regime type of characterizing some East Asian countries is a 'developmental welfare regime,' which had emphasized the state's architectural role in constructing the welfare system to help the state-led economic growth and rapid industrialization strategy. Perhaps the Korean case is one of the best examples. However, Korea has experienced an extensive welfare reforms toward a 'universalized' insurance system since the financial crisis in the late 1990s, even though the heavy influence of the globalization and the neo-liberalism. Observing this trend, some commentators claim that the Korea has gone beyond the stage of the developmental welfare regime toward a post-developmental one.
This paper, as a preliminary research applying these data to the Korean case, framed various dimensions of the social bases of the welfare system based on the previous theories on the development of the welfare state, including individual characteristics, education and skill specificity, labor market status, political partisanship, and region and religion. The statistical analysis based on the ISSP data reveals that the Korean welfare system does not have any strong and coherent social bases regarding particular groups, classes, and partisanships to support its expansion toward the universal welfare state as causality level. The Korean people's idea of welfare still remains in the narrow concept of welfare, a residual concept of welfare helping exclusively the low-income people rather than a universal one of welfare supporting a wide range of social insurance system. The majority of the Korean people continue to support a wide range of the roles of the state, especially the economic growth and regulation, even though a relatively long and strong exposes of the neo-liberal ideology. These findings imply that the institutional legacies of the developmental state still remain strong in the Korean people's perception in the role of the state, restraining the emergence of the policy reform agenda toward a universal concept of the welfare system.

A Study of the Factors Affecting the Resilience of Battered Wives

By Sun-Kyung Kang  
The purpose of this study is to determine the manner in which battered wives' purpose in life influences resilience, based on the stress coping model. This purpose is meaningful in that it may help present battered wives with a new perspective of a changeable life, away from the negative perspectives so often associated with domestic violence victims. Furthermore, this study is targeted specifically toward improving individual quality of life, as well as the within-family drive to pursue self-fulfillment with resilience. The specific research question is that the higher the objective of life (meaning/value), the more they influence upon resilience (self-confidence/communication efficiency/optimistic orientation) of the abused wives.
This study surveyed 16 shelters with similar environmental conditions among the 20 shelters located in the Seoul and Kyunggi areas. 130 questionnaires were distributed since August 2009 and 120 (92.3%) were collected until the end of September, 2009. Among 120 collected questionnaires, 10 contained insufficient information for analysis. Therefore, our analyses were based on 110 questionnaires, using the SPSS 15.0 program for statistical analysis.
The results of this study can be summarized as follows. First, the meaning and value of life influence upon self-confidence among the purpose of life (meaning/value). Second, the results of our analysis on the effects on communication efficiency demonstrated that value, among the constituent factors in purpose of life, affects communication efficiency, and that these two factors are negatively related. Thus, personal values are negatively related with communication efficiency. Third, the results of our analysis of optimism showed that only the "value of life" variable had any effect on optimism. This underscores the importance of personal internal aspects. Based on these results, it is suggested that a kind of program for enhancing self-confidence in order to develop the purpose of life, communication efficiency, and optimistic orientation.

Welfare Regimes and Global Cities - A Missing Link in the Comparative Analysis of Welfare States?

By John Hudson  

The so-called 'welfare modelling business' has been at the heart of comparative social policy analysis since the publication of Esping-Andersen's classic The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Debate has advanced considerably since the emergence of this text, be it in terms of expanding the range of countries considered, expanding the scope of policy areas and issues encompassed in typologies or in linking welfare types to both the contextual factors shaping welfare systems and the varying outcomes that social policies seek to address.

However, debate to date has largely proceeded on the basis that coherent nation states exist even in what many view to be an era of globalisation. This assumption was always problematic - as many theorists have acknowledged - but globalisation processes have added a further dimension to this debate. In particular, geographer and sociologists have pointed to the increasing power of global cities that act as co-ordinating hubs for the global economy. Though residing in nation states, these cities have a special status flowing from their central role in the global economy. While theorists have highlighted the social tensions that often exist in these cities themselves, there has been no systematic attempt to explore the implications of these cities for welfare regimes and welfare regime analysis. This paper addresses this under explored issues and argues that an analysis of global cities can not only better inform our understanding of globalisation processes but may also be significant in understanding the development of differing welfare types too.

Comparative study of the distribution standard of basic income institutional and Silhak(scholars of last Choson)

By Choi Song Sik, Park Hyun Suk, Yeo Koo Hwan, Bae-Eun Suk, and Park Esther  
Modern age is under capitalism and market economy, it focus contribution on distribution of wealth. It is distributed for need preferentially by social welfare but deficient. The gulf between rich and poor is getting worse, and the lower class and the labor lower class are getting increase. To solve like this problems it suggested to the nation that give basic income to all social member or all family. The thing is the national basic needs should supplied by the nation and give income to citizen to have a balanced distribution income. This distribution system ideology is similar which idea proposed by scholars of Silhak. The conception of Silhak was a trend of idea of social reform, it proposed modernistic course and politics. The idea of Silhak was emphasize the need by give all people some land equally for equitable income, by government-owned principles of the land, by upper-lower limit system of land-owning to narrow the gap between the wealthy and the poor.
 Comparison between basic income institutional and Silhak of Choson will be propose realistic possibility and deduction of progress of basic income institutional. So this study is compare contribution with need in distribution of wealth standard by two idea's social and economic situation. According to this study, the purpose is to prepare for historical and philosophical base in introduce basic income. 
As a result, Basic income and idea of Silhak is similar because distribution of wealth is not functioning at that time. These society and economic situation that need, contribution, ability or effort were not concern in distribution of wealth and the need were not satisfy national desire. For this reason to solve the imbalance situation, we need political discuss like introduce basic income.
Archives

Key Words

Emailing Group

Join the EASP emailing list
We welcome you to join the EASP emailing list and hope to share your work, idea and information with us. Please click above link then click 'join the list' on the newly opened window, or contact Shinichi Murota (shin1@stirps.net) for further details.