Conclusion: Rethinking the Politics of Diversity

Abstract

The human, social, and environmental costs of the current global financial crisis are often interpreted from a welfare-state perspective, with a focus on countries from the global North. Scholars in recent years have begun to examine the broader changes in state policy interventions designed to facilitate economic growth and consider the implications of these policies for social redistribution, climate change, and the politics of sustainability. The creation and use of financial markets for housing, health care, old-age security markets, and so on, has also begun to receive greater scholarly attention (Castles et al. 2010). Nevertheless, the consequences of climate change for social policy and the redistributive welfare-state remain largely unstudied (Gough and Therborn 2010: 716–8). It now appears that the state’s involvement in the financialization of the economy is deeper than a ‘retreat/evisceration of the welfare state’ perspective would allow us to appreciate. Despite significant differences in European and American models in respect to social policy profiles and redistributive strategies (Castles 2010: 630–42), the welfare-capitalist states are deeply implicated in financial markets through market-creating, market-correcting, and market-compensating social policies (Schelkle 2012).