NAFTA, the redesign, and rescaling of Canada's welfare state

Studies in Political Economy

Volumn , Issue 76, 2005, Pages 7-30

  Johnson, Robert ^a   Mahon, Rianne ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA   (Canada)

^b CARLETON UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 28244436242     PISSN: 07078552     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/19187033.2005.11675121     Document Type: Article

References (77)

1. The main classificatory schema for welfare regimes is Gösta Esping-Andersen's: the residual, liberal variant, the class-segmented conservative regime, and the inclusive and "decommodifying" social democratic variant.
2. G. Hoberg, K. Banting, and R. Simeon, "The Scope for Domestic Policy Choice: Autonomy in a Globalizing World," in Capacity for Choice: Canada in a New North America, G. Hoberg, (ed.), (University of Toronto Press, 2002).
3. J. O'Connor, A. Orloff, and S. Shaver, States, Families, Markets: Gender, Liberalism and Social Policy in Australia, Canada, Great Britain and the United States (Cambridge University Press, 1999).
4. On the concept of redesign, see J. Jenson and M. Sineau, "New Contexts, New Policies" in Who Cares? Women's Work, Childcare and Welfare State Redesign, J. Jenson and M. Sineau, (eds.), (University of Toronto Press, 2001), and below.
5. On rescaling, see J. Peck, "Political Economies of Scale: Fast Policy, Interscalar Relations and Neoliberal Workfare," Economic Geography 78/3 (2002);
6. R. Mahon, C. Andrew, and R. Johnson, "Policy in an Era of 'Globalisation': A Multiscalar Process," written for On the Cutting Edge: New Directions in Canadian Public Policy, M. Orsini and M. Smith, (eds.), forthcoming (UBC Press). The latter discusses the similarities and differences between this concept and the literature on governance, especially multilevel governance.
7. Hoberg, Banting, and Simeon, "Scope for Domestic Policy Choice."
8. Ibid., p. 4.
9. J. Jenson, "Supra-national Citizenship? A Comparison of NAFTA and the European Union" (2000).
10. S. Clarkson, Uncle Sam and Us: Globalism, Neoconservativism, and the Canadian State (University of Toronto Press, 2002), p. 81.
11. A. Jackson and M. Sanger, When Worlds Collide: Implications of International Trade and Investment Agreements for Non-Profit Social Services, CCPA and CCSD (2003).
12. A. Jackson, "From Leaps of Faith to Hard Landings: Fifteen Years of 'Free Trade,'" CCPA (2003), p. 10.
13. A. Jackson, "Is Work Working for Women?" CLC Research Paper 22 (2003), p. 5.
14. A. Jackson, "From Leaps of Faith," p. 13.
15. Hoberg, Banting, and Simeon, "The Scope for Domestic Policy Choice";
16. K. Banting and G. Boychuk, "The Paradox of Convergence: National versus Sub-National Patterns of Convergence in Canadian and American Income Maintenance Policy," in North American Linkages: Opportunities and Challenges, R. Harris, (ed.), (University of Calgary Press, 2003).
17. Canada's Unemployment Insurance became less generous through the withdrawal of the federal contribution, increased qualification periods, shortened duration of benefits, and reduced benefit levels.
18. See P. Hall, "Policy Paradigm, Social Learning and the State: The Case of Economic Policy in Britain," Comparative Politics 25/3 (1993), pp. 275-296.
19. J. Peck, Workfare States (Guilford Press, 2000).
20. S. Bashevkin, Welfare Hot Buttons: Women, Work and Social Policy Reform (University of Toronto Press, 2002).
21. J. Jenson and D. Saint Martin, "Building Blocks for a New Welfare Architecture: Is LEGO the Model for an Active Society?" Paper presented at the 2003 Workshop of Research Committee 19 of the International Sociology Association, Toronto (22-24 August 2003).
22. See T. Iversen and A. Wren, "Equality, Employment and Budgetary Restraint: The Trilemma of the Service Economy," World Politics 50 (1998), pp. 507-546.
23. R. Mahon, "Death of a Model? Swedish Social Democracy at the End of the Twentieth Century," Studies in Political Economy 63 (2000), pp. 27-60.
24. G. Esping-Andersen et al., Why We Need a New Welfare State (Oxford University Press, 2002).
25. J. Peck, "Political Economies of Scale," p. 251.
26. R. Gomez and M. Gunderson, "The Integration of Labour Markets in North America," in Capacity for Choice: Canada in a New North America, G. Hoberg, (ed.), (University of Toronto Press, 2002), p. 115.
27. A. Jackson, "Is Work Working," p. 4.
28. W. Walters, "International Organization and the Practices of Liberal Government: The Case of the OECD Jobs Strategy" (1999).
29. J. Jenson and S. Phillips, "Regime Shift: New Citizenship Practices in Canada," International Journal of Canadian Studies 14 (1996), p. 111.
30. A. Jackson, "Is Work Working?" p. 4.
31. Esping-Andersen et al., Why We Need a New Welfare State (Oxford University Press, 2002).
32. See inter alia A. Hemerijck, "The Self-transformation of the European Social Model(s)," in Why We Need a New Welfare State,
33. B. Palier, "The Europeanisation of Welfare Reforms." Paper presented at the 2003 Workshop of Research Committee 19, Toronto, Ontario (21-24 August 2003).
34. S. McBride and R. Williams, "Globalization, the Restructuring of Labour Markets and Policy Convergence: The OECD 'Jobs Strategy,'" Global Social Policy 1/3 (2001).
35. W. Walters, "International Organization and the Practice of Liberal Government."
36. J. Peck, "Political Economies of Scale," p. 334.
37. T. Courchene, "Ontario as a North American Region-State: Toronto as a Global City-Region: Responding to the NAFTA Challenge," in Global City Regions, Allen J. Scott, (ed.), (Oxford University Press), p. 177.
38. Ibid., p. 161.
39. G. Boychuk, Patchworks of Purpose: The Development of Provincial Social Assistance Regimes in Canada (Kingston and Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 1998).
40. The 1984 Canada Health Act lays down the five principles of the Canadian health care system, committing the federal government - and the provinces and territories wishing to obtain their full share of federal funds - to a universal, accessible, comprehensive, portable health care system, under public administration. The Canada Assistance Plan integrated federal cost-sharing programs in the area of social assistance under one act. It, too, laid down certain key principles including the exclusion of workfare programs from cost-sharing arrangements with the provinces and territories.
41. The CHST rolled together the federal government's cost-sharing programs in health and social services into one and reduced the overall funding. It also marked a shift from conditional to block funding.
42. D. van Nijnatten and G. Boychuk, "Economic Integration and Cross-Border Policy Convergence: Social and Environmental Policy in Canadian Provinces and American States," Journal of Borderland Studies, forthcoming, p. 14 of draft.
43. J. Peck, "Political Economies of Scale," p. 332.
44. Ibid, p. 333.
45. At least until the passage of the Canada Assistance Plan act in 1966. See below.
46. T. McIntosh and G. Boychuk, "Discovered: EI, Social Assistance and the Growing Gap in Income Support for Unemployed Canadians," in Federalism, Democracy and Labour Market Policy in Canada, T. McIntosh, (ed.), (McGill-Queens University Press, 2000), p. 82.
47. The difference in generosity levels holds well when comparing the United States and Canada but not when comparing Canada with countries that fall in the social democratic or conservative-corporatist regimes.
48. See Klassen (1999) and Bradford (2003, 1998) for Ontario, and Sharpe and Haddow (1997) for Canada.
49. R. Haddow, "The Political and Institutional Landscape of Canadian Labour Market Policy-Making," in Federalism, Democracy and Labour Market Policy in Canada, T. McIntosh, (ed.), (McGill-Queens University Press, 2003).
50. K. Banting, "Disembedding Liberalism? The Social Policy Trajectory in Canada," Dimensions of Inequality in Canada, J. Kesselman, (ed.), forthcoming (UBC Press).
51. In 1990, the federal government placed a cap on CAP funds going to the richest three provinces, Ontario, BC, and Alberta. For Ontario, this couldn't have happened at a worse time because the province was just heading into a major slump.
52. Employment Insurance split into two separate accounts, one for passive income transfers and the other for "active" transfers.
53. The immediate pressure point was Quebec, whose demands for control over labour market policy gained force not only from the close 1995 referendum (on Quebec sovereignty) results but also from the strength of the Bloc Quebecois in the House of Commons.
54. The CRF provided similar services to non-UI groups, including women, youth, Aboriginal peoples, and recently arrived immigrants.
55. J. Jenson, "Redesigning the 'Welfare Mix' for Families: Policy Challenges," Discussion Paper F-30, CPRN (2003).
56. The provinces and territories put out a joint communiqué emphasizing more funding for skills and training, including the Consolidated Revenue Fund (Provincial-Territorial Labour-Market Ministers, 2002).
57. K. Banting and G. Boychuk, "Paradox of Convergence."
58. The American federal government contributed one-third of AFDC costs whereas the Canadian government paid one-half of CAP-covered programs.
59. This was part of CAP from the outset; it was added to AFDC after a court ruling in the 1960s, along with limits on the states' right to impose tight moral restrictions (Bashevkin, Welfare Hot Buttons, p. 18).
60. In 1962, child care subsidies were used to encourage low-income mothers to work; the 1967 reforms established the Work Incentive (WIN) program, making employment mandatory if child care was available; in 1974, child care subsidies were again targetted to support a turn to workfare (S. Michel, "Child Care Public Policy: Historical and Policy Analysis," Interim Report 2, Pew Charitable Trusts (1996), pp. 3-5).
61. R. Haddow, Poverty Reform in Canada 1958-1978: State and Class Influences on Policy Making (McGill-Queens University Press, 1993).
62. R. Mahon, "The Never-Ending Story: The Struggle for Universal Child Care in the 1970s," Canadian Historical Review 81/4 (2000), pp. 482-615.
63. CAP did not exclude the possibility of cost-sharing subsidies to commercial child care but funds obtained through the less invasive (income not means-tested) and more generous of the two funding routes were only available for nonprofit or publicly run child care centres.
64. S. Michel, "Child Care Public Policy:...," Interim Report 2, Pew Charitable Trusts (1996).
65. Both have their roots in previous decades but expanded to become the major program in the 1990s, as Bashevkin notes, under "third way" governments.
66. K. Banting and G. Boychuk, "Paradox of Convergence."
67. In the 1970s, family allowances became taxable earnings and were only partially indexed to inflation. In 1989, they were clawed back from upper income families (J. Jenson and S. Stroick, What Is the Best Policy Mix for Canada's Young Children? (CPRN, 1999), pp. 78-79).
68. The NCB includes two components: the first is the tax credit available to most families, though the amount of the credit declines with family income; the second NCB supplement is narrowly targetted at the very poor, working and nonworking.
69. The PRWORA also included a Child Care and Development Fund. Yet "in addition to a lack of sufficient funding, there is wide variation in the bureaucratic practices that determine access to child care at the local level; inadequate compensation and benefits for child care providers, coupled with minimal support for improving program quality; and difficulties in coordinating child care with other public programs for early childhood education," D.U. Levy and S. Michel, "More Can Be Less: Child Care and Welfare Reform in the United States," in Child Care Policy at the Crossroads, S. Michel and R. Mahon, (eds.), (Routledge 2002).
70. Quebec remains outside of SUFA and all related initiatives. It has its own, frequently superior arrangements.
71. The AIT was explicitly designed as the domestic complement to NAFTA, which aimed to remove internal barriers to trade. See Clarkson, Uncle Sam and Us, pp. 82-89.
72. Clarkson, Uncle Sam and Us, p. 296.
73. Jenson and Stroick, What Is the Best Policy Mix?, p. 79.
74. Examples include child care, child benefits and early childhood services, programs for children "at risk," and earned income supplements and health benefits.
75. Thus, for instance, Saskatchewan and Ontario invested about the same amount in programs for children, even though Ontario's population is roughly ten times that of Saskatchewan's (Mahon (2000), p. 29).
76. This included all provinces and territories except Quebec, as did the NCB. However, Quebec has its own programs, which usually surpass those adopted by the others.
77. Graefe, P., "Tipping the Scales: Conceptualizing Social Reform Beyond the Centralization - Decentralization Dynamic." Paper presented at the "Questioning the Boundaries of Governance: A Graduate Workshop on the Theory and Practice of Federalism: Decentralization and Multi level Governance," University of Toronto (14-15 February, 2003), p. 2.