![]() Second, the Cold War heavily impacted political coalition-building in Western countries. Social reforms worked as a bulwark against communism, hand-in-hand with tougher anti-communist measures. Developing social security programmes offered (market-based) alternative to communism and secured the loyalty of the working class. Due to the limited space of this essay, we focus on two mechanisms linking the Cold War and the Western welfare state (see Petersen 2013):įirst, social policies were important for securing mass loyalty and as an anti-communist strategy in Western Europe. The Cold War influenced the development of the welfare state in multiple ways as national contexts (political, social and institutional) varied. However, this compromise could take different forms and shapes. In contemporary debates, the welfare state was seen as “a compromise between the two extremes of Communism on the one hand, and unbridled Individualism on the other” (Hobman 1953, 1). Systemic competition also positively influenced patterns of social spending (Obinger and Schmitt 2011). Key aspects of this systemic competition were social reform, economic well-being and the development of advanced welfare states offering a brighter and more secure future for their populations. The Socialist Eastern Bloc led by the Soviet Union competed with capitalist Western democracies (Pax Americana). The Cold War was primarily a battle for the “hearts and minds” of the people (Westad 2017). However, simple questions rarely have simple answers. ![]() ![]() ![]() In this chapter, we ask the simple question: How did the Cold War influence the development of welfare states in selected Western European countries in the first decades after 1945? So far, less attention has been paid to the linkages between the Cold War and social policy reform during the so-called Golden Age of the welfare state (ca. That war and conflict had an impact on the development of modern welfare states is well established (Obinger et al. The Cold War and the growth of the welfare state constitute two major frameworks for understanding politics and society in post-1945 Western Europe. ![]()
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