Political Effects of Welfare Pluralism: Comparative Evidence from Argentina and Chile

The 1990s saw new orientations in welfare policy radically alter the roles of the state, market, and civil society in welfare provision across the developing world. Most of the studies of this reform wave have looked at its socioeconomic consequences—e.g. on levels of poverty and inequality—paying less attention to its political consequences. This article looks at the effects of this transformation on state–society relations and the quality of democracy. It draws on a paired comparison of Argentina and Chile, utilizing qualitative data, to investigate the effects of “welfare pluralism” on state–society relations and participatory governance. It shows how the pluralist welfare reforms enacted in Argentina and Chile in the 1990s led to contrasting political outcomes and how this can be explained by their different regime institutions. In Argentina, regime institutions provided politicians with wide discretion in distributing social funds, resulting in a populist mode of social governance in which neo-clientelism served to politicize the linkages between the political elites and subaltern sectors. In Chile, by contrast, regime institutions provided politicians with little discretion in distributing social funds, resulting in a technocratic mode of social governance in which neo-pluralism served to depoliticize the linkages between the political elites and subaltern sectors. Both outcomes differ from assumptions that couple welfare pluralism with more participatory governance and poor peoples’ empowerment. The findings illustrate how regime institutions may exercise a crucial impact on the political outcome of welfare reform.