IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cam/camdae/2246.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Theory and Policy Today: Lessons from Barbara Wootton and the Creation of the British Welfare State

Author

Listed:
  • Alves, C.
  • Guizzo, D.

Abstract

This article investigates Barbara Wootton’s contribution to the creation of the welfare state in Britain through her interpretation and adaptation of economic theory to support social policy. It revisits Wootton’s Lament for Economics (1938) and explores unpublished archives showing her considerable engagement in public discussions on government spending, employment, poverty alleviation and her interaction with William Beveridge’s epoch defining welfare plan for Britain. We claim that her critique of economic theory for being an abstract science confined to equilibrium states, combined with her acute observation of social reality, allowed Wootton to cut free from established modes of economic thought. This laid the foundation for pioneering insights justifying an interventionist welfare state based on real-world issues and concepts of social justice, rather than self-interest and market failure principles.

Suggested Citation

  • Alves, C. & Guizzo, D., 2022. "Economic Theory and Policy Today: Lessons from Barbara Wootton and the Creation of the British Welfare State," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 2246, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    • Handle: RePEc:cam:camdae:2246
    Note: cca30
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econ.cam.ac.uk/research-files/repec/cam/pdf/cwpe2246.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alves, Carolina & Kvangraven, Ingrid Harvold, 2020. "Changing the Narrative: Economics After Covid-19," Review of Agrarian Studies, Foundation for Agrarian Studies, vol. 10(1), July.
    2. Barr, Nicholas, 1992. "Economic theory and the welfare state : a survey and interpretation," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 279, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    3. Robert Dimand & Indra Hardeen, 2003. "Barbara Wooteen's lament for economics and vision of a social economics," Forum for Social Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(1), pages 23-32, January.
    4. Keynes, John Neville, 1890. "The Scope and Method of Political Economy," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, edition 4, number keynes1890.
    5. Barr, Nicholas, 1992. "Economic Theory and the Welfare State: A Survey and Interpretation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 30(2), pages 741-803, June.
    6. Charles Feinstein, 1990. "What really happened to real wages?: trends in wages, prices, and productivity in the United Kingdom, 1880-1913," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 43(3), pages 329-355, August.
    7. Roger E. Backhouse & Steve G. Medema, 2009. "Defining Economics: The Long Road to Acceptance of the Robbins Definition," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 76(s1), pages 805-820, October.
    8. Deane, Phyllis, 1983. "The Scope and Method of Economic Science," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 93(369), pages 1-12, March.
    9. Joseph E. Stiglitz, 2017. "Countering the Power of Vested Interests: Advancing Rationality in Public Decision-Making," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(2), pages 359-365, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Didier Blanchet, 1996. "La référence assurantielle en matière de protection sociale : apports et limites," Économie et Statistique, Programme National Persée, vol. 291(1), pages 33-45.
    2. Kuhn, Andreas, 2011. "In the eye of the beholder: Subjective inequality measures and individuals' assessment of market justice," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 625-641.
    3. Murray, Christopher J. L. & Acharya, Arnab K., 1997. "Understanding DALYs," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(6), pages 703-730, December.
    4. Rainer Kotschy & David E. Bloom, 2022. "A Comparative Perspective on Long-Term Care Systems," NBER Working Papers 29951, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Härpfer, Marco & Cacace, Mirella & Rothgang, Heinz, 2009. "And fairness for all? Wie gerecht ist die Finanzierung im deutschen Gesundheitssystem? Eine Berechnung des Kakwani-Index auf Basis der EVS," Working papers of the ZeS 04/2009, University of Bremen, Centre for Social Policy Research (ZeS).
    6. Giampaolo Arachi & Massimo D'Antoni, 2004. "Redistribution as Social Insurance and Capital Market Integration," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 11(4), pages 531-547, August.
    7. Kuhn, Andreas, 2009. "In the Eye of the Beholder: Subjective Inequality Measures and the Demand for Redistribution," IZA Discussion Papers 4360, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. von Berchem, Sascha & Berthold, Norbert, 2004. "Reform der Arbeitslosenversicherung: Markt, Staat oder beides?," Discussion Paper Series 70, Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg, Chair of Economic Order and Social Policy.
    9. Boarini, Romina & Le Clainche, Christine, 2009. "Social preferences for public intervention: An empirical investigation based on French data," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 115-128, January.
    10. Sebastian Gechert, 2010. "Supplementary Private Health Insurance in Selected Countries: Lessons for EU Governments?," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 56(3), pages 444-464, September.
    11. Haddad, Lawrence & Oshaug, Arne, 1998. "How does the human rights perspective help to shape the food and nutrition policy research agenda?," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 329-345, October.
    12. Olivia S. Mitchell, 1998. "Administrative Costs in Public and Private Retirement Systems," NBER Chapters, in: Privatizing Social Security, pages 403-456, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Nirvikar Singh & Ravi Thomas, 2000. "Welfare Policy: Cash Versus Kind, Self‐Selection and Notches," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 66(4), pages 976-990, April.
    14. Blomquist, Soren & Christiansen, Vidar, 1999. "The political economy of publicly provided private goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 31-54, July.
    15. Jan Boone, 2004. "Unemployment Insurance and Workers' Mobility," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 160(2), pages 275-293, June.
    16. Hwanjoon Kim, 2000. "Anti-Poverty Effectiveness of Taxes and Income Transfers in Welfare States," LIS Working papers 228, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    17. repec:ces:ifodic:v:7:y:2009:i:3:p:14567070 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Vittas, Dimitri & Michelitsch, Roland, 1995. "Pension funds in Central Europe and Russia : their prospects and potential role in corporate governance," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1459, The World Bank.
    19. José F. Alonso & Ricardo A. Donate-Armada & Armando M. Lago, 1994. "A First Approximation Design of the Social Safety Net for a Democratic Cuba," Annual Proceedings, The Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy, vol. 4.
    20. Hennessy Peter & Warin Thierry, 2004. "One Welfare State for Europe: A Costly Utopia?," Global Economy Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 4(2), pages 1-17, December.
    21. Ravallion, Martin, 2003. "Targeted transfers in poor countries : revisiting the tradeoffs and policy options," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3048, The World Bank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Economic Methodology; Market Failure; Neoclassical Economics; Social Policy; Welfare State;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B22 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925 - - - Macroeconomics
    • B31 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought: Individuals - - - Individuals
    • B41 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology - - - Economic Methodology

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cam:camdae:2246. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jake Dyer (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.econ.cam.ac.uk/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.