Emergency Neoliberalism, and Welfare Policy in Canada
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Critical Studies 15 (2020) 22-39 Unequal Impact of COVID-19 Unequal Impact of COVID-19: Emergency Neoliberalism, and Welfare Policy in Canada Toba Bryant, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ontario Tech University Scott Aquanno, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Ontario Tech University Dennis Raphael, School of Health Policy and Management, York University KEY WORDS: COVID-19, NEOLIBERALISM, WELFARE STATES, HEALTH This paper examines Canada’s liberal welfare state in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic. It argues that contrary to claims that the pandemic is affecting both rich and poor equally, its impact is both gendered, racialized and class-related. It thereby exacerbates existing social and health inequalities. Responsible for much of this is Canada’s welfare state that reproduces established patterns of power that create systemic social and health inequalities. In addition, the responses of the Canadian liberal welfare state to the COVID-19 pandemic make explicit its underdeveloped nature and its difficulties in responding to social and health inequalities. This paper shows how the political foundation and organizational logic of the liberal welfare state promotes and reinforces existing inequalities. Similarly, its responses to the pandemic reflect crisis management that meets immediate urgencies but does little to provide long-term economic and social security to citizens. INTRODUCTION June 9, 2020 represents the beginning of Week 11 of Canadian efforts to prevent the spread of COVID-19 virus. Although it has become fashionable to declare that the virus ‘does not discriminate,’ it has exacerbated systemic inequalities, making the already vulnerable even more so. This has occurred despite historic expansion of governmental support aimed at replacing incomes from the private market. The differential effects of the pandemic on those of different classes, races, and genders reflects the undeveloped nature of Canadian welfare state policies. This paper examines Canada’s liberal welfare state in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic. It places the pandemic within established patterns of power among various Canadian sectors, and shows how the political basis and organizational logic of Canada’s economic and political systems work to promote and reinforce unequal health outcomes. Welfare States as Forms of Institutionalized Power The welfare state in wealthy nations was initially developed to provide income and other supports to the population during periods of unemployment, inability to work, and retirement (Briggs, 1961). This served to stabilize and legitimate capitalist economics as it both supported mass consumption and blunted some of the worst effects of capitalist economic competition and technological change. It did so through measures regulating business activity and providing social 22 Critical Studies 15 (2020) 22-39 Unequal Impact of COVID-19 citizenship1 rights. In this way, national welfare states should be considered emergent state institutional formations that reflect in part the agency and relative power of progressive social forces and working-class political organizations (Coates, 2005; Maher & Aquanno, 2018). These developments in some instances have been motivated by the capitalist class’ goals of self- preservation in that severely adverse living and working conditions can lead to rebellion. These formations are nonetheless bounded by the deeper generative forces of capitalist social control, including historically evolved patterns of class domination. As a result, they respond to changing objective conditions, organizations of class power and competitive economic conditions, but move forward through path dependent institutional compromises that, while always themselves crisis prone, help regulate choices by mediating political possibility. For example, Canadian governments have long resisted implementing a national childcare program, preferring to consider the raising of children as a family matter, usually foisted upon women. They do so although the objective reality of most families is that the stay-at-home mother caring for children era is long past (Friendly, 2016). These compromises have taken different forms such that structural, institutional and agential configurations have produced at least three different forms of the welfare state in wealthy nations: Social Democratic, Liberal, and Conservative (Esping-Andersen, 1990). These welfare state types differ in how they manage stratification2 and decommodification3, and offer different roles to the state, market, and family in providing economic and social security. The Social Democratic form provides a strong state role in providing economic and social security to its members while the Liberal welfare state leaves these issues to the vagaries of the capitalist market economy. The Conservative form occupies the middle ground. Social democratic welfare states (e.g., Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden) provide comprehensive cradle-to-grave support to citizens through state provision of universal benefits and greater emphasis on state provision of goods and services, and reducing commodification of services such as childcare, pensions, and employment training. They derive resources to support their welfare programs from their more progressive tax systems. Their marginal tax rates come on- stream much sooner than in most welfare regimes. In addition, their generally stronger labour sector and high collective agreement coverage among workers minimizes job stratification such that income inequality rates are the lowest among the welfare state types (Bryant, 2020). All of these processes evolved under governance by Social Democratic parties of the left. Spurred by the ideological inspiration of equality, the result is considerably less stratification, greater decommodification of supports and services, and a stronger state role in the provision of economic and social security, than seen elsewhere (Bryant, 2020). Some social democratic regimes have reduced social and health spending in response to neoliberalism and globalization pressures, but 1 Social citizenship consists of social, political and civil rights (Patrick, 2016). The emphasis is on social security together with participation rights, including access to resources that help individuals feel able to participate in the community and society in which they reside. 2 Stratification refers to institutionalized differences amongst society members and is usually defined in terms of wealth, income, education and power and influence (Scott, 2014). Stratification is both a cause and result of the ability of specific classes and other groups to shape public policy to meet their needs. 3 Decommodification refers to a situation in which citizens are less dependent on their incomes to obtain particular goods which are provided by the State, such as public health care, pensions, and childcare amongst others (Esping- Andersen, 1990). 23 Critical Studies 15 (2020) 22-39 Unequal Impact of COVID-19 these reductions have tended to be not as deep as those seen in liberal regimes such as Canada and USA. Conservative welfare states (e.g. Belgium, France, Germany and Netherlands) provide generous benefits, but usually provide these through social insurance plans associated with employment rank, with primary emphasis on male wage earners (Esping-Andersen, 2015).4 Christian Democratic parties have dominated their political and social history in which traditional Catholic Church concerns with supporting citizens blended with traditional approaches towards maintaining status differences and adherence to authority. These tendencies are sometimes reflected in corporatist approaches (e.g. Germany) where business interests are an important influence, or in statist approaches (e.g. France) in which the state has a primary role in providing economic and social security to the population. Though union strength is lower than in social democratic regimes, collective agreement coverage is very high, reflecting the Conservative ideological inspiration of solidarity (Saint-Arnaud, 2003; Gautié, 2010). Liberal welfare states (e.g. Canadian, US, Ireland, Australia, and UK) are underdeveloped, providing modest, targeted benefits when the economic market fails to meet citizens’ most basic needs (Saint-Arnaud, 2003; Bryant, 2020). Their political and social history is one of dominance by pro-business Liberal political parties (the term here refers to an ideological orientation, not an actual party name) that favour programs that increase the vulnerability of social locations with less power and influence (Raphael, 2015). Consequently, these systems tend to have a smaller state role, relying on market mechanisms to deliver goods and services, income and other support programs. These programs target those who are considered most destitute and most deserving of support, and aim to meet only immediate needs. There is no commitment to reducing long-term insecurity or inequality. At the same time, labour in these countries is weak, and the scarcity of collective employment agreements leads to a greater proportion of the workforce being low paid than seen in other welfare states. Not surprisingly, work is also more likely to be precarious, income and wealth inequalities are greater, and poverty rates higher than seen in social democratic and conservative welfare states (Bryant, 2020). In addition, all liberal welfare states, with the exception of United Kingdom, are federal states. As a political institution that divides authority between two