Welfare State " an Essay of Sociological Interpretation Maurice Tremblay
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Document generated on 09/27/2021 8:40 p.m. Relations industrielles Industrial Relations The Concept of the " Welfare State " An Essay of Sociological Interpretation Maurice Tremblay Volume 6, Number 2, March 1951 URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1023238ar DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1023238ar See table of contents Publisher(s) Département des relations industrielles de l’Université Laval ISSN 0034-379X (print) 1703-8138 (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article Tremblay, M. (1951). The Concept of the " Welfare State ": An Essay of Sociological Interpretation. Relations industrielles / Industrial Relations, 6(2), 42–48. https://doi.org/10.7202/1023238ar Tous droits réservés © Département des relations industrielles de l’Université This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit Laval, 1951 (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ The Concept of the " Welfare State " An essay of sociological interpretation by MAURICE TREMBLAY, Professor in the Faculty of Social Sciences of Laval University This article will be devoted to an We beUeve that they originate in analysis of the problems raised by the "Liberal State" as it was made up the evolution of the liberal democra• in the 19th Century. We submit that cies towards the regime known as the "Welfare State" is situated in the "Weffare State",1 to bring out the prolongation of the traditional Libe• factors which are involved in this ral State, not only as its successor in evolution and which can help us to fact, but if not as the necessary, at explain it. least as its normal product. We sub• mit that it is born negatively, on one What are the sociological roots of hand, from the laissez-faire economy, the "Welfare State" ? from the unsatisfied wants bred by the liberal capitalism; and, positively, on the other hand, from poUtical U- O) Why do we use in French the En• glish expression to indicate the object beralism, from the development itself of our studies? Etymologieally, the of the democratic principle. name "Welfare State ' is rather vague. It could apply indifferently to any political system, because there is not any that does not profess as its end, Economic Liberalism the welfare of its citizens. Use, how• ever, has narrowed the meaning and the expression is now universally ad• Conceived in reaction against the mitted, in the English language, to abuses of the mercantilism and held designate the particular system of up by the glorification of the idea of economic regulation and social assist• ance which the liberal democracies liberty in all spheres, the laissez-faire are now adopting, half-way between economy is characterized by the ra• the "laissez-faire" system and the dical separation that it operates bet• socialist system. ween economics and politics. It is probably the vague etymology of the expression that explains its success, permitting it to cover equally According to the laissez-faire and without prejudice all the aspects theory, in fact, the common prospe• of the complex and controversial real• rity is not an end to which the State ity that it represents. should direct rationaUy the various No name in French has had the economic factors. It is rather a hao- same success. "Régime de protectorat social", "Etat sécuritaire", "Etat de py consequence which is expected to service social", "Etat paternaliste", result spontaneously by the search "Etat-Providence"; none of these na• of each one, in competition with aU mes has been granted unanimity, the others, in the framework of a free probably because they have all a too explicit, unfavourable meaning. market, of his own advantage: and We shall therefore confine oursel• this, by aU the ways that his talent ves in the French text to the English and industry can secure for him, with expression of which the use is firmly the exception, however, of violence, established and which has the great fraud and coalition, which would advantage, in a sociological analysis, of not causing any prejudice at first eliminate the mechanism of compe• sight tition. 42 Tbe Industrial Relation* Review It is competition, in fact, which is being content to sanction the rules of expected to be the principal animator the game, the activity of the various and regulator of the economy. On economic factors. It is the famous one hand, it must insure the maxi• "laissez-faire" policy. mum utilisation of productive re• sources and energy, as weU as the continual improvement of products Competitive Capitalism and services on the market. On the and its results other hand, it must insure the balance of the system, by adjusting automa• It is under this economic-poUtical tically in each sector, the production conception that the capitalistic sys• to the consumption, by the action of tem has developed during the 19th the law of supply and demand, which century. Let us see how the facts only shows the effects of competition measure up to the postulates of the on the commodity and labour market. doctrine. Here is how Jean Marchai descri• It must be recognized that the bes this latter function attributed to open race to profits by the capitalis• Competition by the fervents of the tic entrepreneurs of the 19th century, laissez-faire economy. "When there putting to work more and more per• are too many products, owing to the fected techniques to lower their cost competition among sellers, prices go price and assure themselves against down. Some entrepreneurs are dis• their competitors of a place more couraged and production diminishes. and more advantageous on a constan• At the same time, the product being dy expanding market through the made accessible to new groups of parallel progress of means of com• buyers, the demand increases. When munication, has caused an economic it is the demand, on the contrary, advance without equal in history and which exceeds the supply, prices go which has been properly caUed a up, some buyers are obliged to re• revolution: the Industrial Revolution. duce their consumption or give up Jaurès, who has not much sympathy the product, whereas the entrepre• for the system admired "the power neurs, stimulated by the high profits, of revolutionary action of the middle- increase production. Identical me• class, breaking out of its former chanisms are met with in salaries, to framework, wiping away aU old adapt the supply to the demand for powers and beUefs, turning upside- labour and in the question of inter• down the world's habits, renewing national trade to equaUze imports and 2 continually its own technique, letting exports." loose the tragic beauty of unlimited The economy, thus finding in com• productive forces." 3 petitive Uberties its principle, at the same time, dynamic and regulating, It must also be recognized that the not only State interference becomes letting loose of the productive forces, useless but further it could only con• by the multiplication of the means tribute towards paralyzing and strain• of subsistence that this has caused, ing the normal functioning of the has permitted a growth without pre• system. Under this conditions one cedent of the population up until function only is reserved for the Sta• this time held back, by primitive te, that of being on the watch for the methods of life, to a level of mere respect of property and contracts, and renewal. In Europe, the population to arbitrate thus from the outside, in increased in the 19th century from 160 to 400 mdlions. In the United (4) Jean Marchai, Cours d'économie poli• tique, Book I, p. 92, Librairie de Mé• (3) J. Jaurès, l'Armée nouvelle, Rieder, dicis, Paris, 1950. p. 306. March 1951 43 States, it jumped from 5 to 100 to be impossible, under penalty or miUions, and in the whole world, bankruptcy, to make any increase in where there are still large zones that wages, and, moreover, the competi• capitalism has not touched, went tion of workers between themselves from 900 to 1,600 miUions. on the labour market, where they find In conformity with the consequen• themselves alone, unorganized, in ces of the Liberal thesis, the capital• face of employers who, according to ism of the 19th century has therefore the expression used by Adam Smith, really led us to an ever-increased constitute, each one to himseU, a and improved production of goods natural coalition. The working class, in the end, stands aU the competition and comforts of life; but, on the other 4 hand, it has not fulfilled the promises on which rests the system." of common prosperity and economic Thus if competition which gave balance of liberalism. life to the system, has produced pros• In fact, if capitaUsm in developing perity, one may say that it has sys• itseU has multipUed the means of tematically excluded the working subsistence, and permitted, because class. of this, an extraordinary increase in At the same time, competition has the population; on the other hand, not insured the automatic adjust• it has maintained the vast working ments of the economic system that class to which it gave rise at the it was supposed to guarantee. Crises simple subsistence level, and this, as or relative over-production, starting long as and to the extent that it chains of fadures of entrepreneurs has stuck to the principle of straight and widespread unemployment for competition.