Global Financial Markets or Globalization and the Future of the Welfare State

Global Financial Markets

Author: Ian Giddy

This text explores foreign exchange options theory and trading, equity markets, commodity markets, swap financing techniques, and financial innovations in international corporate financing such as hybrid Eurobonds. Its hands-on approach features end-of-chapter conceptual questions and extended applications with data drawn from real corporate and banking situations. Over 30 applied cases are included.

Look this: Natural Resource and Environmental Economics or East Central Europe and the Former Soviet Union

Globalization and the Future of the Welfare State

Author: Miguel Glatzer

In the last quarter of the twentieth century, the global political economy has undergone a profound transformation. Democracy has swept the globe, and both rich and developing nations must compete in an increasingly integrated world economy.



How are social welfare policies being affected by this wave of economic globalization? Leading researchers explore the complex question in this new comparative study. Shifting their focus from the more commonly studied, established welfare states of northwestern Europe, the authors of Globalization and the Future of the Welfare State examine policy development in the middle-income countries of southern and eastern Europe, Latin America, Russia, and East Asia.



Previous investigations into the effects of globalization on welfare states have generally come to one of two conclusions. The first is that a global economy undermines existing welfare states and obstructs new developments in social policy, as generous provisions place a burden on a nation's resources and its ability to compete in the international marketplace. In contrast, the second builds on the finding that economic openness is positively correlated with greater social spending, which suggests that globalization and welfare states can be mutually reinforcing.



Here the authors find that globalization and the success of the welfare state are by no means as incompatible as the first view implies. The developing countries analyzed demonstrate that although there is great variability across countries and regions, domestic political processes and institutions play key roles in managing the disruptions wrought by globalization.

Table of Contents:

1	An introduction to the problem	1
2	Globalization, democratization, and government spending in middle-income countries	23
3	Economic internationalization and domestic compensation : Northwestern Europe in comparative perspective	49
4	Globalization and social policy developments in Latin America	75
5	Revisiting "embedded liberalism" : globalization and the welfare state in Spain and Portugal	106
6	Globalization and the future of welfare states in post-communist East-Central European countries	130
7	Globalization and the politics of welfare state reform in Russia	153
8	Globalization and social policy in South Korea	179
9	Conclusion : politics matters	203