Social Policy

Abstract

After 12 years of relative neglect of social policy in the United States, Bill Clinton came into office pledged to making life better for the disadvantaged. The administration was pledged to reach this goal not through traditional Democratic “tax and spend” methods, but rather through more market-oriented programs, using workfare as much as welfare. While the commitments to new means of addressing social problems are in some ways laudable, they face enormous difficulties. Some of these difficulties are ideological and are bound up in the historical American resistance to strong government involvement in social policy. Other difficulties are related to the relatively weak American economy and the changing nature of work in the United States and other industrialized countries. The general trends appear to be in the direction of greater socioeconomic inequality and greater need rather than less, and government will be hard-pressed to stem that tide. That difficulty is, of course, exacerbated by the deficit problem. Social policy thus presents a significant challenge to the leadership and policy creativity of both Clinton and his administration.