Abstract
The chapter examines the influences of social policy choices at national level.Policy choices reflect both economic and political values embodied and inherent in states. Further, social policy preferences reflect normative and principled values espoused by nation states. In this respect, national social policy choices emanate from political and social processes, and the country’s economic stance. Policy preferences are however subject to external processes with global processes impacting upon the contents of country policies. The result is that policy choices and preferences derive from not only national but global processes too. Globalization reflected in labor mobility, ease of communication and travel has increased interconnectedness and inter-relationships which, at times, transcend national policy priorities. Global policy agendas can be in conflict or in tandem with national priorities reflecting internal political, social and economic tensions. National states are continually in a process of exposure with pressure from globalized forces to adopt certain policies. It is therefore inevitable that conflict may arise, with disconnect between policy prescriptions and outcomes thereof. This is the focus of investigation in this chapter.
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Notes
- 1.
Bob Deacon, Global Social Policy and Governance (Los Angeles, Calif.: SAGE Publications Ltd., 2007), 9.
- 2.
Jimi Adesina, “Beyond the Social Protection Paradigm: Social Policy in Africa’s Development.” Canadian Journal of Development Studies/Revue Canadienne d’études Du Développement 32 (4) (2011), 461.
- 3.
Omano Edigheji, “Constructing a Democratic Developmental State in South Africa: Potential and Challenges.” In Constructing a Democratic Developmental State in South Africa: Potentials and Challenges, ed. Omano Edigheji. (Cape Town, South Africa: Human Sciences Research Council, 2010), 5.
- 4.
Eiman Osman Zein-Elabdin,. 2011. “Postcoloniality and Development: Development as a Colonial Discourse.” In Philosophy and African Development. Theory and Practice, ed. Lansana Keita (Dakar: Oxford, UK: Codesria, 2011).
- 5.
Frank Ellis, “‘We Are All Poor Here’: Economic Difference, Social Divisiveness and Targeting Cash Transfers in Sub-Saharan Africa.” Journal of Development Studies 48 no. 2 (2012), 202.
- 6.
Bob Deacon and Paul Stubbs. 2013. “Global Social Policy Studies: Conceptual and Analytical Reflections.” Global Social Policy 13, no. 1 (2013), 7.
- 7.
Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, Joshua Greenstein, and David Stewart. 2013. “How Should MDG Success and Failure Be Judged: Faster Progress or Achieving the Targets?” World Development 41 (January 2013), 19.
- 8.
RobVos, Arjun Bedi, Paul K. Kimalu, Damiano K. Manda, Nancy N. Nafula, and Mwangi S. Kimenyi. 2004. “Achieving Universal Primary Education: Can Kenya Afford It?” http://digitalcommons.uconn.edu/econ_wpapers/200447/?utm_source=digitalcommons.ucon.edu%2Fecon_wpapers%2F200447&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages (2004), 4.
- 9.
Julia Preece, 2013. “Africa and International Policy Making for Lifelong Learning: Textual Revelations.” International Journal of Educational Development 33 no. 1 (2013), 98.
- 10.
Fukuda-Parr, Greenstein, and Stewart. 2013. “How Should MDGs,” 19.
- 11.
Peter B. Evans, 2010. “Constructing the 21 Century Developmental States: Potential and Challenges,” in Constructing a Democratic Developmental State in South Africa: Potentials and Challenges, ed. Omano Edigheji. (Cape Town, South Africa: Human Sciences Research Council, 2010), 37.
- 12.
Marion Ouma and Jimi Adésínà. 2019. “Solutions, Exclusion and Influence: Exploring Power Relations in the Adoption of Social Protection Policies in Kenya.” Critical Social Policy, (August 2019), 39.
- 13.
Ibid., 4.
- 14.
Jìmí Adésínà, 2009. “Social Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Glance in the Rear-View Mirror: Social Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa.” International Journal of Social Welfare 18 (April 2009), 38.
- 15.
Adésínà, “Social Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa”, 44.
- 16.
Thandika Mkandawire, “From Maladjusted States to Democratic Developmental States in Africa” in Constructing a Democratic Developmental State in South Africa: Potentials and Challenges, ed. Omano Edigheji. (Cape Town, South Africa: Human Sciences Research Council, 2010), 70.
- 17.
S.F.O’Brien, and Terry C.I Ryan, “Kenya: Aid and Development 1980–1988.” in Aid and Reform in Africa, ed. David Dollar, Shantayanan Devarajan, and Torgny Holmgren, (Washington, DC: World Bank Publications, 2001), 34.
- 18.
Ndangwa Noyoo, Social Welfare in Zambia (Lusaka: Multimedia 2000).
- 19.
Felix Masiye, Bona M. Chitah, and Diane McIntyre. 2010. “From Targeted Exemptions To User Fee Abolition in Health Care: Experience from Rural Zambia.” Social Science & Medicine 71 no. 49 (2010), 747.
- 20.
Amina Mama, “Gender Studies for Africa’s Transformation.” In African Intellectuals: Rethinking Politics, Language, Gender and Development, ed. Thandika Mkandawire, (Zed Books, 2013), 100; Mahmood Mamdani, “Higher Education, the State and the Marketplace.” Higher Education 6 no. 1. (2008), 7; Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, “The Academic Diaspora and Knowledge Production in and on Africa: What Role for CODESRIA?” in Africa Intellectual Rethinking: – Politics, Language, Gender and Development, ed. Thandika Mkandawire, (Zed Books, 2013), 233.
- 21.
Evelyne Huber, and John D. Stephens, Democracy and the Left: Social Policy and Inequality in Latin America. (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2012).
- 22.
Louise Tillin, and Anthony W. Pereira. “Federalism, Multi-Level Elections and Social Policy in Brazil and India.” Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 55 no. 3 (2017), 336.
- 23.
Madalitso Zililo Phiri, Neo Molotja, Hlamulo Makelane, Takura Kupamupindi, and Catherine Ndinda. “Inclusive Innovation and Inequality in South Africa: A Case for Transformative Social Policy.” Innovation and Development 6 no. 1, (2016), 2.
- 24.
James Manor, and Jane Duckett, “The Significance of Political Leaders for Social Policy Expansion in Brazil, China, India and South Africa.” Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 55 no. 3 (2017), 310.
- 25.
Marianne S. Ulriksen, “Welfare Policy Expansion in Botswana and Mauritius: Explaining the Causes of Different Welfare Regime Paths.” Comparative Political Studies 45 no. 12 (2012), 1483.
- 26.
Madalitso Zililo Phiri, “Comparative Perspectives on South Africa’s and Brazil’s Institutional Inequalities under Progressive Social Policies.” Journal of Southern African Studies 43 no. 5 (2017), 972.
- 27.
James Manor, and Jane Duckett, “The Significance of Political Leaders for Social Policy Expansion in Brazil, China, India and South Africa.” Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 55 no. 3 (2017), 304.
- 28.
Stephen N. Ndegwa, 1996. The Two Faces of Civil Society: NGOs and Politics in Africa. (West Hartford, Conn: Kumarian Press, 1996).
- 29.
Zein-Elabdin, “Postcoloniality and Development”.
- 30.
Jimi Adesina, 2014. “Accounting for Social Policy: Reflections on Recent Developments In Sub-Saharan Africa.” http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/(httpAuxPages)/15F0DC9FE0A6AE8FC125707005D9C04/$file/Adesina.pdf. (2014); UNRISD. 2006. “Transformative Social Policy: Lessons from UNRISD Research.” Policy Brief 5. UNRISD Research and Policy Brief. Geneva: UNRISD.
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Ouma, M. (2020). Accounting for Choices and Consequences: Examining the Political Economy of Social Policy in Africa. In: Oloruntoba, S.O., Falola, T. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of African Political Economy. Palgrave Handbooks in IPE. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38922-2_44
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