The European Social Model and an Economy of Well-being: Repairing the Social Fabric of European Societies

This timely book critically examines the European Social Model as a contested concept and concrete set of European welfare and governance arrangements. It offers a theoretical and empirical analysis of new economic models and existing European investment strategies to address key issues within post-Covid-19 Europe.

The authors explore the structural inequalities that have been shaped by strong imbalances in the relationship between public health, work, formal and informal care, inequality, poverty and the labour market across Europe. They then assess the potential of new economic models and measures, when combined with existing European governance and collaborative welfare arrangements, to repair the European Social Model. With a particular focus on policy measures that affect young and older people in Europe, chapters also provide a critical insight into the fragmented, multi-actor and multidimensional process of building a European social space that has led to the hybridization of welfare systems.

Offering a firm theoretical foundation to the understanding of European welfare arrangements and the social open method of coordination, this book will be a valuable resource for academics and students of European social policy, comparative social policy and European governance. Its analysis of empirical evidence relating to the implementation of policy measures will also be beneficial for policymakers and practitioners working in health, social care and welfare fields.

Giovanni Bertin, Professor of Comparative Welfare States, Department of Economics, Ca’Foscari University of Venice, Italy, Marion Ellison, Professor of European Social Policy and Sociology, Department of Psychology, Sociology and Education, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, UK and Giuseppe Moro, Professor of Sociology and Social Policy, Department of Political Science, University of Bari Aldo Moro, Italy