Today, we’re kicking off our long-awaited SASE mini-conference on financialization and the welfare state. Organized by Jeanne Lazarus, Daniel Mertens and myself, the mini-conference aims to explore the complicated new ways in which social and financial policies have become entangled in contemporary welfare states. The contributions to the mini-conference map the ongoing financialization of the welfare state in contemporary political economies by focusing on the introduction and expansion of financial tools and mechanisms in public and private welfare provision. The contributions study how welfare states and other social groupings have debated and introduced new public policies and financial tools that promise to protect against growing financial risks in everyday life. Looking at these promises of protections through the market requires a fundamentally different understanding of the nature of the welfare state than the scholarship’s traditional focus on decommodification.
Even though we are not able to meet in person in Amsterdam this year, we have been able to put together an exciting online program covering multiple dimensions of financialization in the realm of social policy and the state. Today’s program includes a panel on the political economy of financial sector practices, regulation and macroeconomic functions; financialization and household debt; and financialization and pensions. For details, see below.
Panel “The Political Economy of Finance Sector Practices, Regulation and Macroeconomic Functions” (10:00-11:30 CET)
Panel “Financialization and Household Debt” (15:00-16:30 CET)
Panel “Financialization and Pensions” (18:00-19:30 CET)
Natascha van der Zwan 