Center for European Studies Working Paper Series 77 (June 2001) Beyond retrenchment 1 Bruno Palier CNRS researcher, Centre d'etudes de la Vie Politique francvaise (CEVIPOF) Science Po Paris, France palier@msh-paris.fr Abstract Current research on welfare state changes should go beyond the notion of retrenchment to be able to embrace the different kinds of developments that have occurred. Recent Euro- pean welfare state changes should be analysed in differentiating between different periods of time and different types of changes introduced by governments. Certain reforms may prove to enforce continuity while others may prove to introduce a new logic into the welfare system. And, contrary to the overall notion of retrenchment, every reform does not always imply less welfare state. A specific framework of analysis inspired by general public policy analysis, and emphasising the role of welfare institutions, aimed at differentiating three orders of changes, is proposed. 1 Earlier versions of this chapter have been presented in the University of Stirling, the University of Tokyo, the Max Plank Intitut in Cologne and Harvard University, Center for European Studies. I wish to thank all the commentators from those venues, and particularly Olli Kangas, Mari Miura, Fritz Scharpf, Peter Hall and Rosemary Taylor for their very useful comments. brought to you by CORE View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk provided by Archive of European Integration