AECC-03 Governance, Policy & Business

UNIT - II
DEVELOPMENT PROCESS AND INDUSTRY

TOPIC - IDEA OF WELFARE STATE

“Power has only one duty –

To secure the social welfare of the People.”

Benjamin Disraeli

INTRODUCTION

According to William O. Doughs, an American Jurist and Politician of the Twentieth Century,
“The concept of the public welfare is broad and inclusive… the values it represents are
spiritual as well as physical, aesthetic as well as monetary. It is within the power of the
legislature to determine that the community should be beautiful as well as healthy, spacious as
well as clean, well balanced as well as carefully patrolled”.

A welfare state is a state committed to providing basic economic security for its citizens
by protecting them from market risks associated with old age, unemployment, and
sickness. Based on the principles of equality of opportunity and public responsibility, a
welfare state focuses on assuring equitable standards of living for all and plays a key
role in the protection and promotion of the economic and social well-being of its
citizens. So basically, a welfare state provides education, housing, sustenance,
healthcare, pensions, unemployment insurance, sick leave or time off due to injury,
supplemental income in some cases, and equal wages through price and wage controls.
The term ‘welfare state’ rst emerged in the UK during World War II.

According to the Political Scientist Esping-Andersen, there are three ways of

organizing a welfare state: Social Democracy, Christian Democracy and Liberalism. A
Social-Democratic welfare state is based on the principle of universalism granting
access to bene ts and services based on citizenship; while Christian-democratic welfare
states are based on the principle of subsidiarity and the dominance of social insurance
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schemes, offering a medium level of decommodi cation and a high degree of social
strati cation; and a liberal regime is based on the notion of market dominance and
private provision and the state only interferes to ameliorate poverty and provide for
basic needs, largely on a means-tested basis.

Across developed OECD countries (2006), total welfare-state spending varies from
about a fth to about a third of their GDP. This share is tightly related to the degree of
“universality” of public social spending, i.e., the extent to which bene ts are received
by individuals in all income classes, rather than largely targeted to particular groups of
individuals, such as low-income groups.

Welfare State and Socialism

Though welfare state often coincides with the idea of socialism, which is characterised
by social ownership of the means of production and workers' self-management of
enterprises, it is not the same. There are enormous differences between the two ways of
organizing the economy and public administration.

Initially, in a welfare state, there is a lower bound on people's benefits i.e. if a person is
sick, unemployed or old, there would be social security to guarantee him/her a
minimum level of existence. However, there is no upper bound on how much a person
achieve. It believes in eradication of absolute poverty; a situation where people are
dying and suffering without the basic necessities. But in socialism, there is often a
lower bound, but more importantly a very strong upper bound. There is a strong
compulsion to not allow anyone to get too rich, by the government controlling all
methods of production. It believes in the concept of relative poverty; which is based on
income inequality. The socialists have a more radical anti-capitalist goal in favour of a
number of measures designed to improve the strength and democratic influence of the
workers and poor while tolerating the continuation of private property and markets. The
welfare state is rather a socially embedded mixed economy with a belief in socialism
but strong capitalist leanings. Experts believe that the welfare state is a compromise and
agreement between moderate socialists and rational conservatives.

Is India a Welfare State?

The Indian Constitution contains the Directive Principles of State Policy from Articles
36 to 51, which lay down the framework for welfare, socialist state. These Directive
Principles are not enforceable by law, rather they are the long-term but fundamental
goals of a welfare state which help in de ning the path of development the country is to
follow, and it is the duty of the State to apply them while making laws.

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Article 38 of the Indian Constitution reads: “The state shall strive to promote the
welfare the people by securing and protecting as effectively as it may, a social order in
which justice-social economic and political-shall pervade all institutions of national
life.”

Article 39A states, “The State shall secure that the operation of the legal system
promotes justice, on a basis of equal opportunity, and shall, in particular, provide free
legal aid, by suitable legislation or schemes or in any other way, to ensure that
opportunities for securing justice are not denied to any citizen by reason of economic or
other disabilities.”

Article 46 states that “The State shall promote, with special care, the education and
economic interests of the weaker sections of the people”.

Hence, we can say that according to the constitution, India is a welfare state.

India is committed to the welfare and development of the people. The Indian
Government launched a lot of schemes for the welfare of the people. In fact, each union
budget sets aside an impressive amount of funds for various social welfare schemes.
Some of the welfare policies are the following:

Pradhan Mantri Jan Vikas Karyakaram

The Pradhan Mantri Jan Vikas Karyakram (PMJVK) in particular, aims to improve the
socio-economic infrastructure facilities for minority communities in the areas of
education, health, and skill development.

Hamari Dharohar
The “Hamari Dharohar” program was launched by the Ministry of Minority Affairs to
preserve the rich cultural heritage of India’s minority communities.

Its objectives include preserving the rich cultural history of minorities within the
context of Indian culture as a whole, curating the exhibition, preserving literature and
other records, supporting and promoting calligraphy, etc.

Schemes Related to Women

Because India has historically been a patriarchal society, women have always
experienced societal disadvantages and limitations, regardless of their class, caste, or
religion. Thus, it became important to implement some corrective measures to better
the situation of women in the historically male-dominated society.
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Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana

The scheme is implemented by the Ministry of Women & Child Development to
provide partial compensation for the wage loss in terms of cash incentives so that the
woman can take adequate rest before and after delivery of the rst living child.

Swadhar Greh
Swadhar Greh Scheme targets women victims of dif cult circumstances. It will be set
up in every district with the capacity to provide shelter, food, clothing, counseling,
training, and clinical and legal aid aimed to rehabilitate women in dif cult
circumstances.

Ujjawala Scheme
The scheme is being implemented by the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
It is a comprehensive scheme for the Prevention of Traf cking and Rescue,
Rehabilitation, Reintegration, and Repatriation of Victims of Traf cking for
Commercial Sexual Exploitation.

One Stop Centre Scheme

It is a centrally sponsored scheme formulated by the Ministry of Women and Child
Development (MWCD) as part of the National Mission for Women’s Empowerment’s
umbrella program.

These centers will gradually be built around the country to offer comprehensive
support and help to women who have experienced violence in both private and public
spaces in a phased manner.

Schemes Related to Children

Due to their age, children are thought to be at risk of being exploited, abused, violent, and
neglected.

However, children in very tough situations, such as orphans and street children, refugees or
displaced children, child workers, children who are trapped in prostitution or sexual abuse,
children who are disabled, and delinquent children are particularly vulnerable.

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Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Scheme

This centrally sponsored scheme is for early childhood care by providing supplementary
nutrition, immunisation, and preschool education to the children. The scheme falls under the
Ministry of Women and Child Development (MoWCD), Government of India (GoI).
Services under the scheme are delivered via Anganwadi Centers (AWCs).

Integrated Child Protection Scheme

The Integrated Child Protection Scheme is being implemented by the Union Ministry of
Women and Child Development as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme.

The objective of the scheme is to institutionalize essential services and strengthen structures
for emergency outreach, institutional care, family and community-based care, counseling,
and support services at the national, regional, state, and district levels.

Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan

It was created with the overarching objective of enhancing school performance as

determined by equitable learning outcomes and equal access to educational opportunities.

It incorporates the three former schemes, Teacher Education, Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha
Abhiyan, and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan Schemes (TE).

Mid-Day Meal (MDM) Scheme

The National Program of Mid-Day Meals (MDM) in School scheme is the Government of
India’s agship school-based feeding program intended to improve students’ nutritional
status and support the expansion of elementary education. This program aims to prevent
classroom hunger, raise school enrollment, increase school attendance, and improve
socialization among castes, etc.

So, we can see that India has launched many programmes for the general good.
However, according to the report by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme
Implementation, 12 such pro-poor schemes, in which the central government invested a
good amount of money, have failed to achieve their set targets in the past many
years. For example, Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana failed to meet its target in 14
states, Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana – Gramin could not reach its target in 27 states, the
skills development programme National Rural Livelihood Mission met its goal only in
Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The much-lauded Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY) has also failed
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as an instrument to transform rural India. The major reason for such failures includes
mismanagement of central as well as state government, the corruption on
implementation, as well as lack of public support. The mainstream development
paradigm has also aggravated discontent among Adivasi communities.

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