Colonialism, Postcolonialism and the Liberal Welfare State

Colonialism and Postcolonialism: Psychological Dimensions

European colonial powers invaded then dominated a large part of the world from the Renaissance to the middle of the twentieth century. Across this long history and numerous geographical settings, colonialism took various forms, was associated with diverse practices, and was justifi ed by different ideologies. However, it created unprecedented situations of encounters between the original inhabi...

Repentance and the Liberal State

The article defends four broad theses: that repentance is the intrinsically appropriate response to moral wrongdoing (Part II); that legal punishment may seek to facilitate repentance and, when repentance is in evidence prior to the completion of a justified punishment, that it can be a legitimate ground for the merciful reduction of the offender’s sentence (Part III); that according repentance...

The Welfare State and Competitiveness

In all modern industrial countries, redistributive expenditures are a larger component of the government budget than consumption of goods and services. In this paper, we use a general equilibrium, two-country model with exportables, importables and nontraclables to study redistribution across different types of agents in a world characterized by the presence of labor unions and distortionary ta...

The Welfare State and Redistribution

Because it taxes and spends, the welfare state is by definition redistributive, but this does not automatically entail that it creates more equality. A quick historical glance at social reform will dispel of any notion that the welfare state was pursued for egalitarian reasons. Its foundations were typically laid by conservative reformers who, like Bismarck, sought primarily to reproduce, rathe...

Normalization and the Welfare State