Public Attitudes towards Family Policies in Europe: Linking Institutional Context and Public Opinion

235 Pages·2014·3.074 MB·English

by  Monika Mischke (auth.)

Public Attitudes towards Family
Policies in Europe
Monika Mischke
Public Attitudes towards
Family Policies in Europe
Linking Institutional Context
and Public Opinion
Monika Mischke
Siegen, Deutschland
Zugleich Dissertation der Universität Mannheim, 2012
ISBN 978-3-658-03576-1 ISBN 978-3-658-03577-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-658-03577-8
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Acknowledgements
This book is based on my doctoral thesis handed in at the University of
Mannheim in September 2012.
First of all, I wish to thank Prof. Dr. Bernhard Ebbinghaus and Prof. Dr.
Claus Wendt for supervising this thesis and supporting my research in numerous
ways. Both of them provided valuable feedback on the developing manuscript
and their doors were always open to discuss questions, ideas, and problems.
I am also grateful to the Mannheim Center for European Social Research
(MZES) and the Mannheim Graduate School of Social and Economic Sciences
for providing a great research environment with an excellent infrastructure and
stimulating seminars and training. I wish to thank all my colleagues and fellow
PhD students at the MZES for all of the stimulating discussions and exchanges
as well as my coffee-break team for many joyful moments.
My research has also profited from my participation in several summer
schools and conferences as well as a research stay at the Swedish Institute for
Social Research (SOFI), which was made possible by Tommy Ferrarini and the
EQUALSOC Network of Excellence, funded by the EU.
The idea for this thesis was born during our project “Attitudes Toward
Welfare State Institutions: New Perspectives for the Comparative Welfare State
Analysis,” which was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and
headed by Claus Wendt. My work greatly benefited from our discussions and the
joint research, and I am grateful to my colleagues Michaela Pfeifer and Claus
Wendt for the successful and very pleasant cooperation. Furthermore, I would
like to thank our student assistants in Mannheim and Siegen for their support, in
particular Regina Jutz, Nadine Reibling, Ines Schaurer, and Pia Schütz.
I am especially grateful to Ryan DeLaney, who thoroughly proofread most
parts of this thesis, as well as to Miriam Ott, who helped in collecting and editing
the family-policy indicators.
Thanks for their support also go to the administrative and IT team at the
MZES, namely Sibille Eberle, Josiane Hess, Beate Rossi, Marianne Schneider,
Helena Wozniak, Marlene Alle, and Christian Melbeck, and to Susanne Müller at
the University of Siegen.
I also wish to thank Christian Albrekt Larsen, Thomas Bahle, Agnes Blome,
Tommy Ferrarini, Ulrich Kohler, Einar Overbye, and Stefan Svallfors as well as
6

all members of the EQUALSOC Institutional Change group for their stimulating
discussions and helpful comments on my work.
Of the many people who have, in one or the other way, contributed to the
completion of this thesis, I would like to extend my appreciation to: Sharon
Ashcroft, Jennifer Boothby, Jeff Kavanagh, Gabriele Mischke, and Swantje
Schmidt for proofreading parts of this thesis; Claire Corkhill and Wolfgang
Mischke for their valuable comments on parts of the manuscript; and Benjamin
Branzko for his constant encouragement, emotional support, and delicious
cooking.
Last but not least, I am deeply grateful to my family and friends for their
continuous support and their unwavering belief in my abilities.
Contents
Abbreviations ...................................................................................................... 9
1 Introduction ......................................................................................... 11
2 Theoretical background and literature review ................................. 25
2.1 Institutional theory ................................................................................. 26
2.2 The link between institutions and welfare attitudes ............................... 29
2.3 Differences among social groups ........................................................... 37
2.4 Deservingness perceptions and feedback processes .............................. 42
2.5 A conceptual framework ........................................................................ 45
2.6 Family policy as a special policy field ................................................... 50
2.7 Classifications of family-policy institutions .......................................... 54
2.8 Attitudes toward family policies – state of the art ................................. 59
2.9 Public attitudes toward family policies: Hypotheses ............................. 63
3 Family policies in Europe – a cluster analysis ................................... 75
3.1 Indicators for the construction of family-policy types ........................... 78
3.2 Methods ................................................................................................. 89
3.3 Family-policy types: Results from the cluster analysis ......................... 90
3.4 Conclusion ............................................................................................. 98
4 Family policies and public opinion ................................................... 103
4.1 The three dimensions of attitudes ........................................................ 104
4.2 The link between family policies and public attitudes ......................... 105
4.3 Public attitudes in comparative perspective ......................................... 108
4.4 Research strategy and variables ........................................................... 117
4.5 The family-policy indicators and public attitudes................................ 121
4.6 The family-policy typology and public attitudes ................................. 123
4.7 Conclusion ........................................................................................... 128
5 Family policy, contextual features, and public opinion .................. 129
5.1 Contextual indicators ........................................................................... 131
5.2 The family-policy clusters put into context ......................................... 134
5.3 Family policies, contextual features, and public attitudes ................... 140
5.4 Public expenditures for families .......................................................... 147
5.5 Conclusion ........................................................................................... 152
8 Contents

6 Social cleavages within European welfare states ............................ 157
6.1 Independent variables and hypotheses ................................................. 159
6.2 Correlations ......................................................................................... 166
6.3 Cluster- and country-specific regression models ................................. 167
6.4 Conclusion ........................................................................................... 202
7 Summary and discussion ................................................................... 205
8 Bibliography ....................................................................................... 229
9

Abbreviations
CA Cluster analysis
CI Confidence interval
CL Cluster
ESS European Social Survey
EU European Union
FPM Family-policy model
FTE Full-time equivalents
GDP Gross domestic product
GRA Gender-role attitudes
HCA Hierarchical cluster analysis
ICC Intra-class correlation coefficient
LFP Labor-force participation
PT; PTE Part-time; part-time employment
Ref. Reference category
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
OLS Ordinary least squares
OMC Open Method of Coordination
PPP Purchasing power parities
SD Standard deviation
10 Abbreviations

Country abbreviations

AT Austria
BE Belgium
DE Germany
DK Denmark
ES Spain
FI Finland
FR France
GR Greece
IE Ireland
IT Italy
LU Luxembourg
NL The Netherlands
PT Portugal
SE Sweden
UK United Kingdom