This paper tries to understand the current status of South African labor market, which is changing in contradictory directions, i.e. a strengthening of the rights and protection of workers at the same time as the flexibilization of employment, in the context of the characteristics of labor and social security legislation in South Africa, as well as the nature of labor and social security reform...

This chapter summarises the evidence assembled in the previous chapters covering different aspects of the market-related reforms of the English National Health Service (NHS) under New Labour. It tries to assess the extent to which the objectives of the reforms had been met or the concerns of sceptics vindicated by the time that New Labour lost power in May 2010. It concludes by discussing the n...

Health care reforms require fundamental changes to the ways in which the health workforce is planned, managed and developed within national health systems. While issues involved in such transition remain complex, their importance and the need to address them in a proactive manner are vital for reforms to achieve their key policy objectives. For a start, the analysis of human resources in the co...

Since the 1970s Sweden’s dual-earner model of family policy has gradually been strengthened by expansions of public day-care, extended earnings-related parental leave and individualised income taxation of spouses. Sweden has become a central case for comparative gender policy analysts and aspects of these policies have become a point of reference for policy makers in other advanced welfare stat...

The past 15 years in Hungary have been characterised by unique changes. Apart from democratisation and managing the immediate crises caused by the collapse of the economy in the early 1990s, a strong part of the reforms was a desire to build Western models of health care and the necessary social and economic infrastructure. Hungary was forced to start substantial reengineering of health service...

Across Europe, contemporary negotiated reforms of economic and social policy are increasingly characterized by a logic of information rather than a logic of exchange. Unlike in neo-corporatist bargaining over incomes policies, states negotiate with the social partners not primarily to secure their acquiescence, but instead to enlist their active assistance in designing and mobilizing support fo...

India's economic reforms began in 1991 when a newly elected Congress government, facing an exceptionally severe balance-of-payments crisis, embarked on a programme of shortterm stabilization combined with a longer-term programme of comprehensive structural reforms. Rethinking on economic policy had begun earlier in the mid-1980s by which time the limitations of a development strategy based on i...

Health reforms that emphasize public health and improvements in primary care can be cost-effective measures to achieve health improvements, especially in developing countries that face severe resource constraints. In their paper “Shanghai rising: health improvements as measured by avoidable mortality since 2000,” Gusmano et al suggest that Shanghai’s health policy-makers have been successful in...

health reforms that emphasize public health and improvements in primary care can be cost-effective measures to achieve health improvements, especially in developing countries that face severe resource constraints. in their paper “shanghai rising: health improvements as measured by avoidable mortality since 2000,” gusmano et al suggest that shanghai’s health policy-makers have been successful in...

This paper assesses India’s current fiscal situation, its likely future evolution, and impacts on the economy. We examine possible reforms of macroeconomic policy (including fiscal, monetary and exchange rate policy) and broader institutional reforms that will bear on the macroeconomic situation. We also consider the political feasibility of possible reforms. We examine both medium and longer r...