The Democratic Class Struggle Revisited: The Welfare State As a Vehicle of Social Cohesion and Political Conflict

This paper attempts to resolve disagreements concerning how class conflicts are manifested in contemporary welfare states. An analytical distinction is made between social (tensions/antagonism between classes) and political (class based differences in political preferences) manifestations of class conflict. Using ISSP data (1999/2009) from 20 countries, the results indicate that social conflict is more common in meager welfare states where economic inequality is relatively high compared to encompassing highly redistributive welfare states where levels of economic inequality are relatively low. When it comes to distributive struggles in the political sphere – political conflict – the pattern is reversed. The results support the theory outlined in The Democratic Class Struggle, which suggests that in modern welfare states, institutionalized political conflict tends to replace less institutionalized and unorganized social conflict. This is more the case in encompassing welfare states characterized by strong working-class organization than in residual welfare states where working-class organization is weak.