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Debating the Quality of Life: Social Democracy during the 1980s1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Jos de Beus  and
Thomas Koelble
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Extract

Social Democratic Parties Across Europe Face adjustment problems. Given the electoral decline of almost every social democratic party, it is tempting for social scientists to pronounce such political parties as either in decay or even a thing of the past. There is little doubt that social democratic parties are searching for new concepts, ideas and policies. At the heart of the attempt to regain the political initiative is the debate over how to react not only to the challenges from the new social movements but also to the re-invigorated attack by liberals and conservatives on central social democratic policies: the welfare state and socioeconomicequality.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 29 , Issue 4 , 01 October 1994 , pp. 515 - 535
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1994

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Footnotes

1

Drafts of this article were presented at the 21st Annual Joint Sessions of the ECPR in Leiden, April 1993, and at the 89th Annual Meeting of the APSA in Washington DC, September 1993. The authors would particularly like to thank David Miller and Tim Tilton for their comments.

References

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