Reforms in Long Term Care Policies in Europe : Investigating Institutional Change and Social Impacts

Long-term care policies are one of the welfare policy fields where institutional changes and policy innovation have mainly taken place in the last 10-15 years in many European countries. In contrast to what has characterized the last two decades in relation to mainstream policy fields (e.g. health care and pensions), where attempts to reduce or, at least, not to increase public intervention have been relevant trends, long-term care has seen a general growth in public financing, an expansion of beneficiaries, and, more generally, an attempt to define larger social responsibilities and related social rights. The book is aimed at describing this general trend, at identifying what factors can explain it, which are the main differences among European countries and what are some of the main consequences. The countries considered in this study belong to different “welfare families” in Europe. Spain and Italy constitute the Southern European family, France, Germany and Austria the continental family, England is part of the Anglo-Saxon family, Sweden and Denmark are part of the Scandinavian family. The Netherlands are a special case, characterized by a mix combination of Nordic and continental patterns. The Czech Republic was chosen as a case belonging to Central-Eastern European countries.