Ilari Lindroos

Welfarestate and its history. Finnish Researchers of Social Policy and History in the Context of the Economic Depression of the 1990's.

My point of the departure is the practical conceptions of history of the Finnish Researchers of Social Policy. I am not interested in the basic textbooks or the introductions of the Social Policy, since "history" as a theory and as a practice are everything else than identical; e.g. many thoughts that are neglected in the former case are still used in the latter one. Therefore, I have studied some Finnish periodicals (published between years 1985-1994) concerning welfarestate as a changing entity.

My paper is about the presumptions of history and of historical. More accurate, what kind of attribute Finnish researchers of social policy have implied to history. So, I am going to present some preconceptions of the researchers about history in general, i.e. its mechanisms, goals and utility for the present-day. Especially I will analyse how the development of society and peoples' place in this special movement has been understood.

My conclusion is that the Welfarestate has been seen both as a construction against economical forces and as a construction for social forces. But, what is more important, is that the both of these forces are considered a-historical, i.e. as a constant factors that are conditioning the human world eternally.

Ph.D-student Ilari Lindroos
Department of Political History
20014 Turku University
tel: +358 (0)2- 333 5374, fax: +358 (0)2- 333 6585
E-mail: ilalin@hotmail.com; ilalin@utu.fi