Understanding the origins of social policy in colonial contexts: An actor-centric approach

A. Shriwise, Carina Schmitt
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Abstract

Social policy scholars seeking to understand the dynamics of social protection arrangements have advocated for an actor-centric approach. However, when seeking to understand the impact of colonialism on social policymaking, most scholars have focused not on actors but on ideas and institutions. To address this gap, this paper develops an actor-centric framework for understanding the introduction of social policies in colonial contexts. We identify and compare actor constellations of relevance to the introduction of social policies in two colonies of French West Africa that differ with respect to precolonial population density: Dahomey (present-day Benin), with a relatively high precolonial population density, and Côte d’Ivoire, with a relatively low precolonial population density. Despite evidence that precolonial population density can shape colonial strategies and policies, the results provide no supporting evidence that precolonial population density is a driver of meaningful variation in the introduction of social policies or in the composition of the actor constellations from which they originate. Instead, the results point to the key role of transnational and regional actors in the introduction of social policies in colonial contexts. They also highlight the domestic economic and societal arenas as sites where: i) heterogeneity emerges in the social policy actor constellations; and ii) local actors mediate tensions arising from imperially driven social transformations.
了解殖民背景下社会政策的起源:以行动者为中心的方法
试图了解社会保护安排动态的社会政策学者主张采用以行动者为中心的方法。然而,在试图理解殖民主义对社会政策制定的影响时,大多数学者关注的不是行为者,而是思想和制度。为了弥补这一不足,本文建立了一个以行动者为中心的框架,用于理解殖民背景下社会政策的引入。我们确定并比较了与法属西非两个殖民地引入社会政策相关的行为体组合,这两个殖民地在殖民前的人口密度有所不同:达荷美(今贝宁)殖民前的人口密度相对较高,而科特迪瓦殖民前的人口密度相对较低。尽管有证据表明,殖民前的人口密度会影响殖民战略和政策,但研究结果并没有提供支持性证据,证明殖民前的人口密度是导致社会政策的引入或其所产生的行为体构成出现有意义的变化的驱动因素。相反,研究结果表明,跨国和地区行动者在殖民地环境下推行社会政策方面发挥着关键作用。这些结果还强调,国内经济和社会领域是:i) 社会政策行为者组合出现异质性的场所;ii) 地方行为者对帝国主义推动的社会变革所产生的紧张局势进行调解的场所。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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