Since the 1980s, many centre-right parties in conservative welfare states have shifted from promoting male-breadwinner to dual-earner family models, contributing to a path departure in the regulation of gender, family, and labour markets. This radical ideological and institutional transformation challenges traditional partisan and path dependence theories. Complementing previous electoral and functional perspectives, this dissertation offers a new explanation by emphasising the role of policy feedback effects generated by left-wing governments. It argues that welfare partisanship is resistant to contextual changes due to entrenched policy paradigms and social linkages. However, strong feedback effects can alter parties’ stances toward policies. In this case, progressive work-family reforms initially established against conservative resistance foster ideological change, turning antagonists into supporters. Using a nested comparative historical analysis, the macro-level comparison of six conservative welfare states in Western Europe shows that centre-right parties only support work-family reforms if left-wing administrations introduce transformative policies, explaining country differences. At the micro-level, process tracing in Spain and Germany identifies bureaucratic continuity and civil mobilisation as causal mechanisms that link left- and right-wing policymaking. By gathering novel empirical evidence, the dissertation develops a new policy feedback theory of comparative welfare politics, contributing to broader debates on party adaptation and institutional change.
Manuel Alvariño Vázquez is a political scientist working on comparative welfare politics. His research explores the politics of social and labour market policy change. His PhD takes the case of work-family policy, with publications in Politics & Society and Government and Opposition. He has also conducted research on gender policy and labour market regulation, with forthcoming work to be published by Oxford University Press. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Copenhagen Business School, investigating how policies and politics interact around work, family, and leisure.