The Potential for Cross-Class Coalitions: Assessing Socio-Economic Status, Risk Exposure and Welfare State Support

Public mass preferences have been shown to be important drivers behind contemporary welfare states’ resilience against retrenchment. But which individuals support generous social policy? By combining two leading schools of welfare state research - power resources and risk redistribution approach - this study argues that the clientele of welfare states in post-industrial labor markets goes far beyond the usual suspects within the working class. This bears potentially far-reaching implications: Increasingly widespread job insecurity rooted in pervasive precarious employment situations substantially moderates hostility towards the welfare state among the more affluent and leaves some of them as potential partner for broad cross-class coalitions in order to ensure persistently strong social safety nets run by the state.