ABSTRACT
Why a large extended handbook on the welfare state? That is, without a welfare state we would have to invent a welfare state in one way or another. This as the impact and consequences of market failure still make welfare states important in order to ensure a good life for as many as possible to have interventions. The size and type of intervention may, and will presumably always be, contested as part of variations in national development, the influence of ideologies and economic perspectives on what and how the welfare state influences everyday life as well as overall societal development. Recent years’ increase in inequality around the globe has further implied a stronger focus on how welfare states might help in reducing inequality.
