The Impact of Party Competition: Why Unemployment Benefits in Italy and Germany Diverged after World War II.

This paper shows that different patterns of party competition can affect reforms of social protection. It focuses on two basic logics of competition: centrifugal competition that is generated by ideologically polarized party systems and centripetal competition in nonpolarized party systems. Their effects are analyzed by comparing the development of unemployment benefits in Italy and Germany after the end of the Second World War. Centrifugal competition induces particularistic policy-making because it makes comprehensive reforms impossible. Consequently, it brings about a fragmented unemployment benefit system with wide differences in benefit generosity. Centripetal competition enables programmatic competition and is more sensitive to the policy preferences of voters. This tends to produce more comprehensive benefits with less marked generosity differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]