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Anastasia Balezdrova 

Could a welfare state survive in a period of severe financial crisis? Could the citizens of a seriously hit country rely on any support by social institutions or they will be left to cope alone? Is there a friendly solution and how is it possible to reach it?

Answers to these questions particularly relevant in Greece now tried to give the Professor of Economics at the Athens University and Director of the Centre for Health Services Management and Evaluation Lycurgus Liaropoulos.

"It is quite difficult to talk about the welfare state in this instance. Currently, it is in a kind of persecution from many countries and under many pretexts and conditions. I would say that it is not a particularly well-established concept in the western world not to mention the whole world. Welfare state has existed for a century, since when European countries were created. They decided together to try to deal with some very serious dangers. At that time, some systems appeared that we could say constitute the welfare state today. It started from Bismarck in Germany in 1893, and then followed other countries with health systems that are the more specific form of the welfare state."

According to Lycurgus Liaropoulos, the welfare state is not just something especially useful for the people who benefit from the services offered. "It supports the economic system in times when it overheats. Then, a well-organized welfare state drains money thus regulating the temperature of the overheated economy. When things do not go so well, it has resources to give to support the needy groups, thus preserving the social cohesion with no major riots and reactions and maintaining a balance in the economy."

What interests us is if and how the welfare state can endure in times of crisis. How certain gained rights could be kept.

"We in Greece are supposed to be very concerned about the welfare state. In fact, the opposite is happening: Everyone is trying to lie on the hands of the other to take away his privileges. No one has ever addressed the question whether we have many civil servants; that if they are many, wages will drop and we will not be even able to pay them."

What is the criterion of endurance and the need for welfare state? According to Lycurgus Liaropoulos, the answer lies in the ideology and philosophy. "In America, things are more or less put on a personal level. The man there depends on his own forces and capabilities. In Europe, things turned out differently. We had capitalism, but at the same time, institutions were established. Capitalism without democracy is a jungle, but democracy rests on the welfare state. If there is no welfare state and people begin to attack each other in times of distress, trying to secure themselves and their relatives, not concerning the others, then democracy is doomed. I fear that democracy in our country will go through trials and it very soon. My concerns are very serious."

In times like today, the problem is which solution to choose. Lycurgus Liaropoulos identified the options in the following way: "One option is the neoliberal approach: Leave them to themselves. The other option is of those kindhearted, who say, We want to protect everyone. There is also a middle option, which seeks one solution not to turn the system, not to break the society and to keep certain rights until the moment things will change."

"My opinion is that the welfare state is not a problem, it does not necessarily burden the economy. Therefore, the old European economy has a problem because it has to support a large welfare state. This is not true. In Scandinavian countries, in Germany and France things are not this way. Their citizens are in much better condition than are those in America under the same conditions. This is because they can "round the corners".

Lycurgus Liaropoulos believes that countries that have traditions in the welfare state can more easily adapt to new conditions than those in which it is missing completely. "If we look at the data, we will see that in Europe, we are providing twice as more money for social needs than in the USA. And if the argument is that the maintenance of such a system violates the competitiveness of the economy I would oppose by the fact that competition in the USA is much worse than in Europe."

The outlook of the professor on the course of the welfare state in Greece is not optimistic. In his opinion, the problems in the state organization are so great that the country should start it up again but the starting point is very bad. "We are now in a problem. The state of health and education system is dramatic; we have a large percentage of poverty and inequality. After the USA, Greece and Turkey have the highest rates among the member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. We now have a very high percentage of crime. In any case, surely we must do something not to find ourselves in a very tragic situation."

Meanwhile, a report by the United Nations released today shows that two thirds of the world's population or 5.1 billion people have no social security and only 15 per cent of the world's population receives unemployment benefits.

The report was compiled by a commission headed by former President of Chile Michelle Bachelet to be presented at a meeting of the leaders of the 20 richest countries in the world, which will be held in Cannes on November 3 and 4. United Nations will launch an appeal to the members of G20 to increase social security at international level. According to the report entitled "Social protection floor for a fair and inclusive globalization," ensuring more people with social security will help economic development and regulation of social tension.