Doctoral Dissertation Research: Bringing Welfare State Theories to the States: How Ideas, Actors, & State Structures Affect Welfare Reform Trajectories in Minnesota and Wiscons

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SES-0527035Robin StrykerPamela K. WaldUniversity of Minnesota-Twin CitiesWelfare state scholarship has focused mostly on national policies. Individual states, however, have played key roles in welfare reform and other policy decisions in the U.S. This research examines how Minnesota and Wisconsin have reformed welfare since 1985, while also considering how constraints set by national policy, particularly the 1996 welfare reform legislation, have influenced these decisions. Existing research suggests that these states should have taken similar and relatively generous approaches to welfare reform. Yet, since 1985, Wisconsin has consistently enacted punitive policies that emphasize immediate employment, promote marriage, and discourage out-of-wedlock childbearing. In contrast, Minnesota has enacted relatively generous policies that provide job training, educational opportunities, and other resources to those who move from welfare to work, although it has recently moved in a more punitive direction. This project examines the following questions: Why have two states with similar geographic, demographic, economic, and cultural characteristics diverged in their reform trajectories? How and why have these states' policies recently become more similar? Under what conditions do states enact generous versus punitive welfare reforms? How have national policies and debates shaped reforms in these states? To answer these questions, this research analyzes how state government structure, the balance of power between political parties in the states, key policymakers, and the ways lawmakers and advocates interpret welfare reform affect state policy decisions. This project relies on state-level data collected in Minnesota and Wisconsin and on publicly available national-level data. State-level data include legislative materials, newspaper articles and in-depth interviews with policymakers and societal advocates involved in welfare reform. National level data include key portions of the 1996 legislation and key congressional debates. Broader Impacts. The project has practical significance because state-level welfare reforms affect the well-being of poor parents and children. Whereas evaluation research focuses directly on how welfare reform policies impact poor people, this research helps provide a more complete picture of how and why these impacts are produced. In addition, the interpretations that this project examines reflect and contribute to broader public debates about such value-laden topics as families and parenting, work, the causes of poverty and welfare, and the role of individual responsibility and social compassion.