Familialism begets familialism? How family solidarity shapes welfare preferences in Europe

Families constitute a pillar of welfare provision in post-industrial societies, functioning as an alternative or a complement to social policies. In the European context, the role of families in welfare provision

Nonetheless, the role of family solidarity exchanges and welfare familialism (i.e. the relative allocation of welfare provision responsibilities among families and states) has rarely been addressed by the literature on welfare preferences.

Although research on social policy preferences has explored multiple explanatory factors, it has barely addressed the role played by the family in welfare provision. The proposed dissertation
intends to tackle this research gap by focusing on the role played by intergenerational solidarity arrangements in preference formation. As parents and adult children exchange resources to insure each other against life
contingencies, the need for social benefits shrinks, but an undesired dependency on family solidarity
might also lead to increased demands for public provision. The interplay between family and
state-based welfare provision and its’ potential effects on welfare preferences are explored,
considering different specific policy designs from a comparative perspective, emphasising how
institutional and cultural factors determine differences in family support across societies. The
proposed studies take a quantitative approach based on the use of secondary survey data.