Harold L. Wilensky is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been twice a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. He is the author of 75 articles and 13 previous books, including Industrial Society and Social Welfare (1958, 1965), Organizational Intelligence: Knowledge and Policy in Government and Industry (1967, 1969), The Welfare State and Equality (1975) and Rich Democracies (2002). Before joining the University of California in 1963, he taught at the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago.
Part I. Globalization, Public Policy, and the Wellbeing of People: 1. The
welfare state as the center of public finance and political conflict; 2.
Energy policy and performance: US and the world; 3. What tradeoffs are good
and bad for the economy?: domestic structures and policies that permit
adaptation to globalization; 4. Retrenchment of the welfare state?: the
fate of 'cutback budgeting' in Italy, France, Germany, the US, UK and New
Zealand; 5. Pensions coverage: US health care remains unique; 6. The impact
of 'globalization': an overview; Part II. Moving the US. off the Low Road:
Lessons from Abroad: 7. Low road versus high road: American exceptionalism;
8. Policy implications for the United States: how to get off the low road.
