Kováts Bence: The Financialisation of Housing and Housing-related Family Support in Hungary
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2. Theoretical foundations
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2.2. Approaches to housing support by the family
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2.2.2. Familialism and “backwardness” in Southern Europe
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2.2.2.1. Familialism in welfare

2.2.2.1. Familialism in welfare

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Since, similarly to early political economy, early theory of housing processes focused on the relationship between the market and the state, the significant role of the family in housing provision was first explored as a trait of regions portrayed as lagging behind high-income regions. In this sense, the strong involvement of the family in housing provision was portrayed as a remnant of pre-modern eras that ought to disappear once countries catch up with developed countries. Indeed, housing theorists such as Harloe (1995) and Kemeny (1995) could not locate countries not belonging to the global economic core in their theoretical frameworks. Not only the lowest-income countries of the world could be hardly divided into any of Kemeny’s (1995) or Barlow and Duncan’s (1994) categories, but even SE member states of the EU could not be easily classified in the housing-welfare systems of Kemeny (1995).

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Regarding their housing systems, countries in the South had a very low and residualised public housing stock, a low level of public housing expenditure and a high home-ownership rate which would normally classify them as liberal-dualist. Still, housing welfare either in the form of public housing units or subsidies were not based on a means test and provided to those on the lowest incomes, but were favouring those with income gained on the formal labour market which would classify them as corporatist-unitary (Allen et al., 2004). Also, in SE self-built housing1 tends to represent a much higher share in the housing stock and building regulations tend to be rather permissive and their enforcement is very weak.

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The obvious differences between the group of high-income countries and the rest of the world led Barlow and Duncan (1994), to briefly mention a fourth type of welfare regime alongside the three categories of Esping-Andersen: the rudimentary welfare state. In their interpretation, rudimentary welfare states are similar to liberal regimes in that they are characterised by residual welfare provision and “forcing entry into the labour market” (p. 30). However, in these countries “there is no right to welfare and no history of full employment policies”, there is a significant gray economy and welfare is often provided by families (ibid.).

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This characterisation of SE often focuses on the high level of informality in the region, that is, “all income-earning activities that are not regulated by the state in social environments where similar activities are regulated” (Castells and Portes, 1989, p. 12). Any transactions not recorded officially fall into this category, and family transactions constitute a large part of them.

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Allen et al. (2004) further elaborated on what Barlow and Duncan called rudimentary welfare states. However, they did not apply Barlow and Duncan’s term pertaining to any low-income countries with insignificant welfare provision, undeveloped welfare institutions and limited entitlements, instead, they strictly apply the concept only to SE welfare states and broaden their analysis by cultural interpretations of welfare regime formation.

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Allen et al.’s theory emerged with the aim of addressing limitations of Esping-Andersen’s (1990) original typology of welfare regimes. In the authors’ view, the concept of the welfare regime focuses on state-market relations in the provision of welfare, but does not pay attention to other factors, notably the family and extended kinship networks playing a key role in welfare provision.

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Allen et al. take up findings of Ferrera (1996) who took note of the dualistic nature of the labour market in the South of Europe and its implications for the welfare system. Ferrera argues that in SE, a large share of the population does not have formal employment while welfare services are organised so that people without formal employment fall outside social protection guaranteed by the state. Pension policy is particularly generous, as pensions have an outstanding high wage replacement rate in Europe, yet they are provided only to those having been formally employed.

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Another feature of the Southern welfare state highlighted by Allen et al. (2004) is the clientelistic nature of state administration. Referring to Mény and Rhodes (1999), the authors argue that Southern countries’ delayed modernisation and democratisation led to the persistence of patron-client relations, a feature deemed characteristic of pre-capitalist societies, in public administration (Allen et al., 2004, p. 104). The strong role of political parties in governance and the lack of strong horizontal interest aggregation foster clientelism as democratic control is weak and civil servants can be appointed based on party loyalty (p. 105). In Southern countries where precarious employment is widespread and formal employment grants both secure income and access to welfare, a job in the public administration is often used as a form of social policy. For instance, in Greece recruitment regulations for public sector jobs included criteria certifying need such as the number of dependent children or income, and not professional qualifications (ibid.).

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As the labour market is dual and the informal economy is extensive, measuring income is difficult by universal regulations. Therefore, SE welfare policies are characterised by a high level of discretion on the local level. Complex local legislations ascertaining need can be used by the civil administration to serve their clientele and not cater to the neediest (pp. 106-107). Bureaucracy can be characterised as non-Weberian, that is not “delivering services in a depersonalised and universalistic way” (Allen et al., 2004, p. 117). Similarly, recruitment of civil servants is not pursued based on skills, but loyalty; and their capacity to implement policies and enforce regulations is severely restricted. Favouring kinship and the family by allocating benefits or loose enforcement of regulations (e.g. in issuance of building permits) by the administration is widespread.

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Due to the limited coverage and selectivity of Southern welfare provision, families gain a greater role in the provision of welfare. Resources are often provided by family members with formal employment to those without; by older family members to the young ones; by those with clientelistic ties to public administration to those without. Burdens of large investments such as buying or constructing a house are shared by the family.
 
1 According to the definition of Duncan and Rowe (1993, p. 1332), self-provision is the term describing housing construction realised by the would-be owner-occupant household. Based on the form of involvement of the household, self-provision is divided into self-build and self-promotion. While self-build refers to housing production where ‘the household […] (individually or collectively) [carries] out the bulk of the construction work’, self-promotion pertains to the type of production whereby the household is not significantly involved in the actual construction of housing, but ‘(alone or collectively) finds finance, buys land, manages the project and owns the finished product’ (ibid.).
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