Cash Transfers and Basic Social Protection ─ Towards a Development Revolution?

The author offers a ground-breaking analysis of the political discourses that facilitated the rise of cash transfers as instruments of development policy since the 1990s. Using an innovative theoretical framework, von Gliszczynski gives a broad, yet detailed, overview of the history of basic social protection in global policy and identifies discursive shifts that radically changed the perception of cash transfers in global policy. His in-depth analysis of political discourses illustrates in how far the career of cash transfers was part of a 'development revolution' and shows to what extent the ideas behind development policy have truly changed. By demonstrating that cash transfers are part of a specifically developmental model of social protection, this book also sheds light on potential future directions of social policy in the Global South.

Moritz von Gliszczynski is a leading researcher at LAG Soziale Brennpunkte Niedersachsen, Germany. He holds a PhD in sociology from Bielefeld University and from 2010 to 2013 worked as a researcher for the Financial Assistance, Land Policy, and Global Social Rights research group (FLOOR).