What is (successfully) “social” in global social policy and how does it diffuse?

Abstract

Dear GSP readers, This issue consists of eight articles, a Forum entitled “COVID-19: Lessons for genderresponsive recovery and transformation” and a Digest covering the fields of global social governance, global social policies (redistribution, regulation, rights), health, employment and work, social protection, education, environment, migration and gender, but with an ongoing emphasis on the Covid-19 pandemic. As usual, this editorial briefly presents the discussions and contributions to this issue, but also hints at a number of recently published books in the field. The insights and discussions from our last issue (GSP 21.3) – a special issue on Covid-19 – are continued in the GSP Forum edited by Sarah Cook and Silke Staab, as well as in an article by Zuñiga-Fajuri et al., with a particular focus on gendered and feminist perspectives. The Forum contains short reflections by feminist researchers and advocates from civil society, academia, and intergovernmental agencies. They explore the role feminist activism and ‘policy entrepreneurship’ has played in responding to crisis and driving a more forward-looking gender transformative agenda. Among the insights we get from these contributions are the following: Covid-19 has highlighted gender impacts and inequalities in relation not only to the pandemic but also the crises arising from various measures to prevent the virus from spreading. Activism on genderrelated needs and rights rapidly intensified at the start of the pandemic, drawing on existing evidence and transnational networks. Particularly interesting are the considerations of what transformative, sustainable gender-sensitive policies could be like, linking feminist arguments about care and the environment. In a related vein, the chapter by Warria Ajwang’ in “The Palgrave Handbook of Global Social Problems” (Baikady et al., 2021) describes Covid-19 as a “catalyst for transformative socio-political activism for accountability and justice”. It highlights the potential of the regularization of migrant work for accessing social rights (irrespective of residence, gender, and status). That fits well with the GSP Digest’s comment on the new 1079099 GSP0010.1177/14680181221079099Global Social PolicyKaasch editorial2022