1 - Introduction

Summary

The social security system in Vietnam is in the process of changing and developing. Although there are still many difficulties, the State still allocates a significant amount for the development of this system. This also reflects the great care of the State for social policies, especially the policies for vulnerable and disadvantaged groups.

Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (1999, p. 20)

European and Western scholars have discussed for a long time which factors (international, economic, political, institutional, historical, cultural) explain how welfare is provided through welfare states. Since Esping-Andersen's publication of The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism (1993) the debate on what affects welfare outcomes in a country has somewhat shifted away from finding one single explanatory factor to establishing regime typologies. Latest welfare regime typologies have included the newly industrialized economies in East Asia, and even more recently low income countries such as Vietnam. As welfare regimes and social policy has been in a state of flux almost everywhere, the discussion about welfare regimes in East Asia is intense and passionate. For the last fifty years many countries in the region have seen a rapid socioeconomic modernization — in some cases even a political transition towards democracy. The question is thus whether East Asian countries with increasing levels of wealth would develop similar welfare regimes as the ones developed in the Western world, develop their own genuine systems or no systems at all.

The same question also applies to Vietnam, which has been in a tremendous modernization and transition process for the last twenty years. Large economic and societal restructurings have changed the relationship between the public and private economic sector, workers have become more mobile — migration has increased both within Vietnam and to other countries; the arrival of international companies and donors has exposed the political elite, but also the whole society, to new ideas in terms of categories such as the family, the elderly, the work place, and social protection.

The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) and the government have indicated their commitment towards improving people's income as well as the overall welfare of society.