Like all other multilateral development banks, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which approved its first loan in November 2016, has adopted Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) policies. Treating the text as Chinese discourse and using Critical Discourse Analysis as methodological tool, this article unveils socio-political interests beyond its contents and semiotics. We identify areas where the AIIB policies are intertextual with the ones that inspired them, namely those of the World Bank and the regional multilateral development banks, but also important departures from their discursive practice, reflecting the legal culture and strategic interests of AIIB's founders. Both appropriation and colonisation of ‘classical’ ESGs by the AIIB ones lead to reflection on social wrongs associated with development, and suggest solutions for turning development safeguards into meaningful instruments.

This paper analyses the implications that demographic and economic projections have on public pension spending in the European Union (EU). Using some stylised facts, we study the aging trends of the population, as well as labour force and employment projections. Indices of both demographic and economic dependence are built. All of this is used to determine the impact on public pension spending in the EU. Although we detect substantial heterogeneity of circumstances, we show that the states in which aging of the population weights more in explaining public pension expenditure growth as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) are generally the ones that make greater efforts to control this spending. Given the limited capacity of policies to increase active population or employment to offset the effects of aging, measures aimed at diminishing the generosity of the public pension system and at promoting private schemes have gained relevance.

Global social policy (GSP) takes different forms from those of national welfare states, since it depends on the activities of an array of international organisations and transnational actors. Three broad theoretical approaches have dominated the literature on national welfare state development: those focused on processes of economic development, industrialisation and urbanisation; those focused on class struggle and political mobilisation; and those focused on the effects of political institutions. This article applies each of these broad theoretical approaches to the development of GSP in order to illuminate the nature of GSP, its likely future development, and the constraints upon such development. It is concluded that the dominant forms taken by GSP will continue to be piecemeal, minimalist and essentially neoliberal for as long as an effective global political movement in favour of a more extensive GSP is absent.

Over the past two decades, most Latin American countries have developed cash transfer programmes for poor and low income families not covered by the social security system. These programmes now benefit about 127 million people throughout Latin America and in some countries they include more children than the family allowances of the social insurance system. How have these innovations changed the structure of child benefits in Latin America? This article discusses this issue by looking at the experiences of Argentina, Brazil, and Chile. In these three countries, a wide-ranging programme of non-contributory cash transfers for low income families now operates alongside a pre-existing scheme of family allowances for formal sector workers. This has contributed to expand coverage of cash benefits for families and children, while at the same time keeping a segmented benefit structure. In contrast, a universal child benefit could overcome this segmentation and guarantee equal rights to all children.

Internationally, the care-leaving debate began in the 1970s. The poor outcomes associated with care-leaving in the United Kingdom, United States of America and Australia prompted attention resulting in policy change in recent years, which continues to develop. The experience and outcomes for care leavers in South Africa reflects that of their contemporaries in other countries, however, contextual factors compound the problems that they face and there is little support available to them. This paper discusses some of the challenges facing care leavers and the development of the care-leaving debate, legislation and policy in the United Kingdom, United States and Australia. A comparison of the care-leaving arena in South Africa and the support services available to care leavers in the different countries will be presented. The paper concludes by arguing that the absence of services for care leavers is a neglect of the state's responsibility as corporate parent, and represents an issue of social justice.