ABSTRACT OF PAPER
Title: Corporatism, welfare state and social justice in the interwar period
Author: CARDOSO José Luis
The aim of this paper is to explore the relevance of the interwar corporatist experiments in Southern European countries, not only for a better understanding of the development and spread of economic ideas during that period, but also to explain how different political regimes may accommodate and make use of notions and concepts with a much broader meaning and scope, as those usually related to both the formation of the welfare state and the development of principles and policies of social justice. Among the founding ideas incorporated into the corporatist discourse, one can find a number of notions and moral precepts that were to become central tenets of 20th-century corporatism, namely organic harmony and cohesion, social regeneration, mutuality, solidarity, justice, willing consent, spontaneous fellowship, etc. The implementation of these principles has required the creation or strengthening of those institutions considered crucial for generating the spirit of social homogeneity, loyalty and national pride, such as the family unit, the school, local associations, corporate groupings, the workplace, the church and the State. On the whole, these principles and institutions may be considered as the pillars of a model of social organisation and social justice, different from both liberalism and socialism, which represented the main target in the battle waged by corporatist supporters in the interwar period in order to build up a distinct type of welfare state.
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