8- MEDICION, ANÁLISIS Y MEJORA GENERAL
8.2 SEGUIMIENTO Y MEDICION 1 La satisfacción del cliente
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2.1
Introduction
Deciding where and how to improve the quality and cover of social protection in Ireland over the coming years must be based on a thorough understanding of how economic and social policies interact in the conditions and circumstances facing small industrial nations in the 21st century. This does not mean restricting developments in social protection to what most evidently fits a social ‘investment’
perspective. It means recognising that the boundaries between what have,
traditionally, been thought of as separable economic and social policy domains have become increasingly blurred.
Formerly, advances in social protection were largely thought of as a societal
dividend which democratic political processes extracted after the event from
successful economic performance. The most widely recognised direct economic function to social spending was its role as an automatic stabiliser over the course of the business cycle. Increasingly, however, the factors that underpin economic and business success in Ireland in the medium- to long-term will depend directly
on human qualities— the hard and soft skills which people bring to the workforce,
their learning capabilities and opportunities, the life-work balance they maintain, the autonomy and commitment they assume in their workplaces, the quality and child-friendliness of their built environments. It is this wider set of conditions which will sustain and nurture the adaptability and flexibility of the Irish workforce over the coming decades, keeping skilled workers in the country, and enabling labour productivity to rise by more than enough to compensate Irish business for having to operate in what is already — by the standards of some of their competitors — a high cost environment.
For much of Ireland’s independence during the 20th century, people were its greatest asset, but in literary, religious and political discourse only. There was little proof of this perspective in the economic and social realities of the time. On the contrary, many people of working age could find no satisfactory employ- ment and emigrated; many of the fortunate ones who found employment in Ireland were underemployed or engaged in low-skilled, unsatisfying work; most women were confined to domestic work in the home; many children, particularly those in large families, were reared in poverty and many young people, particularly those whose fathers were unskilled workers, received no education beyond primary level; a large number of people with a physical, mental or social disability were treated as liabilities to society.
This social history is invoked to throw Ireland’s new economic and social realities into sharper relief. Today, such is the strength of demand for labour, many employers rely on immigrant workers; more employments require high levels of knowledge and skill; women are as, or more, educated than men and there is a strong commitment to offering them employment on equal terms to men; nearly six out of ten young people enter third level education and the search is on to make education a lifelong activity beginning in early childhood and extending through working life; there is a growing recognition that more Irish workplaces need to reflect and enhance people’s creativity and responsibility; national strategies have been developed to help afford all children the opportunity to develop their full potential, to minimise disability as a social obstacle and to ensure that social disadvantage does not become lasting social exclusion; a new legislative and institutional framework has been developed to ensure universal regard in Irish life for the dignity of the human person and protection from discrimination. Ireland, in short, is more entitled now than at any time since its Independence to claim that people areits greatest asset. Its economic and social policies in the first decade of the 21st century are doing more to treat them as such than ever before.
Box 2.1
Aligning Economic and Social Policy
Turbulence — economic, social, and technological — is a long-standing attribute of human society, as is the capacity to survive it. Indeed, the (20th) century … provides ample evidence of how people can adapt and even thrive in a world of rapid and pervasive change. However, profound and unanticipated transformations are not a virtue per se. Nor are tests of human adaptability. Rather, it is safe to assume that most people prefer a world where life is characterised by stability, continuity, predictability, and secure access to material well-being. Societies with these attributes garner more easily the commitment and adherence that sustain societal cohesion over time. … Competition and structural change are not fundamentally incompatible with societal cohesion. On the contrary, they are a motor of the economic growth and prosperity on which cohesion can thrive. Reciprocally, a strong social fabric provides a secure basis for the flexibility and risk-taking which are the lifeblood of vibrant economic activity and wealth creation. Striking a sustainable balance between dynamism and security constitutes one of the primary missions of the political processes. The capacity to find the appropriate balance, thereby avoiding both stagnation and social fragmentation, is one of the key strengths of OECD democracies.
Michalski et al (1997), Societal Cohesion and the Globalising Economy. What does the Future Hold?, OECD.
The relation between economic performance and social policy .. is the key to the future prosperity and well being of the European Union. …The European economy needs to adapt to new competition and new technological possibilities, but this adaptation must be achieved while strengthening social inclusion. Europe has social as well as economic objectives. …Economic and social policy should be made in conjunction, to avoid a situation where the problems in one domain are exacerbated by the solutions adopted in the other.
Report of the High Level Group on the Future of Social Policy in an Enlarged European Union (2004), DG for Employment and Social Affairs.
However, recognising where economic and social advances have mutually supported each other does not mean there are areas where they have not. Trade-offs can and do exist between good economic performance and social policies. Economic and technological turbulence can damage social cohesion and fracture society unless social policy responses are intelligently designed and well resourced. Ill-designed social policies can undermine people’s cooperation with economic change and contribute to undermining economic performance and, ultimately, the social protection that a country can provide its citizens in the long-run.
The following sections explore the evidence that good economic performance and improved social protection are neither intrinsically opposed nor compelled to occur together in some automatic way. The conclusion is, rather, that they can be made to support each other — where there is sufficient shared understanding and commitment on the part of those who shape and implement a country’s economic and social policies respectively.