SOCIAL POLICY MODELS IN THEORY AND IN PRACTICE (Modele polityki spolecznej w teorii i praktyce)

Since Esping-Andersen's contribution (in Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism) there is a broad literature about welfare (state) models or regimes. The author tried to show a so-called modeling business achievements but with some deeper theoretical and empirical insights. The first concerns three functions of welfare state models: descriptive, explanative and evaluative, and each with two separate variants. The study is rooted in literature and illustrated with new exemplification. In the second one he analyzed the dynamics of models on the basis of fuzzy set methodology and its results. They allow to verify main hypotheses about changes of the welfare state i.e. frozen landscape, retrenchment, workfare or productive transformations, with a certain precision. The aim of the last part of the article is to analyze recent European Union social policy initiatives as viewed through the lenses ot he welfare models.