2011,4 (57) - Klaipėdos universitetas

THE NOTION OF SOCIAL MARKET ECONOMY: WHAT IS NEW IN SOCIAL SCIENCE APPROACH?
available for everybody is not sustainable. Nevertheless, the best possible solution for the
present economies is synchronizing high level of GDP and socially orientated programs at
the same time, in the example of the Nordic countries (Sweden, Norway, Denmark and
Finland). But at the same time there is a threat that this model is also not sustainable for
everybody but only for the small group of countries. It is necessary to return back to the
contradiction between the needs and the desires. In one or another way, it was raised even
earlier than Zygmunt Bauman – in the works of famous philosopher Erich Fromm,
especially in his book “To have or to be?” In post-modern times Italian leftist sociologist
Franco Berardi (Bifo) discusses the exhaustion of capitalism and he maintains even more
radically that the present capitalism has no future and that economics is not a science
anymore. Franco Berardi (Bifo) maintains that modern economics can not be a positivist
science because it is not quantitative but psychological, i.e., economy is the purely the field
of people expectations and nothing more (Berardi, 2009). According to Berardi (Bifo), the
present economic crisis is the crisis of expectations and not the crisis of economies. In this
respect, there is the problem of sufficient needs and enormous desires. In Lithuania or in
underdeveloped world, the ideas of stopping of economy, stopping of GDP increase can be
treated as insane in the world where the basic needs of large groups of population and
marginalized (socially excluded) groups are not met so far.
Two more items can be discussed further. One is related to the “Social quality”
quadrant researchers who have their base in the Netherlands. According to “social
quadrant” the left upper space is “social-economic security” (mainly it is income), the
left lower quadrant space is devoted to “social inclusion” – inclusion means the
opposite to “exclusion.” The upper right space of the quadrant is devoted to “social
cohesion” and the right down space is left for “empowerment” (Fig. 1).
“Social-economic security” refers to personal income, which is remuneration for
work, dividends or social allowance. “Social inclusion” refers to everything what is
not meant by “social exclusion”, as belonging to formal establishments, institutions
and organizations. “Social cohesion” refers to informal, personal and communal social
relations, where “social capital” and “social trust” are paramount. “Empowerment”
refers to personal or collective opportunities to make (final) decisions and the ability
of individuals to affect their own lives.
Considering social market economy rather than free market, the last three spaces of
“social inclusion”, “social cohesion” and “social empowerment” are the most important.
However, “social inclusion” and “social cohesion” places of the quadrant
methodologically are more important for social market economy than “empowerment.”
Supporters of free market also stress the importance of “empowerment”, in fact, nowadays
everybody stresses the significance of “empowerment” – the left, the right forces, the
governing and the governed. Meanwhile, “social inclusion” and “social cohesion” items
can be addressed as “purely” social economy market items. In this respect, the present
social security and social administration efficiency indicator has to be the social
reintegration indicator, i.e., the level of reintegration, for example, how many unemployed
became employed or how many alcoholics have abandoned their habit. This social
reintegration indicator as the final result can be the true indicator for efficiency of social
administration, and for social market economy.
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