Robert E. Goodin, Bruce Headey, Ruud Muffels, Henk-Jan Dirven. The Real Worlds of Welfare Capitalism, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1999, x+358 pp.

The Real Worlds of Welfare Capitalism represents the fruits of ten years' interaction of an international team of colleagues from Australia and the Netherlands. What it does can be summarised as follows: it compares different welfare states each of which is deemed to represent one of the three main types of welfare regimes. This is done with reference to five external criteria taken as standards of success. As a basis for the assessment, the study uses an advanced statistical instrument – namely – panel studies. And to say right at the beginning, this is an impressive piece of work.