Decentralized Community-Led Social Security Planning with a Focus on Care

Abstract

The Community Social Security Plan, despite having been in place for over twenty years and the considerable achievement it has met with after numerous attempts and efforts, has yet to evolve into a truly community-driven welfare policy framework. A good community social security plan should balance logical integration and socio-political integration, a process that, as this study finds, is difficult to implement in the current framework of welfare policymaking where national government guidance holds predominant sway. However, this study also identifies, through an examination of the implementation of pilot integrated community care, the potential for a shift toward decentralized, community-led care. For local welfare policies to continue on the decentralized path, changes need to be made to how community social security planning is evaluated and rewarded. Additionally, opening up local social security indicators could further the welfare discourse. This study also argues for the need to do away with the nationally uniform methods employed in the planning and evaluation of local social security.