This paper deals with the changing role of the state in the Dutch healthcare system. At the eve of the first oil crisis the Netherlands had a relatively compound healthcare system combining several characteristics of the three Western healthcare system types: National Health Service, social...

The essential argument of this paper is that, despite the work of many pioneering scholars, the original agenda of those who came to comparative public policy with a view to demonstrating that the functioning of democratic politics makes a difference remains substantially unfulfilled. The...