How to balance sustainability and social policy?

Global ecological crises are accelerating, threatening livelihoods and increasing inequalities in many parts of the world. An important question for the social policy literature is how it can consider ecological issues and whether there is conflict or synergy between social and ecological objectives. This chapter discusses how sustainability and social policy can be balanced by improving social outcomes of environmental policies and by making social policies, and welfare states as a whole, more environmentally beneficial. It also considers the role of actors and interest groups within social-ecological policy. While there are various potential tensions between ecological and social policies, the chapter argues that there are options for promoting both of them jointly. However, the chapter does acknowledge the challenges inherent in transitioning towards sustainable welfare which relate to the need to fundamentally transform the current economic system and the power and interest constellations embedded in it.