Policymakers' Arguments for the Neoliberal Development Model against the Socio-Economic Dimension of Citizenship Rights in the Constitution

Policymakers of the structural adjustment strategy in the country's development plans have introduced the causes of lag as welfare policies of the state in the field of Public policy. While welfare policies were in accordance with the Islamic Republic of Iran constitution’s principles. Then its main consequence is to marginalize the socio-economic dimension of citizenship rights such as housing, education, health and other welfare indicators. Citizenship rights have three dimensions: civil rights, political rights, and socio-economic rights. A reaction that was formed in opposition to the socio-economic dimension of citizenship rights include the formulation and implementation of structural adjustment policies in the field of government policy and management, along with contemporary criticism of the welfare state as an agent for the realization of citizenship rights. The purpose of this paper is to explain the reactionary arguments of free market economists in opposition to the welfare states based on Albert Hirschman theory (The Rhetoric of Reaction: Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy). The analytical-documentary method is used to examines the oppositions' arguments of welfare state. Findings show that in the beginning, the argument of perversity was used more than other arguments in justifying the strategy of structural adjustment in the development plans of the country, But in other periods, especially nowadays, the most influential argument is the jeopardy argument for ignoring the socio-economic rights that is came true by welfare state policymaking. The argument of futility has always played the role of a Subsidiary and spare argument.