Social Security
The recognition of social security as a basic human right is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948). The development of social security programmes is one of the most significant social achievements of the international community, but its enhancement and extension remain one of the main challenges of the 21st century.
As per the ISSA Constitution, the term "social security" means any scheme or programme established by legislation, or any other mandatory arrangement, which provides protection, whether in cash or in kind, in the event of employment accidents, occupational diseases, unemployment, maternity, sickness, invalidity, old age, retirement, survivorship, or death, and encompasses, among others, benefits for children and other family members, health care benefits, prevention, rehabilitation, and long-term care. It can include social insurance, social assistance, mutual benefit schemes, provident funds, and other arrangements which, in accordance with national law or practice, form part of a country's social security system.
At the World Social Security Forum held in December 2010 in Cape Town, South Africa, the ISSA Secretary General Mr. Konkolewsky called for a “worldwide culture of social security” as a foundation for the financial, social and political legitimacy of social security in challenging times.
Read more about this topic: International Social Security Association
Famous quotes containing the words social security, social and/or security:
“Social Security is a government program with a constituency made up of the old, the near old and those who hope or fear to grow old. After 215 years of trying, we have finally discovered a special interest that includes 100 percent of the population. Now we can vote ourselves rich.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
“...every woman who has any margin of time or money to spare should adopt some one public interest, some philanthropic undertaking, or some social agitation of reform, and give to that cause whatever time and work she may be able to afford ...”
—Frances Power Cobbe (1822–1904)
“Thanks to recent trends in the theory of knowledge, history is now better aware of its own worth and unassailability than it formerly was. It is precisely in its inexact character, in the fact that it can never be normative and does not have to be, that its security lies.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)