Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the idea of solidarity as a background to Anthony Giddens’s “third way” of, and examining its problems. In recent political debates, the problem of “social inclusion” and “social exclusion” are becoming more important and the workfare model has spread through the developed world. In Britain, New Labor suggests the fight against social exclusion and stress that its priorities are for social inclusion through empowerment, and also to strengthen civil society and solidarity. However, the problem is that such an idea is often accompanied by emphasis on responsibility or duty. This paper considers Giddens’s analysis of the change in solidarity，from the beginning 20th century to the present, as backdrop to his notion of “third way”. I show that in Giddens concept of solidarity by active trust, individuals' spontaneous commitment conversely came to be demanded as a principle of new solidarity. It pointed out that a problem was in this new concept of solidarity rather than in the notion of a subject or the autonomous self.
