Recently, ‘social protection’ has attracted attention as a powerful tool for poverty alleviation. For example, Target 1.3 of the 2015 UN Sustainable Development Goals calls for nationally appropriate social protection systems for all. However, ‘social protection’ has defied common definition to date. Rather, it can denote very different anti-poverty approaches, policies, beneficiaries and end goals. This lack of clarity has led to confusion and contestation between international institutional actors, including the International Monetary Fund and International Labour Organization.

By historically tracing the development of ‘social protection’ within the economics, human rights, development and labour ‘transnational legal orders’, this article argues that different usages reflect diverse and enduring discourses about the root causes of poverty and most effective solutions. In particular, neoliberalism continues to inform the work of international financial institutions, in a way that is misaligned with human rights understandings. This article proposes a new paradigm to advance engagement between different orders, being ‘social protection as dialogue’, to achieve more meaningful legal developments.