IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/socres/v26y2021i2p326-342.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

‘21st Century Welfare’ in Historical Perspective: Disciplinary Welfare in the Depression of the 1930s and Its Implications for Today

Author

Listed:
  • Matthew Cooper

Abstract

Since 2010, UK governments have intensified conditionality as part of a programme of ‘welfare reform’. Social scientists have undertaken much critical analysis but less attention has been paid to possible historical parallels. This article sheds new light on welfare reform through comparison with the depression of the 1930s. It undertakes a documentary analysis of policy in the 1930s informed by a governmentality perspective. In both periods, governments committed to liberal orthodoxies and feared the unemployed would become vulnerable to ‘demoralization’ and ‘dependency’; their behaviour and character were determinant of their rights to support. However, there are notable differences in what interventions have been considered appropriate. The article assesses the significance of continuities and contrasts, and argues in particular that the severity and ubiquity of behavioural regulation employed today is even greater than that seen in the ‘dark decade’ of the great depression.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthew Cooper, 2021. "‘21st Century Welfare’ in Historical Perspective: Disciplinary Welfare in the Depression of the 1930s and Its Implications for Today," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 26(2), pages 326-342, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:socres:v:26:y:2021:i:2:p:326-342
    DOI: 10.1177/1360780420937741
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1360780420937741
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1360780420937741?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peden, G. C., 2000. "The Treasury and British Public Policy 1906-1959," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198207078.
    2. King, Desmond, 1995. "Actively Seeking Work?," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226436227, September.
    3. John Welshman, 2006. "The concept of the unemployable," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 59(3), pages 578-606, August.
    4. Blyth, Mark, 2013. "Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199828302.
    5. Eichengreen, Barry, 2016. "Hall of Mirrors: The Great Depression, the Great Recession, and the Uses-and Misuses-of History," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780190621070.
    6. Nick Taylor, 2018. "The Return of Character: Parallels Between Late-Victorian and Twenty-First Century Discourses," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 23(2), pages 399-415, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. John Goering & Christine M. E. Whitehead, 2017. "Fiscal Austerity and Rental Housing Policy in the United States and United Kingdom, 2010–2016," Housing Policy Debate, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(6), pages 875-896, November.
    2. Fritz Breuss, 2016. "The Crisis Management of the ECB," WIFO Working Papers 507, WIFO.
    3. Achim Truger, 2015. "Implementing the golden rule for public investment in Europe," Working Paper Reihe der AK Wien - Materialien zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 138, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik.
    4. Jörg Bibow, 2018. "How Germany’s anti-Keynesianism has brought Europe to its knees," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(5), pages 569-588, September.
    5. Mark Setterfield, 2024. "Managing the Discontent of the Losers Redux: A Future of Authoritarian Neoliberalism or Social Capitalism?," Working Papers 2401, New School for Social Research, Department of Economics.
    6. Fraccaroli, Nicolò & Giovannini, Alessandro & Jamet, Jean-François & Persson, Eric, 2022. "Ideology and monetary policy. The role of political parties’ stances in the European Central Bank’s parliamentary hearings," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    7. Ivo Arnold, 2021. "An Interest Stabilisation Mechanism to Unburden the ECB," Intereconomics: Review of European Economic Policy, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics;Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), vol. 56(5), pages 274-277, September.
    8. Füsun Kökalan Çımrın & Zafer Durdu, 2017. "Indirect welfare regime practices and transformation of social security system of Turkey after 1980," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 51(6), pages 2781-2792, November.
    9. Costa Cabral, Nazare, 2022. "The European Monetary Integration Trap: incomplete sovereignty and the State-mimicking method," MPRA Paper 115245, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Clément Fontan & François Claveau & Peter Dietsch, 2016. "Central banking and inequalities," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 15(4), pages 319-357, November.
    11. Samuel Brazys & Aidan Regan, 2016. "These Little PIIGS Went to Market: Enterprise Policy and Divergent Recovery in European Periphery," Working Papers 201517, Geary Institute, University College Dublin.
    12. Paqué Karl-Heinz, 2015. "Die Rückkehr der Ideologien," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, De Gruyter, vol. 16(3), pages 302-321, October.
    13. Duca, John V., 2017. "The Great Depression versus the Great Recession in the U.S.: How fiscal, monetary, and financial polices compare," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 50-64.
    14. Lars P. Feld & Ekkehard A. Köhler, 2023. "Standing on the shoulders of giants or science? Lessons from ordoliberalism," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 195(3), pages 197-211, June.
    15. Kovács, Olivér, 2023. "Az intézmények fejlődése és a fejlődés intézményesülése. Benczes István: Gazdasági növekedés és versenyképesség intézményi perspektívában. Ludovika Kiadó, Budapest, 2022, 264 o [The evolution of in," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(9), pages 1043-1051.
    16. Philipp Heimberger & Jakob Kapeller, 2017. "The performativity of potential output: pro-cyclicality and path dependency in coordinating European fiscal policies," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(5), pages 904-928, September.
    17. Giovanni Dosi & Marcello Minenna & Andrea Roventini & Roberto Violi, 2021. "Making the Eurozone work: a risk-sharing reform of the European Stability Mechanism," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 299(1), pages 617-657, April.
    18. Tim Congdon, 2015. "In Praise of Expansionary Fiscal Contraction," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(1), pages 21-34, February.
    19. Macher, Flora, 2018. "The Austrian banking crisis of 1931: one bad apple spoils the whole bunch," Economic History Working Papers 87151, London School of Economics and Political Science, Department of Economic History.
    20. Veldboer, Lex & Kleinhans, Reinout & van Ham, Maarten, 2015. "Mandatory Volunteer Work as Fair Reciprocity for Unemployment and Social Benefits?," IZA Discussion Papers 9111, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:socres:v:26:y:2021:i:2:p:326-342. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.