Critical Social Policy

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Critical Social Policy

Critical Social Policy 1988 8: 120
DOI: 10.1177/026101838800802416

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 Claus Offe(1) - have made powerful use of system models to identify sources
of social contradiction and conflict, and there are some parallels with this ap-
proach in After Full Employment. The problem, as so often in the debate on
employment, is a looseness and eclecticism of explanation. Without a
rigorous understanding of the origins of unemployment there is little pro-
spect that we will come up with effective forms of intervention.
Keane and Owens continue to define the field of argument, for some
reason, as a ’full employment’ orthodoxy with which they see themselves in
almost single-handed polemic. This misreads the state of public debate,
where it seems that against the triumphant march of Thatcherism neither the
causes of ’full employment’ nor ’post-employment’ are making the slightest

headway. While we advocates of the right to work or not to work slug it out
in our ’nostalgic’ or ’utopian’ styles, market theory has the ground to itself.
Since we probably agree more than we disagree on the fundamentals, it
would probably help our respective positions more if they were viewed as
solutions to the same problem, and if we sought to clarify in a hypothetical
way what their positive and negative consequences might be if they were
attempted.

The post-employment position

There need be no disagreement about the value of greater flexibility and
choice in regard to work. For example, I support proposals for greater choice
in regard to retirement, not only to allow individuals to retire earlier than is
now normal, but also to allow them, if they wish, to continue to work later in
life. There is no good reason for assuming that all individuals will want to
make this life-transition at the same age; there is evidence that its effects are
often damaging. I also support proposals for sabbaticals and paid educational
leave, both because they are beneficial to individuals, and because they are
likely to help a society which needs higher levels of skill. Education and
training could be a more important means of enabling individuals to defend
their interests in labour markets, as the power of collective bargaining is
fragmented, I’ve advocated a right to a year’s post-school education (or its
equalivent) for all citizens, independent of formal educational
qualifications, (2) which I think is in the spirit of Kean’s and Owens’ argu-
ment. I also support the increased fiscal recognition of ’caring’ work in the
informal sector, eg through more generous allowances. The development of
fostering and adoption in child care, extensions of this principle in the care of
aged or handicapped adults, and the provision of support for ’self-help’ com-
munity groups seem to be more promising avenues for social services than
the idea that full-time professionals (and the bureaucracies for which they
work) should be directly responsible for all personal social services. Profes-
sionals in the caring field might be better deployed as coordinators and

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providers of expert consultation than as primary care-givers. In a similar
category is the idea of an infant child benefit payable to the parents of young
children and the idea of extended parental leave after birth. There is no dis-
agreement about these possible ways of extending recognition to forms of
work not now negotiated through the labour market, but valuable
nevertheless.
There is one area of growing flexibility of working patterns of which
Keane and Owens are critical, but which I think represents progress. This is
in the growth of part-time work for women, which now involves a very large
number of people. Keane and Owens argue that this imposes a double burden
of work on women, who continue to do the same work at home as they did
before. (It seems that this may be changing, however)(’). Access to the
world of paid work confers important freedoms on women, materially and
socially. The flexibility of part-time employment already allows different
combinations of domestic and waged roles, which is one reason why it has
developed so rapidly. While it is true that experience of paid work (and
education) is important in explaining the rise of modem feminism, I don’t
think that Keane’s and Owens explanation of this in terms of an experience of
increased deprivation (double exploitation, so to speak) is correct. It has
more to do with rising expectations, experience of greater freedom and wider
communication making it possible to conceive and claim more. The develop-
ment fo part-time work, like the reduction in overall working time, is an ex-
ample of a (slowly) growing freedom from the rigid constraints of full-time
work, which like Keane and Owens I regard as a social good.
Still in contention, however, is the idea of the right not to work in princi-
ple, that is to say, the idea that there should be an unconditional social wage
awarded to everyone. In their article in CSP 18 they argue,

’Quite simply, every adult citizen would be paid by the state a weekly or mon-
thly income for life, adequate for comfort, without precondition... Provided
with an adequate social wage, individuals would no longer be forced to work
in the formal labour market. For the first time in modem employment
societies, the right to a guaranteed income (and the greater life choices it of-
fers) would be separated fully from the possession of job.’(4)
To consider the potential effects of this social wage, we might ask at what
level, proportion of average wages, it should be set? What is to count as
as a

’adequate for comfort?’(’) The higher the level, the greater the material
disincentive to citizens to take paid jobs. Those who do routine but socially-
useful jobs like to feel that society recognises their worth by paying them
significantly for their work. Money is a measure of value in this society,
hence the moral feeling properly attached to claims for pay. The problem
with raising the relative value accorded to not working is that it unavoidably
disvalues working, and its social contribution, in very tangible ways. It does

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 seem that in present material conditions the exchange whereby people under-
take work that they don’t fully like, in return for material benefits that sup-
port their freedom outside work, is a necessary one, and it is not at all ob-
vious how society can do without it.
Keane and Owens do give evidence in their reply that they recognise this
dilemma. They say that ’the guaranteed right of all individuals to (periodical-
ly) withdraw from the labour market without fear of going without... is a
fundamental condition of genuine equality between men and women.’ They
claim that they ’spoke only of the need for state policies geared to the
equitable reduction of paid working time, and the public recognition and ade-
quate support of the importance of work which is presently unpaid.’ They
amusingly protest that they are not envisaging ’a future Cockaigne, in which
(as in Breughel’s painting of that name) there is no fear of want and no work
to be done.’ But I think this is a retreat from their earlier position. An income
for life, without precondition, allows for permanent, not periodic,
withdrawal from the labour market. This principle would amount to more
than the greater recongition of informal kinds of work. For those who choose
it, this ’comfort’ without obligation to do work of any kind might come
rather close to Breughel’s vivid image. (Of course it is a right that those who
possess enough inherited wealth already have). Whittling down the idea to
mean periodic sabbaticals, more parental leave, and more flexible definitions
of caring work is fme, and makes possible some practical discussion, not
least from a feminist point of view. But because these measures (like benefits
for the unemployed and the old) don’t contradict the principle that income en-
titlement should normally depend on contribution or on specific need, they
are not contentious like the social wage principle itself.

A return to full employment?

Those serious about a return to full employment (qualified as above) do also
have to take account of the social contradictions revealed by the breakdown
of the post-war consensus. Unbridled collectivistic competition within and
between classes, did eventually become very unstable, in the late 1960s and
early 1970s. What we have seen is a resolution of that unstable equilibrium to
the right, in the interests of capital. The question is, is any other resolution
possible? (Therbom<6> , incidentally probably understates the problem, since
four of the five countries he cites as positive examples - Austria, Japan, Nor-
way, Sweden and Switzerland - have quite small economies, and in several
caes enjoy exceptional competitive advantages.)
Crucial to this argument is the issue of alternative forms of social integra-
tion. How are class conflicts to be contained or resolved? Andrew Glyn’s
Campaign Group pamphlet A Million Jobs a Year, (7) advocated a resolution
by the left through a dramatic enhancement of state power over the market
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economy, if need be by large-scale nationalisation and central planning.
More centrist solutions revolve around the reconstruction of the post-war
class compromise, probably backed up by constitutional reforms which
would strengthen the centre. ~8~ According to these ideas (their most lucid
presentation is by Richard Layard (9», the restoration of full employment
might be possible if wage bargaining power, and thus inflationary pressure,
were restricted, through an incomes policy of some kind. Thus, the advan-

tage to the working class of full employment would require not to be ex-
ploited too dramatically in terms of income redistribution and pressure on
profits. The social democratic preference is to channel claims for distributive
justice through the political process, and the tax-benefit system, on grounds
that this may be more compatible with a rational economic strategy than
struggle by trade unions. Within this counter-inflationary framework, a
measure of reflation, especially through targetted public spending program-
mes, could substantially reduce unemployment. While the Labour Party was
understandably more circumspect about the incomes policy aspect of this
package, its own measures were similar in other respects to this approach.
The statutory right to work idea (10) added to this the concept of a legally-
enforceable entitlement to work, and the setting up or regional agencies with
responsibility for providing it, as employers of last resort. It seemed to me
that it would be more likely that trade unions would concede some powers in
the wage-bargaining field if a new kind of citizenship right were instituted.
There is, it is true, the danger of this ’right’ amounting to no more than a kind
of forced labour at very low wages, such as is already developing under the
provenanance of the government’s employment creation schemes. It seems
to me this could be avoided if it were clear that the purpose of the entitlement
was not poor relief, but the implementation of a right and responsibility of
citizenship. The idea of a right should entail just wages and proper employ-
ment protection. I am unapologetic about the principle of this. The idea of an
entitlement of all citizens to a share in the means of life and social participa-
tion seems to have as an appropriate condition the idea that society can expect
a reasonable contribution in return. (The major limitation of the Beveridge
Report is not that it proposed entitlements only for dependents and the in-
voluntarily unemployed, but the basic terms of subsistence in which such en-
titlements were envisaged.)
I accept that there are political risks in this approach. The connections bet-
ween rights and obligations are likely to be framed in very different ways by
the right and the left. Once opened up, (as it already has been, through con-
cepts of ’workfare’ etc.) the debate could move either in a disciplinary direc-
tion, or towards an extended concept of citizenship. However, I think some
risks are inevitable whenever new departures are proposed. The opportunity
for political movement partly arises from uncertainty - the gains and losses
from a new approach are not all determined in advance. I therefore favour

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 constructing an argument which insists on a universal nght to work, which is
prepared to tolerate an element of obligation in return for clear and substan-
tial categories of exemption (where it is unreasonable to expect work) and for
generous means of implementation (ie extended periods to allow job-search,
etc.). If we don’t make this argument, we may find instead that it is made for
us in very hostile terms. That is, instead of a universal right to work we will
find ourselves with a combination of permanent unemployment and highly
punitive forms of poor relief, backed up by an elaborate apparatus of
surveillance and degradation. The larger issue is whether we can reconstruct
an inclusive ideal of citizenship (whose long-term benefits would be great) or
whether the descent to an exclusionary society with a large marginal sub-
proletariat is to continue.
An advantage of this citizenship strategy, is that it is consistent with what
are still widely-held values in British society, and provides some possible
basis for alliance between disparate social groups. Even those in well-paid
work stand to gain something from an enhanced idea of citizenship and the
general possibility of contribution from all. It is not obvious, on the other
hand, why secure workers should support a redistribution of their income to
those who choose not to work. So there is an issue here about which lines of
social division are potentially the most productive for radicals? (11)
One reason for our authors’ suspicion of the statutory right to work is its
association, in their minds, with a disciplinary state. In fact, they exaggerate
the role of the state in this proposal. After all, it is meant to guarantee the
right to work, not provide all of it through its own central agencies. Sensibly,
the local and regional state, and funding through private and voluntary sector
bodies, would be the major means of employment provision. Keane’s and
Owens’ contrast between civil society (good) and state (bad) is unduly stark,
and it is strange that markets, classically regarded as the main sphere of ex-
change in civil society, are left out of the picture. A guaranteed right to work
is compatible with a vigorous market and voluntary sector, with the state as
no more than the last-resort provider of work and regulator of the labour
market. Part of what I thought (wrongly it seems) as the political feasibility
of my statutuory right to work proposal was that it carefully limited the ex-
tension of the state’s role in the economy, to a specific role, no more than was
needed to solve the unemployment problem. It wasn’t and isn’t a particularly
centralist proposal.
I think there is sometimes a false equation made between the idea of a
statutory right to work, and the idea of full-time male employment. Hence
the suggestion that my argument is in some implicit way sexist, or at least
gender-blind. There is no reason why a right to work should be biased either
in the direction of full-time rather than part-time work, or towards men’s
rather than women’s interests. It could be made to the advantage of
employers to make part-time work available (through tax and insurance
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provisions) though in fact it seems that the tendency is for part-time work to
increase anyway. There is no reason why entitlement should be gender-
specific, nor why criteria of eligibility for work and benefits should not take
proper account of responsibilities outside the labour market, such as child
care. The tax-benefit system could be a powerful instrument for equity bet-
ween men and women. It is important to think about the implications of such
an entitlement for various kinds of employment, but I don’t think that such
differences negate the principle of the proposal.
In conclusion, I hope I have shown that both the idea of a separation of in-
come from work, and that of a statutory right to work, can be usefully con-
sidered as alternatives to the present prospect of permanent unemployment
for several million people. We can probably all agree that as a consequence
of rising material provision, and changing aspirations, the total time devoted
by individuals to paid work could and should diminish. In this context, the
approaches outlined in our articles in CSP might turn out to be more recon-
cilable than at first seemed likely.

References

1 Claus Offe (editor, John Keane), Contradictions of the Welfare State, Hutchinson, 1984; Disorganised
Capitalism, Polity Press, 1985.
2 In Janet Finch and Michael Rustin (eds), A Degree of Choice: Higher Education and the Right to Learn,
Penguin, 1986.
3 There is evidence of some increase in the responsibilities taken by men for domestic work and child care, given
in Jonathan Gershuny and Sally Jones, ’The changing work/leisure balance in Britain: 1961-84’, in J. Home,
D. Jary, and A. Tomlinson, (eds). Sport,Leisure and Social Relations
, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1987.
4 Keane’s and Owens’ original formulations about the social wage are on pages 175-6 of their After Full Employ-
ment, Hutchinson, 1986.
5 There is a possible trade-off between the level at which a social wage or benefit is most likely to be set, and its
degree of conditionality. One can envisage that at subsistence levels, benefit might be granted with few ques-
tions asked or conditions set, since the level is itself a disincentive. Where such a ’social wage’ were markedly
lower than incomes from work, it might scarcely conflict with a work-based value-system. But the nearer a
social wage approximates to normal wages (for example as was the case for wage-related unemployment
benefit) the greater the likelihood of an obligation to accept work or retrain as a condition of eligibility. This lat-
ter is the pattern in Sweden, with its egalitarian and inclusivist ideas of citizenship.
6 Goran Therborn, Why Some People are more Unemployed than Others, Verso, 1986.
7 Andrew Glyn, A Million Jobs a Year, Verso, 1985.
8 The relationship between the political system and the failures of economic policy in Britain is discussed in A.M.
Gamble and S.A. Walkland, The British Party System and Economy Policy, 1945-83 , Oxford University Press,
1984. See also my ’Restructuring the State’, New Left Review.
9 Richard Layard, How to Beat Unemployment, Oxford University Press, 1986.
10 My paper on a statutory right to work is in For a Pluralist Socialism Verso, 1985.
11 Keane and Owen recognise, in their book, the problem of reconciling the ’pro-employment’ values of those
classes (including much of the working class) who gain from their role in the labour market, and those so
marginalised as to be, in Andre Gorz’s view, wholly negative to the work ethic.

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