Social Policy

Social policy can loosely be described as the wellbeing of the people and all of the institutions
that exist to improve the quality of life of people within a nation. Depending on political
persuasion the approach to social policy can vary dramatically and the amount spent on social
policies following suit. In the UK alone £320 billion is spent annually on social policies,
however this is relatively little in comparison to other european nations (Polity.co.uk, 2019).
Three different perspectives are going to be explored in relation to social policy since the welfare
state has come to exist within the UK; Social Democracy, Neo-liberalism, and the Third Way.
Social Democracy and Neo-liberalism directly contrast one another where the Third Way
attempts to bridge the gap and present somewhat of a compromise between the two with a third
alternative to the polarized debate.

Social democracy as an ideology has its roots in the 19th century with the advent of Karl Marx
and communism however it is a different approach to the radical militant attitudes oft taken by
communism with revolution and the overthrow of the bourgeoisies and the totalitarian control of
the nation by a communist party (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2019). Instead (originally known as
revisionism) social democracy advocates for a gradual change from the status quo by slowly
moving toward socialist policies. Come the middle of the 20th century many western nations had
sizeable social democratic parties who would come to drop the concept of class rule and instead
adopt democratic sentiments as the only way to truly reach an equitable society (Encyclopedia
Britannica, 2019). T. H. Marshall was one such theorist from the mid 20th century that came to
define social democracy ideologically, in his theory he outlined that as societies evolved the
citizenry gained further access to rights (Haralambos, 2013). The first rights of which they
gained access to is civil rights, those being of the rights to freedom of speech, ownership of
property, etc. Once these had been attained it allowed the people to pursue political rights, being
the right to vote and the right to stand for office within their governments. This would allow
‘ordinary’ individuals to be part of the government and have the power to institute social rights,
social rights being many of the things we associate with social policy today such as education,
the NHS, and more (Haralambos, 2013). This being considered Marshall did not advocate for a
truly equal society as he recognized this was not possible nor desirable within a capitalist society
however he believed that this approach to social policy would allow for the creation of a more
egalitarian society.

Richard Titmus also contributed significantly to the social democratic viewpoint on social policy
as he also advocated for the use of social welfare programs to promote a fair and egalitarian
society. Key to Titmuses perspective was that of getting rid of means-tested social welfare, that
meaning taking into consideration the economic standpoint of the individual among other to
calculate the amount of welfare the individual was deserved (Haralambos, 2013). Titmus argued
that by being rid of this means-testing allowed for the bureaucratic cost of welfare policies to
drop as they would not need to go through the arduous process of means-testing everyone, it also
allowed for the stigma of claiming benefits to be shed as they were not claimed rather owed to all
citizens in the nation thus in his eyes promoting national harmony. He also saw including the
rich and poor in the same welfare programs vital as the rich and those with more power would
see to it that these services would not degenerate as they could pressure the right people to assure
this so (Haralambos, 2013). Titmus saw this universal application of welfare extending to
services such as the NHS, free primary and secondary education, and pensions among others. It
was also seen that means-testing the benefit system was creating a poverty trap by discouraging
workers as when those in poverty would get a job their benefits would lessen and eventually stop
causing life to be harder as they attempted to better their financial situation, dissuading them
from doing so. It was also known that this universal approach was likely not enough to achieve
all which social democracy aims to so a system of positive discrimination was suggested in order
to give extra help to those that most need it within society (Haralambos, 2013).

The social democratic approach in relation to how Titmus and Marshall outline it show an
understanding of how the development of rights within a society can evolve to a point where
people may be able to make positive changes and reform within their society, and that this
expansion of rights that is advocated for is key to the creation of a fairer society (Haralambos,
2013). However it can also be said that the concept of expanding the welfare state until a more
egalitarian society is achieved is naive as modern examples of such have not gone as smoothly as
they would have in concept such as Sweden having high unemployment comparatively to the
United States which has a significantly smaller welfare state (Haralambos, 2013). The UK's
welfare state also struggled in the 70s leading to the growth of neoliberalism on the right and
eventual election of Thatcher. Marxists and Feminists also have complaint with social democrats
as the Marxists would argue that they do not go far enough in order to reform the capitalist
system and Feminists arguing that within these campaigns for workers rights the rights of women
are often left at the sidelines (Haralambos, 2013).

The opposition to social democracy was clear by the 1970s when the welfare state started to
show its flaws and the economy in the UK was suffering greatly. It was in this time their
opposing viewpoint that countered the growth of the welfare state entirely was formed and
popularized under various new right politicians. James Bartholomew is one such critic of the
social democracy driven welfare state, he criticises almost every aspect of the welfare state so in
the interest of brevity only three will be covered; Education, Housing, and Health. Firstly
Bartholomew critiques the state-run education system by claiming that although pass rates have
increased over time the requirements to pass have dropped not the aptitude of the student body
(Haralambos, 2013). By using an international test this was gauged to be true within a conducted
study, he furthers this point by showing how private schools across the board achieve better
results than those of the state-run public schools. He also cites that public education has not done
anything to reduce the gap between those of well to do families and those of comparatively
poorer families as the rates of those pursuing higher education still shows (Haralambos, 2013).
The root of this as Bartholomew claims is a waste of resources (that being social policy
spending) in the public education system and that the money is not being spent on the teaching or
outside testing bodies but rather in admin. He also cites that the union power of the teachers has
prevented them incentivizing the performance of teachers by offering those that achieve higher
pass rates a higher salary as another cause of this lack of progress in public schooling.
Bartholomew continues to critique the social welfare solution to housing, council housing, as
although it was with good intentions in mind did not work as planned (Haralambos, 2013). He
argues that the ‘slums’ that had been cleared in way of the construction of council housing were
actually by in large sound housing that simply needed refurbishment, he also argues that due to a
lack of private market intervention the housing does not need to match the needs of the tenant as
there is no alternative for the tenant. This combined with the fact that the tenant does not own a
stake in the council house means that the tenant has no incentive to actually take care of the
house they are given. These issues all combined bring the downfall of the council housing
welfare plans, however he does make not of Thatchers programme that allowed the council
houses to eventually be purchased by the tenants. Lastly, his critique of the NHS is also
comprehensive, he claims that due to bureaucratic failures in administration the NHS is
inadequate to meet the needs of the people (Haralambos, 2013). He argues that the current
system incentivises the NHS to see less patients and conduct less operations as to keep within
their own budget. This also links back to the neoliberal concept that when left unchecked
bureaucracies and administration tend to grow in order to protect their own interest and to attract
more government spending into their jobs. The primary positive to be gleaned from
Bartholomews work is to identify areas in which social welfare has failed and can be improved
however even though many of his claims are backed up with presented evidence there is much to
the contrary of which he claims. One such issue with his claims is that it has been proven that
during periods in which social welfare was expanded inequality in the UK was seen to shrink and
the opposite was true when social welfare was curtailed such as during the Thatcher years.
Another such issue is with the neoliberal replacement for public spending being private charities,
however this does not explain how it will care for certain aspects of society that most people tend
to avoid such as more people being willing to donate to care for orphaned children rather than
the care of homeless or drug addicts.

Seldon goes on to present the two key problems highlighted by neoliberalism and declares five
possible remedies to these two problems (Alcock et al., n.d.). The primary issues highlighted by
neoliberalism is the concept of the ever expanding bureaucracies aiming to serve themselves and
further their own power and salaries, and the concept of state coercion or that of state welfare
being a monopoly with those involved in it not having the option to go anywhere else for their
services, this causes a lack of competition which is a driving force in improving the quality of
services. Some of the presented solutions for these problems are as follows; a reduction is social
welfare will cause the private sector to grow into where the government had previously
occupied, these new providers will offer more choice for the consumer and more competition
(Alcock et al., n.d.). Furthermore the introduction of negative income tax in order to assure the
person on low incomes participation in the market, this comes in the form of a sum to cover
basic fees associated with living. Finally safety net welfare rather than universal benefits and tax
cuts for businesses to foster economic growth is seen by neoliberals to remedy the issues that
social welfare seemingly can’t.

The Third Way is a bridge between the social democratic and neoliberal points of view devised
by Anthony Giddens and exemplified by Tony Blair’s New Labour. This new perspective
criticized the social democratic objective of equality of outcome rather than paying heed to their
individual responsibilities (Haralambos, 2013). This roughly meaning that social democracy
focused too much on assuring peoples rights while ignoring people that make the effort to fulfill
their responsibilities. Rather than assuring that at the end of all things considered people are in an
roughly equal and fair situation the Third Way instead focuses on providing equal opportunity in
the beginning as a way of assuring fairness and making the claim that what you put in is what
you will get at the end advocating instead for responsibility rather than the state ensuring your
quality of life. In further critique of social democracy it discourages the increase in public
spending that is seen in social democracy however it does not agree with the neoliberal
counterpoints of allowing the economy to go unchecked and instead advocates for strong
government influence in the direction of the economy (Haralambos, 2013). Furthermore rather
than providing a passive universal benefit to its people the Third Way argues that the welfare
should be active and that in order to receive certain benefits it is required that the individual is
engaged in some sort of positive activity. An example of this would be job-seekers allowance
requiring proof of active searching for a job and regular meetings with an advisor to help steer
their progress. This is often coined in the phrases a ‘hand-up’ rather than a ‘hand-out’. Although
seemingly being more critical of the social democratic approach it is also heavily critical of the
neoliberal alternative as it completely disagrees with just letting the free market fill in for where
the social democrats would have heavy social welfare. Instead it argues that the government
should monitor the free market and assure that the needs of the people are met in one way or
another.

Robert Page went on to review the implementation of certain Third Way perspectives in the New
Labour government which went on to ‘modernize’ the welfare state. Many reasons for this need
to modernize were given, among which; as previously mentioned the hand-up not hand-out
approach needed to be adopted with welfare to work programmes making individuals actively
involved in the betterment of themselves. The new welfare state also needed to focus more on
the user of said service rather than the provider, thus the creation of several monitoring bodies
allowed for the government to assure the meeting of certain targets. Like the neoliberal approach
in the years prior they advocated for more choice for the service user (Haralambos, 2013). In
order to provide this greater variety New Labour fostered more development in certain sectors
such as education, encouraging wide varieties of school to grow such as faith schools, and
specialist schools (Haralambos, 2013). Though this centrist approach to social policy may seem
uniting at first it is riddled with criticism from both sides, one such general arguement is that
many Third Way policies are socially divisive such as the encouragement of faith schools
causing more religious segregation. Furthermore New Labour was criticized for its failure to
reduce income equality as the income of the very rich increased.

Though some of the points given by the social democrats and the neoliberals may overlap from
time to time by in large they differ greatly in their opinions on how the welfare state and social
policy should be handled. The Third Way offers a centrist alternative to these two however
draws heavy criticism from both sides on many different issues that it tackles. By in large it
would appear that the social democratic approach is where the most equality is seen however it is
also dogged by heavy costs economically. The neoliberal approach may benefit the few
economically but is heavily felt by societies weakest. The Third Way allows for some to be
appeased on both sides however seemingly leaves both wanting for better than just the status
quo.
References

Polity.co.uk. (2019). [online] Available at:

http://www.polity.co.uk/shortintroductions/samples/dean-sample.pdf

Encyclopedia Britannica. (2019). Social democracy. [online] Available at:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-democracy

Haralambos, M. (2013). Haralambos & Holborn sociology. London: Collins.

Alcock, P., Haux, T., May, M. and Wright, S. (n.d.). The Student's Companion to Social Policy.