Abstract
Jones and Novak, lead authors, have form in this territory both individually and together and it is therefore no surprise to find them trenchant in their criticism of present welfare policies and their impact on their recipients. Whenever I hear the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions claiming that the immiseration he is causing by his welfare reforms (benefit caps, cuts in personal support, the so-called ‘bedroom tax’ and time limits on receipt of benefits) is done in the name of social justice, I feel like throwing a brick at the radio. Clearly that is not an adequate intellectual response to what is, for millions of welfare recipients, an appalling prospect (or, now, a reality) so it is refreshing to have a compelling, though equally passionate, analysis of how poverty is increasing and inequality widening as a result of government policies.
Jones and Novak’s essay ‘“We don’t want to be ashamed tomorrow”’, provides a global context to the economic crisis facing most countries, and argues that social workers need to stand up and be counted alongside the poorest who, they assert, are ‘stirring and rising’ (p. 1). Leaving aside this slightly optimistic gloss on what is to date fragmented and largely unconnected political action (albeit with, as their illustrations show, some hopeful signs even in the most downtrodden corners of the world), their analysis of the capitalistic roots of poverty and inequality reminds us that the ruling class in Britain has long been able to manage the poor and dissent to their own advantage. How have the bankers managed to come out of the disaster they caused, pay themselves huge bonuses and still leave the poor as both victims and cause of the resultant poverty? All welfare activists now have a responsibility to speak truth – nay, ‘howl’ it – to power, to ‘cross the barricades’ and use what little power they have to align themselves with oppositional forces wherever they can be found, challenging the co-opted timidity of their profession. To help them in this task, they provide a very useful set of sources and resources.
The first response, by Abramovitz, analyses the form that the neoliberal thrust has taken in the USA, showing how the crisis has to a large degree been manipulated by government to provoke an atmosphere of fear and division, and undermine opposition. The war on the poor is, more specifically, a war on women: her thesis is illustrated with accounts of the impact on women as service users, as service providers and as members of trades unions. There is, for her, no middle ground and again, social workers have to decide, in the words of the old NUM song, ‘which side are you on?’
Dudziak recounts the Canadian experience. Whilst the management of the poor by the state parallels much of what previous authors describe in the context of the UK and the USA, Canada is different both because it is smaller, with a smaller population, but also because of the impact of its powerful southern neighbour. This brings tensions: it is difficult to ignore what is happening in the USA although most Canadians would want to. Class struggle has had a weaker history than in some other countries, but Dudziak suggests there are hopeful signs of opposition – for example the Occupy movement – to the mounting poverty and inequality which governments attempt to obscure with weasel words.
Not coincidentally, Teloni discusses the tragedy being played out in Greece, one of the hardest hit economies of Western Europe where average unemployment rates are now around 25% and suicide rates increased recently by 20%. She concurs that social workers cannot remain neutral, and that they could have a key role in challenging the labelling of the poor by the multinational agents of a capitalist political economy such as the IMF, which has blamed the Greeks for being lazy and corrupt and thus the agents of their own downfall.
Schram concludes the responses with a sharp reminder that social workers have, in the main, become fully assimilated to the use of power by the state to discipline the poor and collude in their surveillance. The well-known paradox at the heart of welfare systems is that capitalist states wish to destroy them but cannot do without them: the answer for many is therefore to marketise them and ensure they manage the poorest well enough to prevent political breakdown.
Jones and Novak’s conclusion argues that part of the responsibility for this situation lies with social work educators who have laid down curricula that meet the demands of the state to manage poverty and inequality and not challenge it. The question facing social workers is thus not just which side are you on, but what are you going to do about it, by demonstrating a social work rooted in solidarity, compassion and understanding. And this will not be social work managed by the state but outside its neoliberal grip.