Between the state and the individual: ‘Big Society’ communitarianism and English Conservative rhetoric

Abstract

During his quest for leadership of the English Conservative Party, David Cameron declared his intention to turn Britain into a Big Society. In May 2010, having gained office as Prime Minister, he unveiled a string of policies to bring his vision to fruition. After five years, however, talk of the Big Society has withered in public debate such that today only the press refer to it, and then as a policy in decline. This article argues that as an attempt to revitalise citizenship and local communities, and deal with the apparent ills of state centralism and liberal atomism, it was destined to fail. This is because it coincided, intentionally some have said, with an austerity crisis that made talk of the Big Society politically feasible; left Big Capitalism, the cause of austerity, untouched; was seemingly reticent to divert power to localities; under-theorised the nature and complexity of modern communities; and was an attempt at depoliticisation by diverting risk to bodies such as charities and schools.

Elite or grassroots? A feminist institutionalist examination of the role equalities organisations play in delivering representation and participation in a third sector–government partnership

“…However, there are different forms of communitarianism. Conservative communitarianism counters the size of the modern state and is based around localism and the core belief that small, self-governing communities are the best form of social organisation (Gibson, 2015). For example, Etzioni (2021: 68) describes a communitarian society where the state seeks to minimise its role and relies on fostering communal bonds.…”

Welfare conditionality, sanctions and homelessness: meanings made by homeless support workers

“…The Conservative andLiberal Democrat Coalition Government (2010-2015) aimed to generate a policy and political mandate for welfare state fiscal consolidation and retrenchment strengthened by claims that the profligate welfare system was the cause of Meanings made by homeless support workers public sector debt and welfare dependency (Department for Work and Pensions, 2010a;Gibson, 2015). A variety of discursive approaches that sought to address "welfare dependency" and problematized "cultures of worklessness" were mobilized (Reeve, 2017).…”

Timebanking and the co‐production of preventive social care with adults; what can we learn from the challenges of implementing person‐to‐person timebanks in England?

“…The community and voluntary sector has long formed a part of delivering social care services in the mixed economy of welfare in England, but the focus intensified since the 'Big Society' policy of the Coalition Government in 2010 (Dickinson, Allen, Alcock, Macmillan, & Glasby, 2012), which promoted increased community involvement to support public services (Alcock, 2010). Although the Big Society narrative has 'quietly faded' (Gibson, 2015), encouraging volunteering in social care has continued (Cameron, Johnson, Willis, Lloyd, & Smith, 2020), but despite sustained interest there has been little exploration of how volunteering in social care works in practice (Dickinson et al, 2012;Mountain, Gossage-Worrall, Cattan, & Bowling, 2017). This paper explores one such scheme, timebanks, which claim to deliver preventive social care by providing low-level services such as practical support with cleaning and shopping, otherwise unavailable through statutory services, through a mutual aid network (Timebanking UK, 2017).…”