The Big Society and the Conjunction of Crises: Justifying Welfare Reform and Undermining Social Housing

Abstract

The idea of the "Big Society" can be seen as culmination of a long-standing debate about the regulation of welfare. Situating the concept within governance theory, the article considers how the UK coalition government has justified a radical restructuring of welfare provision and considers its implications for housing provision. Although drawing on earlier modernization processes the article contends that the genesis for welfare reform was based on an analysis that the government was forced to respond to a unique conjunction of crises: in morality, the state, ideology and economics. The government has therefore embarked upon a programme, which has served to undermine the legitimacy of the social housing sector (most notably in England), with detrimental consequences for residents and raising significant dilemmas for those working in the housing sector.

Democracy of housing policy as exemplified by Poland. Political and linguistic analysis

“…The economic and financial crisis, accompanied in many countries by austerity policies, contributes to the destabilization of housing policy. Occasionally, neoliberal solutions promote the concept of a welfare society by shifting the responsibility for housing problems of local population onto the shoulders of civic society organizations, which exceeds their managerial and financial abilities (Manzi, 2015). Other times, in the name of the same neoliberal attitudes of political policy-makers, the participation of civic society organizations in deliberations on housing policy is marginalized and omitted.…”

“…When analysing the British experiences (influence of the Big Society -the political ideology popularized at the turn of the twenty-first century in Great Britain, which combines the neoliberal assumptions relating to the economy with the concept of social solidarity based on bottom-up and local initiatives -on housing), Tony Manzi (2015) shows that a radical and negative (in place of 'bureaucratic' public institutions) inclusion of network management (network governance, and particularly neighbourhood governance) into housing policy does not help solve social issues linked to housing (for instance residential areas subject to ghettoization). Instead, it aggravates the stigma associated with social housing and its residents.…”

Slippery discrimination: a review of the drivers of migrant and minority housing disadvantage

“…The introduction of the 'Right to Buy' social housing at a discounted price in 1980 led to the sale of two million homes by 2012 and together with the de-regulation of the PRS in 1988 created the conditions for the residualisation of social housing and the subsequent growth of the PRS (Davies 2013; Hancock and Mooney 2013; Robertson and Serpa 2014). These changes transformed the recognition of housing as a universal right to the acceptance of housing as an asset which in turn led to the exclusion of poorer households from ownership and increasing difficulty in accessing social housing (United Nations 1966;Kennett, Forrest, and Marsh 2013;Manzi 2015). The subsequent development of financial instruments that encouraged investment in buy-to-let properties contributed to the growth of the PRS.…”

The Repoliticization of High-Rise Social Housing in the UK and the Classed Politics of Demolition

“…The Grenfell fire has refocused in new and unexpected ways, a submerged but long-existing debate around social housing in general, and its role in UK society, and around the social needs of the populations who tend to live in this housing tenure. The ways in which welfare has been regulated in the UK has resulted in far reaching changes to welfare provision with negative consequences for residents, not least those that relate to housing (Manzi, 2015).…”