Therefore only those who were truly in need would rely on it (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003; Timmins, 1995; Taylor 1995/2005). In practice the Act did little more than formalise measures already widely in place across the country, but its importance lies in its introduction of the concept of a national, unified response to social problems. In 1870 the Education Act created compulsory free education for all children up to the age of twelve. In the second half of the century philanthropists and social observers such as Booth and Rowntree published detailed accounts of the reality of poverty under which much of the country’s population lived. Their work “showed that poverty… and other social problems were not due simply to personal inadequacies but were created by circumstances beyond individual control” (Taylor et al, 1995/2005: 155).
1911 saw the National Insurance Act of passed by Lloyd George’s Liberal government. Desperate to ensure the continued support of labour organisations, the Liberal government pushed through an Act seemingly apposite to classic liberal ideals. It has been argued that this piece of legislation laid the essential foundations for the modern welfare state (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003). Workers aged between sixteen and seventy were required to contribute part of their wages in exchange for a national system of health care and unemployment insurance. Although “the Liberal reforms did not lead to the creation of a welfare state in the modern sense” (Taylor et al, 1995/2005: 164), the Act did introduce the idea of lifelong benefits which were not fully paid for by the recipient. The Governments intervention in society throughout the First World War “prepared the way for a more state-managed form of capitalism.” (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003: 832)
The inter-war years saw long-term structural unemployment, economic depression and housing shortages. The Second World War meant a continuation of state intervention in welfare provision, while “civil defence brought social classes together” (Timmins, 1995: 34). It was into this climate of national unification against adversity that William Beveridge’s ideas “provided the framework of the modern welfare state” (Taylor et al, 1995/2005: 155). His report, published in 1942, made recommendations for a national system of initiatives which would slay the “five giants” of social deprivation: want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The report was based on universal principles. Every citizen would be granted benefits simply by dint of their citizenship.
The National Insurance Act of 1946 was “the core of the Beveridge report: state-run insurance, paid for by employers, employees and the general taxpayer, from cradle to grave” (Timmins, 1995: 135). Following Keynesian ideas of state intervention in labour markets to ensure full employment, Beveridge’s initiatives “argued along the grain of current thinking” (Timmins, 1995: 38) and were massively popular. The report also contained radical proposals for extending healthcare, education and improved housing to the populace – including the creation of the NHS via the National Health Act of 1948. His theories were “based on patriarchal assumptions” (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003: 834) of a male breadwinner and a female child carer, and have attracted criticisms from feminist thinkers. Equally Marxist critiques of the welfare state have argued that state welfare provision is an attempt by the ruling classes to manipulate the working class – maintaining an army of reserve labour to serve capitalist goals (Taylor et al, 1995/2005).
Thatcher’s 1979 election would propagate “significant changes in the provisions of… general welfare provided by the State” (Bilton et al, 1981/1996:183). During eleven years in office, Thatcher aggressively reduced the size of the welfare state. Successfully combining neo-conservative rhetoric (advocating a return to Victorian values) with neo-liberalist policies (reducing state welfare provision), the professed aim of her policies was to reduce state expenditure and state interference in citizen’s lives - although the reality of her agenda required the state to continue playing a large role in public life. Her efforts meant the 1980s saw “a rapid increase in the level of inequality” (Taylor et al, 1999/2003: 666) in Britain.
Unemployment climbed, benefit levels dropped, there were “growing divisions” (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003: 668) between those relying on state pensions and those who had made private provision, and unionisation withered. Thatcher’s handling of the welfare state was a huge departure from what had gone before; her time in power “attempted to bring the logic and discipline of the market into institutions that could not be fully privatised” (Bilton et al, 1981/1996: 301). Her successors, John Major (Conservative, 1990 – 1997) and Tony Blair (Labour, 1997 – present) have in the main continued along the same lines, although Blair’s philosophies are ostensibly different: “even when the popular base of support was thoroughly eroded in the mid-1990s, the structural changes [in the welfare state] were embedded in ways that would prove very difficult to reverse” (Bilton et al, 1981/1996: 303).
Representing the Labour party, Tony Blair was elected Prime Minister on the 2nd of May 1997. While many assumed he would reverse or at least slow the pace of Thatcher and Major’s market-centred reforms, he continued with the privatisation and reduction of the welfare state. His program took its cue for welfare reform from the “third way” theories of Giddens (1994, cited in Fulcher 1999/2003). The central core of Giddens’ “third way” is the idea that citizenship entails obligations as well as rights – chief amongst which is the obligation to undertake paid employment if at all possible and contribute to the state through taxes.
Blair’s vision of “third way” Britain also encompassed a mixed economy of welfare, in which the state, the market, the voluntary (ie charity) sector and the informal (ie family and friends) sector combined to lessen the impact of the social problems targeted in the Beveridge report. Yet practical reality has not been radically different from Thatcher’s reign, with privatisation continuing, benefits being reduced and being linked to participation in employment and training, continued rhetorical insistence on the responsibilities of the individual and “more than a hint of authoritarianism” (Fulcher and Scott, 1999/2003: 850).
In its undiluted form – seen until 1979 – the welfare state made huge strides towards achieving its aims. The price of these gains – excessive inflation and high unemployment by the mid-1970s – allowed the contraction of the welfare state and the reversal of much of the progress made at the hands of Conservative governments since 1979. The current Labour administration has continued dismantling the welfare state, whilst masking its actions as a “third way” between market liberal and welfare state principles.
Bibliography
Bilton, T, Bonnett, K, Jones, P, Skinner, D, Stanworth, M and Webster, A, “Introductory Sociology”, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1981/1996
Fulcher, J and Scott, J, “Sociology”, Oxford: Oxford University, 1999/2003
Taylor, P, Richardson, J, Yeo, A, Marsh, I, Trobe, K and Pilkington, A, “Sociology in Focus”, Ormskirk: Causeway, 1995/2005
Timmins, N, “The Five Giants: a Biography of the Welfare State”, London: HarperCollins, 1995
