Canada Research Chair in Citizenship and Governance
Redesigning citizenship regimes
after neo-liberalism: Convergence around
the idea of social investment
Jane Jenson
www.cccg.umontreal.ca
Presentation to CINEFOGO, Paris
14-16 February 2008
Argument
• The substitution of the discourse and instruments of “social
investment” for those of “social protection” is more than a
European story.
– Intended for a service economy that is “informalised,”
precarious, and without job security
– Goals of social policy are creation of capabilities and
capacity to adapt and to break intergenerational
transmission of disadvantage
• Institutionalisation of social investment marks a significant
change in social citizenship and citizenship regimes more
generally
• Identifiable mechanisms are spreading this new
understanding of social citizenship
Why emphasise social investment?
• Social inclusion, anti-poverty and / or pro-poor are too
limited concepts
– Not simply who but also how…
– “child-centred investments” and “human capital push”
Moving away BOTH
• from notions of social protection (risks, rights, delivery)
for social security
• from “safety nets”
• to those of social investment …
– Emphasis on new social risks, different rights, and new
forms of delivery
• Ex: break the intergenerational cycle of poverty rather than
protect against poverty
Another notion of time
•
•
Not here-and-now of trente glorieuses
Not the present is mortgaging the future via debt and
dependency
Rather :
1. Legitimate role for state if the payoff is in the future
2. Spending is not for “insuring against misfortune” but for
pro-active capability building
3. Instruments of policy evaluation and life-course
perspective:
“The life course perspective is highly relevant from a
practical policy point of view. Indeed we should keep
firmly in mind that good pension policies – like good
health policies – begin at birth.”
Frank Vandenbroucke
Citizenship regime a tool for observing change
• Responsibility mix
• Rights and
responsibilities
• Governance
arrangements
• Belonging
• Three moments
state
market
family
community
Responsibility mix
Post-1945: market + family + community + state
Neo-liberalism: market + family with state to be only a safety
net + community as safety net of last resort
Social Investment: market + community + family + state
But state follows precepts of social investment
• Examples:
– early childhood education and care
• “not whether to invest but how much and at what
level” (OECD)
– asset-building
Rights and responsibilities
• Post-1945: Rights acquired by contributions, by
citizenship or by need
• Neo-liberalism: Rights to be retrenched and social
inclusion to be the goal, to be achieved by inclusion into
the labour market
• Social investment: social inclusion via strengthening of
capabilities to learn how to make work pay
– Examples: from decommodification to workfare to
investments in activation
– From education and training to investments in human
capital
Social investment’s “big idea” – investing
in children and in parents of young
children
From family policy to family responsibility to investing
in children
Social investment means:
1.
Investing in human capital, starting with pre-school
2.
Investing in parents of young children via income
supplements and “making work pay”
3.
Limiting child poverty and its effects.
Governance arrangements
• Post-1945: Weberian state and accountability for spending
• Neo-liberalism: displace the central state and rely on local
government and communities ; break “monopoly
providers”
• Social investment: “the new orthodoxy of local
partnerships” to increase social cohesion and citizen
engagement. Accountability for “outcomes.”
Why convergence around
social investment?
• May be a local story…
– But how to account for adoption and remaking of neo-liberalism as
its limits were rendered obvious in Latin America as in Europe
• May be convergence (common outcomes) without being
diffusion (process of spread from one to another)
• Need to identify the mechanisms leading to convergence
(when usually we look for divergence)
Three mechanisms
• Legitimation of alternatives
– Does not account for why social investment
• Rallying around an “idea”
– The advantages of “social investment” in a postneoliberal world
• Crossing boundaries
– By networks of academics and policy-makers
– Across sub-disciplines (ex: developmental and
“mainstream” economics)
– By international organisations, supranational
organisations and NGOs blur the boundaries of
governance and carry ideas.