Moving Right Out of Welfare - and the Way Back

Abstract

This article examines the relationship of new right ideology to the attack on welfare. It asks why it is so hard to defend the welfare state in its present form. Central to new right ideology is a methodological individualism rooted in biological determinism, sociobiology, which replaces a collective by an individual view of human need. Neo-marxist writings on the welfare state emphasise the state, but neglect the second (private) and third, (domestic) systems of welfare pointed to by the new feminist critique. This critique, which derives from an analysis of gender divisions and the nature of reproductive labour within all three welfare systems, is contrasted with the masculine, productionist tradition. This new understanding can form the basis of an enriched theory of human need, integrating biological and social, which offers a restatement of the goals of collective welfare.