Resilience, discipline and financialisation in the UK’s liberal welfare state

Abstract

ABSTRACT Financialisation has become central to contemporary liberal welfare states. The embedding of asset-based welfare and social investment strategies has emphasised focus on maximising the number of potential consumers, alongside reducing the welfare state’s economic liabilities as much as possible. A central component of this is shifting risk away from the state, individualising risk. The efficacy of this process rests on individuals internalising this risk shift and accepting the premise that they are entirely responsible for their own economic wellbeing, regardless of the social conditions in which they live. In this article, I argue that the concept of ‘resilience’ facilitates this internalisation, which helps to explain its relatively rapid uptake in the social policy of welfare regimes such as the UK. ‘Resilience’ can be understood as a disciplinary mechanism that assists with both legitimising and enforcing the financialisation of everyday life through the welfare state. This article makes a theoretical contribution to the literature through providing the first substantive attempt to demonstrate the role resilience as a social policy strategy may play in maintaining the longevity of financialised welfare capitalism and furthering the financialisation of everyday life.