Social policy, freedom and individuality

Abstract

Contemporary social policy lacks an account of the ends it serves. The reason for this is a laissez‐faire policy regime where property right overwhelms the right of each individual to be a self‐determining person. Laissez‐faire policy creates a scarcity of public resources where a universalistic social policy cannot be afforded. A narrowly targeted social policy designed for the poor prevails: it is one where the poor are subject to state coercion. In the more expansive social policy associated with social democracy, the outcome of equality is championed but there is no coherent account of how this end can be reconciled with achieving freedom. The universal idea of the self‐determining person is the basis of a rationale for social policy. Thus the end that social policy should serve is the development and sustaining of an individual who has the set of capabilities that he or she requires to be free in the sense of self‐determining.