This talk for the Adur Churches Network on the good society and citizenship. What are the principles of a good society and how can we restore the welfare state back to health.

1. The Good Society
Citizenship and the welfare state
Dr Simon Duffy of the Centre for Welfare Reform for
Adur Churches Forum - 23rd November 2015

2. • The Christian conundrum
• The welfare state solution
• Trouble in the welfare state
• Citizens and the good society
• Finding our way forward

3. The post-Enlightenment period
has been an era of competing
and deathly ideologies.

4. • Fascism
• Racism
• Communism
• Eugenicism
• Capitalism (?)
• Utilitarianism (?)
• (Neo)liberalism (?)

5. “Ideology - that is
what gives evil
doing its long-
sought justification
and gives the
evildoer the
necessary
steadfastness and
determination.”
Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008)

6. “For the power of
Man to make
himself what he
pleases means,
as we have seen,
the power of
some men to
make other men
what they please.”
Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963)

7. The Christian conundrum
- we must find our role in
a faithless society.

8. Deuteronomy 6:20 (NIV)
“Follow justice and justice alone,
so that you may live and possess the
land the Lord your God is giving you.”

9. For some the welfare
state seemed to mean
that the problem of
social justice was at an
end. Others seem to
believe that the welfare
state is a bad thing…

10. …are they asleep?

11. The welfare state is our response
to the economic and social
insecurities of the modern
world.
Without the welfare state we
create increasing levels of
inequality, oppression and fear.

12. “…only legal and political
institutions that are
independent of the
economic forces and
automatism can control
and check the inherently
monstrous potentialities of
this process. Such
political controls seem to
function best in the so-
called welfare states
whether they call
themselves socialist or
capitalist.”
Hannah Arendt (1906-1975)

13. “Christ does not call his
benefactors loving or
charitable. He calls them
just. The Gospel makes
no distinction between the
love of our neighbour and
justice. We have invented
the distinction between
justice and charity. It is
easy to understand why.
Our notion of justice
dispenses him who
possesses from the
obligation of giving.”
Simone Weil (1909-1943)

14. “If the present order is
taken for granted or
assumed to be sacrosanct,
charity from the more to
the less fortunate would
seem virtuous and
commendable; to those for
whom the order itself is
suspect or worse, such
charity is blood-money.
Why should some be in the
position to dispense and
others to need that kind of
charity?”
William Temple (1881-1944)

15. But is the welfare state
in trouble?

16. • Growth in debt
• Growth in inequality
• Growth in poverty
• Growth in stigma
• Growth in elitism

24. In total, across England as a
whole, the WCA disability
reassessment process during
this period was associated with
an additional 590 suicides
(95% CI 220 to 950), 279,000
additional cases of self-
reported mental health
problems (95% CI
57,000 to 500,000) and the
prescribing of an additional
725,000 antidepressant items
(95% CI 406 000 to 1 045 000).
Barr B, et al. J Epidemiol
Community Health 2015;0:1–7.
doi:10.1136/jech-2015-206209

27. Christians must
oppose this way
of thinking
absolutely. We
are all vulnerable,
we are all equal.

28. We don’t need to go
down this path.

29. We could choose to live
in a world where
everybody was valued.

30. from a church in Bolton

31. The key to a good
society is citizenship.

32. “A polis is not just a larger
scale village. In ‘having
reached the limits of self-
sufficiency’, it forms a
framework for the exercise
of all human capacities.
And so, ‘while coming into
being for the sake of life’,
the polis exists ‘for the
sake of the good
life’ (1252b). It constitutes
the telos, the final end, of
human of association.”
Aristotle (384-322 BC)

33. “Above all, I think the
idea of citizenship
should remain at the
centre of modern
political debates about
social and economic
arrangements. The
concept of a citizen is
that of a person who can
hold [their] head high
and participate fully and
with dignity in the life of
[their] society.”
Jeremy Waldron (1953 - )

34. Citizenship allows us to
reconcile equality and
diversity through community.

36. Together we construct
our understanding of
citizenship.

38. An inclusive approach to
citizenship means all can
be equal.

39. The keys to citizenship

40. We make citizenship real by
1. Finding our sense of purpose
2. Having the freedom to pursue it
3. Having enough money to be free
4. Having a home where we belong
5. Getting help from other people
6. Making life in community
7. Finding love

41. To restore the welfare
state change will need to
take place at every level.

42. • Citizenship control
• Family security
• Community empowerment
• Constitutional change

47. “There are eight degrees of
charity, one higher than the other.
The highest degree, exceeded by
none, is that of the person who
assists a poor Jew by providing
him with a gift or loan or by
accepting him into a business
partnership or by helping him find
employment - in a word, by
putting him where he can
dispense with other people's aid.
With reference to such aid, it is
said, “You shall strengthen him, be
he a stranger or a settler, he shall
live with you” (Lev. 25:35), which
means strengthen him in such
manner that his falling into want is
prevented.”
Maimonides (1135-1204)

49. If you found this interesting…
www.centreforwelfarereform.org

50. www.centreforwelfarereform.org
@CforWR
If you want to find more information and resources
on new ways of thinking and doing then explore:
www.facebook.com/centreforwelfarereform
@simonjduffy