| Social Justice, Conservatism and the State |
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Tuesday 15th January 2008
The seminar consisted of a wide-ranging discussion about conservative perspectives on social justice, conducted under Chatham House rules. It opened with a thirty-minute overview from Greg Clark, Conservative Shadow Cabinet Office Minister, of the Conservatives’ approach to tackling poverty and inequality, followed by further contributions from Cameron Watt and Sunder Katwala. There followed an hour-long roundtable discussion including the respondents and all the participants. Some of the main points to emerge from the discussion were as follows: A fair chunk of the discussion was given over to discussing differences between left and right perspectives on social justice – whether differences in analysis, policy preferences, or ambition. A key difference here was over the role of the state in tackling poverty and inequality. Some argued that the welfare state could itself reinforce poverty, and they key was allowing people to help themselves. On the flip side, others pointed to international evidence that the best performing countries in terms of equality were those with strong welfare states. Also debated was the emphasis one should place on individual behavioural causes of poverty. It was claimed that the right currently has a deeper and broader conception of poverty, which embraces a range of causes, and correspondingly a greater range of solutions than the left. While all agreed that there were indeed relevant behavioural factors, a countervailing challenge was the need to recognise the importance of income and the necessity of financial transfers in any anti-poverty strategy. The role of the voluntary sector in tackling social problems was discussed at length. The claim was that the Government were too prescriptive in their approach, and that conservatives wanted to see a bigger role for the sector. There were challenges from both left and right for the Conservative Party to clarify the nature of the increased role they envisaged for charities and voluntary organisations – was this limited to a greater reliance on these organisations for the provision of state-funded services, or did it involve an expansion of the role of philanthropy and non-statutory provision in the total welfare mix? A discussion about the importance of family structure in ensuring positive welfare outcomes touched on both the relevance of marriage, and the relative importance of family functions and family structure. There were interesting exchanges on whether or not incentivising behaviour such as marriage was a ‘moral’ issue or not – and, if not moral, on what grounds was it justified? Attendee list:
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