Austerity, Women and the Role of the State: Lived Experiences of the Crisis 9781529210538

Citation preview

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

“Testimonnial here. Solupiet ea dolenim quid magnimo quis maximincium dis quatemquas dessequia volorrovit aut esseque ratio. Ut ipsapelique dolluptatem imincipisit pelitis am cus eserchit faciist, quibus, omnia alia dolor minctibus, seceper rovitae niatia volupta tusanime nulpa ipsam, am est quo de eriorum aceatempos everum faccum rereptiae. Ut as escienda voluptae.”

Lived Experiences of the Crisis Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

Testimonial credit

Odis dolum et ulpa nonsequia doloria ssinctus. Itat la vent officium fuga. Et et et porum doleste nullit lam delest voluptur? Onem il iuntur? Quia nobitibus, omnit id quasperum lant porendis et ommoluptate qui recatur, quam endisquis et am il ipicaturis et eum harum simus es elitataqui officitaquia voluptaque volorep reritat entore, sunt labo. Sedis et a delibus min por molum est, omnimodis vendus. Nam restem nissinte ne dus et aut ut que di aut aceptas esed maximos magnima et aut que il magnitas non corepel est ant occaecea por sequi beation nihicie ndisitium voluptiistem ex exeribusi busaperum fuga. Obitam lanis et am que nam que recepudit harupture, cuptisqui totatia vollectiis et.

SAMPLE BAR CODE

B R I S TO L

XXXXX

@bristoluniversitypress www.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk

Cover image: LAURA STOLFI – stocksy.com

ISBN: XXX-X-XXX-XXX-X

Vicki Dabrowski

Author name gitatio iditass itaquae nihitis et exerio con est facitatecae. Evendem Nobiscimil id mo eaquam volorum cum voluptae. Gitatio iditass itaquae nihitis et exerio con est facitatecae. Evendem nobiscimil id mo eaquam volorum cum voluptae. Itatio iditass itaquae nihitis et exerio con est facitatecae. Evendem nobiscimil id mo eaquam volorum cum voluptae.

Vicki Dabrowski GENDER and SOCIOLOGY

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Gender and Sociology series Series editors: Sue Scott, Newcastle University and Stevi Jackson, Centre for Women’s Studies, University of York

Presenting high-quality research from established scholars and early-career researchers,the Gender and Sociology series is aimed at an international audience of academics and students who are interested in gender across the social science disciplines, particularly in sociology.

Forthcoming in the series: Feminist Politics in Neoconservative Russia An Ethnography of Feminist Resistance and Resources Inna Perheentupa Politicizing Childcare Maternal Workers, Class and Contemporary Feminism Maud Perrier Chinese Men’s Practices of Intimacy, Embodiment and Kinship Crafting Elastic Masculinity Siyang Cao

Out now in the series: Sharing Milk Intimacy, Materiality and Bio-Communities of Practice Shannon Carter and Beatriz M. Reyes-Foster Work, Labour and Cleaning The Social Contexts of Outsourcing Housework Lotika Singha

Find out more at bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/gender-and-sociology

Gender and Sociology series Series editors: Sue Scott, Newcastle University and Stevi Jackson, Centre for Women’s Studies, University of York

Presenting high-quality research from established scholars and early-career researchers,the Gender and Sociology series is aimed at an international audience of academics and students who are interested in gender across the social science disciplines, particularly in sociology.

International advisory board: Susanne Y. P. Choi, Chinese University of Hong Kong Meihua Chen, National Sun Yat Sen University, Taiwan Sara Crawley, South Florida University, US James Farrer, Sophia University, Japan Nayoung Lee, Chung Ang University, South Korea Nishi Mitra, TISS, Mumbai, India Pei Yuxin, Sun Yat Sen University, China Kopano Ratele, UNISA/MRC, South Africa Rosemary Du Plessis, Canterbury University, New Zealand Ann Phoenix, University College London, UK Ayse Saktanber, Middle East Technical University Ankara, Turkey Raffaella Ferrero Camoletto, University of Turin, Italy Momin Rahmin, Trent University, Canada Elina Oinas, University of Helsinki, Finland Miriam Adelman, Federal University of Paraná, Brazil Kristen Schilt, University of Chicago, US

Find out more at bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/gender-and-sociology

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE Lived Experiences of the Crisis Vicki Dabrowski

First published in Great Britain in 2021 by Bristol University Press 1-​9 Old Park Hill Bristol BS2 8BB UK t: +44 (0)117 954 5940 e: bup-​[email protected] Details of international sales and distribution partners are available at bristoluniversitypress.co.uk © Bristol University Press 2021 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978-​1-​5292-​1052-​1 hardcover ISBN 978-​1-​5292-​1054-​5  ePub ISBN 978-​1-​5292-​1053-​8  ePdf The right of Vicki Dabrowski to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of Bristol University Press. Every reasonable effort has been made to obtain permission to reproduce copyrighted material. If, however, anyone knows of an oversight, please contact the publisher. The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the author and contributors and not of the University of Bristol or Bristol University Press. The University of Bristol and Bristol University Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this publication. Bristol University Press works to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race, disability, age and sexuality. Cover design by blu inc Front cover image: LAURA STOLFI –​stocksy.com Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY Bristol University Press uses environmentally responsible print partners

Contents About the Author Acknowledgements Series Editors’ Preface

viii ix xi

Introduction 1 The Political Project of Austerity 2 Living In and With Austerity 3 Navigating Through Austerity 4 Austerity Talk 5 Austerity and Feminism(s) 6 Austerity Future(s)? Conclusion: The State Women are Now In

1 21 47 69 89 113 137 155

Notes References Index

161 167 189

vii

About the Author Vicki Dabrowski is Associate Lecturer in Sociology at the University of York. Her research interests include gender, class inequality and the role of the state. She is a Website Review Editor for journals Theory, Culture and Society and Body and Society.

viii

Acknowledgements I would like to thank all the women who generously gave their time to tell me their stories. This book would not exist if you had not openly shared your lives, thoughts and experiences. I would also like to thank the Economic and Social Research Council for providing funding that made this research possible, as well as those at Bristol University Press for their help in preparing this manuscript. Over the years spent researching and writing this book, I  have received invaluable guidance and encouragement from academic colleagues and friends. Austerity, Women and the Role of the State is based on my PhD research conducted at Goldsmiths, University of London. A very special thank you to my former PhD supervisors Beverley Skeggs and Rebecca Coleman for their support and guidance. Imogen Tyler and Mary Evans examined my PhD thesis. I would like to thank them for their thorough engagement with the research and for providing such constructive feedback. In addition, I am grateful to Sue Scott and Stevi Jackson for accepting this book as part of their Gender and Sociology book series. Thanks to my colleagues in the Department of Sociology at York for their interest in my research and for providing a stimulating and supportive academic environment to work in. Thanks especially to Dave Beer for his helpful advice and continuous encouragement and to Silvia Falcetta and Rachael Burns for their everyday kindnesses and support. I am also very grateful to those who have read chapters, discussed ideas with me and provided valuable advice on shaping this book. I  would like to thank Angelo Martins Junior, in particular, for generously reading and carefully commenting on every single page of this book many times over. Thanks also to those at the NYLON research network for giving helpful feedback on chapters and for providing a stimulating space to share ideas. Lastly, huge thanks to my friends, my parents —​Susan and Stefan —​ my sister Lisa and to Gino for all their patience, care and support.

ix

Series Editors’ Preface We are delighted to have this book in a series that aims to bring original sociological thinking to bear on contemporary gender relations, divisions and issues of concern to feminists. It is our aim for the series that it will challenge received wisdom, offer new insights and expand the scope of sociology both theoretically and substantively, and we are convinced that this book by Vicki Dabrowski does all of those things. This preface is being written after three months of ‘lockdown’ as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The gendered impacts of lockdown are adding to the long-term effects of austerity, as outlined in this book, and rendering the lives of many women even more challenging. While so far more men have died of COVID-19 in the UK, women may suffer more from the long-term effects, as these will be added to the already higher levels of morbidity in older women. Evidence is also emerging about the higher levels of childcare, domestic work and home schooling undertaken by women during lockdown, and of course for women who are single parents this extra labour will be completely their responsibility. It is also the case that more women have been furloughed and are concerned that their jobs may disappear, and that women are disproportionately represented in the sectors of the labour market most likely to shrink. In this book, Dabrowski writes about the symbolic connections between austerity and the post-war period of ‘thrifty housewives’ and this symbolism has been rolled out frequently over the last few months. While not always explicit, the image — like a picture from a 1950s Ladybird book of a mother in the kitchen, teaching her small daughter to bake a cake — is in the background of many discussions about managing lockdown. Traditional assumptions about the so-called nuclear family have been at the fore and the likelihood of women losing their jobs and/or having increased caring responsibilities looms large, while at the same time the state withdraws the extra, albeit limited, support put in place during the crisis. All of these factors will have a far greater impact on those women

xi

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

who are already dealing with the austerity policies which have been in place since the economic crash of 2007–8. The current situation makes this book even more timely and significant than it already was. Conservative governments since the Thatcher era have had ‘shrink the state’ as a mantra. It has gone against the grain of the views held at the heart of government to be forced to intervene with financial support for individuals and parts of the public sector during the COVID-19 crisis, and we can be sure that this will be withdrawn as fast as possible and the language of austerity and support for it as a civic duty will be ringing through Westminster and Whitehall. The central aim of this book is to show the ways in which the austerity project is gendered and how this plays out intersectionaly in relation, primarily, to class and race. It is working-class women, particularly black working-class women, who have been most adversely affected. Dabrowski is especially interested in the effects of austerity on working-age women, many of whom will have children. 61 women were interviewed for her research, who were aged between 18 and 35 — women who have been affected by austerity for all or most of their adult lives. One of the key arguments is that another government mantra ‘we’re all in it together’ is nonsense. The book draws on data, for example, from the Women’s Budget Group, to show clearly the ways in which austerity exacerbates pre-existing social and economic inequalities. Austerity is shown to be the ultimate intersectional double whammy, underpinned by deceptions designed to mislead the public into believing that that public sector cuts will bring about economic recovery and that state spending led to debt and deficit in the first place. Drawing on the work of writers such as Connell and Waylen, Dabrowski also sets out to show, the ways in which gender is at the heart of the historical creation of state structures and that gender relations are also partly constituted through the state. Discussions of the state have been somewhat lacking in feminist sociological research in recent years. Gender and class analysis have also not been as central as they might have been, with notable exceptions in the work of writers such as Skeggs and Lawler. It is therefore particularly pleasing that this book not only offers a rigorous analysis of the role of the state in the lives of working-class women, but goes further in providing an intersectional account which gives the women Dabrowski interviewed a voice. Through the accounts of these women, and drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of capital, Dabrowski is able to show how and why women are not ‘all in this together’ and the ways in which women are differently able to navigate the landscape of austerity. She presents us not with a

xii

newgenprepdf

Series Editors’ Preface

closed argument, but with diverse accounts of the varieties of the lived experience of austerity. Of special interest in the context of this series is Dabrowski’s critique of aspects of the feminist response to austerity. She argues that, while feminism is a key site through which the austerity project has been challenged, it is also implicated in the further reproduction of austerity discourse. The book presents a picture of a particular form of feminism, which converges with austerity policies and discourses via narratives of morality, culture, distance, distinction and blame. This neoliberal feminism, Dabrowski argues, acknowledges inequality — between men and women and among women — only to disavow it through a focus on individualism and responsibility. Her argument is powerful and raises the question ‘is this form of feminism any kind of feminism at all?’ Professor Sue Scott Professor Stevi Jackson June 2020

xiii

Introduction ‘Everyone’s had enough. Staff are overworked, we haven’t had a pay rise for years, services and patients are suffering and everyone wants to leave or take time off. I work at a private practice some evenings and weekends to get more money. I’ve become a lot more careful. I mean, I’m not extravagant, I never have been, but I do enjoy myself. I go on holiday, but I try to not eat out all the time, and I won’t go buy something just because I think it’s nice. I can’t afford to buy a house right now, despite the fact I’ve been working for almost ten years. So, I do notice it. I can see that things are getting more expensive now and life’s getting harder. Living in London, and working in the NHS, it’s not easy.’ (Anna, 27, middle-​class, white, physiotherapist, London, August 2014, emphasis added) ‘I notice it. Since the last year and a half actually. I can see it. Now I’m working, it should be easier, right? I get Housing Benefit and tax credits and I can get credit now, I have an Argos card, which I couldn’t get before. But my Housing Benefits have been deducted. When I first started [working] I was paying something like £36 per week towards my rent and that’s now jumped to £60. That’s almost doubled in a year. I get in arrears just like that [clicks her fingers]. I’m trying to keep on top of it … but it’s a lot of work. People don’t see that … they think if you’re getting help [from the state] then you don’t put the work in. But sometimes at the end of the month I’m left with £30 to do shopping. I’m sweating to get to work, sweating to get him [her son] to school, and I’ve got £30 to do shopping. And like any kid, my son wants the latest trainers. I do feel bad, but I just can’t

1

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

do it, and I tell him, “I have to buy the bargains or it won’t work”. I’d love to know how others are doing it, I really would.’ (Marie, 28, working-​class, black, part-​time waitress, London, March 2015, emphasis added) Marie and Anna are two of the 61 women whose experiences of living with, and navigating through, the effects of UK austerity and welfare reform are documented within this book. Becoming evident in their narratives, and as is further developed throughout the pages of this monograph, Anna and Marie both notice and see austerity in their daily lives. For Anna, this is materialized through stagnation in wages, her increasingly negative experience of working in the NHS and the feeling that her life is becoming harder. In contrast, Marie encounters austerity through the changes to her Housing Benefit and tax credits, which leaves her short at the end of every month. Despite juggling caring responsibilities and part-​time work, within a climate that is hostile to welfare claimants, Marie often feels judged for being partly reliant on state support. For these women, despite some crossing commonalities, austerity is lived and felt very differently. Contributing to the growing field of feminist literature on the gendered politics of austerity, Austerity, Women and the Role of the State thus invites its readers to examine the multivalent way in which difference —​particularly through the lens of class, but also mindful of ‘race’, age, parenthood, disability and geography  —​contours how women can live with, navigate through and speak about austerity policies and discourses, and the ways in which austerity intensifies and extends existing social and economic inequalities. This book also examines the role of the state in shaping these women’s different experiences. It provides a gendered analysis of the nuanced workings of the state during current and previous times of crisis. By doing so, this monograph explores the ways in which the state and austerity’s historical legacies return and work upon present day gendered experiences, (re)producing and legitimizing economic, symbolic and institutional violence. Austerity, Women and the Role of the State thus analyzes the symbiotic relationship between the state’s production and legitimization of austerity and women’s lived experiences. Through such an exploration, this book captures the impact austerity policies and discourses have on women from different backgrounds, like Anna and Marie, demonstrating how urgently theories need to be grounded in lived realities, with an in-​depth awareness of historical, political and socio-​economic differences.

2

Introduction

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State is thus an illustration of the ways in which forms of social identification are made within a context of crisis. By documenting women’s differing attempts to deal with the constraints of UK austerity, this book shows how women respond to their existing or changing circumstances, and unpacks the often complex negotiation that goes on between the individual and the social. It explores the ways in which women try to adapt to unfolding events —​pay freezes, periods of unemployment, cuts to welfare —​but, at the same time, also attempt to maintain what they know and what they value. In doing so, the book challenges the idea that the relation between the personal and the social is simply the latter directing the former, highlighting, through women’s narratives, why of course there are considerable spaces for agency. This does not mean, as is made evident throughout this book, that there is any acceptance of the harshness of the austerity project, but, by focusing on the complex negotiation between women’s experiences and the role of the state, it allows for discussion on the ways in which austerity curtails and directs personal choices.

Austerity: a gendered economic project Austerity appealed to many Eurozone politicians in the aftermath of the 2007–​9 financial crisis, perceived as the only possible response in both Europe and the US. This view was especially prevalent in Britain. The UK Coalition (Conservative–​Liberal Democrat) government (2010–​15) introduced their programme of austerity in 2010, as a means of reducing the government budget deficit brought about by the financial crisis. The government originally stated that this programme would last for a five-​year period. However, in 2014, the Treasury protracted the planned period of austerity until at least 2018. This, the government argued, was to try to further stabilize the economy (Kirkman, 2014). In 2015, it was once again extended to 2020. Following the UK-​EU referendum of 2016, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, one of the chief architects of austerity, George Osborne (2010–​16), estimated that the goal of eliminating the deficit by 2020 was now no longer realistic (Wilkinson, 2016). Despite the softening of political rhetoric, Osborne’s successor, Philip Hammond (2016–​19) continued with the austerity programme. In September 2019, Sajid Javid, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer (2019–​20) claimed that the UK could now afford to ‘turn the page on austerity’. Publishing department budgets for 2020–​21, the Chancellor claimed that a rise in spending of 4.1 per cent within this period would ‘bring

3

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

about a decade of renewal’. But, as observers have noted, the planned 4.1 per cent real-​terms rise in day-​to-​day department spending will reverse only a quarter of the cuts made by consecutive Conservative governments since 2010 (Inman, 2019). In March 2020, the current Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, unveiled plans to ‘level up’ the country by implanting a large increase in public spending. Responses to this budget have however questioned the focus of this investment, highlighting the absence of investment in social care and the failure to address the poverty caused by successive welfare cuts and underfunding (Women’s Budget Group [WBG]), 2020). The programme of austerity has translated into a range of savage reforms and punitive policies across government departments. As can be seen in Figure  1.1, the Departments of Communities and Local Government, Work and Pensions and Housing and Communities have experienced some of the largest per cent reductions across all government departments. With a reduction of 77 per cent since 2010, the Department of Communities and Local Government has been most affected. Yet, the localization of this process makes it very difficult to give a standard account of the cuts. Leeds, for example, has been hit harder by government cuts than many other local authorities: a 12.5 per cent cut, compared to the 10.3 per cent average for core cities. This has resulted in Leeds losing £180 million of core government funding since 2010 (Centre for Cities, 2015). Figure 1.1: Cumulative real change (GDP deflator-​adjusted) in per-​capita Resource Departmental Expenditure Limit, 2009–​10 to 2020–​21

Source: Resolution Foundation.

4

Introduction

The budget for the Department of Work and Pensions has been reduced by 69 per cent, with more than £37 billion being cut from the welfare budget. These changes include (but are not limited to): a 1 per cent limit on most benefit rises, cash freezes to Child Benefit, a cap on the total amount households can claim for those aged between 16 to 641 and cuts to Housing Benefit.2 The removal of the spare room subsidy (infamously known as the ‘bedroom tax’3) has meant that, depending on the number of rooms ‘available’ in a home, a percentage of eligible rent is withdrawn. The introduction of Universal Credit (a single monthly payment) has changed how benefits are paid, and in a large majority of cases, has resulted in people receiving less. Parents with children are now moved from Income Support to Jobseeker’s Allowance ( JSA) when the child turns five. This age has been reduced from twelve (in 2008), to ten (in 2009) and then seven (in 2010). Parents or carers receive the same amount of money, but must prove that they are actively seeking work, or face sanctions. This imposes more conditionality on the receipt of welfare. There have also been significant cuts to legal aid and a reduction in public expenditure on schools, further and higher education and early childhood education (WBG, 2017). Despite perpetual claims from the socio-​political register that ‘we’re all in it together’ (Osborne, 2012, 2015) the effects of austerity have not been equally felt. An intrinsically gendered issue, austerity has affected women far harder than men. This analysis has been backed up by the House of Commons Library: 86 per cent of the burden of austerity has fallen on women (Cracknell and Keen, 2016). Chronicling the impact of these policies on women, the WBG (an independent network of leading academic researchers, policy experts and campaigners) has highlighted how decisions about economic policies  —​the determination of where investment is withdrawn, which services will be run down, whose living standards will be protected or boosted and whose reduced —​are not gender neutral, even though they may make no explicit reference to gender (Pearson, 2019:  29). As noted by this organization and associated feminist political economists, the economy thus needs to be understood as a gendered structure. Feminist scholars, policy experts and women’s sector organizations have written extensively about the gendered impact of austerity, highlighting the disparate effect austerity policies have had on the spheres of finance, production and reproduction (NEWomen’s Network and Women’s Resource Centre [NEWN, WRC], 2012; The Fawcett

5

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Society, 2012; Pearson and Elson, 2015; Trades Union Congress [TUC], 2015; WBG, 2016; Gedalof, 2018). The equality campaigner, The Fawcett Society (2012), has labelled this a ‘triple jeopardy’, since the austerity programme of deep spending cuts has left women facing cuts to jobs, benefits and vital services. The austerity agenda is therefore particularly damaging to women  —​not only do women already earn lower wages in a gender-​discriminating labour market, but they typically use state services more than men, they are typically employed at a higher rate in the public sector than men, and due to their caring responsibilities and their relative economic inequality and poverty, are more reliant on benefits and tax credits than men. But austerity is not only distinctly and inherently gendered. It is a socially uneven condition which exacerbates pre-​existing social and economic inequalities. Women with disabilities (Woods et al., 2012), from specific regions (NEWN and WRC, 2012), black and minority ethnic women, working-​class women and single mothers (Pearson and Elson, 2015; Sandhu and Stevenson, 2015; TUC, 2015; WBG and Runnymede Trust, 2017) have been specifically affected. As Kalwinder Sandhu and Mary-​Ann Stevenson (2015) note, one of the key features of women’s experience of austerity is that they often face several cuts simultaneously; experiences made worse by the instantaneous operations of the social divisions of gender, ‘race’, ethnicity, class and disability. Performing a cumulative distributional analysis of tax and benefit changes since 2010, the WBG and Runnymede Trust (2017) found that women are hit harder than men across all income groups, specifically black and minority ethnic women. The analysis found that by 2020, Asian women in some of the poorest families will be £2,247 worse off. Black and Asian lone mothers, it was noted, stand to lose £3,996 and £4,214, respectively, from the changes, about 15 and 17 per cent of their net income. According to the analysis, one of the changes which has most directly impacted black and minority ethnic women is the benefit cap, which limits Child Benefit to two children per family, and limits total receipts to £20,000 per year per household (£23,000 in Greater London) —​ a cut from the 2013 ceiling of £26,000. Black and minority ethnic women are more likely to be affected by these measures since ‘they tend to be concentrated in the urban centres of big cities, where rents are higher than the national average, and they are more likely to have three or more dependent children’ (Pearson, 2019: 32; also see WBG and Runnymede Trust, 2017). In addition, black employed women are set to lose approximately £1,500 a year as a result of the introduction of the new Universal Credit system (Pearson, 2019).

6

Introduction

WBG and Runnymede Trust (2017) found the same groups hardest hit by the tax and benefit changes are also those that have been hardest hit by cuts to public services. Black and minority ethnic women from low income households are, in many cases, most effected by cuts in health, (pre-​)education and social care spending. Cuts to NHS services, for example, have the greatest impact on black and minority ethnic women since their health issues and experiences of health care differ from that of non-​black and minority ethnic women and all men. Due to the ways in which health service budget cuts have been directed and applied, the report noted how: GPs are frequently refusing to treat women whose residence permit for the UK includes the condition that they have no recourse to public funds, and many people from minority communities, regardless of their nationality or citizen status, are having their access to hospital services challenged by a bureaucracy seeking to make non-​UK residents liable for their health charges in the NHS. (Pearson, 2019: 33) As later chapters of this book will demonstrate, austerity policies have produced and further enabled gendered material exclusions, which have impacted women differently due to differences of class, ‘race’, immigration status, parenthood, geographical location, age and disability.

The production of austerity: a gendered state project Austerity is not only an economic programme of fiscal management, materializing in the form of unequal and unjust cuts and reforms. This model of fiscal policy is underpinned by a series of ‘deceptions’ that are designed to oversimplify the rationale for austerity and mislead the general public into believing that public sector cuts will bring about economic recovery (Cooper and Whyte, 2017:  5). These ‘deceptions’ have constructed a ‘logic’ of austerity that legitimizes fiscal consolidation in various ways: via an emphasis on reducing debt and deficit; framing the cause of the crisis as being due to ‘irresponsible’ spending on the welfare system; and by representing austerity as the only viable economic response. In 2010 the Prime Minister, David Cameron argued that Britain’s ‘massive deficit’ and ‘growing debt’ was ‘the most urgent issue facing Britain today’ (2010a: no pagination). This issue, he argued, threatened to loom over the economy and society for a generation.

7

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Constructed as a threat to the nation and the future of the country, disastrous eventualities, it was thus claimed, may occur if the debt and deficit was not immediately acted upon. By pointing out the potential consequences that would take place by failing to ‘act decisively and quickly’, Cameron warned these consequences would be worse than the problems facing the nation at present. For instance, not getting ‘a grip on our public finances’ meant investors, Cameron (2010a) argued, would ‘doubt Britain’s ability to pay its way’. This would result in a rise in interest rates and a fall in investments. Such an outcome, Cameron claimed, would mean that ‘no real recovery’ could take place. Britain’s economy, it was argued, would therefore begin an inevitable slide into decline. The framing of debt and deficit as being in need of reduction, and the detailing of potential consequences of the failure to act, allowed for the cutting of public spending to be seen as both necessary and urgent. This is because the core element of the austerity story is the argument that state spending led to debt and deficit. As John Clarke and Janet Newman argue, the cause of the deficit has been changed from an economic problem (how to rescue the banks and restore market stability) into a political problem (how to allocate blame and responsibility for the crisis) (2012: 300). Discussing the crisis in 2011, Germany’s Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble wrote in The Financial Times that it was ‘an undisputable fact that excessive state spending has led to unsustainable levels of debt and deficits’ (2011: no pagination). Likewise, Cameron, when explaining the reasons for the ‘deficit’ in 2010, stated that much of the deficit was structural. Failing to reference the high-​risk banking strategies, blame was instead placed upon irresponsible government spending, which he argued, had built up before the recession. Framed in such terms, the country —​especially the previous Labour government —​was thus constructed as having overspent and become heavily in debt. Constructing debt as a national issue and framing it in political terms has significant political consequences: it not only allows, but legitimizes the government’s targeting of the welfare system. Yet, for these specific cuts to become framed as the solution to ‘irresponsible spending’, a discourse was required that naturalized the idea of the welfare system as being ‘too expensive’, ‘out of control’ and having a stagnating effect on growth and prosperity. The framing of the welfare state through a ‘crisis lens’ has not arisen in the current context. This discourse has been circulating for the last few decades, most notably during the Thatcher years. However, within the context of austerity, these discourses have intensified. In 2010, Osborne argued that ‘the explosion in welfare

8

Introduction

costs contributed to the growing structural budget deficit in the middle part of this decade’ (2010b: no pagination). This has large implications on how welfare can be regarded in a time of financial strain. Claiming that welfare costs are ‘one reason why there is no money left’ (2010b) suppresses discourses that emphasize the necessity of welfare spending. This subsequently further helps to legitimate the argument that welfare spending cuts are the only common sense solution for financing the public debt. The programme of austerity thus becomes framed as the saviour to the nation’s problems, seen as necessary in both economic and moral terms. Cameron, then leader of the Conservative Party, popularized the term ‘age of austerity’ in his keynote speech to the Conservative Party forum in April 2009. Discussing responsibility, thrift and fairness, he committed to end years of what he called ‘excessive government spending’, in which we would move from an ‘age of irresponsibility to an age of austerity’ (Cameron, 2009:  no pagination). When the Conservative–​Lib Dem government was then formed in 2010, austerity was taken forth as the policy that would cure the deficit and clear Britain’s debt. Framed within the moral discourse of ‘virtuous necessity’, austerity thus became the ‘saviour’ to Britain’s public debt, understood as being ‘what is right for our country not just for today but for the long-​term’ (Cameron, 2012b: no pagination). Consequently, questioning austerity was seen as irrational, since the ‘austere’ response to the deficit was backed up using economic research. In 2010 Osborne gave a speech laying out his plan to eliminate the deficit. He cited Carmen Reinhart, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and her colleague Kenneth Rogoff directly, drawing on findings from their paper ‘Growth in a Time of Debt’ (2010). The paper argues that, once debt reaches more than 90 per cent of GDP, the risks of a large negative impact on long-​term growth become highly significant. However, the economic research that allegedly supported the austerity push has since been discredited (Stiglitz, 2012; Blyth, 2013; Krugman, 2015). These results were based on highly dubious assumptions and procedures  —​plus a few outright mistakes  —​which should have evaporated under closer scrutiny. The data showed that there was no such link between high debt and low growth, but their conclusions were based on a spreadsheet error (Graeber, 2013). The Chancellor admitted he knew this when questioned. Economists revealed that causality lies in the opposite direction: low growth leads to high levels of debt (Elliot, 2013). In 2014, Reinhart and Rogoff authored a new working paper, ‘Recovery from Financial Crises: Evidence from 100

9

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Episodes’, shifting their arguments away from favouring austerity to argue ‘this crisis may in the end surpass in severity the depression of the 1930s in a large number of countries’ (2014: 55). The premise behind the cuts therefore turns out to be faulty —​there is no proof that high levels of debt necessarily lead to recession. The IMF has since concluded in the paper ‘Neoliberalism: Oversold’ that austerity policies can do more harm than good, resulting in increased inequality and stunted economic growth (Ostry et al., 2016). Therefore, as Paul Krugman (2015) has argued, the economic intellectual explanation for austerity is bankrupt. Despite this, fiscal probity has been championed as the only way of fixing the economy, restoring market confidence and helping Britain’s future. As Gavan Titley (2013) describes, ‘dissent or the proposition of alternatives is constructed as taboo, for it is seen to dent market confidence, raise spectres of unrest and show a limited grasp of reality’ (in Jarrett, 2014:  144–​5). Countries running significant budget deficits in the aftermath of the crisis were deemed at imminent risk of ‘becoming Greece’ unless they immediately began to implement austerity (Krugman, 2015). At this point, Greece was using Keynesian policies to better their situation. Advocates for a policy of austerity zoned in on this, and Greece became an example of how Keynesian policy did not work. During this period, Osborne made repeated comparisons to the fiscal situation of Greece and the UK. For instance, in 2010 he stated, ‘you can see, in Greece, an example of a country that didn’t face up to its problems, and that is the fate that I want to avoid’ (Reuters, 2010 in Blyth, 2013: 73). The IMF has since admitted it had failed to realize the damage austerity would do to Greece during the bailout (Elliot et al., 2013). The closing down of alternatives can therefore be understood to be a key ideological mechanism, since it establishes a singular view of economic circumstances and solutions, and renders contrary positions illegitimate (Jarrett, 2014: 145).

The legitimization of austerity Numerous studies have focused on the cultural and discursive mechanisms deployed to justify austerity measures, reproduced in policy discourse and frameworks, but also in media and visual cultures (Bramall, 2013; Jensen and Tyler, 2015). Within these different platforms, attention has been given to the combined use of economic logic and a moral appeal, deployed to legitimize such measures, spoken through gendered terms. As feminist scholars have argued, female citizens are often called upon by the government to conduct themselves

10

Introduction

in accordance with the values of enterprise, resilience, thrift, hard work, positive thinking and economic productivity (Allen et al., 2015; Jensen, 2016; Forkert, 2017; Gill and Orgad, 2018) —​values, these feminist scholars observe, which need to be operationalized both at home and in the workplace. Attention has also focused on the way austerity facilitates the production of certain gendered, classed and racialized subject positions, with scholarship documenting the different ways in which they are played out, circulated and reinforced by the state, in public sites and through popular culture. For instance, work has explored the presence and persuasiveness of the past  —​especially austerity Britain of the 1940’s  —​in framings of austerity in the present through gendered moral imperatives of shared sacrifice and suffering, fairness, freedom and a sense of collective obligation (Bramall, 2013). Consideration has also been given to the production of ‘good citizens’ and ‘abject figures’, which it has been argued have been used to produce and reinforce division and blame for diminishing social resources inside of the population in complex and contradictory ways (Jensen, 2012; Allen et al., 2014; Allen et al., 2015; Evans, 2016; Gedalof, 2018). Feminist researchers have analyzed the various frequently circulated figurations of austerity politics, from the ‘benefit scrounger’ (Patrick, 2014) to the ‘chav mum’ (Tyler, 2008), ‘benefits brood’ families (Jensen and Tyler, 2015) and the ‘feral parent’ (De Benedictis, 2012). Reality television has become a powerful site through which these figures of disapproval are circulating, mobilized by politicians as evidence of a society plagued by welfare dependency and moral breakdown (Allen et al., 2014; Jensen, 2014). The production and circulation of these subject positions across political and media discourse demonstrates, as Kim Allen et al. argue, ‘how austerity has afforded opportunities to reboot classed and racialized discourses that have historically positioned black and working-​class mothers outside of the hegemonic ideal of white, middle-​class maternity (Gillies, 2007; Phoenix, 1991)’ (2015: 918). The state and social institutions therefore play an important role in the (re)production of gendered difference and inequality. It is this focus —​the production and legitimization of these gendered exclusions by the state  —​that this book, in part, focuses on. The following chapter examines austerity discourses that have circulated within the political register since 2010. This analysis not only highlights in further detail why and how austerity has been legitimized by the state, but how these discourses interlock and contradict each other. Exploring these circulating contradictory discourses helps to understand how austerity

11

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

is put to use by the state and the particular ways in which austerity shapes gender relations. Yet, it is important to acknowledge, as Gargi Bhattacharyya (2015:  155) notes, that ‘austerity relies on histories and practices of gendered exploitation’. These are both material and symbolic, classed and racialized. Feminist scholars have pointed specifically to the ways in which austerity discourse has recycled and drawn on previous historical figures of contempt, or adapted gendered ideas from previous historical contexts (Jensen, 2012, 2014; Bramall, 2013; Tyler, 2013a, 2013b; Montgomerie, 2016; Evans, 2017; Forkert, 2017). Drawing on such work, this book considers the social and political history of austerity in the UK. It does so by examining how class and gender have been shaped in different times of crisis and state formations. Such attention is necessary since the state and body politic is, and has always been, gendered (see Pateman, 1988; Waylen, 1998). As Raewyn Connell notes, ‘gender dynamics are a major force constructing the state, both in the historical creation of state structures and in contemporary politics’ (1990: 519). Gender (and racial and class) inequalities are buried within the state, but as Georgina Waylen argues, through part of the same dynamic process, gender relations are partly constituted through the state. The state therefore ‘partly reflects and partly helps to create particular forms of gender relations and gender inequality’ (1998: 7). Without unpacking how the state has historically shaped gender relations, it becomes difficult to fully understand how austerity affects the lives of women. It is through such a consideration that Austerity, Women and the Role of the State is able to convey how austerity is made possible through a set of discursive and economic formations, and how these are materialized in, and impact upon, different women’s lives.

Austerity and women’s lived experiences Since the implementation of austerity measures in 2010, there has been a series of hugely important analyses and testimonies by writers such as Mary O’Hara (2014), Kerry-​Anne Mendoza (2015) and Vickie Cooper and David Whyte (2017) detailing the human impact of austerity in the UK. Their work highlights the different but often intersecting material, psychological and symbolic effects felt by people in their everyday lives as a result of the implementation of austerity measures: the rise in food poverty and hunger, the consequences of welfare reforms, increased levels of debt, increased pressure on household income and wages, and changes to employment.

12

Introduction

There is a large body of feminist scholarship that has assessed the impact of austerity on women through economic policy (Pearson and Elson, 2015; Sandhu and Stevenson, 2015; WBG, 2016; WBG and Runnymede Trust, 2017; Pearson, 2019) and gendered political and cultural discourse (Bramall, 2013; Jensen, 2014; Allen et  al., 2015; Evans, 2016; Forkert, 2017). This work has highlighted how austerity is inherently gendered and demonstrated how it reproduces classed and racialized material and symbolic exclusions. Bringing forward an alternative economic strategy, which insists on the incorporation of reproductive and care work into economic analysis and economic policies (a feminist Plan F), the Women’s Budget Group have, for example, challenged the privileging of the financial economy that is inherent in the neoliberal framework, and have also been critical of the productive economy of neo-​Keynesians, which emphasizes investment in physical infrastructure and the output of manufacturing and allied sectors (see Pearson and Elson, 2015; Pearson, 2019). Empirical scholarship in the field has studied the effects of these policies and discourses, highlighting the importance of understanding women’s experiences and the intersection of difference (Lonergan, 2015; Raynor, 2016; Bassel and Emejulu, 2017; Craddock, 2017; Hall, 2019). As Sarah Hall (2015:  1) notes, conducting research in the context of austerity involves people who are affected in distinctive ways, ‘those already living in or close to poverty; those witnessing or knowing others struggling and offering support; those largely insulated from the consequences’. With difference at the forefront of such work, research from these different scholars provides a detailed and nuanced understanding of how austerity impacts particular groups of working-​ class and minority ethic women and their specific experiences, in messy and multiple ways. This book also considers how difference and processes of differentiation affect women’s experiences of the UK government’s post-​crash austerity-​driven social policies. Revealing how austerity intensifies existing social and economic inequalities, several chapters of this book draw on Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of capital (1979, 1986, 1989, 1991) to emphasize how and why women are not ‘all in this together’ (Osborne, 2009, 2012, 2015) and why women have differing abilities to navigate within the context. It is within these chapters that divergent accounts of varieties of austerity as lived come into view. It is through such an analysis that this book questions and counters policy, practice and thinking associated with the project of UK austerity, helping to myth-​bust and fracture dominant socio-​political and media discourses.

13

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

In addition, this monograph illuminates how consent for austerity and the dismantling of the welfare state is both achieved and resisted within micro-​level everyday discussions. Previous work in this area has focused on the different ways in which austerity is discussed across and within different groups, through processes of othering, distinction making, distancing and boundary formation (Shildrick and MacDonald, 2013; Dhaliwal and Forkert, 2015; Bramall, 2016; Stanley, 2016; Shildrick, 2018). For those labelled ‘hard working’ by the government, research has shown that there is often a process of boundary making and differentiation between themselves and classed and racialized ‘others’ (Bramall, 2016; Stanley, 2016). Cultural mechanisms such as reality television tend to feature in such narratives, where protagonists appear as evidence when making distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’ (see Allen et al., 2014). Chapters 4 and 5 examine how differences of class impact upon women’s ability to speak about, question, reproduce and resist the austerity programme. These chapters highlight the complexity of the shifting boundaries and perceptions of poverty and inequality in 21st-​century Britain. Austerity, Women and the Role of the State therefore unpacks and extends the understanding of austerity and its gendered impacts. It does so through exploring the plethora of ways in which the term is produced and legitimized by the state, and how it is articulated and experienced by women in their everyday lives. For the 61 women involved in this research, austerity was not only made present in different ways, but had differing consequences. These differences arise from the varying resources and capitals available to them in the present, and the historical legacies that structure, reproduce and legitimate inequalities produced by the current crisis of financial capitalism. This book therefore examines the particular configuration of the state and gender and class relations, in the specific context of UK austerity.

Researching Austerity,Women and the Role of the State The arguments made in this book are the outcome of policy and political discourse analysis and a series of observations, in-​depth interviews and group discussions with 61 self-​identifying4 women in Leeds, London and Brighton between February 2014 and June 2015. Narratives such as these tend to rarely feature within more orthodox justifications, which position austerity as necessary, fair and leading towards a better future. Reading against this grain and listening to these alternative stories thus sheds light on some of the less dominant

14

Introduction

and more complex accounts that are weaving their way in, around and through state and media discourse. Research lasted for a period of 17 months, during which 49 interviews and two group discussions with women living in cities that had been differently affected by the cuts to public spending were conducted. Leeds is a large post-​industrial city in the north of England that has now developed into a national centre for financial and business services. It also has one of the highest ratios of private to public sector jobs of all major UK cities. In 2016, Leeds City Council and the NHS employed 109,000 people (26 per cent of total employment) (LEEDS.GOV.UK, n.d). London, the UK’s capital, is known as the world’s leading financial centre for international business and commerce. Now mostly a service-​ based economy, in 2016 over 85 per cent of the employed population of Greater London worked in the service industries (UNCSBRP, 2016). Brighton is a seaside resort on the south coast of England which has evolved from a low-​wage traditional coastal and manufacturing-​based economy, into a city driven by the tourism, culture, creative industries and digital media sectors (Centre for Cities, 2015). During the time of research, despite being in a stronger position than most other northern cities, unemployment in Leeds was higher than the national average (Office for National Statistics [ONS], 2014). There had also been a drop in the real value of average earnings for employees in this city: 19 per cent. This was compared to the UK average of 13 per cent (ONS, 2014). Wages in Brighton and London were higher than this average figure. In Leeds, 14–​29 per cent of people earned less than the living wage, in comparison with Brighton (16 per cent) and London (18 per cent) (ONS, 2015). Leeds also had a larger majority of JSA claimants and a larger percentage of claimants who had been unemployed for more than a year (ONS, 2014). Despite higher levels of employment and earnings during this period, Brighton’s housing affordability ratio declined. In 2004, the average cost of a house in this city was nine times the average income, and by 2014 this had risen to 12 (Centre for Cities, 2015: 21). Brighton, alongside London, saw house prices rise by more than 10 per cent in a single year —​more than twice the national average. Overall, London experienced the greatest increase in its affordability ratio. By 2014, the average house was almost 16 times average earnings, up from 9.5 in 2004. The average house price in London (£501,500) was almost three times higher than that in Leeds (£174,500), which had a 1.6 per cent growth (Centre for Cities, 2015: 22). Both London and Brighton saw few houses built in 2004–​13 (in Brighton for instance, only 6,260 new homes were built) (Centre for Cities, 2015).

15

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Both London and Leeds have some of the largest levels of inequality in the UK. At the time of the research, around 20 per cent of the population in Leeds lived in areas ranked in the top 10 per cent of the most deprived, nationally (Centre for Cities, 2015). It is these neighbourhoods that experience severe and persistent deprivation, even during periods of growth. The financial impact of welfare reforms has hit hardest in these areas due to their high concentration of welfare claimants. The Leeds district had the third largest absolute loss attributable to welfare reform: a £232 million loss (£460 per head per annum). Some London boroughs (alongside other older industrial areas, largely in the north east and north west) have however been most affected by the welfare reforms (Beatty and Fothergill, 2013). This is primarily because Housing Benefit reforms and the Household Benefit cap greatly impact London boroughs.5 The reforms to Housing Benefit have also had a substantial impact in Brighton due to the city’s large private rented sector and higher rent levels (Beatty and Fothergill, 2013). By contrast, Britain’s older industrial areas, hit hard by many of the other welfare changes, are less acutely affected by the Local Housing Allowance reforms (and subsequently the ‘bedroom tax’) because a higher proportion of their low-​income households live in the social rented sector or in lower-​price owner-​occupied property (Beatty and Fothergill, 2013). Women from a diverse range of ages and backgrounds were interviewed in these cities:  those from middle-​and working-​class backgrounds who identified as white, black, Indian, mixed race and south Asian. These women were aged between 18 and 35 years. Age, like other social markers, has an impact on women’s experiences of austerity. As noted by TUC (2015), employment changes, large scale changes to higher education, pay legislation, state support and access to housing for working-​age people, have all had an impact on working-​age women. Women between these ages were therefore recruited to allow for an understanding of how age compounds with class and other social markers to affect their different experiences of austerity. The sample encompassed mothers; disabled women; those working in full-​time and part-​time employment; studying in Higher Education; women who were unemployed; and those who were partially or wholly reliant on welfare support. 56 out of 61 women were born in the UK, with five women having multinational backgrounds: Benin, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Romania and Sierra Leone. The interview consisted of open questions based around four main themes: 1) women’s family background; 2) their lives in the present; 3) their discussions of the future; and 4) perceptions of and opinions

16

Introduction

about the crisis and austerity measures. The first theme aimed to recover the life story of the participants. Women were asked about their lives growing up (family background, mobility of the family, occupation of parents and level of education). They were then asked to describe their everyday lives (their occupation, where and with whom they lived, their leisure activities, and whether and how they identified themselves in class and ‘race’ terms6). These questions were important tools to give contrast to and sometimes challenge established discourses and representations, revealing, for instance, how social differences differentiate women’s experiences. These interviews provided insight, firstly, into how these women’s social trajectories differently position them in social space (Bourdieu, 1989), and secondly, how their position in social space shapes how austerity is experienced and negotiated. Moreover, the last two themes of the interviews —​women’s discussions about their future, and perceptions of, and opinions about, the crisis and austerity measures —​ also permitted further understanding of how austerity is lived and felt by women. For example, such questions allowed for an understanding of how austerity works as a series of moral–​political discourses and how these discourses are taken up and challenged. The complex nature of austerity commanded the shape of the research process. The messiness of austerity and its differing impacts on women’s lives meant that there had to be continuous changes of direction, adaptation, negotiation and adjustment, which took place at every stage of the research’s production. Often the interview moved from a structured to an unstructured agenda. This is because it was more important to let women steer the topic of conversation towards what they felt was most important in the context of austerity, than follow a prescribed list of questions. Two unexpected group discussions emerged when it became clear that asking some women to speak about their experiences in the intended way fostered anxiety and hesitation. For those women who are already required by the state to regularly give accounts of themselves, one-​to-​one interviews were not conducive to the non-​hierarchical interview setting that had been imagined. Speaking about their lives and experiences had often been tied to domination and techniques of surveillance by the administrative state (Steedman, 2000; Skeggs, 2015). This is particularly significant in the context of austerity and the fieldwork site we were in. These processes did not impinge on the research but, in contrast, became necessary in order to effectively research austerity and its impacts. The messiness of the research process mirrors the messiness of the concept of austerity and the various ways in which it unfolds in, and affects, a diverse group of women’s lives.

17

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Looking forward The central argument of this monograph is that austerity builds on histories which reproduce and legitimate material, symbolic and institutional violence in the present. It is thus crucial to situate austerity within its historical context in order to better understand the workings of austerity in the present, and how and why difference comes to matter in women’s experiences. Chapter  1, The Political Project of Austerity thus considers the social and political history of austerity in the UK. It begins with a historical contextualization of austerity as a repeating political project, exploring the ways in which the state has been put to use during different times of crisis and state regimes. This genealogy provides a gendered analysis of the workings of the state, highlighting how women have continually been used and/​or blamed. The remainder of the chapter focuses on the present era of UK austerity. Through the examination of policy documents and political discourse it examines how moral discourses that emanate from the state both justify changes to the welfare state and reinforce gendered, classed and ‘racial’ divisions inside the population. It is these arguments which provide a framework for critical dialogue in subsequent chapters. Austerity has real outcomes and gendered social effects. It is this symbiotic relationship  —​the role of the state in shaping women’s experiences —​that the remainder of the chapters of this book explore. This is since, as Georgina Waylen (1998) notes, actions cannot be understood outside of the structures that constrain them, just as those structures cannot be understood without some consideration of the impact of the choices made by actors (both in and outside of them) in creating and changing those structures. Chapter  2 Living In and With Austerity explores how austerity measures —​the consequences of welfare reform, increased levels of debt, increased pressure on household income and wages, and changes to employment —​have differently affected women’s everyday lives. Highlighting how changes to employment and living standards are impacted by class and other intersecting forms of social difference, this chapter demonstrates how austerity measures intensify and extend existing forms of inequality. Building on this argument, Chapter  3 Navigating Through Austerity reveals how women respond to and navigate through the effects of these measures. It highlights the commonalities in women’s navigation strategies, but also where and how these approaches diverge, with particular attention paid towards the strategies employed by single mothers.

18

Introduction

Chapter  4 and Chapter  5 explore how the symbolic nature of austerity, as a moral–​political project, is played out in women’s everyday lives. These chapters demonstrate how historical legacies survive, repeat and live with vengeance in the present context of austerity. Chapter 4 Austerity Talk unpacks the role of the state in reinforcing and producing social divisions, processes of discrimination, stigmatization, prejudice, exclusion and blame in the everyday. It explores the complex, contradictory and nuanced ways in which women who are closer to the stigmatized position of the ‘bad citizen’ simultaneously reproduce and reinforce moralistic narratives of economic productivity and moral worth and, at the same time, question and talk back to existing discourses through processes of distancing, blame, boundary formation and creation of alternative values. Chapter 5 Austerity and Feminism(s) draws on feminist identification to further examine austerity’s moral discourses. This chapter analyzes women’s understandings of, affiliations with, and positions within feminism to highlight how feminism has become a key site through which austerity discourse is both challenged and further reproduced. Chapter 6 Austerity Future(s)? changes its focus to reveal the ways in which austerity affects women’s access to different kinds of imagined and real futures. Making interventions into some of the more utopian and post-​political futures’ research and thinking, this chapter specifically reflects on the different ways in which austerity distributes social distress and anxiety. The concluding chapter summarizes the central themes from this book and discusses their implications for the role of the state in continuing to reproduce and legitimize gendered state violence. These discussions thus raise speculative questions about the human complexity of the imposition of austerity and the long-​term political and social consequences of creating a generation which has been led to suppose that austerity is somehow essential.

19

1

The Political Project of Austerity Austerity relies on histories and practices of gendered exploitation. (Bhattacharyya, 2015: 155) This chapter situates the present context of austerity within historical legacies that structure, reproduce and legitimize material and symbolic violence. In doing so, this chapter explores the complex social and political history of austerity in the UK and examines how the state has crafted and shaped gender and class relations within these different periodizations. Despite austerity being contested and complex, meaning different things in different periods (Bramall, 2013), unpacking and understanding this history is vital. This is since, as Raewyn Connell notes, ‘gender dynamics are a major force constructing the state, both in the historical creation of state structures and in contemporary politics’ (1990: 519). Without such an analysis, it would be difficult to comprehend the relationship between the state’s production of, and women’s navigation through, austerity, or understand how these legacies return and work on present day gendered experiences. The argument throughout this chapter is therefore as follows: while class and gender relations have clearly been reconfigured through different historical periods and crises in complicated and contradictory ways, certain central features remain. Working-​class women are repeatedly used, seen as a solution, blamed or labelled as the problem by the state in the interests of capital. It is this historical contextualization of austerity, as a repeating gendered political project, which informs a more nuanced understanding of austerity in the present, beyond its generic typology.

21

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

The crisis of 1929, the Depression and the ‘hungry thirties’ As Mark Blyth discusses in Austerity (2013), despite being so central to the governance of states and markets, austerity’s intellectual history is both short and shallow. Not readily apparent in the history of early economic thought, the conditions of austerity’s appearance —​parsimony, frugality, morality and a pathological fear of the consequences of government debt —​lie deep within economic liberalism’s fossil record from its very inception (Blyth, 2013: 115). Leaping back to the pre-​history of austerity and the early 17th-​century, liberal thinkers such as John Locke, David Hume and Adam Smith and their ideas concerning the role of the state, paved the way for such a project. In setting up markets as the antidote to the state, economic liberals believing in natural law, free trade, private property and the virtues of market equilibrium struggled to admit the necessity of states for the creation and preservation of markets. In the 19th century, liberal economists built upon the ideas of Locke, Hume and Smith. However, debates surrounding the role of the state remained. Tensions between two types of liberalism —​that of social reformers, who defended an ideal of the common good (such as Alexis Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill), and that of supporters of individual liberty as an absolute end (such as Herbert Spencer and David Ricardo) —​remained between 1880 and 1930. Nonetheless, the state had already begun changing its role in Britain. Due to the success of capitalism, a variety of social movements came forth, bringing with them demands for political representation, economic compensation and social protection. As Pierre Dardot and Christian Laval have explained, this context propelled liberalism into crisis —​the practical need for government intervention to confront organizational changes in capitalism, class conflicts that threatened ‘private property’ —​as well as the new international balance of power (2013: 22). Austerity as a policy appeared in its own right as a response to the crises of the 1920s. This was triggered by the collapse of the post-​war economic boom in 1921, increased competition from abroad, the disaster of the General Strike of 1926 and the decline in the mining and steel industries. The role of austerity in responding to this crisis was then enhanced in the 1930s, by attempts from the government to solve the catastrophic economic crisis of the UK Great Depression (1929–​39).1 The Treasury, which up to that point had continued with the laissez-​faire approach, proposed a series of temporary work programmes to help alleviate mass unemployment. Although the state

22

The Political Project of Austerity

seemed to be in a position to salvage the economic and social situation, the government retained the central role of reducing spending and monetary contraction. As Bill Janeway argues, ‘the constraining power of austerity ideas persisted: fear of loss of confidence, still limited action by a government exempt from external financial and political change’ (2012 in Blyth, 2013: 125). The iconic image of the Depression is ‘The Forgotten Man’: the newly poor, downwardly mobile, unemployed worker, often standing in a breadline. However, the crisis of 1929, the recession and the subsequent depression had a significant impact on women. By 1931, unemployment reached nearly three million —​23 per cent of male workers and 20 per cent of women workers were out of work. This cut across ‘skilled’ and ‘unskilled’ workers (Todd, 2014: 61). The industrial and mining areas in the north of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales were particularly hard hit by economic problems. By 1938, the unemployment rate in each of the basic heavy industries of coal, cotton, shipbuilding and steel was twice what it was in other forms of employment. In these areas and in these industries unemployment became an unavoidable way of life. Although the crisis triggered mass unemployment, the government’s response to the crisis was to cut costs. The first target of these cuts was the benefits paid to the unemployed. A man without work was entitled to benefits under the unemployment insurance scheme, known as the ‘dole’. This was paid for the first six months. The cuts to unemployment benefit were accompanied with a means test —​a measure which helped to suggest and reinforce the idea that individuals were culpable for their own poverty (Turvey, 2008; Todd, 2014). The household means test was instituted three years later in 1934, administered by Public Assistance Boards. The household means test reduced an unemployed person’s benefit if they shared a house with a wage earner (Todd, 2014). This resulted in wives and children often becoming responsible for supporting the family on extremely low wages. Focusing on dissuading the unemployed from being reliant on the state and providing incentives to work, Stanley Baldwin’s Conservative government rolled out a labour transfer scheme. This was later expanded under the National Government and meant that those men and women who found employment were forced to take up work miles away from their partners and families (Todd, 2014). These measures made it harder for individuals to ride the storm of the Depression. The increasingly punitive measures towards the unemployed were accompanied with a discourse from its architects that individuals were

23

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

to blame for their situation and were not financially responsible. In a way not dissimilar to the current context of austerity, Selina Todd (2014:  62) notes ‘there was a persistent assumption made by the powerful and privileged that the willful idleness of the poor caused poverty’. Households were increasingly monitored by officials  —​ inspectors or ‘relieving officers’ had the right to inspect unemployed persons’ homes to see if they had goods to sell before being eligible for benefit, or if they were spending money fecklessly. This caused stress, humiliation and indignity for these households. The media of the time also reinforced the narrative held by many political elites. In 1931 a Times Newspaper editorial glorified the means test, stating that the dole had become ‘an alternative source of almost permanent maintenance’ (Todd, 2014: 67). Families in receipt of such benefit were labelled by the media as being a ‘heavy burden to the tax payer’ and labelled a ‘workless breed’. Such language helped foster and reinforce resentment from working-​and middle-​class ratepayers. Unemployment and punitive measures towards families had an impact on maternal health —​in the mid-​1930s, due to the denigration of living standards, working-​class areas recorded ten maternal deaths per 1,000 live births (Todd, 2014: 85). During this time, the rate for the dole was 75p per week for man and wife and about 25p for each child. However, the British Medical Association estimated that a family of two adults and three children needed at least £1.12 a week for food. Characteristically, the response of the government and the media to this crisis of maternal health was to blame the victims, especially mothers. Todd (2014: 86) cites a Times Newspaper editorial from 1934, which blamed ‘the ignorance of many young mothers’ for their increased risk of death during childbirth. As debates on maternal health progressed towards the end of the decade, poor physical health was suggested to be due to a lack of exercise, not poverty. Neville Chamberlain (the Prime Minister at the time) proposed a national programme of ‘physical training’ to combat this. Many of those individuals or families who faced unemployment protested against their treatment. This most notably took the form of hunger marches, the Jarrow March of 1936 being one of the most enduring images of the period. Labour politicians, feminist campaigners, social investigators and writers also worked hard to highlight that poverty was caused by social inequality and was a common experience of working-​class life (see for example, Greenwood, 1934; Orwell, 1937; Temple, 1938; Spring Rice, 1939). This was despite some writers and investigators portraying working-​class men and women as ignorant or helpless victims, or reinforcing liberal rhetoric, whereby voluntary

24

The Political Project of Austerity

assistance or education was deemed as the solution to issues of poverty, rather than that of state intervention. Women were also blamed for the mass unemployment created by the Depression in industry and manufacturing. This reinforced the pressure to eradicate women from the workforce.2 During this period, the government set the unemployment benefit for women at a lower rate than that for men. Working-​class women, Sue Bruley (1999) notes, were therefore either unwillingly returned to unpopular and badly paid jobs, such as domestic service, or were placed there by Labour Exchanges. The alternative was starvation, as women were denied unemployment benefit if they refused to undertake such work. Middle-​ class women, however, largely benefited from increased opportunities in the labour market, in which women accounted for about a quarter of posts in the civil service by 1935. These were mostly at clerical and administrative grades, rather than the technical and professional jobs, which were still dominated by men. As with the return of working-​ class women to domestic roles, middle-​class women’s employment also helped to reinforce traditional stereotypes of what constituted women’s work (Ware, 1981). A revived ‘cult of domesticity’ also emerged during the 1930s, in keeping with the dominant (but contradictory) ideology of the times, dictating that the ideal housewife’s place was in the home (Ware, 1981). Women in their role as housewives and mothers were forced to make ends meet by maintaining the home on a limited budget (Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, 2000: 99). Required to take on even more important roles in their homes, women were therefore given extra obligations through the state transfer of responsibility, playing often unrecognized roles in helping the country through the Depression.

Austerity Britain Broadly defined, the periodization of ‘austerity Britain’ extends from the beginning of the Second World War through to the post-​war settlement and the final years of rationing in the mid-​1950s (Zweiniger-​ Bargielowska, 2000; Bramall, 2013). However, such timeframes have been contested. David Kynaston (2008) for example, defines this period as 1945–​51. Others note the reference as pertaining to ‘1940s austerity’ (Brown, 2009 in Bramall, 2013). The distinction, as Ina Zweiniger-​Bargielowska (2000) states, rests on the different political and economic imperatives that motivated rationing policies during and after the war. From 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill led a coalition government, which was the outcome of consensus

25

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

politics and a unifying war effort. A politics of austerity emerged in 1945 with Labour’s landslide victory, with rationing and controls in consumption —​the era of austerity through which reflections and links are often made in the present context. Thus, it is important to remember, as Rebecca Bramall helpfully points out, that ‘the question of when austerity was, and therefore of the politics of austerity to which are being referred, can figure as another destabilising element in contemporary discourse’ (2013: 7). The Second World War is often referred to as ‘the people’s war’. Yet, Todd notes that ‘the myth that the war was characterised by the elision of class distinctions as all strata of British society pulled together in the face of a common foe is false’ (2014: 140). The heroic evaluations that were necessary to incite nationalistic eagerness and enthusiasm would often slip into devaluations of working-​class soldiers as ‘unhygienic cannon fodder’ (Skeggs, 2014b). However, the war did have a progressive impact on British society. The necessity of enrolling the physical and emotional support of millions of workers in the cause of total war led the state to condone the inculcation of a sense of the greater good to justify the sacrifice of lives and conditions. As Todd puts it: the legitimacy of social inequality was constantly, if subtly challenged by the war effort … in view of the increasingly heroic positions that working-​class soldiers, munitions workers and thrifty housewives assumed in both press and propaganda, it was no longer tenable after 1945 to argue that the lower orders should know their place. (2014: 140) Housewifery and motherhood acquired an enhanced sense of national importance. The successful implementation of rationing, ‘fair shares’ and other economy measures was vital in maintaining public health and morale, and so housewifery, no longer regarded as a private concern, became a central component of the war effort and post-​war reconstruction (Minns, 1980; Noakes, 1998; Zweiniger-B ​ argielowska, 2000). Despite reinforcing traditional gender roles, the housewife’s battle on the kitchen/​home front was understood to be as critical to victory as that of the soldier or the worker in essential industry. However, this sense of importance also came with judgement when working-​class women were seen as not producing their menfolk as quality artillery (Skeggs, 2014b). Women had to adjust their housewifery skills and child-​rearing techniques to the altered circumstances. Nonetheless, the idea of

26

The Political Project of Austerity

a ‘common purpose’ and ‘shared sacrifice’ across the nation was not actually a reality for women. ‘This disproportionate sacrifice’, Zweiniger-Bargielowska writes, ‘frequently shielded men as well as children from the full impact of the reduction in consumption’ (2000: 149). Despite the fact that rationing reduced income differentials in consumption standards, these were by no means eliminated and class differences in vital statistics persisted virtually unchanged. Especially during the early war years, those with money could still afford delicacies (Bentley, 1998; Todd, 2014). Kynaston (2008) draws on mass observation diaries and interviews to discuss the hunger, dirt, damp and sacrifice, which was indicative of working-​class women’s experiences during this period (also see Garfield, 2005). The reality of many working-​class women’s lives at that time was of queues, shortages and the struggle to combine domestic responsibilities with some form of paid work (Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, 2000: 149–​50). The role of housewife and mother became central to the policy of austerity and a basis of female citizenship. Responsible for putting austerity into effect daily, the government had to muster housewives’ and mothers’ co-​o peration to implement the austerity policy successfully. The importance of female contribution was highlighted through the unprecedented outpouring of propaganda reinforcing the idea that women’s housewifery skills and child-​rearing techniques were extremely important to the wartime conditions, national identity and citizenship (Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, 2000: 99). For instance, in 1943, the Board of Trade urged Britons to ‘Make Do and Mend’. The leaflets and posters reminded housewives that ‘a neatly patched garment is something to be proud of nowadays’, rather than a shameful sign of poverty. ‘Making do’ was no novelty for working-​class women, but it was a novelty to be praised rather than vilified for their initiative (Todd, 2014:  140). Yet women were not passive recipients of government policy and propaganda. Attitudes varied depending on the policy, as well as the income group. This changed over time as wartime patriotic acceptance gave way to disillusionment and discontent among many housewives during the late 1940s (Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, 2000: 99–​ 100; also see Garfield, 2005). Housewives became a major political force after the war and their discontent with the continuation of austerity had important political and electoral consequences. Although praised for their efforts, expressions of anxiety about women’s sexual morality were framed by constructions of national identity and the ideals of citizenship. There was an upsurge of public concern about immorality on the part of women, with ‘talk about young women whose behavior was threatening to populate the country

27

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

with illegitimate babies, some of whom could well be black’ (Rose, 1998: 1147). Fears of sex and interracial marriage between black men and white women has a long cultural history. Sonya Rose (1998) drawing on the work of Ann Laura Stoler (1995) argues that rather than maintaining the boundaries of empire, in this context, the empire ‘came home’ when non-​white colonial troops were stationed in Britain. A national fantasy was therefore constructed by the government and propagated in newspapers across the country, which depicted some women as ‘antithetical to the nation, especially those women whose amorous escapades were so perverse as to jeopardize the nation’s racial homogeneity. It simultaneously incorporated virtuous women and all men as comrades in struggle’ (Rose, 1998: 1176). Rose continues: although class differentiated which women were made the targets of overt policies of social control, public expressions of apprehension about women who frolicked with soldiers constituted a normalizing discourse that had as its goal the making of female moral citizens appropriate to fighting a ‘people’s war’, and building a ‘new Britain’ when it was over. (Rose, 1998) This was in contrast to ‘internal others’ (or ‘anti-​citizens’) which the nation defined itself against.

State-​managed capitalism and the family wage State-​managed capitalism emerged from the Great Depression and the Second World War. Named by its original architects as a ‘cradle-​ to-​g rave’ safety net for citizens, the welfare state was understood to protect citizens from the risks of the markets, while supplying welfare-​enhancing collective goods  —​diffusing the contradiction between economic production and social reproduction. Nancy Fraser (2016: 109) notes that ‘the creation of the state-​managed regime was a matter of saving the capitalist system from its own self-​destabilizing propensities –​as well as from the spectre of revolution in an era of mass mobilization’. She goes on to explain: productivity and profitability required the ‘biopolitical’ cultivation of a healthy, educated workforce with a stake in the system, as opposed to a ragged revolutionary rabble. Public investment in health care, schooling, childcare, and

28

The Political Project of Austerity

old-​age pensions, supplemented by corporate provision, was perceived as a necessity in an era in which capitalist relations had penetrated social life to such an extent that the working classes no longer possessed the means to reproduce themselves on their own. In this situation, social reproduction had to be internalized, brought within the officially managed domain of the capitalist order. Accepting unionization, which brought higher wages, and public-​ sector spending, which created jobs, policy-​makers reinvented the household as a private space for the domestic consumption of mass-​ produced objects of daily use. As Fraser illustrates, ‘linking the assembly line with working-​class familial consumerism, on the one hand, and with state-​supported reproduction, on the other, this Fordist model forged a novel synthesis of marketization and social protection’ (109). However, it was, above all, the working classes  —​ both women and men —​who led the struggle for public provision, wanting full membership in society as democratic citizens. Therefore ‘unlike the protective legislation of the liberal regime, the state-​capitalist settlement resulted from a class compromise and represented a democratic advance. Unlike its predecessor, too, the new arrangements served, at least for some and for a while, to stabilize social reproduction’ (109). Gender and racial hierarchy was not absent from these arrangements. Unequal gender relations (as well as ‘race’, disability, age and sexuality) underpin ‘welfare regimes, their outcomes, the organisation of labour … the delivery of services, political pressures and ideologies and patterns of consumption’ (Williams, 1994:  50 in Jensen and Tyler, 2015: 3). It is therefore, as Fraser argues, ‘important to register the constitutive exclusions that made these achievements possible. Such a regime financed social entitlements in part by ongoing expropriation from the periphery’ (2016: 110). As in earlier regimes, the defence of social reproduction in the core was entangled with (neo)imperialism. Explaining one example of expropriation, Beverley Skeggs states that ‘it was the brutal British colonization of Malaysia and the $118 million dollars made through indentured Chinese and Indian labour that provided the money for the development of the UK welfare state’ (2014b: no pagination). In addition, the accommodation of a class compromise benefited only certain sections of the working class, particularly skilled white men, in which its ‘racialised and gendered character generated a hierarchy of oppression’ (Bakshi et al., 1995: 1548). As Amina Mama describes:

29

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

the history of the development of welfare and the circumscribed nature of access to it demonstrates that provision has always been constituted along social divisions. Class, race and gender discrimination have often operated through notions and judgements about who are ‘really deserving’ and who are ‘undeserving’. In short, the welfare state has never existed universally for the public, but has operated to exclude minorities and uphold dominant ideologies about the family, motherhood and sexuality, often behaving punitively and coercively towards … marginalised groups through various ideological mechanisms and administrative practices. (1992: 86) In the US, for example, the welfare system took a dualized form. On the one hand, it was divided into stigmatized poor relief for (‘white’) women and children lacking access to a male wage; on the other, respectable social insurance for those constructed as ‘workers’ (see Fraser, 1989; Brenner and Laslett, 1991). By contrast, in the UK benefits were available to individuals deemed ‘public persons’ by virtue of their participation —​usually claimed by men —​and dependents of ‘public persons’ (also known as ‘private persons’) —​ usually women (Pateman, 1988). This was further compounded by ‘race’ and immigration status. The discriminatory nature of the welfare state is perhaps most clearly felt by black women. As citizens and consumers, they have experienced most keenly the fact that ‘healthcare, education, housing, social security and social services have been differentially delivered’ (Mama, 1992: 86, also see Misra and Akins, 1998). Thus, the broad tendency of state-​managed capitalism was to ‘valorise the heteronormative, male-​b readwinner, female-​h omemaker model of the gendered family’ (Fraser, 2016: 111). These norms are reinforced by public investment in social reproduction. However, the gendered, classed, and ‘racial’ order of state-​managed capitalism also contributed to its contradictions and its breakdown. Despite the prosperity created by the welfare state, a cultural and political crisis in the late 1960s and early 1970s marked a period of disillusionment with the status quo. The so-​called ‘capitalist–​citizen accord’ broke down in the 1960s. Mass social movements  —​civil rights, women’s liberation and anti-​war movements —​were part of this change. In addition, according to Dardot and Laval (2013: 152), the ‘virtuous’ model of Fordist growth came up against its endogenous limits, with the slowdown in productivity as a result of the balance of

30

The Political Project of Austerity

industrial power and subsequent high unemployment. The coexistence of the two phenomena —​high inflation and high unemployment —​ seemed to discredit the tools of economic policy, in particular, the positive impact of public expenditure on the level of demand and the level of activity, starting with the level of employment (Dardot and Laval, 2013). Stagflation —​high inflation combined with high unemployment and stagnant demand in a country’s economy —​seemed to sign the death certificate of the Keynesian art of ‘managing the conjuncture’, which assumed a trade-​off between inflation and recession (Evans and Sewell Jr, 2013). The 1973 Arab oil embargo, precipitated by pro-​Israeli US involvement in the Yom Kippur war and the extended stagflation following Richard Nixon’s withdrawal from the Bretton Woods accord3 led to a stock market crash and a deep recession from late 1973 to 1975. The states of advanced capitalist countries initially responded to the economic crisis of the 1970s with initiatives that were variants of existing state-​centric policies —​for example, fiscal stimulus programmes, extension of social spending, or income policies. When the cultural and political crisis was compounded by an economic crisis in the early 1970s, the state-​centred synthesis of the post-​war political and economic world began to come apart (Evans and Sewell Jr, 2013). The individualist and anti-​state bias offered fruitful ground for a renewal of a wide variety of liberal political ideas, and enabled the move away from Keynesianism, shattering the belief in the capacity of government regulation of markets.

The neoliberal state and financialized capitalism Like the liberal regime before it, the state-​managed capitalist order dissolved in the course of a protracted crisis during the 1970s. Neoliberalism entered the political field in the UK: On the one hand, via the budgetary constraints imposed on a reluctant Labour government by the International Monetary Fund (by this time hijacked and steered by neoliberal principles) as a condition of assistance with the financial chaos of the seventies, and on the other hand, and in the long run more consequentially, through the upheavals within the Conservative party in opposition wherein the perceptual schemes of the future Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, were fashioned and eventually triumphant. (Atkinson, 2013a:4)

31

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Stuart Hall developed the concepts of ‘authoritarian populism’ and ‘traditionalism’ to understand and interpret the legacy of Thatcherism (1979–​90). As Kirsten Forkert notes in Austerity as Public Mood (2017: 39), and as will be shown later in this chapter, such concepts help us to understand some of the continuities in the last 40 years, especially how austerity is built on discourse that appeals to nostalgic concepts of work, morality and community, which divisively position some as outsiders. According to Hall (1988a), the ideology of ‘authoritarian populism’ was employed to reach out to big and small businesses, the middle class, and parts of the working class, drawing on racialized nationalist spirit and advocating a return to Victorian values of discipline, restraint and morality. The agenda’s distinctive elements, Satnam Virdee (2014: 147–​8) explains, ‘emphasised self-​reliance over government intervention, of individualism over collectivism, and a racializing nationalism underpinned by shared allegiance to cultural homogeneity’. This vision, Virdee continues, ‘was counterposed by Thatcher to the unassimilable, the enemy within, made up variously of racialized minorities, trade unions, socialists, feminists and other alleged “social deviants”’ (148, also see Hall and Jacques, 1983). It was in this context that the ‘underclass’, irredeemable ‘other’ re-​appeared. Law-​and-​order politics were used as the ‘legal apparatus’ for ‘containing social and industrial conflict’ (Hall, 1988a: 136), which helped to dismantle the trade unions when working-​class men became the ‘enemy within’. Law-​and-​order politics were also employed to combat the alleged increase of mugging and street crime. Mugging was presented as a key element in the moral panic over the breakdown of law and order, and it was the ‘black mugger’ who was used to symbolize the threat of violence (Hall et al., 1978). State racism ‘was a crucial ingredient in the toxic cocktail that Thatcherism was constructing around its authoritarian populist agenda, a racism where blackness and Britishness were reproduced as mutually exclusive categories’ (Virdee, 2014: 149; also see Gilroy, 1987). Violence and crime thus became synonymous with ‘un-​British’ ‘alien cultures’, the implication being that they were committed by ‘outsiders’. In this way, the public could be persuaded that ‘immigrants’ rather than the capitalist system, caused society’s problems of high unemployment and crippling recession. The working class thus became effectively divided on racial grounds —​the white working class was encouraged to direct its frustrations towards the black working class for ‘taking’ their jobs, housing and public services. Work was central to this ‘traditionalism’, since it brought together different lived experiences, feelings and ideas  —​work as meaning

32

The Political Project of Austerity

employment, self-​discipline and the work of compliance of social norms (Forkert, 2017: 42). In a context of resentment and anxiety about social change, benefit claimants were positioned against those who were conforming to social norms (see Hall, 1988a, 1988b). Hall (1988a) notes how anyone who benefited from the welfare state, in particular the figure of the claimant, was seen as ‘soft’ and ‘dependant’. Thatcher called on the public to be tough, resourceful, disciplined, and to put up with hardship and sacrifice. Forkert (2017) states how Hall drew attention to the language of ‘hardness’ versus ‘softness’ in Thatcher’s rhetoric, noting how the metaphor of the ‘economy as a household’ was suggestive of traditional gender roles (see 1988a). The thesis argued that the coherence of ‘Thatcherism’ rests on its creation of a seamless repressive ideology that placed women firmly in the home. Despite its importance in understanding the climate of Thatcherism and austerity, the ‘Thatcherism’ thesis, as discussed by Jean Gardiner (1983) and Elizabeth Wilson (1987), was vulnerable in relation to women. The Thatcher government used women in complex ways and it cannot therefore be suggested that during the crisis and era of Thatcherism that women were only associated with the domestic sphere. ‘Thatcher, and the neoliberal resistance to extensive welfare provision by the state’, Mary Evans (2016: 443) points out, ‘brought into a central political focus two pictures of womanhood’. This, Evans goes on to say, was on the one hand, the affluent, ‘emancipated’ woman, and on the other, the ‘thrifty housewife’. Women were therefore being asked to ‘spend liberally’ and ‘provide for themselves’, ‘supporting the two central tenets of the neo-​liberal state’ (443). Yet, during this context, some women were more able to take on these roles than others. Policies pursued by the Conservative government did not affect women uniformly. Instead, policies widened the gap between better-​off women and those at the bottom of the employment hierarchy, especially black and minority ethnic women. This was, in large part, due to the loss of women’s jobs in the manufacturing sector. For instance, as Angela Weir and Elizabeth Wilson (1984: 93) note, ‘decline in manufacturing meant that there were fewer jobs for the poorest women, which was not offset by the increasing size of the service sector. It was also in manufacturing that relative pay declined most rapidly’. For black working-​class women, racism and, for some, their immigrant status made them even more vulnerable. Privatization and pauperization accelerated and intensified during the crisis as a result of the government’s general economic strategy and policies pursued in order to create a low-​wage economy. However, the government defended part-​time work as a solution for women, arguing that such

33

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

work was what the women of Britain wanted, since it fitted in with their domestic responsibilities. The rhetoric of choice and freedom was used to mask the reality of super-​exploitation and falling real incomes. Alongside the discussion of choice and freedom, the rhetoric of ‘the family’ was also used to provide an ideological legitimation for the recession and austerity policies. The philosophy stressed the need to return responsibility and choice to the family, both of which it claimed had been eroded by the growth of the welfare state. However, the practical effects of austerity policies associated with the philosophy were, for example, lowering the real value of benefits and privatizing services. Women were disproportionately affected by these cuts in health, education, housing and social services. Therefore, as Wilson summarizes, the Thatcher welfare picture was, broadly speaking, similar to the situation found in women’s employment: while the underlying imperative of Tory policies is the desire to cut back public spending, to privatise and to increase productivity, the results bear disproportionately upon women. Women are less likely –​particularly if they have young children –​to be earning a full-​time wage, and their consequent poverty makes them both more dependent on state welfare and more exposed to its growing deficiencies. (1987: 222) Emphasis was laid more on the parental control of children, and on the family as the central institution in an individualistic and competitive society, which, at times, called for a return to patriarchal values. Lone mothers were understood as a social threat, cast ‘as a drain on public expenditure and as a threat to the stability and order associated with the traditional two-​parent family’ (Kiernan et al., 1998: 2). At that time the media became increasingly hostile to lone mothers, (especially Afro-​ Caribbean single mothers), exemplified by headlines such as ‘Wedded to Welfare’ and ‘Do They Want to Marry a Man or the State’ (Sunday Times, 11 July 1993). Parents, especially working-​class single mothers, were blamed for juvenile delinquency and the decay of morals.

New Labour state Although Bill Clinton and Tony Blair were critical of the excesses of Reagan and Thatcher, it was during the peak of their leadership, from the late 1990s to 2000s, that a thoroughgoing neoliberal international policy regime was codified and organizationally instantiated in bodies

34

The Political Project of Austerity

like the World Trade Organization (Brenner et al., 2010). Although the material, symbolic and political landscapes changed very little during this period, there were certain contradictions with regard to the shaping of gender and class relations. Citizenship became redesigned around work and worklessness, and inclusion and exclusion. Paid work was regarded as a moral duty, an important component of good citizenship in an advanced, globalized, multicultural, liberal, modern society. In particular, paid work and the ability to consume became traits of the ideal subject: the autonomous, independent, self-​regulating individual who takes responsibility for managing his or her own risks and those of their family. This, Linda McDowell (2008: 155–6​ ) argues, radically changed the meaning of motherhood. While femininity, domesticity and mothering used to be inextricably intertwined, the ‘good mother’ transitioned into a mother who entered the labour market to raise her income for the benefit of her children, and who no longer occupied the home as a continuous presence. This was accompanied by the introduction of active labour market policies that combined ideas about national competitiveness with policies to challenge social exclusion (McDowell et al., 2006). This had also been supplemented by the filling of the ‘care gap’, by typically racialized migrant workers. It was in the context of New Labour (1997–​2010) that the white working class were characterized as an obstruction to what Chris Haylett (2001) terms ‘multicultural modernization’, labelled as ‘poor abject whites’, reproducing the historical division of respectable and abject within the working class (Skeggs, 2004). Socially excluded individuals were perceived as needing to be ‘helped or coerced to become included citizens’ (Gillies, 2005: 838). Both national and local government policies emphasized cultural changes through policies of re-​education, parenting classes and even lessons in dress codes, to facilitate their re-​inclusion in ‘normal’ (for which read middle-​ class) society (Haylett, 2001). For instance, within the Sure Start programme, which provided childcare and other forms of support to parents (especially single women in cities identified as disadvantaged), working-​class women were discursively defined as inadequate and socially excluded. This was seen as being a result of their social and cultural attitudes, rather than their poverty (McDowell, 2004). Such rhetoric, Skeggs asserts, reveals that whiteness does not naturally predispose people to social privilege and success while making the figural association between black and working class

35

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

disappear (Haylett, 2001). This unhinging, as Hall (1996) demonstrates, enables culture to become the defining feature of race. (2005: 972) This demonstrates a shift from naming the working class as ‘underclass’, a racialized and irredeemable ‘other’, to naming them ‘the excluded’, a culturally determined but recuperable ‘other’, which, as Haylett argues, ‘was pivotal to the recasting of Britain as a post-​imperial, modern nation’ (2001: 351). This shift, Christy Kulz (2014:  156) notes shows how ‘categorisation can temporally shift and do different work’. Punitive policies were deployed by the government to manage these citizens, limiting financial or material aid so as to make citizens take responsibility for their own welfare. This was done, in part, through civil orders such as Anti-​Social Behaviour Orders (ASBO’s), Parental Orders (POs) and Individual Behaviour Orders (IBOs), which treated working-​class cultures as both lacking and pathological (Skeggs, 2009: 38; also see Haylett, 2001; Tyler, 2013a). Such punitive and disciplinary orders reinforced the myth that poverty could be reduced, and social equality improved, by changing the attitudes and behaviour of the ‘workless’. Loïc Wacquant, who identified the spread of what he calls the new penal or ‘carceral state’, argues that liberal democracies of the global North have transformed into authoritarian ‘Daddy States’, characterized in policy by ‘the new priority given to duties over rights, sanction over support [and] the stern rhetoric of the “obligations of citizenship” ’ (2010: 201). In the US, he says, this is done through the process of incarceration, which developed initially as a backlash against the social advances made by the black and white working class. He argues that it offers a new meaning to poor relief, ‘not to the poor, but from the poor, by forcibly “disappearing” the most disruptive of them’ (204). Despite the introduction of social reforms that were aimed at women and employment opportunities, New Labour amplified the shaping of class, ‘race’ and gender relations through disciplinary moral ‘cultural’ reform. Women were brought forward in their capacity as independent citizen workers in the interests of global capitalism. Yet racialized neoliberal state regulation enabled class to take new shapes and form new relationships via culture, representing (white) working-​class women as having nothing to offer, as being un-​modern, with a valueless culture, at the edges of the nation (Skeggs, 2004).

36

The Political Project of Austerity

Legitimizing contemporary austerity through state discourse It is by looking back at these historical legacies that we can look to, and understand, the present. To reflect on the ways in which these legacies work upon and shape contemporary gender and class relations, a thorough analysis needs to be undertaken —​one which studies the state and its shaping of social relations in detail. The remainder of this chapter does just that, examining how moral discourses that emanate from the state both justify changes to the welfare system and shape and reinforce gendered and classed divisions inside the population. State discourses often carry more weight than other discourses, since they are official and are viewed, often accepted, as being authorized and legitimate accounts (Bourdieu, 2014; Crossley, 2016). The state therefore has the power to create social divisions and to reproduce social identities through its dominant discourse, categorizations and judgments (see Bourdieu, 2014). Despite being socially and historically specific —​not mapping onto the realities of people’s everyday lives —​ the proliferation of discourse, beliefs and ideas are legitimized by their seemingly universal and natural appearance. The state thus becomes centrally involved in the (re)production of symbolic domination and symbolic violence, in which arbitrary relations of power are masked by the naturalized process of naming and categorizing (Bourdieu, 1987; Loyal, 2014). These categories and discourses thus impact on how people can live and plan their lives, as well as how they imagine themselves and others. Such categories and discourses therefore need to be de-​naturalized and framed within specific contextual power struggles. The focus of the rest of this chapter will be on this task, drawing on discourses that contextualize subsequent chapters, and will provide a framework for critical dialogue.

‘All in this together’? The unity of ‘we’ By engineering the deficit as being the fault of the nation, it became ‘our’ responsibility to help dissolve it. To enact this agenda, the coalition government employed the discourse of ‘we are all in this together’ (Osborne, 2009, 2010a, 2012, 2015; Cameron, 2010), aimed at generating feelings of collective pain sharing. This strengthened the idea of a nation united in the face of adversity and moved beyond something that was purely a concern of the state. As Liam Stanley (2013) has noted, one way in which this was enacted was to liken

37

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

the capacity and finances of the state to a household. When the state is likened to a household it appears that we are all to blame for the crisis. Reducing debt is therefore experienced as a moral imperative, since we all need to live within our means. Framed in this way, every individual is responsible for balancing the books, and called upon to be frugal, productive and responsible. By doing so together, everyone helps recovery by sharing the pain. Similar to the post-​war austerity discourse discussed in a previous section of this chapter, this ‘national unity’ solicits consensus and cross-​class cooperation and aims to head off resistance and complaint. It is also arguably used to appease opposition, to manage dissent and to blur inequalities of resources of all kinds (Bramall, 2013; Tasker and Negra, 2013). This is even though we are not all in this together, due to the unequal distribution of spending cuts and the privileging of certain gendered practices and subject positions.

The ‘striver’ and ‘skiver’: the language of the welfare debate In the re-​writing of the reasons for the crisis, binary imaginaries have been used to discuss the welfare state, and show why the benefits system should be reformed. Binary divisions, as emphasized in this chapter, have a long history, and as Tracey Jensen (2014:  2.3) argues, ‘are complex and multiple –​some recycled and reanimated from the zombie category of the “underclass” (so-​called because despite sociological attempts to “kill it off” with evidence, it keeps returning: see MacDonald, Shildrick, and Furlong 2014), while other terms are relatively new’. The figure of crisis in the current welfare debate is ‘the skiver’, gaining traction because of its connotations with criminality, fraud and worklessness. Inheriting the ideological baggage of preceding abject figures, the skiver has become a catchall term for figures of social disgust (the single mother, the immigrant, the unemployed, and most recently, the sick and disabled) imagined in opposition to the ‘striver’  —​the hard-​working citizen. George Osborne exemplified this binary in 2012 stating: Where is the fairness … for the shift worker, leaving home in the dark hours of the early morning, who looks up at the closed blinds of their next-​door neighbour sleeping off a life on benefits. When we say we’re all in this together, we speak for that worker. We speak of all those who want to work hard and get on … They strive for a better life. We strive to help them. (No pagination)

38

The Political Project of Austerity

This binary therefore creates two types of people, one that ‘strives for a better life’ and one that ‘sleep[s]‌off a life on benefits’. These figures, Jensen argues, are ‘re-​imagined as static testimony to a perverse welfare system that rewards irresponsibility and punishes commitment’ (2014: 2.5). Despite the repeated claim that ‘we are all in this together’, the notion of togetherness becomes conditional upon being in paid employment. The obligations of citizenship, which, as demonstrated previously, have always been open for contestation, intensify in this context, built upon nostalgic and socially conservative ideas of work and community. ‘Good citizens’ are held up as helping the nation recover from the crisis by being autonomous, individualized, economically productive and fitting with conservative social norms of good behaviour. For Osborne (2011: no pagination) ‘it is the strivers, the entrepreneurs, the engineers, the innovators, the savers, who create growth’. Employed strivers, Osborne infers, contribute towards the economic recovery —​they go beyond what is required, since the striver ‘innovates, engineers and saves’. The striver can be read in heavily gendered terms: the need to be thrifty, to save, but also generate growth. Thrift and resourcefulness, for example, works for an era of adjusted economic realities. But women not only need to save, but generate growth. Pointing to the contradictory nature of this idealized subject position, Evans notes, ‘as far as the purposes of present-​day capitalism are concerned, that women continue to spend money as active consumers is crucial. Far from saving the string, we are now exhorted to buy new string as often as possible’ (2013: 839). The ideal citizen is thus called upon to ‘work hard’ in all areas of life: at home, at work and on the high street. The cutting of welfare is therefore done to help these ‘hard-​working people’, since as Cameron continues, ‘dealing with the deficit, getting our economy moving, increasing the level of responsibility in our society and getting on the side of hard-​working people’ becomes what ‘matters the most’ to the government (2012b: no pagination). Unity is therefore enacted against individuals that are described as ‘sleeping off a life on benefits’ and who, it is implied, are not playing by the rules, not working hard or matching up to what is required by the government and the nation. Within this context, benefit use is constructed as a matter of choice. As Cameron stated in 2011:  ‘if the State is paying them more not to work, it becomes a rational choice to sit at home on the sofa’ (2011a:  no pagination). This was accompanied by an emphasis on ‘something-​for-​nothing culture’, reinforcing the

39

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

notion that individuals claiming benefits take but do not contribute to society. These ‘bad citizens’ are therefore not seen as playing a full part in society because they are not in paid work. This further constructs the idea that the number of benefit claimants is not due to Britain’s economic situation, but to a culture in which individuals choose not to work. It suggests that unemployment is a matter of personal choice: the fault of the skiver. Binary thinking therefore invades the discourse of ‘we are all in this together’ and results in the discourse of striver versus skiver becoming central to furthering the austerity programme. These distinctions help to legitimate the uneven distribution of spending cuts, and win approval for otherwise unpopular economic policies, such as punitive welfare-​to-​work programmes. ‘It is through imagining or inventing anxieties about the scheming deceits of those entitled to social protection’, Jensen (2014: 2.3) argues, ‘that such entitlements become easier to undermine and dismantle’.

A revolution in responsibility Furthering the previous argument, welfare has been framed within two different state discourses. First, individuals are understood as rational economic actors, who choose to be workless, and second, they are represented as ‘passive victims’ of a dysfunctional welfare system. These discourses effect the powerful narrative of state and personal failure around welfare, which is re-​cast as an expensive, lumbering and ineffective system that rewards wilful worklessness and generates dependency. In 2011, Cameron discussed the need for ‘a social recovery’ in Britain: my mission in politics –​the thing I am really passionate about  –​is fixing the responsibility deficit. That means building a stronger society, in which more people understand their obligations, and more take control over their own lives and actions. (2011a: no pagination) Supplanted with moral rhetoric about conduct and behaviour, the ‘responsibility deficit’ suggests, for instance, that people are unemployed because of their own welfare dependence, culture of entitlement and irresponsibility, rather than because of a range of external factors such as redundancies, high job competition and a lack of jobs. Similar to other periods of crisis, individual behaviours are thus imagined as the problem of political and economic crisis and these ‘bad/​failed’ subjects are

40

The Political Project of Austerity

projected as a sinister threat to civility that must be controlled, corrected or kept at bay (Tyler, 2013b). This diminishes sympathy towards the victims of spending cuts, as they become positioned as the ‘undeserving poor’ who should not be entitled to welfare support. This discourse suppresses the moral question of unfairly targeting people in need of social security, and it justifies the notion that the welfare system is, as Osborne stated in 2010, ‘morally indefensible’ without reform. To restore this lack of responsibility, to quote Cameron, there was an emphasis on the need for ‘a massive step change’ and a ‘revolution in (personal, parental, social, and civic) responsibility’ (2011a:  no pagination). The family, once again, becomes one of the central means by which this ‘revolution in responsibility’ can be implemented. Cameron (2011b: no pagination) notes: Strong families are where children learn to become responsible people. When you grow up in a strong family, you learn how to behave, you learn about give and take. You learn about responsibility. The ‘strong’ —​read ‘nuclear’ —​family, is envisioned to be able to instil responsibility, morals and the values needed to fix ‘Broken Britain’. Feminist scholars have highlighted how the ‘good mother’ of the strong family —​the responsible, resilient, middle-​class mother —​reflects the norms of contemporary citizenship. As Kim Allen and Yvette Taylor (2012) explain, the good mother not only withstands the consequences of the recession, but at the same time helps to reinvigorate the economy and society by governing themselves and their children in the ‘right’ ways. This normative view of good parenting, Shani Orgad and Sara De Benedictis (2015: 421) stress, is ‘predicated on self-​governance of certain gendered selves and [being] interlinked with the economy is intimately connected to the intensifying entanglement of mothering and neoliberalism’. This ideal is placed in opposition to the ‘broken family’ —​read lone parent —​which is shaped in heavily gendered, classed and racialized terms. The mother of the so-​called broken family is regarded as an inevitable failure, marked with negative value, who has not fulfilled the new social contract of the government. This relationship between responsibility, motherhood and society can be seen through the depiction of the ‘feral’ parent —​a figure which gained traction in the aftermath of the 2011 riots, combining discourses surrounding dirty whiteness, ‘gang’ culture and black families. Discussing this figure, De Benedictis (2012: 1) highlights how austerity discourse positioned

41

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

the feral parent as being to blame for the riots, having failed her children, herself and Britain through her parenting decisions. Deemed as a ‘counterpoint to “ordinary” (and middle-​class) whiteness’, De Benedictis notes how the discourses of the strong family and the feral parent work alongside each other to implicitly and oppositionally mark the strong family with ‘ordinary’, middle-​class whiteness. The feral parent is therefore held up as a justification for cuts and welfare reform, since it is her lack of responsibility, fostered by the welfare state, that has resulted in her inability to care and provide for her children. Reliance on welfare thus becomes synonymous with failure, irresponsibility, laziness and unemployment. The reality television series Benefits Street (Love Productions), especially the central protagonist in the show ‘White Dee’, have been used as further ‘evidence’ for the need of such reforms by political elites. As Conservative MP Philip Davies (Cooper, 2014: no pagination) argued in 2014: Every time people look at White Dee … it will serve as a reminder to people of the mess the benefits system is in and how badly Iain Duncan Smith’s reforms are needed. White Dee is bone idle and doesn’t want to work another day in her life and has no intention of finding a job. Labelled as bone idle, the figure of White Dee serves to justify the need to reform the system, but also as feminist scholars have noted, inscribe cultural, economic and moral value with the middle-​class, white, heterosexual, married, responsible parent (Allen and Taylor, 2012; De Benedictis, 2012; Jensen and Tyler, 2012; Allen et al., 2014). In January 2014, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan-​Smith, used Benefits Street to justify his series of reforms. Yet, in contrast to the discussion from Philip Davies MP mentioned earlier, Duncan-​Smith argued that the show exposed ‘the hidden reality’ of the lives of people ‘trapped’ on state benefits (2014). The welfare system has also been blamed for allowing migrants to ‘fill the gap in the labour market left wide open by a welfare system’ (Cameron, 2011a: no pagination). Thus, it is claimed that reforming the ‘woeful welfare system [will] end welfare as a trap’ (Duncan-​Smith, 2011a:  no pagination) and will also help to control immigration. The Welfare Reform Bill (2011) represents the implementation of such reforms as helping to end ‘wasted lives, wasted money, the end of a system, which keeps people in poverty and dependency’ (Duncan-S​ mith, 2011a: no pagination). Benefit claimants are therefore constructed as both rational economic actors able to play the system

42

The Political Project of Austerity

and shirk their responsibility to work, and victims trapped in welfare dependency. Both discourses, however, legitimate the same action: the uneven distribution of cuts. The former discourse justifies spending cuts to reintroduce responsibility into the ‘dysfunctional’ lives of those reliant on benefit income, the latter discourse justifies the same spending cuts to prevent welfare becoming a ‘trap’.

Fairness for the job seeker; fairness for the taxpayer Welfare reform, it is also argued, establishes a fairer relationship between those who ‘take benefits’ and those who ‘pay for them’. The state discourse of ‘fairness’ therefore not only strengthens the legitimacy of the uneven distribution of cuts, but also helps to further the inequality of the austerity programme. According to Cameron (2012b:  no pagination), there is a ‘welfare gap in this country between those living long-​term in the welfare system and those outside it’: Take two young women living on the same street in London. One studied hard at college for three years and found herself a full-​time job –​say as a receptionist –​on £18,000 a year, or about £1200 take-​home pay a month. She’d love to get her own place with a friend –​but with high rents in her area, the petrol to get to work and all the bills, she just can’t afford it. So, she’s living at home with her mum and dad and is saving up desperately to move out. Then there’s another woman living down the street. She’s 19 years old and doesn’t have a job but is already living in a house with her friends. How? Because when she left college and went down to the Jobcentre to sign on for Job Seeker’s Allowance, she found out that if she moved out of her parents’ place, she was automatically entitled to Housing Benefit. So, that’s exactly what she did. Again, is this really fair? Discussing the gendered figures of the ‘welfare claimant’ and the ‘worker’, the issue of fairness is brought to the fore by telling their respective stories and asking ‘is this really fair?’ Welfare, it is argued, has led to ‘huge resentment amongst those who pay into the system, because they feel that what they’re having to work hard for, others are getting without having to put in the effort’. Such a discussion implies that it is unjust for the taxpayer to pay for other people to ‘sit on benefits’ and that the government needs to reform welfare in

43

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

the interest of the hard-​working ‘good citizen’. Generating feelings of injustice and unfairness legitimizes spending cuts targeted at those receiving welfare payments (understood to be undeserving of them). Reforming the welfare system and introducing benefits with conditions (in the form of sanctioning and back-​to-​work policies) therefore re-​ establishes ‘fairness’ —​‘fairness for the job seeker’ and ‘fairness for the taxpayer’ (Duncan-​Smith, 2011b: no pagination). As Cameron says: the system is saying to these people, can’t afford to have another child? Tough, save up. Can’t afford a home of your own? Tough, live with your parents. Don’t like the hours you’re working? Tough, that’s just life. (2012b:  no pagination) Sanctions are positioned as being fairly applied since it is argued, ‘it shouldn’t be a lifestyle choice and if people can work, they should work. That’s why we have a sanctions system and I believe that sanctions system is fairly applied’ (Cameron, 2016: no pagination). The combination of the discourse of fairness with previous discourses explored here, including the ‘striver/​skiver’ binary and the ‘responsibility deficit’, allows for the possibility of creating multiple negative feelings towards those reliant on benefit payments. This further intensifies feelings of injustice. For instance, the figure of the undeserving skiver being sanctioned due to their failure to seek work becomes more effective, since the feeling of injustice towards those ‘bad citizens’ has been continually reproduced by differing but complementary state discourses. The greater the feeling of injustice, the more effective the discourses of fairness will therefore be. Subsequently, the uneven distribution of spending cuts becomes a just and fair action towards the public deficit, strengthening the legitimacy of the cuts. Groups formerly regarded as deserving —​because of ill health or disability —​have now become targets for welfare reform. It has been argued, specifically by literature from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), that some receiving Disability Living Allowance are fit to work since the allowance ‘appears to have some disincentive effect on employment’ (DWP, 2010:  12). This discourse suppresses the notion that individuals may receive Disability Living Allowance because they are unable to work because of their disability. Rather, it naturalizes the notion that Disability Living Allowance claimants shirk their responsibility to seek work and that benefits contribute towards welfare dependency. Consequently, this has enabled the discourse of ‘greatest need’ to emerge, suggesting that support will only be available

44

The Political Project of Austerity

for individuals with more severe disabilities. This implies that of those previously entitled to state provision, not all were in need and deserving of support.

Conclusion Historical legacies inform the present, since, as Skeggs notes (1997; 2004) such legacies are recycled and repeated. The state, in different forms, at different times, and through particular configurations, has not only controlled and disciplined women for the things that they have ‘done’ or ‘failed to do’, but also used and mobilized them in the interests of capital. Certain dominant features remain: black and white working-​class women have been interchangeably used and/​or blamed in the interests of the state. They have had to successfully carry the impact of austerity and government reform, and have needed to juggle paid employment and childcare, as state services are withdrawn. The same working-​class figure has also been continually blamed and shamed for the lack of social order. These women have come to be known as carriers of immorality, degeneracy and danger, as the anti-​ citizen endangering the natural racial harmony, and as the black and/​ or (dirty) white welfare mother. They are perceived as exhausting national resources and as being in need of confinement, instruction or moral reform. It is by understanding how austerity is produced, legitimized and made present by the state, situated within its historical legacies, that it is possible to analyze how women live with and navigate through austerity’s policies and moral and ideological discourses. It is this symbiotic relationship —​the role of the state in shaping women’s experiences of austerity —​that will now be analyzed in each of the following chapters.

45

2

Living In and With Austerity We are all in this together. (George Osborne, former Chancellor of the Exchequer, 2012, 2015) Contrary to the exhaustive repetitions from two of austerity’s architects, George Osborne and David Cameron, this chapter exposes how women are certainly not ‘all in this together’. An intrinsically gendered issue, the burden of austerity has fallen heavily on women. Austerity has reconfigured the value of women’s capital, the range of possibilities open and, ultimately, the degree to which economic necessity presses on their senses (Atkinson, 2013a: 14). Yet, as this chapter shows, the gendered effects of austerity are not experienced equally; they can be felt as minimal, significant or extreme. For some women, the realities of austerity are witnessed through small changes to their employment sectors. Others navigate short-​term or part-​time contracts, hoping for something better to come along. Many women try to succeed, but ultimately always fail to please their Jobcentre advisor despite searching for a certain number of non-​existent or unsuitable jobs per week. This is done while juggling child care responsibilities on their own. For several women, being sanctioned no longer becomes a threat, but a repetitive reality. Multiple caps and cuts to welfare leave a number of women hungry, homeless and in debt. Austerity’s effects are therefore messy, complex and multifaceted. Some women live in but not necessarily with austerity. Others cannot escape and are thus engulfed by it. As this chapter will show, Pierre Bourdieu’s metaphors of capital (1979, 1986, 1989, 1991) provide the greatest explicatory power with regard to the ways in which difference  —​particularly through the lens of class, but also mindful of ‘race’ (immigration and citizenship),

47

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

age, parenthood and disability —​affects the ways in which women are living in and with austerity. Despite austerity decreasing women’s ‘space of possibilities’ in general, as this chapter highlights, the ways in which austerity materializes itself in women’s lives is dependent on the volume, composition and trajectory of their differing economic, cultural and social capital and resources. Those with a lower volume and composition of capital will be ‘closer to necessity’ as opposed to those who are further away, who have higher volumes and different types of capital. In addition, austerity may affect women in similar ways because they are in some ways adjacent to each other in social space, but due to their different ratios of economic to cultural or social capital, their experience will be very different. It is this general theoretical framework that informs this and subsequent chapters of this book (Chapters 3 and 6).

Changes to the public sector “Everyone’s had enough”, Anna, a 27-​year-​old middle-​class white physiotherapist from London told me, when discussing the state of the NHS. Having worked in the sector since 2008 on a full-​time contract, Anna described the transformation she had seen the NHS go through in recent years. She had witnessed redundancies, pay freezes, the reduction of funding, increased waiting lists, fewer resources and low staff morale. This, she said, had made many staff move to the private sector, or take leave from the NHS. Likewise, Nadia, a 32-​year-​old middle-​class teacher from Leeds who described herself as ‘mixed other’ and who had been employed in the education sector since 2010, called the changes to her sector “significant”. As with other teachers that were interviewed, she explained how she thought cuts were being made in the “wrong places”. An example given was that the reduction of support staff for children with increased needs meant that some children were no longer getting sufficient help and encouragement. Nadia noticed a range of other revisions to the terms and conditions of employment, which she likened to the public sector itself being “run like a business”. Kate, a 30-​year-​old middle-​class white woman living in Leeds, who also worked as a teacher, described her school in a similar manner. Working in an academy —​an independent school receiving funding directly from central government, rather than through a local authority —​she told me that although the school had received more government funding in recent years, the ethos of the school had changed. With more power to make decisions, Kate felt that the school had become more like a “private company”, removing pay

48

Living In and With Austerity

progression based on length of service and linking all pay progression to performance. This change to a generalized performance culture, employed to regulate and discipline the workforce in line with features of the private sector, had resulted in some teaching professionals becoming fearful of missing their targets. Trisha, a 34-​year-​old middle-​class white woman, working as an Advocacy Support Worker in Brighton, also labelled the charity sector in business terms. Detailing the ways that the sector had continued to transform under the current context of public sector cuts, with the change in focus from service to results, Trisha felt the work suffered under this type of “corporate management”: ‘We’ve had a series of managers and we’ve ended up with a woman who is a robot. She doesn’t care about the service users but she’s great at writing reports and making stuff up, manipulating figures, finding ways to look like we provide this great service that’s reaching everyone.’ Despite observing the negative changes to the public sector at a more general level, most of these women did not experience some of the direr consequences, such as redundancies or pay cuts. Several women aged between 25 and 27 acknowledged that time had been on their side, stating that graduating from university between 2008 and 2010 had allowed them to generate more security and an increased level of opportunity. Had they graduated or entered the labour market slightly later, their experience could have been very different. Mia, a 27-​year-​old middle-​class Anglo-​Indian doctor working in London had, for example, managed to avoid the junior doctors’ pay freeze as she graduated in 2010 and qualified as a GP in the spring of 2016.1 Likewise, Sophie, a 25-​year-​old middle-​class white woman, working for NHS England as a marketing officer in Leeds described herself as being “incredibly fortunate” getting a full-​time job in the public sector within a few months of finishing university. She told me that three months into her employment, there was a large reshuffle in her department and many people were asked to take voluntary redundancy. This meant that Sophie was able to move up the ladder faster, taking on work that she was not necessarily qualified to do, gaining more responsibility, working with senior members of the team and having the opportunity to undertake further training courses. These were opportunities which would not have been available to her in her previous role. Although seeing the effect of the recession as being largely positive for younger graduates, Sophie and others said that,

49

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

despite promotions and increased responsibility, they had only recently received a pay rise. These women noted that this had not negatively affected their lifestyle, as they had only just left full-​time education. Nevertheless, the low pay tempers the positive effect of increased employment opportunities —​a mechanism by which labour costs are consistently reduced across different sectors. However, for the majority of these women, despite not increasing their economic capital in terms of income, their employment was relatively stable and secure. It also provided them with a space to accrue both social and cultural capital —​ by gaining further experience and increasing their social networks —​ which may be converted into economic capital in the future.

Witnessing the trend towards casualization Unlike many of the women previously discussed, Trisha had experienced a change in circumstance, being moved from full-​time to part-​time hours. According to the TUC (2015) there has been a persistent and worrying trend towards the normalization of less secure, part-​time work. By 2014, more than 1.7  million workers were in some form of temporary work. This trend has forced many women to accept reduced working hours as well as lower wages, resulting in a significant increase in the precariousness of their situation. Explaining why her hours had been cut from 35 to 15 per week Trisha said, “It was either stay full-​time but work evenings and weekends or go part-​ time.” Being a single mother with a 16-​year-​old son about to take his GCSEs, working evenings and weekends would not have suited her lifestyle. Having worked at her organization for the last six years, Trisha explained that the alteration in her circumstance was due to changes in the ways in which projects were being commissioned. Another example of how labour costs are consistently being reduced across different sectors, the increased competition for project-​funded work had forced her organization to bid lower than they usually would. This affected the amount that they could pay their staff. Despite being disappointed at having to go part-​time, Trisha counted herself as “one of the lucky ones” —​she had not had to take voluntary redundancy. Despite losing a considerable amount of economic capital, Trisha did not take the full-​time role that was offered. With large amounts of capital —​she had savings, she owned her own home, had a post-​ graduate degree, many years of experience and networks within and outside the sector —​Trisha was positive that should the situation stop suiting her needs, she would be able to find another job. Since going part-​time, Trisha had taken up dog walking to fill the extra time she

50

Living In and With Austerity

had. This, she stressed, was more because she loved dogs than because she needed the money. Rebecca, a 28-​year-​old middle-​class white woman also worked in the charity sector in Brighton, as a Debt and Benefit Adviser. She discussed the trend towards casualization in a different way. For her, the increase in short-​term precarious contracts had a major impact on her standard of living and ability to plan for the future. Having begun working in the charity sector in 2013 after finishing her master’s degree, Rebecca was employed on full-​time six-​month contracts. Recently being promoted, Rebecca described this contract as “the holy grail”. Explaining, she said, “Given the industry I’m in, it’s all short-​term contracts, I’ve just been offered a year’s contract but a lot of people are existing on month-​to-​month or three-​month contracts and you can’t make commitments with that.” As mentioned earlier, with the trend to casualization, this type of short-​term contract is becoming the norm in certain industries since contracts are based on securing project funding. This situation is having a second-​hand impact on employees, since not only do they experience this increased sense of precarity, but they are unable to make long-​term commitments. For instance, Rebecca told me that even if she had a deposit for a mortgage, her lack of a permanent contract would count against her. She therefore felt she was being made to live project-​by-​project. This type of lifestyle, she said, was typical of her group of friends living in the Brighton area. In this sense, living project-by-project, jumping from one unsecured job to another, Rebecca and her friends are witnessing, what Bourdieu (1983) would call a decrease in their space of possibilities. The insecurity and precariousness of employment is even more embodied by the increase of zero-​hour contracts. Not only do these contracts give fewer guarantees for employees, but those employed on these contracts earn, on average, 40 per cent less than those with part-​ time and full-​time contracts (D’Arcy and Gardiner, 2014). Hannah, a 23-​year-​old working-​class white woman was one of those employed on a zero-​hour contract. Graduating from university in July 2014 and unable to find full-​time employment, Hannah had been working in two zero-​hour contract jobs, doing concession work at a football stadium and stewarding at various music venues in London for the last six months. Describing zero-​hour contracts as a “pain”, Hannah told me, “The problem that I have at the minute with my two casual jobs is that I’m working in four different places. It’s hard to remember where you need to be.” With no basic workers rights,2 and working odd shifts with no set timetable, Hannah described herself as not knowing whether she was coming or going. She said:

51

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

‘You never get set days, I’ve worked 15 or 16  days this month so I have done quite a few shifts, whereas next month I’m looking at five or six, that’s the problem, especially working in music venues, they’ve had quite a few shows this month, whereas next month they’ve only got seven. Luckily enough I’ve been given four out of seven.’ Despite having only been given four days’ work in the next month, Hannah favoured her current employer to her previous one. In her former job (a zero-​hour contract on a kiosk at another football stadium), she only earned on average £30 per fortnight. Molly, a 26-​year-​old middle-​class black woman was also a university graduate and had experienced life on a zero-​hour contract. Having been born in the UK to Nigerian parents, Molly moved to Nigeria with her family at a young age. Wanting to pursue a career in fashion, Molly decided to move back to London in 2012 after finishing her degree. Staying on a friend’s sofa in the affluent area of west London —​living off money she had saved while working in Nigeria —​Molly began looking for work in the fashion industry. However, she described her job search as “next to impossible”. Despite having previously worked in the fashion industry in Lagos, companies failed to recognize her experience outside of the UK context. This became an impediment to her finding employment. This lack of appreciation of non-​ UK experiences (as well as qualifications) is cited by other studies researching the experiences of people of black and minority ethnic backgrounds in the current period of austerity (Netto and Fraser, 2009; Sosenko et al., 2013). Thus, unable to find work in the retail sector —​one of the hardest hit areas for job losses during the recession (TUC, 2015) —​Molly took a job in sales, working as a door-​to-​door salesperson, on commission. However, unlike Hannah, Molly quit the job after a few weeks. Explaining, she said: ‘I was cold calling. I had to knock on people’s doors. It was the worst. There was a point when I said, I can’t do this again, this is not my life, I’m not broke, I’m not hungry, I don’t know why I’m suffering because I’m scared that I’m not going to get a job. I quit. It was hardcore, it kind of showed me, like, some people hustle hard and it’s terrible. I thought, this is just too much for me; I can’t handle this crap. It’s not like I’m weak minded, it’s just that I choose not to do this kind of job because I know I’m better than this [laughs]. It was too much stress for me.’

52

Living In and With Austerity

Despite Molly and Hannah both finding the work frustrating and having similar experiences of zero-​hour contracts, their outcomes differed due to their different volume of capitals. Molly could quit her job, since she knew that she was able to live off her savings and did not have to pay rent. Describing herself as “not broke”, “not hungry” and “better than this”, her economic and social capital allowed her to leave the job. Hannah, on the other hand, who lived at home with her parents and struggled for money, needed to contribute towards utilities and rent. Faced with the current context and her under-​ employment, Hannah did speak about wanting to invest her time in undertaking an internship. This she thought would improve her CV and chances of being eligible for a ‘graduate’ job. However, Hannah felt that she would not be able to take on this step, unless she could find an internship that paid the living wage. Such an investment was not possible without a wage, due to Hannah and her family being closer to material necessity. Her time therefore had to be spent trying to halt any potential economic losses, rather than trading up or accruing extra value. In contrast, some weeks later Molly was offered an unpaid internship with a bespoke designer. She was able to invest her time and take up this position since she saw her passion for design as being more important than receiving a monthly wage. In other words, her relative distance from material necessity allowed her to take the internship and accrue further social and cultural capital. Angela McRobbie in her book Be Creative (2015) discusses the rise of unpaid internships within the fashion industry (as well as within the wider field of the cultural and creative industries) in the last few decades. She notes that despite ‘creatives’ being aware of the long hours and low returns of these unpaid positions, ‘passionate work’ or ‘pleasure at work’ (Donzelot, 1991) —​ in which work is seen as a passionate attachment —​compensates for their lack of security and protection. Molly’s declaration of this work being her passion demonstrates such compensation. However, a few weeks into the internship, Molly was let go. Having found out later that the government had introduced a policy which made it mandatory for interns to receive a minimum wage if they were not a student, the designer decided from that point on to only take on people enrolled in higher education.

Experiences of unemployment and ‘workfare’ schemes Despite changes to certain sectors and the increase in casualization, nowhere were austerity measures manifested more than through

53

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

unemployment and punitive ‘back-​to-​work’ policies. Since 2010 there have been a range of austerity-​led sanctions designed to punish those who are not ‘actively seeking work’. People have been forced to participate in workfare schemes, made to work without pay or risk losing entitlement to benefit income for being defined as not maximizing their employment prospects (Burnett and Whyte, 2017). These consist of daily sign-​ons at the Jobcentre, intensive training, work preparation and workfare placements. As David Cameron stated in 2011: We’re finally going to make work pay  –​especially for the poorest in society. And we’re going to provide much greater support for unemployed people to find work –​and stay in work … So if you’re unemployed and refuse to take either a reasonable job or to do some work in your community in return for your unemployment benefit you will lose your benefits for three months. Do it again, you’ll lose it for 6 months. Refuse a third time and you’ll lose your unemployment benefits for three years. (2011c:  no pagination) Of the women interviewed, 16 had experienced life on JSA between 2008 and 2015, and the changes to the system brought about by the coalition government. In the first instance, most women described their experience with the Jobcentre as “frustrating” and “demoralizing”. These feelings were said to have increased in recent years with the introduction of the coalition’s Universal Jobsmatch in November 2012. This is an online jobs search system designed to monitor JSA claimants’ online job search activity to confirm claimants comply with the requirement to do a minimum of three job-​searching activities per week. Ila, a 35-​year-​old working-​class Bangladeshi single mother of three, was looking for part-​time work while receiving JSA in Leeds at the time of the interview. Labelling the current system as “very difficult”, she told me that she was made to apply for over ten jobs a week by her Jobcentre advisor. Ila had no previous employment experience or qualifications and knew the jobs that she was being told to apply for were not suitable. She explained: ‘I’m supposed to find ten jobs per week, but you can’t. It’s impossible. I went with five or six jobs that I found and she [the advisor] looked at me and said that’s no good. I could find 100 jobs, but if they’re not suitable what’s the point in

54

Living In and With Austerity

writing them down? She wants me to apply for anything but you can’t apply for anything if it doesn’t suit. Am I going to apply for a manager’s job when I have no experience with that? I can’t apply for a manager’s job straight away; I need to work towards it and they should understand that.’ Having moved to Pakistan when she was 14, Ila told me that as a result, her written English “was not very good”. This therefore affected her ability to apply for jobs. Ila did not possess the type of cultural capital which could be converted and traded into symbolic capital and economic reward. Migrant women also discussed the effect their written English had on their propensity to apply for suitable work under the UK workfare scheme. According to Gwyneth Lonergan (2015) cuts made to English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes have further challenged migrant women’s attempts to find paid work in the context of austerity, in addition to their social reproductive activities. Yet the unsuitability of the jobs available on the Universal Jobsmatch system was not confined to these women previously discussed. Rebecca, who was now working in the charity sector in Brighton, discussed her experience in a similar way, labelling the system as “very demanding” and “frustrating”. However, she also described how having a postgraduate degree and previous work experience worked in her favour. Since advisors at the Jobcentre knew she possessed a master’s degree, she felt that they “left her alone” to look for work. This contrasted with the experience described by Ila, whose advisor was said to be “constantly on her back”. Rebecca said that despite experiencing pressure to find a job, now that she was working in debt advice and heard many stories from users of the service of their experiences of this punitive workfare regime, she felt her own encounter paled in comparison. Some women’s experiences included being made to undertake a ‘Work Programme’ by the government —​a welfare-​to-​work scheme, in which the task of getting the unemployed into work is outsourced to a range of public sector, private sector and third sector organizations. Despite having a history spanning numerous decades,3 these schemes have expanded under current and previous Conservative governments, in which it has been estimated that over 100,000 claimants per year have been forced to undertake such schemes (Clarke, 2013 in Burnett and Whyte, 2017: 65).4 Lydia, a white working-​class woman in her early 20s, had recently completed a compulsory work placement with a charity organization. Working as a shop floor assistant at a store in Leeds City Centre, she had been volunteering 32-​hours week for over

55

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

a year. This placement was initially scheduled to last for a period of four weeks, but had continued for a further 14 months. Lydia explained that during that time, she had “unofficially” been covering maternity leave for one employee. Boycott Workfare, a grass roots organization that campaigns to end forced unpaid work for people who receive welfare, have noted how many claimants that have undertaken these work placements have given testimonies about problematic work conditions and the health and safety risks they have faced. Despite Lydia saying that she had enjoyed her time at the charity organization, she did note that she felt she was always given “tasks that no one else wanted”. Since finishing her placement, Lydia had returned to JSA and continued to look for work. Other women had found paid work using the online job system, yet tended to end up in what Tracey Shildrick et al. (2012) call the ‘low pay, no pay cycle’ —​a cycle of having low-​paying temporary work and then being reliant on welfare. Illustrative of this cycle, Amira, a 25-​year-​old working-​class black woman had recently been given British citizenship after coming to the UK on her own as an asylum seeker from Ethiopia in 2004. Now living alone in social housing on the outskirts of Leeds city centre, Amira was working in a zero-​hour contract for a multinational consumer goods company. She described her life in the UK as difficult despite the fact that she told me that she was “British now”. Having her papers, she was able to work properly, but said that the system was not working for her. Having been claiming JSA on and off for two years, in between low-​paid, short-​term contracts, she had incurred numerous debts and arrears. She explained, “If I am working I will pay everything for my council tax, my rent, everything. If I am not working I will go in the Jobcentre and they will pay it for me”. However, since she had been in and out of precarious work, her benefits were often paid incorrectly. She said, “I might work for one month, I stop, then I need to wait two weeks to get JSA”. During this time, she was often left with no money —​living on minimum wage did not allow her to save up money for such occasions. Amira often found the technical language of the correspondence between her and various arms of the DWP and the Jobcentre difficult to understand. Thus, despite meeting all her appointments for fear of sanctioning, Amira incurred an £800 over-​payment debt since there was a miscommunication regarding the amount of benefits that she should have received over the last two years. Similarly, Lauren, a 33-​year-​old working-​class white woman, also living in Leeds, experienced the ‘low-​pay no-​pay’ cycle. Having been made redundant from a part-​time job in retail, Lauren was now again

56

Living In and With Austerity

claiming JSA. Unlike Amira, Lauren was a single mother, which made her experience of the system far worse. She found it more difficult to take precarious jobs due to family commitments. An independent inquiry co-​ordinated by The Fawcett Society in 2015 raised serious concerns about how single parents (92 per cent of whom are women) were being treated by the welfare system. It found that Jobcentre staff and work programme providers were not aware of the flexibilities that single parents were entitled to, such as being able to restrict their availability for work to fit around school hours. The Jobcentre had recently sanctioned Lauren for six weeks (two weeks longer than expected) after having missed an appointment to care for her son. During that time, Lauren had to wait for her ‘hardship money’ of £50, which took four weeks. Despite the government repeatedly downplaying and denying the harshness of its sanctioning regime, it has been estimated that over 1 million sanctions are now imposed on claimants each year. There has been a large rise in sanctions against single parents —​in 2014 an increase from under 200 sanctions a month to 5,000 a month, resulting in their day-​to-​day living being most severely affected (The Fawcett Society, 2015; Rabindrakumar, 2017). This is not surprising since a report by the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) (2015) noted how Jobcentre managers have put pressure on staff to impose financial penalties on benefit claimants; staff who fail to make sufficient sanctions referrals are placed on Performance Improvement Plans. This can result in them losing out on annual pay awards. Former Jobcentre advisors have spoken out about the increasingly punitive sanction regime, noting how they have been subjected to ‘constant pressure to meet and exceed targets’ (Neville, 2015 in O’Hara, 2017).5 During the interviews undertaken for this book, one of the most distressing experiences of workfare and sanctioning was relayed by Leoni. A single mum of two from London, Leoni, 26, told me about her experience of being sanctioned while six months pregnant. Receiving JSA at the time, Leoni was forced to undertake a Skills Conditionality course. Having attended all the training days required up to that point, Leoni began to experience morning sickness in her third trimester. Having notified her course trainer that she was not well and could not attend, her absence was passed on to the Jobcentre. Continuing, she explained: ‘He [the course trainer] knew anyway because he’d seen me before [I had] to rush off to the toilet to be sick. Then the

57

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

one time I didn’t go, he decided to tell the Jobcentre I was not attending. I was sanctioned. I thought that was quite unfair because it’s not like I didn’t ever go there. I’ve never heard of that before, that it’s not okay to be sick when you’re pregnant. But anyway, they sanctioned me for a month.’ Having been sanctioned by the Jobcentre when six months pregnant, with a six-​year-​old son to care for, Leoni had to apply for hardship money and borrow money from family members in order to get by during that time. With such a punitive welfare system, which brings women a lot closer to material necessity, it is within examples such as these that the violence of the workfare regime is clear for all to see.

Day-​to-​day  living One of the most significant ways in which austerity manifested itself into the lives of women was through the changes to their day-​to-​day living. It has been widely reported that a drop in income coupled with a rise in the cost of living has meant that living standards have fallen significantly in the last decade (see for example, O’Hara, 2014). Of the women interviewed, 56 had noticed the rising cost of living. Those who did not comment on this lived with their parents or grandparents and did not contribute to the household finances. Women who did recognize the changes spoke of how goods and services had become more expensive in recent years, especially in relation to utilities. This is not surprising —​the cost of fuel and electricity has more than doubled since 2000 (O’Hara, 2014). Nevertheless, the rising cost of living was not discussed in the same terms by everyone and women’s experiences of this varied considerably. Women whose standard of living had been significantly affected would discuss in detail the changes they faced, talking about the monetary value of items, specifically which items had become more expensive and their opinions about this. For others, the rise was acknowledged but they did not go into detail about their spending practices. Celia, a 27-​year-​old middle-​class white woman told me about the recent decline in the standard of living, yet said that the impact on her day-​to-​day life was insignificant. Working full-​time in an architecture firm as an HR manager and owning a flat with her partner in north London, she described the inconsequential impact the recession had on her. Having mused that she was aware that things had generally got “a bit more expensive”, Celia then joked that the only effect the recession had had on her living standards was that she “had seen and

58

Living In and With Austerity

enjoyed all the restaurant vouchers” that had been on offer since the crash of 2008: ‘I lived the same lifestyle in 2008 that I did in 2009 and 2010, yeah people became far more money conscious, sure I didn’t get a big salary rise but I worked my way up and got a few promotions. I think for the most part I just saw and enjoyed all the restaurant vouchers, buy one get one free, the recession started that trend and now we are all voucher conscious, I got loads of vouchers!’ In less jovial terms, Mia, who was working towards qualifying as a GP and owned a flat in London, told me that she felt the difference in living standards. However, unlike Celia, she noted that she had changed her behaviour in the last few years. When I asked her to elaborate, she said, “I’ve noticed things are far more expensive, petrol, food, bills, I would never do a massive shop in Waitrose anymore. I’m personally now more aware of money.” Being aware of money was characteristic of other middle-​class women’s responses. Yet, all being in full-​time, stable employment (albeit with differing incomes and amounts of, and types of, capital), they noted that they had not been significantly affected by the rising cost of living, and would be able to cope with an unexpected bill, for example. For other women, this increase was felt more significantly and was discussed in different ways. Trisha, for example (mentioned in the previous section), had recently had her hours reduced because of organizational restructuring. She said, “I know it affects me. There is an element of it where people like me feel it. I guess I’m somewhere around the squeezed middle class.” Asking her to expand on what she meant by “people like me”, she said that, although she considered herself to be quite comfortable compared to others in the current context, the increase in the cost of living had affected her to some degree. Despite this, she was quick to note, “I’m still able to buy my organic veg box and all those things” and “I can get by and have a holiday.” Although this sounds somewhat contradictory, her narrative can be read differently from women such as Mia and Celia. As research has suggested, single mothers are being affected more by austerity in general (The Fawcett Society, 2013; WBG, 2014a, 2014b; Rabindrakumar, 2017) and so it is not surprising that Trisha’s experience does not mirror that of the women mentioned earlier. However, we cannot take Trisha’s experience as representative of all single mothers. Despite losing economic capital and having to take a

59

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

part-​time position, Trisha was in a well-​paid managerial position and, due to her capital and resources, could “get by” more easily than other mothers with fewer resources. Marie, a 28-​year-​old working-​class black woman, lived in London, and like Trisha also worked part-​time in the public sector. Marie spoke of the constant strain she felt on her day-​to-​day finances, since being on a low-​income salary made sustaining her household finances more difficult. Also a single parent, Marie worked as a waitress in a café library in north London, and rented privately through a housing association. Finding it a challenge to pay the bills and “fill the fridge”, she told me, “Sometimes I get paid and finish all the bills and I can’t fill it, things are getting so expensive.” With £30 per month on average to do her household shopping, she said that she worried about being able to keep up with her son’s needs. However, since coming off state benefits, Marie felt that she could “breathe more” since she was now eligible for store credit. In a sense, this newfound access to credit had broadened Marie’s horizon of possibilities. She then wondered how those who are not currently working, reliant on state support or who have more than one child, were coping within the current context. Lucy, a 21-​year-​old white working-​class woman from Brighton was one of those women that Marie wondered about. Feeling the greatest impact of the crisis, Lucy explained, “I survive but I’m not living. Bills, rent, clothes for my daughter, food, trying to get a good meal every day, I manage, but it’s not easy.” A single mother with one young daughter, Lucy struggled on Income Support. She said, for example, that if a utility bill came in which was not accounted for, such as a large electricity bill or extra charges to her phone bill, it would “mess her up for weeks”. Other single mothers who were also dependent on state support equally felt this strain. For these women, what to buy, where to buy from and whether they were able to buy the item was of equal importance. With a small amount of money to spend, their budget only allowed for essentials and therefore sacrifices very often had to be made.

Changes to state support As described by Lucy, the changes to state support unsurprisingly affected those who were wholly or partially reliant on receiving state support. The reduction in monetary payments in the form of caps and the changes to the way payments were allocated and administered, which resulted in delays and sanctions, substantially affected their day-​to-​day living. Those who received more than one

60

Living In and With Austerity

form of benefit discussed how the multiple caps and cuts had affected them. Marie, for instance, received Working Tax Credit and Housing Benefit. Struggling economically with the rising cost of living, as mentioned previously, she found it hard to manage. Despite her hourly rate increasing, her annual benefit increases were restricted and her Housing Benefit had been cut. Nevertheless, as she was not wholly reliant on state support, she was still, as she said, “able to breathe”. However, Marie was adamant that if her circumstances were to change, for example if she lost her job, having to rely on welfare as her only source of income would be a great struggle. Women whose sole income came from welfare felt this increased strain, with the cost of living outstripping their benefit payments. It was not only the change in monetary amount, but also the modifications in the administration of benefits and increase in penalties, which made life harder. The introduction of Universal Credit was conceived to simplify the system by replacing tax credits, and merging six existing separate means-​tested benefits  —​JSA, Employment Support Allowance, Income Support, Working Tax Credit, Child Tax Credit and Housing Benefit —​into one monthly payment. Yet women cited this as an unhelpful change. Adele, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class single mother from Leeds, reliant on state support, told me that the changes to the way her Housing Benefit and Income Support were paid had put her in an increasingly precarious position. Faced with the prospect of one larger lump sum in her account each month, she said that the new scheme made managing her finances much more difficult as she tended to organize her household budget from week to week. Faye, 23 and a single mother from Leeds, who was receiving Housing Benefit and Income Support, also felt the move to Universal Credit would make life harder. Waiting for these changes to take place,6 Faye echoed Adele’s thoughts and said that she knew this new proposal would not suit her needs. Explaining, she said, “Apparently, they are going to start paying everyone monthly. It’s stupid though because if you have kids and you’re skint and you know that money is in the bank you will dip into it, just to make ends meet, that’s just stupid, well your baby is more important isn’t it?” Knowing that new claimants moving to the system were, until recently, confronted with a 42-​day period between applying for the benefit and receiving the first payment, Faye wondered how she and her daughter would cope during that time.7 Many aspects of Universal Credit, which has left thousands of people struggling financially, have since been found unlawful by the High Court. For example, in January 2019 it was found that the DWP had been wrongly interpreting the

61

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Universal Credit regulations which left many families who had been moved onto the system, worse off. The High Court ordered the then Home Secretary, Amber Rudd, to take immediate steps to ensure that no other claimants had been adversely affected and to ensure that all those who had suffered because of the unlawful conduct were swiftly and fairly compensated (Leigh Day, 2019).8 For those women with a disability or a serious health condition, changes to specific benefits generated unease, insecurity, stress and for some, great financial difficulties. Elaine was registered as disabled after becoming ill during her gap year. Having spent five years on means-​ tested benefits, Elaine, 27, described her anxiety about the use of companies such as Atos (a French multinational information technology service) in the delivery of services. As part of the government’s ‘back to work’ scheme, Atos introduced a test to gauge whether a claimant with an illness or disability was fit to work. This ‘test’ was not performed by the claimant’s doctor as before (doctors who were well versed in their patient’s medical history). The government contracted out the task of assessing the claimant’s ability to carry out certain functions to Atos. If during the test the claimant was awarded enough points, they qualified for Employment and Support Allowance. Elaine said, “Before Atos, in my assessments I had to describe my symptoms and it wasn’t very confrontational. Atos is a much more confrontational situation.” She said that she found the assessment staff indifferent and dismissive of her condition, and she suffered both stress and humiliation from having to pander to their points system. Likewise, Louise, a 35-​year-​old white working-​class woman living in Leeds had been diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome ten years ago and was thus unable to work. She also described how her benefit changes had had a major effect on her standard of living. Since the introduction of stringent checks and cuts to benefits, Louise’s Mobility Allowance, which she used to help her get around and travel to hospital appointments, had been stopped. Unable to afford to pay for transport herself, she was having to sacrifice her treatments and appointments. Louise explained the impact this was having on her day-​to-​day living: ‘If I come in and out of hospital and I get too faint, I can’t just go running on buses, I can collapse, so I need a taxi. But because they’ve stopped this allowance, I can’t afford to go in taxis so I haven’t been going to the treatment. Some days I feel so ill I just can’t get about, so you can’t go to get your shopping, your prescriptions and things like that.

62

Living In and With Austerity

Your quality of life rests in their hands, my recovery is in their hands.’ Louise has since appealed at a tribunal against the decision to stop her Mobility Allowance. However, she felt the appeal had caused her increased stress and affected her condition. Her doctor thus advised her not to attend the hearing to avoid further stress. Louise said, “It’s been nearly 14 months, our illness is affect by induced stress, I was throwing up, crying all the time, I can’t sleep, it’s awful.” Likening her experience to being sent to death row, she continued, “That’s what it feels like, waiting to be killed, its horrendous.” If the appeal is granted, Louise will receive 14 months’ worth of backdated allowance. If the appeal is rejected, she noted that she was not sure how she would be able to manage. Despite seeking advice from doctors, medical staff and her local council about her appeal and what she should do if it was rejected, she said that she felt “kept in the dark” most of the time. She explained that this was due to changes being implemented without consultation and the fact that she was unable to understand the technical language practitioners used when they discussed these changes with her. Mirroring the previous discussion, Elaine found it difficult to keep up with the changes to state support. However, unlike Louise, she had been employed to give benefit advice for a number of years and therefore had a basic knowledge of the system. Despite this, she spoke of the difficulties she faced in trying to keep up: ‘There are so many different systems and calling the Jobcentre or the local council they will usually give you the wrong advice. I  now go and look up the big DWP handbook and try to find the latest PDF copy but it’s not useful for many people because it’s written in a very technical, legal way and often takes a lot of cross referencing different documents to figure out what the amendments mean. There are a lot of good sites out there that give a lot of information but again they get out of date very quickly.’ Confused and anxious about the latest change from Disability Living Allowance to Personal Independence Payment —​which was supposed to be implemented in 2014 —​Elaine felt that she was constantly being kept on her toes trying to figure it all out. For those women like Louise, who do not have knowledge and experience of how to understand, navigate through and keep on top of the changing system, the feeling of anxiety is likely to be a lot worse.

63

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

The housing crisis Women’s experience of housing varied just as much as their living standards and experiences of employment. This is not surprising since changes to Housing Benefit, Council Tax Benefit, the introduction of the ‘bedroom tax’, as well as soaring rents, have had a huge impact on housing security. The financial pressures on households have led some to struggle to pay rent, and to fall into arrears or even face eviction. At the same time, the residential property market remains a productive field of investment and wealth generation for many. In spite of record high housing prices, eight of the women interviewed owned their own property, which they had bought in the last few years. Four of these women had bought property in London or Greater London. Despite the current context, these women could invest and thus accumulate capital through home ownership. In contrast, those who were renting properties spoke of having to pay extremely high rents, none more so than those renting in the capital. It was noted that there was a lack of affordable housing in London, observations backed up by the GMB Union (2019) who reported that the cost of renting a two-​bedroom flat in London had increased by more than a fifth since 2011. Monthly earnings, it was noted, had only increased by just 9.1 per cent over the same period. This surge in the cost of rent resulted in nine women either having to move home, to try to save money in order to live independently, or to being unable to leave their parents’ homes due to the housing crisis. Those on lower incomes and with dependent children suffered considerably more from this housing crisis. Many women who were renting wanted to move to social housing, but the shortage of this form of housing meant that they had remained on the waiting list for some time. The housing crisis was directly affecting Marta and her family. Having moved to Brighton in 2007 from Romania as a student, Marta began working in a hotel in the south-​east of England. Meeting her husband in 2010, she became pregnant in 2011 and subsequently left her job as a hotel supervisor. Moving back to Brighton, she and her husband rented a room from a private landlord with the knowledge that it was a short-​term contract. However, they were assured by him that they would be able to renew the contract after the initial six-​month period. Three weeks after giving birth, Marta and her family received notice that they were being evicted. She explained: ‘In that time, I got frustrated and stressed and almost lost my milk. I  went to ask for help at the council and try

64

Living In and With Austerity

to get council house, I didn’t get any help, they told me I  needed to rent privately because they didn’t have any houses. I didn’t know where to go or what to do, the only idea that came to my mind was to kill myself because I have a small baby.’ Having appealed to the landlord about their situation, he agreed to let them rent another room in the same house but for an increased price —​£750 instead of £650. Living on only her husband’s income (he worked as an assistant manager at a discount store), this increase in rent significantly affected their monthly budget. Marta hoped the situation would get better once they moved from private rented accommodation to social housing. However, having been on the waiting list for almost two years and with a shortage in social housing in the Brighton area, Marta was unsure when or if this might come to fruition. Figures from the Sussex Community Foundation have shown that the lack of available social housing has since worsened; Sussex has 5 per cent less social housing than the average for England as a whole (2019: 51). Yet it was those who relied on Housing Benefit who felt the greatest impact of the housing crisis. Of the women spoken to, 15 received Housing Benefit, three lived in privately rented housing and 12 in social housing. It was not only the capping of Housing Benefit coupled with the surge in rent that was discussed, but also the planned changes in the way payments from the government to the recipient would be administered. For the first time, Housing Benefit would be paid to the recipient, who would then be expected to pay their landlord directly. Among the primary concerns was the shift to a single monthly payment. Women were concerned about the effect of a larger monthly lump sum, as they tended to budget from week to week. Since having her daughter, Lucy’s Housing Benefit had been lowered by £75 per month. Coupled with the decrease to her Income Support, Lucy was worried about how this might affect her current housing situation if she got into arrears or if her rent continued to increase. Other women also felt such anxiety, especially those living in London. Since the capital is becoming increasingly unaffordable for people on low incomes or who rely solely on benefits, some women feared that they would have to move out of the area. This is not an unfounded worry, since with a shortage of social housing in London (and other major cities), many homeless families are being offered homes hundreds of miles away. According to a Freedom of Information request by HuffPost UK in 2018, at least 50,000 homeless households have now been forced to

65

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

move out of their communities since 2014 to other areas because of this shortage of homes (Demianyk, 2018). Cuts to Housing Benefit had also had an impact on family structure within black and minority ethnic communities. Ila, specifically discussing the effect of Housing Benefit on extended Asian families, said: ‘Within Asian families there are a lot of extended family members so not only have you got children and cousins, you’ve got grandparents. But now you’ve got to a point that you can’t even have your parents with you because financially now, the fact that they’re living with you, you’re worse off actually, they are worse off, so you are forced to live apart and when you’re forced to live apart, obviously their mental and physical state is affected, I find that instead of keeping families together, they [the government] are intent on splitting families.’ Research has shown that the government’s Housing Benefit reforms have affected aspects of multigenerational living for families. According to a briefing by the Chartered Institute of Housing (Pawson and Wilcox, 2012), rather than encouraging potentially beneficial ways of living for low income families, benefit caps and ‘non-​dependent’ deduction increases for Housing Benefit recipients have essentially been a disincentive to voluntary sharing. For Ila and other women who had previously lived with their extended family, benefit reform caps prevented them from doing so. As Ila noted, in the context of welfare reform, “You are forced to live apart.” Such changes were therefore making families become more individualistic and had an impact on caring responsibilities. Previously, extended family members often looked after children when necessary. Now with families living apart, sometimes in other areas of the city, this was no longer possible. Having experienced cuts to other benefits they received, the bedroom tax made an enormous difference to some women’s standard of living. The policy, which came into force in April 2013, introduced financial penalties for anyone of working-​age living in rented social housing who was in receipt of Housing Benefit and deemed to be ‘over-​occupying’  —​according to a set of criteria set out by the government. The new rules meant that ‘each single adult or couple should occupy one room while two children under 16 of the same gender were expected to share a bedroom and two siblings under 10 of different sexes must share’ (O’Hara, 2014: 76). Priya, a 35-​year-​old Pakistani middle-​class single mother living in Brighton and reliant

66

Living In and With Austerity

on state support, found that of all the changes in recent years, this change had affected her the most. Priya moved to Brighton in 2005 with her son, after experiencing domestic abuse from her partner. Having recently suffered a breakdown, Priya was getting treatment and counselling for severe depression and anxiety. Since her son, who until recently lived with Priya on a full-​time basis, left home to attend private school in Kent (paid for by his father), his room became temporarily unoccupied. Priya had been told that she would have to pay the bedroom tax on this room, since her son was no longer living at her flat permanently. Not being able to cope with the reduction (according to Mary O’Hara (2014), an average 14 per cent of a person’s benefits would be taken away), Priya told me that she was thinking of moving to a one-​bedroom flat. However, this would mean that her son would not have a bedroom when he stayed with her at weekends, and would not be able to move back in if he wanted to live with her permanently again. Louise faced a similar situation. Diagnosed with a genetic condition in which she was unable to work, as previously discussed, Louise had ongoing issues with her Mobility Allowance re-​assessment. Unable to reside in a property with a second bedroom, Louise had been made to move to a one-​bedroom flat the previous year. At that time Louise’s condition, in which she had part-​time carers who used the second bedroom, was not taken into consideration. Due to her mobility benefits being in dispute, she was unable to pay for the second bedroom herself. Louise was thus moved from the city centre where she had lived for six years, to an area further away. Describing the area as ‘rough’, she told me she missed the convenience of being in the centre, near to her friends, and often felt unsafe. Without a second bedroom, Louise’s carer was unable to comfortably stay the night when she was needed. Housing therefore represents an area in which austerity is materialized within women’s lives. For those women who do not have the economic and social capital to avoid the housing crisis, the impact was felt more considerably, especially for those on low incomes. Although Housing Benefit is meant to alleviate housing problems, caps on the amount of benefit paid, coupled with the increase in rents and the changes to the administration of payment, meant that women who relied on this form of benefit often found themselves in arrears. The introduction of the bedroom tax made already unstable positions even worse, as women needed to pay more or move property. Those women with some level of protection from parents or partners, are able to survive the economic onslaught. Those without are laid bare to real precarity.

67

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Conclusion This chapter has explored the material effects of austerity in action, to illustrate the ways in which women are living in and with austerity, on a day-​to-​day basis. Women experience the trend towards less secure and part-​time work, they witness transformations within their employment sectors, some undergo periods of unemployment and are required to undertake punitive workfare schemes during such a time. Equally, women’s lives are impacted by the rise in the cost of living; high utilities and soaring rents, coupled with the increasing cost of food, pull at women’s purse strings. These observations thus make room to fully recognize austerity’s complex and multiple gendered effects. Yet, as this chapter demonstrated, not all women live in and with austerity in the same ways. Austerity is encountered differently by different groups of women. For women like Mia and Celia, austerity touched their lives in minimal ways; they cut back while witnessing small changes within their workplace. These women have larger amounts of legitimate capital and resources, which enabled protection, security and distance from austerity’s more substantial effects. In some cases, these women could even accrue further capital within such a context. Austerity was felt more significantly by women such as Marie; rising housing costs and low pay placed her firmly within the so-​called ‘working poor’. Possessing less capital, Marie found it harder to legitimize or convert this into another form, placing her closer to necessity and economic dispossession. At the extreme, women like Leoni, who were solely reliant on the shrinking welfare state, experienced the worst of it. With a lack of protection, security and legitimate capital and resources, she was forced to participate in punitive back-​to-​work schemes, at the threat of being sanctioned, as well as facing multiple caps and cuts to her benefit payment. This chapter thus exposed in detail how women’s experiences of the present are shaped by pre-​existing social markers, particularly class, but also by ‘race’, parenthood, health and disability; and how these experiences are being further exacerbated by, and within, austerity Britain.

68

3

Navigating Through Austerity I appreciate that there are families who face considerable pressures. Those pressures are often the result of decisions that they have taken which mean they are not best able to manage their finances. We need to ensure that support is not just financial, and that the right decisions are made. (Michael Gove, former Education Secretary, September 2013 [Bienkov, 2013]) We have lost a lot of our cookery skills. Poor people do not know how to cook. (Baroness Jenkin of Kennington, Conservative Peer, December 2014 [Butler, 2014a]) While Chapter 2 focused on how women are living with austerity, attention is now drawn to the kinds of scrimping, saving and making-​do strategies which are employed and negotiated by women in everyday life. Arguments made by political elites and other voices within public discourse have argued that those suffering within the context of austerity do so because they lack important skills and decision-​making abilities. According to Michael Gove, those who are unable to manage their finances are suffering because of their own bad decision-​making. Likewise, Baroness Jenkin has previously noted that food poverty is the result of ‘poor people’ being unable to cook. Similar to rhetoric used by the state in previous times of crisis, in this framework, social markers are denied or seen as irrelevant, blinded by the language of individualism and self-​responsibility. This chapter complicates these statements, demonstrating how difference and processes of differentiation impact the ways in which women respond to and navigate the effects of austerity. Here, divergent

69

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

accounts of varieties of austerity as lived come into view, from women changing their shopping habits in fairly minor ways, to the use of foodbanks and informal loans. Despite the importance of the intersections of class and ‘race’ shaping women’s navigation strategies, notably here, it is the difference between being a mother (specifically being a single parent) or not, which particularly heightens women’s ability to navigate a more or less precarious route through austere times. The mobility of non-​parents —​being able to travel and move into better paid work, or simply, the ease of being able to move anywhere at all —​lies in stark contrast to mothers who become stuck —​in jobs, in relationships, in places, in spaces and in time  —​which impacts upon their ability to move out of the way of the storm. This chapter is divided into five sections, each of which explore the different ways and the extent to which these women are navigating through austerity. It is through such a nuanced analysis that we can further understand both the commonalities and divergences in women’s experiences.

Re-​skilling or changing sectors Making changes to their employment prospects through changing sectors or re-​skilling was one of the navigation strategies women adopted in an attempt to move out of the way of the storm. For Nina and Nadia, this was to try and ensure better job security within an increasingly uncertain environment. Now a primary school teacher in Brighton, Nina, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, originally thought about working in digital marketing, having graduated from the University of Sussex in 2008 with a degree in Media and Culture. Interning at an agency while also working in the hospitality sector, she became unhappy with the insecure, low-​paid work. Explaining this in more detail, she said that she felt the company waved a carrot in front of her as if to say, ‘there might be a job at the end of it, or there might not’. Unable to continue working within such a precarious and insecure environment, Nina decided to retrain as a primary school teacher and qualified in 2012. The job security, the pension contributions, maternity package and career progression outweighed the tough workload. Yet Nina did say that had it not been for the recession, she would have possibly come to the teaching profession later in life and pursued a career in digital marketing further. However, the need for this stability outweighed her passion. Nina did explain that she was able to obtain a grant which enabled her to retrain and gain further qualifications to pursue this more secure profession. If she had taken the course a few years later, she would have had to pay university tuition fees

70

Navigating Through Austerity

of £9,000 per year. Thus, in the current context, women’s capability to feel more secure in employment terms via gaining further forms of economic capital therefore becomes significantly harder. In contrast, having been employed in the public sector in teaching, Nadia, a 32-​year-​old ‘mixed other’ middle-​class woman from Leeds, reskilled and gained further qualifications in the form of a master’s degree in Psychological Research. This was in an attempt to move out of the teaching profession, into a sector that would guarantee her a higher income. She explained that it was her increasingly negative experience of working in the public sector that made her rethink her career and pushed her into pursuing a postgraduate degree: ‘I’m leaving it because of the fact, as well as all the other reasons, that I can’t trust it. Things are changing so much, if I continue being amongst the hundreds of thousands of dissatisfied teachers who are bumbling along, then I’ll regret it in years to come.’ Explaining that she might be in trouble financially if she stayed in the teaching profession, she went on to say, “I have to invest in me now, for the future, so I don’t need to rely on pensions, for instance.” This investment was in the form of going part-​time as a teacher while paying £9,000 in fees over two years. Speaking to Nadia again the following year, she told me that she had since quit her teaching job due to the demands of the master’s degree, and had moved in with her partner due to financial issues. Had she not had the possibility of living with her partner, Nadia would have had to choose between pursuing her master’s degree and taking out a loan to cover her expenses, or returning to teaching full-​time. Her investment was therefore aided by her social capital in the form of protection and security from her partner. Gaining further cultural capital through education and re-​skilling was seen as an important investment for others. However, the current climate and their present position rendered this impossible. Marie, a 28-​year-​old black working-​class woman, had heard rumours from her colleagues that the library that she worked at part-​time was losing some of its funding and as a result her hours were going to be reduced. Having completed a diploma in Business Management while being pregnant with her son, Marie wanted to take her qualification further and accrue more cultural capital in the form of a teaching qualification. This, she thought, would enable her to get a better paying job with more stability. However, as a single parent who was solely responsible

71

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

for her son’s welfare and the household income, she felt that it was a gamble to take on further study at this time. ‘I can do teaching if I keep studying but it’s a lot of work. I’ve considered it, but I’m working and I have to pay for everything. Can I afford to do another added thing that might make me better off at some point? I know people say it’s an investment but there’s no room for that at the moment. I only get one day off in the week and my son needs me. Maybe it’s small-​minded of me but I don’t know.’ As Pierre Bourdieu notes, because cultural capital is embodied, its acquisition requires an investment of time (1984: 244). Marie’s time was spent investing in caring for her son and trying to maintain their lifestyle within a period of intense uncertainty and instability. Without a partner to offset economic loses or shoulder the brunt of parental duties during the long transition period, trying to trade up or accrue extra capital brought with it too much potential insecurity and risk which could result in losses. Investing in caring outweighed and therefore closed down any potential future investment in herself. In contrast to Nina and Nadia, who albeit in different ways due to different circumstances could use their various amounts and types of capital to invest in themselves and move to more secure or higher paying professions, Marie became stuck in a progressively uncertain context. The ability to move through the current context and open one’s horizon and space of possibilities is impacted by the sorts of capital and resources that can be capitalized upon.

Cutting back and living cheap: sacrificing luxuries and essentials Increases in the prices of essential everyday goods —​food, products and fuel —​has put more strain on women’s budgets, whether they are in work or not. The cost of fuel and electricity has more than doubled since 2000 (O’Hara, 2014), and has steadily made it harder for people to heat their homes adequately. The rising cost of food has also affected the cost of living; The Lancet (2014) has noted that since 2007 there has been a relative increase in the cost of food by 12 per cent. This increase is even higher for fresh fruit and vegetables. It was thus not surprising to hear many women saying that they had changed their shopping habits over the last few years, by frequenting low-​cost supermarkets, and not doing so-​called ‘big shops’. This did not mean

72

Navigating Through Austerity

that all women had completely abandoned their favoured mainstream supermarket or wholefoods store; some still opted for organic over value products. Still, there was a resounding acknowledgment that there was an increased need to cut back, trade down to cheaper versions of the same product, or choose essentials over luxuries. Yet, as will be shown, what might be essential by one person’s standards could also be a luxury for another. Equally, ‘living cheap’ and ‘cutting back’ can mean two very different things. Most women said they had had to make changes to their shopping habits by cutting back. Both Anna and Lucy told me that they had stopped buying luxuries. When asked to explain this further, they said that they had become “more careful”. Anna, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class woman who worked as a physiotherapist in London described herself as “very careful”. She tried to have meals at home whenever possible and tended to only buy clothes that were on sale. This she said was because things were “becoming more expensive” and living in London and working in the NHS meant that she was not able to live what she called “an extravagant lifestyle”. Anna was asked to recall the last thing she can remember that she bought for herself; pausing she then said, “Maybe booking flights to go away or maybe a leather jacket, I can’t remember.” Lucy, a 21-​year-​old white working-​class single mother reliant on welfare and living in Brighton also said that she had been cutting back. When asked what the last thing she had bought for herself was, she paused for a minute and then said, “If I have a spare fiver I might buy myself a coffee, that’s the nicest thing I do, that’s my treat, my little luxury.” Thinking about her answer, she then went on to say, “If you think about it, that’s not really a treat is it, going for a coffee?” Continuing, she told me that she had £80 per month to spend on food, nappies and clothes. Describing herself as “struggling” but “getting by”, she spoke about her shopping habits. “I’m good with knowing where to go to get food at certain times and things like that, for example, on Sunday, pretty much every supermarket has discounts.” Discount shopping in bulk with her mother, Lucy explained that they froze food so they could “have an alright meal” every night of the week. She also shopped online to bulk-​buy nappies and wipes. “Living cheap”, she noted, took up a substantial amount of labour power, time and effort. Like other women at the sharp end of the cuts, lists were often discussed as a way to keep track of their finances. Lucy’s discussion is illustrative of this when she said, “I have lists all over my kitchen, I must look crazy, everything that goes in and comes out and I have all my direct debits set up perfectly.” However, many spoke of how

73

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

unexpected essentials such as high utility bills would disrupt their careful financial management and would leave them unable to manage all their outgoings. Women with children also talked about having to cut back on goods and practices such as children’s costly social activities, lengthy Christmas and birthday lists and day trips away. Those who were dependent upon state support said that they sacrificed essentials or skipped meals in order to feed their children, and often had to decide between buying food and heating their homes. This has become known as the dilemma to ‘heat or eat’. These practices are not limited to the women interviewed for this book. Scholars have noted how specific groups such as benefit claimants (see Hitchen, 2016; Patrick, 2017), those at the ‘sharp end of the cuts’ (see O’Hara, 2014; Pemberton et al., 2014; Lambie-M ​ umford and Snell, 2015) and those in the ‘low-​pay-​no-​pay cycle’ experiencing ‘in work poverty’ (see Shildrick et  al., 2012) have also been using time-​intensive strategies and practices, such as low-​cost supermarket shopping, hand-​washing clothes, skipping meals, deciding to ‘heat or eat,’ as well as scavenging supermarket bins for waste food. For women with dependent children, such practices have become increasingly recurrent in the last few years. Scarlett, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class single mother of two from Leeds, on Income Support, told me, “Last week I had to take out of my mouth to put uniforms on my kids.” Similarly, Rita, a 35-​year-​old white working-​ class woman who received state benefit and lived with her daughter in Leeds, had not eaten for two days at the time of the interview. She could not afford to pay her heating bill of £180 and feed herself and her daughter at the same time. With her gas on a meter, it was considerably more costly for her to heat her home. As Ruth London (2017: 103) notes, in 2015 and 2016, the Competition and Markets Authority acknowledged this issue; households on prepayment meters were paying £260 to £320 more for fuel per year than people with bank orders for direct debits. Being in rented accommodation, Rita was unable to change the system. Aware of the costly nature of her meter, she said that she rarely put the heating on and was often cold. She had suffered from pneumonia a few months earlier. What becomes clear from conversations with women like Anna, Lucy, Rita and Scarlett is the different ways in which women are having to navigate the current context to try to preserve economic capital through cutting back and trying to live more cheaply. Despite commonalities, there were very clear differences between women’s experiences when it came to cutting back. For Anna, this meant cutting back on clothes and frequenting low-​cost supermarkets while

74

Navigating Through Austerity

not completely abandoning her previous shopping habits. Women who were further from necessity, like Anna, could use fewer tactics and less effort. Lucy, Rita and Scarlett, single parents who were fully reliant on state support had always had to manage their finances and spend a considerable amount of effort on discount shopping and buying in bulk. Yet being closer to necessity, not just because of the devaluation of economic capital, but due to savage cuts to welfare, meant that they were having to make new decisions: choosing between heating and eating, or feeding themselves or feeding their children, as they could not afford both. This was despite careful implementation of financial management on a daily basis and the considerable effort that went into trying to make the best decisions for themselves and their children.

Alternative lifelines: family support or ​partner protection Relationships often became ‘alternative lifelines’ for women when navigating the changes brought about by austerity and their decreasing space of possibilities. Most women told me that they received help from their families in one form or another, but the extent and necessity of help differed considerably. For some, this was in the form of a contribution towards a house deposit, to help get them onto the property ladder. Bourdieu calls this a ‘reproduction strategy’ (1984:  125), since it is a practice designed (and mediated) to maintain and improve one’s position within the social space. Without this financial boost from their parents, it would have likely taken these women much longer to be eligible for a mortgage. For example, figures from Nationwide (2018), estimate that it will take people between eight and ten years to save a 20 per cent deposit (BBC News, 2018). For other women, living at home with their parents allowed them to save money to secure a mortgage of their own. This was especially practiced in London and Brighton. Most of the women who lived with their parents were either not asked for a financial contribution towards living costs, or they were only asked for a token amount —​considerably less than what they would be paying while renting. This allowed some women to take unpaid internships or lower-​paying graduate jobs, without needing to be financially independent. Alice, a 23-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, lived at home with her parents in south London and was not asked to contribute to household finances. Having graduated from the University of Cambridge that summer, Alice was looking for full-​time employment. Having been unsuccessful when applying for jobs within the not-​for-​ profit sector, Alice had decided to undertake an unpaid internship

75

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

for a small non-​governmental organization (NGO). Her ability to live with her parents, who owned their own home and who were in stable occupations (a GP and a school teacher) allowed her to gain the requisite experience during this period of transition. Alice was now toying with the idea of going abroad for a year or so, which she hoped would not only give her time to figure out what she would like to do with her life, but also give her a chance to increase her economic and social capital. She would be able to learn a language and earn money while, she noted, being able to “sit out the painful job market”. Knowing that she could always move back home with her parents without having to contribute to the household finances generated an increased sense of security. Hannah, also 23, had recently moved back in with her parents after graduating from Cardiff University. However, her parents’ precarious financial situation (working as a hotel cleaner and a lorry driver and renting in south London) meant that Hannah’s presence put a considerable strain on their resources. As described in Chapter  2, Hannah began doing concession work at a football stadium and stewarding at various music venues in London on a zero-​hour contract, to bring money into the household. Like Alice, she had applied for graduate jobs and had been rejected. Unlike Alice, her living situation did not allow her to take time to volunteer or undertake an internship. Although each of their parents could help their daughters by giving them the option to move home, the degree of help depended on the amount of capitals available to both the women and their parents. This altered how women like Hannah and Alice perceived and navigated their possibilities and constraints. Their differing trajectories therefore opened or closed their horizon of possibilities. For Alice, this provided a degree of stability, protection and the ability to accrue further resources and capital. In the case of Hannah, despite having the option of being able to move back home with her parents, time was spent halting losses. Her ability to navigate through this context was therefore limited by her lower amounts of capital and her family trajectory. For women with children, family support became paramount for their ability to move through austerity. Nicola, a 34-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, also lived with her parents in Brighton. As an unemployed single mother with a five-​year-​old daughter, Nicola received very little help from the state. This was because she was not actively seeking work (she had numerous health problems) and had a small amount of money that she had saved from her previous jobs in teaching. Living rent-​free, she was not asked to contribute to the household finances and her parents also helped financially in relation

76

Navigating Through Austerity

to her daughter. Nicola described finding the situation humiliating, but said that living with her parents meant that her daughter “did not go without”. Her family’s support thus created stability and prevented any downgrade or change to her and her daughter’s middle-​class trajectory. However, as discussed in Chapter 2, for many women whose family occupied social housing, moving in with their families was not an available option because of overcrowding or strict housing rules. For other single mothers that were interviewed, help was given in different ways. Frequently, friends and family gave small monetary contributions. Borrowing money from family members was common when money was tight. Scarlett often spoke of borrowing “a tenner” off her mum to help pay for essential utilities. Similarly, Faye, a 23-​year-​ old white working-​class single mother of one, on Income Support, “borrowed the odd fiver” from her dad every few days, which was a lifeline when money was tight. She noted, “If it wasn’t for my dad helping me I don’t know what I would have done. My dad helps me a lot, he gives me money when he can.” Aside from monetary assistance, support with childcare from friends and family enabled women to attend meetings at the Jobcentre, or helped them to avoid benefit sanctions by allowing them to attend mandatory work placements. Family support prevented women like Scarlett and Faye getting into debt or losing benefits through sanctioning. This had a critical impact on their day-​to-​day lives. Support and protection of partners also made a huge difference in women’s ability to navigate austerity, especially for those who relied heavily on state support. For instance, Elaine, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, was registered disabled, received benefits, worked-​ part time and lived with her partner in Brighton. She told me that she felt “ok now” only because she lived with her partner who worked full-​time. She explained: ‘If I didn’t live with him, I’d have to take tax credits. If I was back on benefits it would be harder. Benefits are changing more and more often, Universal Credit is coming in, so yes it would be a big struggle. If I had to move, if I had to go back to private rental I wouldn’t be able to afford it on my own, I would find myself in arrears very quickly. You will easily wait two years on the list for a council house in Brighton.’ The protection of her partner made a vast difference to Elaine’s circumstances. As she said, if she was on her own “it would be a

77

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

big struggle” and she might find herself “in arrears very quickly”. However, at the same time, Elaine said that she had come across a lot of women with disabilities or serious health conditions who were worried about getting into a relationship because of this issue. Depending on the type of benefit and amount received, partner protection could in fact become a problem and could foster dependency, due to the difficulty in applying for social housing once again. Many of Elaine’s friends who relied on this type of support felt that it might become too risky to choose to spend their life with a partner. As Elaine explained, “If your benefits stop and this guy turns out to be the wrong choice, you’re tied in, you could be waiting months to get a flat, and during that time, what do you do? So, it’s going to trap women in bad relationships and it’s just not worth waiting to see if it happens.”

Alternative options: agencies and organizations Not everyone was able to borrow informally —​certain life histories and trajectories rendered this type of strategy impossible. Those who did not have a large support network or couple protection often used outside agencies. Of the woman interviewed, 11 said that they had frequently relied on housing organizations, unemployment centres, debt advice centres and women’s support services in the last few years. Scarlett, Faye and Adele, all single mothers reliant on Income Support had been attending a support service in Leeds for the last two years, for housing, debt and benefits advice. This organization, among other things, allowed them to use the phone to discuss issues they were having with their tax credit and benefit payments. Since Jobcentres no longer offer a free telephone service on the premises, this affects those who do not have access to a phone, or cannot afford to call from their own. Lauren, a 33-​year-​old white working-​class woman who attended the same support centre, said that the organization had helped her when she had been sanctioned, and had assisted her to coordinate a payment plan when she fell into arrears: ‘When I got a letter from the social saying that they had overpaid my Working Tax Credit, I took it all up there and they sorted it out for me. They’ve been amazing. And when I got a letter from the Social Fund saying they were going to try and take money off me when I had been sanctioned, they managed to get my payments down from £20 a week to £9 a week.’

78

Navigating Through Austerity

Despite the importance of these organizations to these women’s lives, they are persistently underfunded by the state. As Rebecca, a 28-​year-​ old white middle-​class debt and benefit advisor from Brighton told me, the increased need coupled with the reduction of services was a ‘double threat’. Explaining this further she said, “Advice services are expected to run on a shoestring and everyone is frazzled because they have so much work to do and nowhere to send people.” She then went on to say that with the increased pressure to do “more and more work with less and less money and resources”, she felt that these services “can only go on for so long”. A report by UNISON in 2013 on the impact of austerity on services provided by the community and voluntary sector reinforced Rebecca’s observations. Of the respondents interviewed, 43 per cent said that they had less time with each service user and only 40 per cent said they were able to provide service users with all the help they needed. Organizations did not only provide benefits advice and support, but also helped the women in other ways. Marta, a 35-​year-​old white working-​class woman, who looked after her daughter full-​time, began attending a Brighton-​based community centre because she felt isolated having moved from Romania (her and her partner’s family lived abroad and she had very few friends in the area). At the centre, Marta’s daughter could stay in the crèche and interact with other children, which she felt was extremely important to her socialization. Marta had also begun volunteering in the crèche. She additionally received help with clothes, shoes, toys and books for her daughter. Similarly, Ila, a 35-​year-​old Bangladeshi working-​class woman who attended a black and minority ethnic women’s centre in Leeds, told me how the organization had helped her. It ran a befriending scheme, which brought women together in the area for both skills sessions and day trips with their children. Ila had felt the squeeze on her finances, and she often felt guilty about not being able to provide her children with what they wanted. The day trips helped Ila to keep the children happy and entertained. Others who attended similar organizations in London and Brighton also discussed the sense of community that these organizations provide. Priya, a 35-​year-​old Pakistani middle-​class woman currently in receipt of Disability Living Allowance, attended a black and minority ethnic counselling service at a women’s centre in Brighton. She said the centre not only made her feel safer than other services that she has attended in the past, but as a Pakistani woman she also felt that they understood her needs more fully. Yet, many such organizations in Brighton have recently closed, and Priya worried for the future of this service. As for

79

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

other at-​r isk services, women were anxious about what they would do if the support services were closed. This is not an unfounded worry, since findings from a report commissioned by the Rosa Fund (Pratten, 2014) show that 60 per cent of women’s sector organizations have struggled to maintain their income since 2010, with nearly 5 per cent being forced to close support services altogether due to lack of funds. Smaller specialist organizations, such as black and minority ethnic support services, are disproportionately affected (also see Vacchelli, Kathrecha and Gyte, 2015). The women using these organizations, who already had a smaller horizon of possibilities to navigate within, are left with even fewer resources to weather the storm of austerity. Food banks unquestionably have become one of the most visible symbols on the austerity landscape. Charity organizations, academics and journalists have noted and observed the complex realities of food bank use in recent years (see for example, O’Hara, 2014; Garthwaite, 2016; O’Connell and Hamilton, 2017; Trussell Trust, 2018). These discussions have countered controversial statements by some government ministers, which have tended to overshadow more pressing concerns about hunger and food poverty and increased need in the UK, attributing the rise of food banks with supply and demand (see news articles by Butler, 2014b; Mason, 2014). Food poverty and hunger has also been depicted in film —​one of the most sobering accounts being Ken Loach and Laura Obiols’s film I, Daniel Blake (2016), a tale of welfare injustice and institutional neglect in austerity Britain. One of the film’s key moments occurs in a foodbank, when struggling mother-​of-​two Katie (played by Hayley Squires), breaks down in hunger and desperately opens a tin of beans. Food poverty is increasing. The most widely used data to understand food poverty are statistics from the Trussell Trust network. Since 2014 food bank use in the network has been shown to have increased by 73 per cent. This is most commonly due to people’s income not covering essential costs, benefit delays and benefit changes. In the year to March 2018, 1,332,952 three-​day emergency food supplies were delivered to people in crisis across the UK by the Trussell Trust network —​a 13 per cent increase on the previous year (Trussell Trust, 2018: no pagination). These figures are however likely to underestimate the extent of food poverty in Britain —​not all of those who are hungry go to, or are able to access, food banks, and not all food banks provide data. Food banks helped women to navigate within the context of austerity. Of the women interviewed, 54 discussed the use of food banks generally. Four women had tried to get food bank vouchers but, as they were in low-​paid employment, they did not qualify. Two

80

Navigating Through Austerity

food banks were visited as part of the research for this book. Most of those observed and spoken to at these food banks —​as well as the five women interviewed who had used the service —​used them due to mounting pressures on household finances. These were caused by, among other things, job cuts, wage stagnation, spiralling utility and shopping bills, and an array of austerity-​driven benefits changes including the application of state sanctions. Marta, Lauren and Heather were all referred to food banks via charitable organizations or schools. To access food banks, people must obtain a referral voucher from a frontline care professional or ‘voucher holder’ —​such as a doctor, health visitor, schools and social workers. The voucher holder identifies people in crisis and issues a red voucher to those who they think are in need. Heather, a 26-​year-​old black working-​class woman on Income Support was given a red voucher from a woman who worked in family services at her daughter’s school in London. She explained: ‘I was pregnant at the time and the family service officer was asking me about the baby and how I was finding it and I was like, “It’s really hard.” She said she had something if I  was interested in it, but to come to a meeting with her. So, I went and you see it in films like, with people going to the food bank, I never thought that they existed and she was like, yeah we have that to help you over the Christmas period if you want and she said she would give me a voucher for the food bank and then I could go and see what I thought and if it was okay and I wanted to go again she would give me another voucher. I think we got about four vouchers under this scheme. It’s better than nothing.’ Likewise, Lauren and Marta also received red vouchers from organizations they were in contact with. Lauren had been sanctioned one month prior and having been in communication with a housing organization she had been given three vouchers to use during that time period. Similarly, Marta and her family were struggling to live only on her partner’s sole income and a health visitor had issued her a number of vouchers. When these women attend the food bank they are met by volunteers, told to take a seat, offered tea or coffee and biscuits or baked goods such as muffins and pastries, and asked what food they would like from the list of items available (a choice of, for example, pasta or rice). This list is then taken to the warehouse or store room. The food is

81

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

packed by volunteers and then handed to these women. A parcel might include cereal, juice, soup, tinned tomatoes, pasta sauces, sugar, tinned vegetables, tinned fruit, rice or pasta, tinned fish, tinned meat, biscuits, long-​life milk, and extra treats (when available) of jam, chocolate and sauces (Trussell Trust, 2018). At times, bakeries donate fresh baked goods, which are added to the parcel. The food bank visited in north London as part of the research for this book also provides people with toilet rolls, nappies and hygiene products such as deodorant, toothpaste and sanitary towels. The parcel is intended to last a household for three days; however, all three of these women told me that they stretched the food out as far as possible so that these vouchers would last longer. These strategies within strategies allowed the women to navigate such precarity for a longer period of time. Unlike Heather, Marta and Lauren, Cherry, 35, was not in contact with a referral agency but came to hear about the food bank from the council. As Kayleigh Garthwaite (2016) notes, it is a common misconception that anyone can turn up at the food bank and get free food and there is a risk that some of the most vulnerable will not be able to access support and will go hungry as a result. At the time Cherry was interviewed, she had moved to London from Chicago following a relationship breakdown seven months before, and, with her four daughters had been going to the food bank on and off for the last few months. Originally from Benin, she had previously lived in France and had European citizenship. Accustomed to a ‘middle-​class lifestyle’, she had previously owned hair and beauty businesses in both France and the US. However, in London, she had no current income or savings and was not eligible for state support. When she first arrived in London, Cherry and her four daughters had been sleeping rough, in various empty garages and bus stops. She explained: ‘When I came here, for four months we were sleeping on the ground, my children suffered, they became very ill, I’d have to find hot water to wash them every night, they said everywhere hurts; sometimes we didn’t have bread to eat.’ Suzanne Fitzpatrick et al. (2016) note that between 2010 and 2015, the estimated number of people sleeping rough in England has more than doubled, increasing year on year. Austerity has played a strong role in this —​rough sleeping has been a direct consequence of welfare reform and cuts to homelessness-​related services. This has resulted in more people being vulnerable to health implication and physical, sexual and verbal violence (McCulloch, 2017). Having been moved to temporary

82

Navigating Through Austerity

accommodation with nine other families, Cherry’s situation was still extremely precarious: ‘Now we are staying in a house where I’m not sleeping at night because a man lives close to us, smoking the whole night, coming out of the house, every time he comes back in, he bangs the door. The house is full of nine different families; it is awful [cries]. It’s now seven months on and I am still waiting for my benefits, they haven’t given them to me. I couldn’t afford to eat, buy my children’s school uniform, nothing! I don’t have Child Benefit, Child Tax Credit or Income Support. I don’t have anything. I work at Tesco’s part-​time, I  get £400 per month but it’s not enough. I’ve been to the council week after week asking for help, but they said there isn’t any. I even asked them to help pay for my children’s school uniform because school was starting and I couldn’t afford the uniform, but they said they couldn’t help me.’ Cherry was given the number of a local food bank by the council and told that they might be able to help. Speaking about her experience of visiting the food bank she said: ‘I went there one day. I  was really broken. Martin [the director of the food bank] asked me what the problem was, so I told him about my children’s uniform. He said, “I can pay it.” That same day he gave me someone to drive me to get the uniforms from the shop. Martin paid for my children’s uniforms. Sometimes I have to run to Martin for him to pay my transport, he will call the council and they will reject him but he will still pay it for me. [Crying] It is too much, we have been going there for a long time now, I want to stop going, I’m always going there … I want to stop, like the last time I didn’t go there for three weeks and the past three weeks we were struggling.’ Like the other women interviewed, Cherry also stretched the food parcels as far as possible, and struggled between each visit. Rather than fostering food dependency, an argument that some government ministers, MPs and councillors have made, this narrative illustrates the importance of such organizations to women’s lives. Cherry, discussing her income and outgoings, said, “I get £400 from Tesco. I have a bill from T-​Mobile [for]

83

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

£500, because my daughter was going to the internet, she didn’t realize that it costs, so now I am paying £95 for that and my telephone £68, transport £80 and what will remain … nothing.” With such deductions, Cherry had £39.25 per week to live on. Food parcels were extremely important for Cherry to be able to navigate her extremely precarious situation. Despite not being fully adequate to their needs, and despite women still having to adopt strategies within strategies to navigate such precarity, without such a network of support, feeding themselves and their families would have become even more difficult. Despite the importance of these organizations, women often felt reluctant, shameful or embarrassed about receiving vouchers or attending food banks. In the current context, as Garthwaite (2016: 136) has argued, feelings of stigma and embarrassment may have been aggravated by representations in ‘poverty porn’ reality television shows, and by political and public discourse, such as those at the beginning of this chapter, which she notes ‘question the lifestyles and personal attitudes of people using the food bank, branding them “undeserving of support” ’. Heather worried that people would find out she was using a food bank, quickly stating that she was using it because “it’s hard” and not because she “can’t afford food”. Similarly, Cherry said, “This is for poor people, not for me.” In such discussions, both Heather and Cherry distance themselves from those who are seen as typically using food banks —​‘poor people’ —​and themselves —​those who sometimes ‘find it hard’. Such a distancing move is not surprising since mothers have long held the main responsibility for maintaining respectability. Being able to make ends meet is a visible marker of being ‘a good mother’ (Skeggs, 1997; Shildrick and MacDonald, 2013). As with Garthwaite’s observations, such a moral discourse, coupled with pre-​existing notions of respectability, may cause these women to experience feelings of stigma, shame and embarrassment when using food banks, despite their growing normalization.

Have now, pay later: loan sharks and payday lending Johnna Montgomerie (2015:  no pagination) has argued that ‘intensifying austerity measures in the UK ensure that households will continue to pay down the public debt by taking on more private debt, be they student loans for the young, home equity loans for pensioners and small businesses, and every other kind of loan for the rest’. Statistics from The Office of Budget Responsibility support this argument:  with household disposable income growing by less than household debt levels, the debt-​to-​income ratio rose from 127 per cent

84

Navigating Through Austerity

in 2015 to 134 per cent in 2017 (Harari, 2018). This bleak picture has also been reinforced by the TUC (2019) who state that Britain’s household debt mountain reached a new peak in 2018, with UK homes owing an average of £15,385 to credit card firms, banks and other lenders. The Trade Union Body said household debt rose sharply in 2018 as years of austerity and wage stagnation forced households to increase their borrowing:  the amounts owed by British households rose to a combined £428 billion in the third quarter of 2018, with each household owing £886 more than it did 12 months previously. Personal debt has therefore become a symbol of how some households have had to make ends meet in an atmosphere of severe austerity. This has had devastating impacts on families and individuals. Four women discussed how they used personal loans and credit cards as a way to navigate within the current context of austerity. In addition, five other women discussed friends or relatives who had also taken out such loans due to necessity. These women were all single mothers who relied heavily on government support. This is a group, which according to StepChange Debt Charity, are extremely vulnerable to debt since they are more likely to be in rented accommodation, least likely to work full-​time, and have a tighter budget than any other group (2016: no pagination). These experiences took place against the backdrop of the government’s removal of the emergency loans and grants that had previously helped to tide people over: Community Care Grants (non-​repayable grants to help people to live independently in the community, or to ease exceptional pressures on families) and Crisis Loans, both of which were administered by Jobcentre Plus. Heather had got herself in debt using credit cards, a strategy she noted “wasn’t ideal” but was the only option available that allowed her to better support her four children and their everyday needs. Having to move numerous times from furnished to unfurnished rented accommodation in the last few years meant that Heather had no alternative in necessitating the need to purchase various basic household items (such as carpets, beds, cookers and washing machines) on top of everyday goods. With the removal of care grants by the government to help families such as Heather’s in times of need, she questioned where she was expected to get money from to be able to adequately furnish these properties. She had no other option but to pay for these items using credit cards. Explaining further, she said: ‘I’ve had to get five credit cards. Five! And even with them, it’s bloody hard. Obviously stupid companies give them to me, and you end up digging yourself into a bigger hole.

85

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

But because of having so many houses and getting them empty, I’ve had to buy cookers, and get carpets and stuff like that to furnish it. Where am I going to get that type of money? You don’t get any housing grants anymore. So I’ve had to get credit cards. But I’m spending it on the house that my kids come home to, so they have a bed and heating and something to eat and it can be clean.’ She then went on to say, “You have to do something. Money isn’t going to fall out the sky. What can I do? Turn to crime, just so you can get money to make us comfortable? I’d prefer to just pay the interest.” Creditors have increasingly sought to enforce debts owed to them compelling payment in one form or another, legitimized by the weight of the law. As David Ellis (2017) notes, the inability by a debtor to fulfil their obligations will potentially see them incur a myriad of punitive sanctions enforced by the legal mechanisms of the state, including court action, the removal of property, eviction, home repossession and the arrestment of the debtor’s bank account. The number of County Court Judgments (CCJs) issues against individual debtors is now higher than at any point since the financial crisis. Having also accumulated credit card debt, like Heather, Scarlet had been struggling to pay off the mounting interest. Turning to a ‘loan shark’ (a moneylender who charges extremely high rates of interest, typically under illegal conditions) two years earlier, Scarlett had agreed initially to a loan of £100. Caught in a cycle of debt and struggling to make ends meet, she then took out another loan for a larger amount. She noted: ‘[The loan shark] came to me and said, “Would you like a bigger [loan]?” So I’m like, you know what, yeah, he [her ex-​partner] was knocking ten bottles of shite out of me and we had no money, so [the loan shark] said right your next one is £250, you have to pay £450 back, so because I needed it, I took it. I didn’t listen to the repayments and I ended up taking out the loan.’ With two loans still to be repaid, Scarlett explained the difficulties she had in managing these repayments, with lenders sometimes being hostile and aggressive towards her: ‘[The lenders] both come knocking at my door asking for money, sometimes they give me a few weeks, sometimes they don’t. One will text me before saying, “Is there any

86

Navigating Through Austerity

point coming?” and I’ll say no, please, and he’ll say, “Right, love, don’t worry about me.” But my other one, no, he’s just at me all the time. I have to give him £35 per week, and because I haven’t been giving it recently, he’s been getting short tongued with me. This morning he was really short tongued and I thought, you know what, I’ve been through hell and back, and the reason I am in this mess is because you come advertising these loans door-​to-​door, so who in their right mind isn’t going to take it?’ According to a report on consumer experiences of unauthorized lending in the UK by the Financial Conduct Authority (2017), Scarlett is one of many people who have experienced such hostility from a loan shark. Exploitation and intimidation at the hands of unauthorized lenders was common, with examples given of consumers being coerced into sex work, drug running or experiencing physical and emotional violence or threats. Research with victims of illegal money lending noted the effect this had on people’s mental health and wellbeing, stating that 5 per cent of victims reported that they had considered suicide directly as a result of being involved with a loan shark (Illegal Money Lending Team England, 2016). Despite Heather and Scarlett being worried about how they were going to pay back the money, as far as they were concerned, they needed to care for their families in the short term. This was more important to them than being debt free. As Scarlett said, “I’m sorry, but if you’re in this situation and your kids need it, you’re going to aren’t you?” Without the necessary capital, which would allow them to avoid such financial pitfalls, these women continued to accumulate interest and, at the same time, shoulder the emotional weight of this mounting debt.

Conclusion Women use a variety of strategies to navigate through austere times: they re-​skill and gain further qualifications, they cut back, they discount shop and they receive help wherever they can. Navigating the complex and messy social reality of austerity therefore requires significant time, energy and emotional strain. Despite the commonality in women using navigation strategies, there are clear divergences in the degree to which these strategies are needed and can be implemented. Being able to up-​skill and move into better paid work, travel or borrow money from family to get on the property ladder and gain further

87

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

security is only possible for women who have the time, the resources and the space to be able to make investments in themselves. This allows them to better navigate a less precarious route through austerity. For mothers in low-​paid work, who were trying to maintain their lifestyle within a period of intense uncertainty and instability, investments took another form —​their children. This closed down their ability to move out of the way of the storm. For women who had experienced a change in their trajectory —​ illness or migration meant that qualifications and experiences gained within the job market did not translate or were lost —​family support became extremely important in their ability to navigate the storm. Being able to learn from, live with, or have the support of their family and/​or partner made the difference between being able to keep the lifestyle that they were accustomed to and shield themselves and their children from economic necessity, or experience a downgrade and become proximate to the effects of austerity. Despite this support becoming a much-​needed lifeline, this did however leave some women feeling stuck —​in their parents’ homes or in relationships —​which caused feelings of shame, anxiety and dependence. All women spoke of the need to cut back. Yet it was single parents in low-​paid work and/​or reliant on the state who found it harder to navigate through austerity. It was these women who had to employ multiple strategies to keep their heads barely above water. ‘Heating or eating’, attending local food banks and organizations, sacrificing food, doing without to give to their children and accumulating vast amounts of personal debt were the types of strategies which these women had to implement on a daily basis. This was done with compromise, ingenuity and resourcefulness, challenging the discourses circulating within the current socio-​political register. Yet these strategies often resulted in further material instability, as well as emotional hardship and further strain. This was particularly the case for women who were accumulating high levels of debt just to get by.

88

4

Austerity Talk Brits on low pay –​and those out of work –​are forced to compete with millions of people from abroad for jobs. (Iain Duncan-​Smith, Conservative MP, 2016, emphasis added) Every time people look at White Dee … it will serve as a reminder to people of the mess the benefits system is in and how badly Iain Duncan Smith’s reforms are needed. White Dee is bone idle and doesn’t want to work another day in her life and has no intention of finding a job. (Philip Davies, Conservative MP, 2014, emphasis added) This chapter explores how women who are significantly affected by austerity and welfare reform and who are devalued and made abject by the symbolic and institutional violence of the austerity programme —​single mothers, women reliant on welfare, migrant women and women with disabilities or health conditions —​talk about the austerity agenda. Women’s narratives are not straightforward, they dialogue with this discourse in contrasting and contradictory ways, simultaneously reproducing, reinforcing, questioning and talking back to moralistic narratives of hard work, fairness and responsibility. They experience a range of violent impacts, increased racism, fear, humiliation, high levels of anxiety and concerns about the growing mistreatment from both the public and institutions of the state. Despite such experiences, their discussions are narrated through paradoxical dialogues of negotiation and distancing towards and away from such negative stereotypes. Rather than assuming such distinctions reflect the prevalence and internalization of anti-​welfare messages and austerity

89

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

discourse, such distinctions are ‘a central feature of their own bid for recognition and legitimacy’ (Dhaliwal and Forkert, 2015: 49). The ways in which these women try to value themselves thus becomes dependent on, and specific to, the immediate context, as well as to the resources and capital that they have available to be mobilized. Divided into three sections, the first part of this chapter examines how women who are deemed to be ‘hard-​working citizens’ by the government speak about these abject figures. Invoking outrage and condemnation, it is within these narratives that the power and influence of ‘poverty propaganda’ (Shildrick, 2018) becomes visible. The second section of this chapter then explores how women who are devalued and made abject through dominant anti-​welfare discourse talk back to and dialogue with these representations. The final section illustrates additional complexities in women’s narratives  —​exploring how they question austerity discourse by critically reflecting on structural constraints and well-​worn stereotypes.

The power and influence of ‘poverty propaganda’ Since 2010, in seeking to legitimize and gain consensus for the programme of austerity and welfare reform, successive Conservative governments have repeatedly stereotyped and stigmatized certain groups of people for diminishing social resources inside the population. Immigrants, single mothers, people with disabilities and recipients of welfare have all been demonized and misrepresented; they are frequently portrayed in political terms as economically unproductive, depleting or undeserving of welfare, and in need of confinement, regulation or moral reform (Allen et  al., 2015; Jensen and Tyler, 2015; Tyler, 2015; Shildrick, 2018). It is these groups who have been disproportionately affected by the austerity agenda. In speeches, policy documents and interviews, politicians, such as those at the beginning of this chapter (also see Chapter  1), have recurrently characterized these groups as being ‘work-​shy’, ‘bone-​idle’ and of ‘playing the system’. Media platforms have worked to reinforce such an idea, with reality television shows such as Benefits Street (2014) and Immigration Street (2015) being used as ‘proof ’ of the need for such drastic reform. Tracey Jensen (2014) calls this ‘anti-​welfare common sense’, where political figures and the media tell stories of problematic behaviour of figures which they argue is supported by the excessive welfare state. These examples, Tracey Shildrick (2018: 8) notes, ‘are often carefully timed and deployed in unison to ensure the message is received and to invoke public outrage towards the welfare state and those in receipt

90

Austerity Talk

of out of work benefits (Jensen, 2014; Allen et al., 2015; Jensen and Tyler 2015)’. Shildrick (2018: 4) calls this ‘poverty propaganda’ which she argues works to stigmatize and label those experiencing poverty and related disadvantages as feckless, lazy and work-​shy, and cause confusion about the root causes of inequality. Discussions with women who were labelled ‘hard-​working citizens’ or ‘strivers’ by austerity discourse demonstrate the power and complexity of poverty propaganda. Women initially questioned and criticized aspects of state discourse —​addressing the financial sector, the government and the wealthy/​privileged in negative terms. Feelings of anger and frustration were often directed at the ‘underserving rich’, seen as unjust recipients of state redistribution who took more from the public purse than they gave. Women would also point out the tactics and scapegoats used by the government to dissipate the real reasons for the crisis. Trisha, a 34-​year-​old white middle-​class woman who worked part-​time as an Advocacy Support Worker in Brighton, discussed the fixation that the government had on the spending habits of those reliant on welfare. She said, “It’s not David Cameron’s business how people spend their money is it? I just think it’s really vile politics actually and it’s a distraction of what’s happening.” She then went on to say, “It’s interesting how we are now forced to look outside at other things, so it covers up what is happening here.” For Trisha, ‘vile politics’ were being covered up by smoke screens, redirecting the population’s attention away from domestic issues to trivial news stories. Despite some women agreeing with austerity measures more than others, there was an awareness by some that certain proportions of the population were suffering because of the austerity measures, while others were not. Examples were often provided of certain policies the government had implemented which had affected people in negative ways. The bedroom tax, which was frequently in the news at the time of the interviews was often discussed. Unfairness therefore figured in the narratives of these women —​they acknowledged (directly or indirectly) that small proportions of the population did not experience austerity in the same way or to the same degree as they did, or even at all. Those women who were more proximate to the effects of austerity, who worked with service users, in charity organizations, or who had experience of the welfare system, would often talk at length about the injustices people faced, resisting and arguing against the popular rhetoric. Trisha, for instance, said, “People are in poverty, food banks cropping up all over the place … I don’t believe all the bollocks you hear about ‘you create them and they will come’. People have dignity and self-​respect, yes David Cameron, even the working-​class have

91

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

dignity and self-​respect not just everyone else, you don’t go unless you need to.” Despite acknowledging that the actions of the ‘privileged’ should not be overlooked, women such as Anna  —​27  years old, white, middle-​class  —​largely blamed “the spongers, scroungers … those on benefits” for the crisis. Conversations often began with a general discussion about the welfare state, which was thought to be problematic, costly and in crisis. Women would often make distinctions between the early welfare state and its current condition. Tiffany, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class Marketing Manager from Leeds, argued that the welfare state, “was set up as a safety net for needy individuals,” but was “not being used in the way it should be.” Expanding on her points, Tiffany, echoing political discourse, said, “I do think that when the benefits system was set up it was for people in need. Now it is being too generous.” As Jensen (2014) notes, such an understanding of the generosity of the welfare state is highly contestable (also see Wacquant, 2009; Dorling, 2010; Shildrick et al., 2012; Atkinson et al., 2013b. The greater conditionality of welfare payments and more punitive sanctions and cuts in various benefits (as shown in Chapters 2 and 3) seriously trouble Tiffany’s understanding. Discussions about the assumed ‘generosity’ of the welfare state then led into thoughts about who used the welfare system and if in fact they should be eligible for, or needed, such support. Mia, a 27-​year-​old Anglo-​Indian middle-​class GP from London, after discussing the welfare system and state of the NHS, said, “There are people who are entitled. I would gladly give my tax money to those who need it.” Making the connection between the welfare state and her tax money, enables, as Simon Winlow and Steve Hall (2013) note, ‘an ideological pitting of the abstracted hard-​working taxpayers against the “benefits claimant” ’ (in Jensen and Tyler, 2015: 483). The underlying suggestion within Mia’s narrative is that there are people receiving benefits who are not entitled and who do not need it.

Boundary-​making and blame: the spirit of hard work Anna felt it was unfair that some people “had to work for their wages” while “others got paid for doing nothing”. Working in the NHS, Anna said that she had been subject to a pay freeze since 2011, and in recent years had had to make do with less. This provoked a sense of anger and resentment, which was directed towards those who were deemed to be taking advantage of the hard work and everyday scarifies of the majority. Despite Anna not specifically naming those she described in

92

Austerity Talk

the binary terms of skiver/​striver, she reproduces the understanding that there are two types of citizens, who have different morals, objectives and ideas (Jensen, 2014: 2.5). Work was therefore central to these women’s narratives. Many women claimed that work was plentiful, despite some acknowledging that some jobs might be low-​paid. These jobs were seen to be better than nothing, and therefore it was thought that people who were reliant on welfare must be “turning their noses up at certain jobs”. Kiran, a 28-​year-​old Indian middle-​class woman living in London and working in training operations, said, “There are jobs … it’s just that these people choose not to take the job … I don’t think anybody can sit there and say I can’t find suitable work.” These attitudes show a lack of fit with the everyday lived experiences of those looking for paid employment. As discussed in Chapters 2 and 3, women who wanted to return to paid employment often experienced repeated setbacks, rejections and a lack of suitable employment to suit their needs (also see Shildrick et al., 2012; Patrick, 2014). This was especially the case for women with caring responsibilities. When women were asked if they knew anyone who matched the description of those who, in the words of Kiran, “turned their noses up at certain jobs”, their understanding was driven by examples from tabloids and social media, reality television shows and political discussions. The hardening of public opinion into consent, Stuart Hall et al. (1978: 129) note, ‘relies upon the repetition and accumulation of expressions and beliefs “on the street”, in conversations between neighbours, discussion on street corners or in the pub, rumour, gossip, speculation’ (Tyler, 2013a:  211). Imogen Tyler notes that in 20th-​ century Britain, ‘the street’ can in fact ‘include the formal technologies of social media’ (2013a: 211–​12). Examples from reality television were often provided as evidence that some who were receiving welfare were ‘tricking the system’. Mia used the example of Benefits Street (2014) to support her point that some people were making up certain conditions to get sick pay. Despite acknowledging the controversy surrounding the show, which she called “skewed”, she said: ‘It started with a girl walking down the street saying this person doesn’t work, here’s a job opportunity for this man called Fungi and he’s not taking his job opportunity because he’s on opiate substitutes. There’s no reason why he can’t work, it’s because of the fear of working and not being used to it and an element of laziness. I think it’s the laziness that’s most aggravating. If people think other people aren’t

93

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

doing it because of laziness then the situation is obviously … it’s probably rarely just laziness, yeah, it might be fear of going back to work, anxiety about it, fear of not being able to keep the job, failure, avoiding something that might make them feel like a failure … but that particular guy who declined that job opportunity, it’s probably badly paid, but still a job. A job that will reflect good on him and his children, who he most desperately wants to see, who aren’t allowed to see him. Surely that’s the right way forward and he probably knows it. I don’t know but … yeah so this guy would work hard on the street to make money. He would sell magazines, which is probably a nine-​to-​five job for him. So, if he’s working that hard, he’s not lazy, but maybe he’s more motivated doing that and can make more money doing that. But that’s not a good enough reason to receive benefits. There will be plenty more people like that doing the same thing.’ Mia makes her point by focusing on the character ‘Fungi’. Despite carefully considering and reflecting upon his situation and the structural constraints he is facing, she concludes that ‘Fungi’ does not have a good enough reason to receive benefits. Although she described the jobs that he declined as “probably badly paid”, she reasons that it is a job that will reflect well on both him and his children. Mia is therefore not only minimizing the effects of the structural constraints Fungi faces, but supplants such a discussion within a moral rhetoric of conduct and behaviour. Fungi thus acts, as Jensen and Tyler (2015) argue, as a figure of welfare disgust. He provides Mia with evidence that such people are not working and are tricking the system. This therefore strengthens the division between groups, and the feeling that some do not work when they should, reinforcing anti-​welfare common-​sense. Employment thus took on a morally weighted rhetoric, mirroring the political view that all citizens ‘should want to work’ and ‘help the nation recover’ through being autonomous, individualized and economically productive. The use of such rhetoric to justify economic behaviour is nothing new. Max Weber notably made the case in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905) that the development of capitalism in northern Europe had been influenced by the Protestant values of prudence and frugality, where idleness was regarded as a sin. As Beverley Skeggs notes, during this period, ‘idle’ persons were held up by the state and gentry as the constitutive limit to propriety (2014b). Such an understanding, as was showed in Chapter 1, has been repeated

94

Austerity Talk

and recycled, especially during times of crisis and subsequent periods of welfare cuts (see Haylett, 2001; Tyler, 2013a; Todd, 2014), to draw divisions between citizens who help the nation and those who do not, regardless of structural conditions. The women’s narratives thus reinforced and helped to further reproduce these divisions.

Boundary-​making and blame: morality and lifestyle Citizens who were out of work and reliant on state support were deemed by these women as not living accordingly. Such an understanding is tied up with pre-​existing notions of negative value that have been attributed to working-​class women, historically marked through incivility, animalistic commentary (Rooke and Gidley, 2010), fecundity (Tyler, 2008), excess, dirt and space (Skeggs, 2004). In the context of austerity, middle-​class women tried to create distance and draw boundaries between themselves and ‘others’, drawing on these moral undertones. The extract which involves a conversation with Mia is demonstrative of this. Mia made a statement that she could identify a working-​class woman by her nails. Asking her to elaborate on this comment, Mia said: Mia: ‘The long talons, nail art … that kind of thing. It’s a very specific type of nail. So much focus and money is in that nail [laughs]. It means they aren’t practical and they pay too much attention to non-​essential things. It’s a sign of being lower-​class. I would never have those nails. How can you have those nails and not be lazy? I’d rather spend money on something else more long standing like education. You shouldn’t waste money on nails. … I mean if you are really poor and you have a very small income, you aren’t going to spend it on big things like wanting a property or saving up for your children’s education. If you have a small income and those things aren’t on your radar, you are more likely to spend money on non-​essential things. Whereas my parents, when they were saving money, they didn’t buy a broom. They used a dustpan and brush. My mum would make my brother’s nappies because they dreamed bigger. So if that’s not on your radar, then you’re more likely to spend money on the here and now and on things that don’t matter. That, to me, suggests a lack of will and a lack of wanting to better yourself and your situation. They have a lack of foresight and

95

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

forward planning and future ambition. Like, the money they put into those nails could be put into advancing themselves.’ VD: ‘So, by saving money, these women would be able to have similar opportunities to you?’ Mia: ‘Maybe, well not their generation, but their kids. It’s about yourself and children and if you can save and try to get a stable home and aren’t reliant on anyone else giving you income then they could buy text books for their children and encourage them to work. Obviously it’s hard. It is hard, but my friend’s mum did it. She had nothing and she worked three jobs and put all the money into her two children.’ VD: ‘And what did she do about childcare?’ Mia: ‘Well I think she was with her husband. And yeah in that sense the cuts wouldn’t have affected her getting a job years back and earning money. But, either way people just live in the here and now, they don’t try.’ Like many other conversations conducted with middle-​class women, within this conversation Mia connects class position, aesthetics and morality. Seeing “long talons” and nail art as a sign of being lower-​ class, Mia then drew a distinction between these women and herself (someone who would never have those types of nails). For Pierre Bourdieu (1984), dominant groups often legitimize their own culture and lifestyle as superior to those of the lower classes, producing class distinction through taste. A  distinction which is evident here. Mia then continued by asking, “How can you have those nails and not be lazy?” Following this logic, ‘aesthetics are translated into morality’, as Stephanie Lawler notes, those perceived as lacking taste are also represented as morally lacking (2005: 441). For Mia, this lack of taste thus signifies being lazy, having a lack of will and a lack of foresight. This carried with it an assumption that income was spent on excess and frivolity: non-​essential items. It is therefore through the body, as Bourdieu (1984) shows, that a whole way of life can be classified as admirable or repulsive and disgusting. Better financial management was suggested as a way women could better themselves and become more responsible. For Mia, this would involve generations of thrift, drawing on the example of her parents using a dustpan and brush and making her brother’s nappies. Although she acknowledged the difference in context, she still felt that women should deal with their situation individually. She laboured the point of ‘living in the here and now’ or ‘not trying’, placing the onus onto the women themselves. It was women’s lack of effort and responsibility,

96

Austerity Talk

spending habits and moral conduct —​not their lack of income or wider structural issues —​which would mean these women would be unable to have the same opportunities as she did. Thrift and responsibility have been encouraged and strongly promoted in different moments of history (targeted mainly at women); the inter-​war period and Thatcherism, through the return to ‘Victorian values’.1 Mia’s narrative documents how thrift has once again been revived as a source of cultural value and a trait of distinction. As Jensen (2014: 4.7) observes, ‘ “new thrift” culture produces and circulates fantasies of the classed Others against whom austerity is positioned as necessary, and who need to re-​learn the lessons of frugality’. From Mia’s narrative, the concept of thrift can be used to differentiate the ‘Other’ and symbolically shame them for not being austere enough: specifically, in the sense of paying for goods that women ‘waste money on’ and don’t ‘need’.

Blaming “the greedy beggars who walk around in posh suits” One of the ways in which the stigmatized figure of the ‘undeserving skiver’ navigated through this context of blame was to, firstly, talk back to austerity discourse. Rita, a 35-​year-​old white working-​class woman spoke angrily about the current state of the country. Sat with four other women who were all heavily reliant on state support at a charitable organization in Leeds, discussions about politics and the government elicited feelings of frustration and injustice. Rita blamed “the greedy government” for the recession and subsequent era of welfare cuts and reform, noting, “We’ve got idiots who put us into a world recession because of greed.” Scarlett, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class woman, then questioned why the banking crisis happened, saying jovially, “Me and you could run a bank, if money’s coming in and you invest you get interest … so I don’t know how they all got it so bloody wrong … it’s just greed!” Most women directed their anger at the government and politicians, who, they argued, did not have their priorities in order: ‘I see politicians on the news saying, “We want to help change this world.” Well you don’t, you want money to line your own pockets while everyone else is suffering. And I’m sorry, if I ever met you (God help you) I swear I wouldn’t be able to keep my cool.’ (Scarlett) David Cameron, who was the Prime Minister at the time of these interviews, bore the brunt of the anger. Women described him as

97

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

being out of touch and privileged, with Scarlett labelling him “a greedy beggar who walks around in a posh suit.” These women frequently felt ignored, not listened to, unfairly stereotyped and blamed for the state of the country. As Scarlett noted, “We get looked down at, I get looked down at all the time for being a single mum at 23 on my own, with two children. As if this [cuts] is all because of me needing help.” Continuing, talking back to political rhetoric, she said: ‘You’re sat here doing it to us and blaming us for it. How can you blame us for something you are putting in place, for the things you are doing? We can’t say well we’re stopping that and we’ll do this, we can’t do that, you’re the ones doing it, so you’re to blame for the mess we are in. You can’t blame someone else for the rules you’re putting in place. We don’t have the authority to go make these rules. All the politicians out everywhere and around Leeds need to face themselves and the difficulties that everyone else is having. Maybe then they might be able to put something decent in place. I don’t think my opinions are too strong, and I think they should come and face it just like other people.’ Woven throughout Scarlett’s narrative is the issue of blame and authority. For Scarlett, it is apparent that people who lack the authority to make decisions are being blamed for the results of these decisions. Infused with anger and feelings of unfairness, Scarlett mentions many times how blame is manifested unjustly and that those in power need to face the difficulties that everyone else is having. Dialoguing directly with the dominant government rhetoric, women would then speak back to the idea of their reliance on benefits as being a lifestyle choice. Despite both David Cameron and George Osborne repeatedly returning to this idea in an attempt to justify welfare reform and cuts to benefits, it was often asked by the women interviewed, “Who would choose this?” (also see Shildrick et al., 2012; Patrick, 2017). This was then followed up with, “We don’t do it for the love of it.” As Scarlett put it: ‘They’ve never lived on benefits; they have no idea what it’s like. They think I’m sat back and enjoying it … enjoy what? I don’t have two pennies to rub together after my bills, shopping and whatever else. What am I enjoying out of that? I had to take out of my mouth to put trainers on my kids last week … what am I benefiting out of that?’

98

Austerity Talk

Navigating symbolic injury In her book Revolting Subjects (2013a: 21), Tyler discusses the politics of disgust, arguing that while disgust is experienced physically, quoting Sianne Ngai (2005) it is ‘saturated with socially stigmatised meanings and values’. As Mary Douglas (1966: 2) highlights, disgust is not an intrinsic feature of the ‘disgusting’ object —​there is no such thing ‘as absolute dirt’ —​‘it exists in the eye of the beholder’. In this sense, disgust (the feeling produced by dirt, for instance) is a ‘byproduct of a systematic ordering and classification of matter’ (36). Therefore, as Tyler (2013a: 25) notes, disgust is political, used throughout history ‘as a powerful weapon in social efforts to exclude certain groups and persons (Nussbaum, 2004: 107)’. Yet, disgust is not just ‘enacted by subjects and groups in the process of othering, distinction-​making, distancing and boundary formation’, but Tyler argues, it is also ‘experienced and lived by those constituted as disgusting in their experiences of displacement and abandon’ (26). Women deemed disgusting in the context of austerity spoke of the negative experiences that they had encountered from the general public in recent years. These discussions were emotionally charged, and there were multiple references to fear and to concerns about the growing hatred and lack of empathy towards them. Due to such experiences, women tried to distance themselves from these figures of disgust using the resources and capitals that were available to them. Marta, a 35-​year-​old white working-​class Romanian migrant living in Brighton with her husband and young daughter discussed the increased hostility she had experienced in recent years. Although she had lived in the UK since 2008, she felt more and more uncomfortable when speaking Romanian on the street. She said that this was because of the increased stigma surrounding certain migrants (especially those from Romania) expressed in political rhetoric and tabloid and television media. Research undertaken by Bianca-​Florentine Cheregi (2015) on the role of images in framing the theme of Romanian people migrating to the UK, found that British television media mostly use economic (images of pauper Romanian villages), political (images of politicians talking about the Romanian migrants) and national security (images of homeless Romanians rough sleeping) frames in the coverage of Romanian immigration which thus infers the polarization between ‘us’ (the British citizen) and ‘them’ (the Romanian migrant). Marta actively negotiated such hostility by now speaking only English in public spaces. She explained:

99

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

‘I’m afraid to talk on the street in my own language with my daughter. She knows English and Romanian. I mean, I heard in some towns it’s like that, if they hear you talking a different language they [long pause] … I would like to speak my language to my daughter; she knows better my language than English, but we are more and more afraid, we just speak English.’ Marta was aware of the negativity directed towards immigrants when she said, “I mean, I heard in some towns it is like that, if they hear you talking a different language they [long pause] …” The long pause here indicates Marta is thinking about something that is known but cannot be named. There has been a sharp rise in xenophobic attacks recorded by police in England and Wales following the EU referendum in June 2016. Embassies of eastern European countries reported a rise in alleged hate crimes in the two months following the Brexit vote (Weaver and Laville, 2016). Reports by charitable organizations and media outlets have noted how victims of these crimes have experienced verbal and physical abuse, which in some cases has resulted in death. Therefore, citing being afraid to speak Romanian to her daughter in public, Marta’s decision to speak only English aims to avoid any conflict and abuse in the future. Elaine, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class woman who is registered disabled and in receipt of Disability Living Allowance discussed how the increasing negativity towards disabled people had affected her. Speaking about her everyday experiences, she described the visible hostility towards disability. Groups formerly regarded as ‘deserving’ and ‘off-​limits’ —​because of ill health or disability, for ­example —​are now prime suspects in the tabloid and wider socio-​political debate about austerity. Such discourses are not without consequences. Leading charities have warned that the government’s focus on alleged fraud and over-​claiming to justify cuts in disability benefits, has caused an increase in resentment, abuse and record levels of hate crime against people with disabilities. According to the Hate Crime Report 2017/​18 for England and Wales, the number of disability hate crimes recorded by the police has more than doubled in the last five years, a 30 per cent increase on those reported in 2016/​17 (Home Office, 2018). This reaction is not just confined to the context of the UK. Karen Soldatic and Helen Meekosha’s (2012) research exploring the experience of disabled women in the Australian welfare state, highlights how the reconfiguration of disabled women in the public image from ‘victims’ to parasitical welfare scroungers has affected

100

Austerity Talk

women’s interactions with official state actors and other citizens (in Tyler, 2013a: 26). Recalling how such discourses had affected her interactions with other citizens, Elaine said: ‘It got to the point, particularly around 2011 and 2012, when they were bringing in the first wave of changes and it was in the media, constantly, always stories, look at this person who gets, I don’t know, £30,000 a year and goes on holiday, some people get BMWs and all sorts of nonsense stories and it would coincide when there was a wave of those stories with getting more abuse in the streets just from strangers coming up and saying “scrounger” or “Why don’t you get a job?” The worst one was when people would come up to me and say, “People like you should be put down to save tax money,” and I was like wow, pretty hostile, when I was just waiting for a bus. And yeah, what I noticed was, which was interesting, that at my current job I have a staff lanyard, if I wear that whilst I am travelling on a bus everything is a lot smoother, I don’t get any comments or whispers or people coming up and asking, “What’s wrong with you?”, “Are you going to get better?”, “Do you work?” interrogating me, but they let it go. When I was working in permitted work, I was on my way to work and the bus ramp was not working properly as they often don’t, so it took a while for the driver to get it working and the man waiting to get on the bus said, “All this fuss and you spend our tax money,” and I was literally on my way to work at a charity with vulnerable teenagers. I don’t know, you can’t stop and say hang on a minute, let’s talk about this, you need to be like, okay, let’s not raise this confrontation.’ In a survey published by the Disability Hate Crime Network in 2015, ‘scrounger rhetoric’ was highlighted in the testimonies of about one in six of 61 disabled people who described being verbally or physically assaulted in disability hate crimes (Burnett, 2017). Elaine navigated through these negative experiences of hostility and abuse by wearing her staff lanyard despite not actually being in work on those days. She explained, “When I started wearing my staff lanyard around, all of that went away. So now I will just put it on and tuck it into my jumper and there we go, people will think I’m on my way to work and won’t bother me.” Negotiating her position as a disabled woman

101

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

and as a worker who was not spending tax money was a way for Elaine to not be identified or labelled as the figure of the ‘bad citizen’. This resulted in people not bothering her, unlike previous occasions without her lanyard, which would give rise to instances of verbal abuse and relentless questioning.

Distancing: legitimizing hard work and morality Within a context of blame, vilification and stereotyping of certain groups by the media, political elites and the general public, there was a tendency among these women to simultaneously characterize themselves as deserving and identify and distance themselves from ‘others’ deemed undeserving. Women who were ‘proximate’ to the class borders as Bourdieu (1986) argues, were most insistent when highlighting their distance from these ‘bad citizens’. Priya, Marie and Lucy, for example, marked their difference through recourse to narratives of work ethic and/​or morality. For Marie, a single mother, who worked part-​time as a waitress in a library café in London, it was important to emphasize that despite receiving state help she also worked for a living and, as she said, had ‘major values’. Having left the UK as a teenager, moving to Barbados to live with her grandparents and complete her education, Marie said that she felt she was different from her siblings and friends who had stayed in the UK. Living in a foreign country had allowed her to acquire more experiences and a better standard of education. When she moved back to London aged 18, Marie began working in a high-​street store while she found her feet. The capitals she acquired did not translate themselves easily to a UK context. She fell pregnant with her son shortly after. Now a single mother, working part-​time and receiving state support, Marie was adamant that she could stand on her own two feet and pay her way because of her values and attitude. In this way, she tries to distant herself from the idea of welfare as a lifestyle choice and its connection to the ‘bad citizen’ who did not have the same work ethic and values as she did. For others, legitimizing themselves had to take a different form as they could not use employment to indicate their position as a ‘good citizen’. Having previously lived abroad in Italy and Belgium working as an au pair, Lucy returned to Brighton after getting pregnant in 2012. Despite returning with her partner, due to the “hard-​working conditions” in the UK, her partner went back to Belgium after only a few months. Lucy was now a single mother reliant on welfare, but

102

Austerity Talk

was resolute that her outlook and mentality differentiated her from those who also received state support: ‘I’m just different with it [benefits]. Others are just stupid with it. They think they’re not getting enough to survive … I still … I think my mum brought me up well, no matter how little money I have, I don’t eat shit. Like, I hate eating shit, like “oh let’s go to MacDonald’s”, no! It’s disgusting, no way! I just, well it’s personal how you handle it … Olive [her daughter] never goes without, I always get her what she needs. It’s just personal how you handle it.’ In this particular moment, as Skeggs (1997:  74) notes, her ‘class positioning (alongside the other social positions) was the omnipresent underpinning which informed and circumscribed her ability to be’. Thus, the way Lucy was able to distance herself from the stigmatized representation of the welfare claimant was by focusing on her moral values and her lifestyle. Even though she said that she received state support, Lucy emphasized that she was “different with it”. This, she explained, was since she had different values and a different mindset to others. However, by doing this, she further reproduces and reinforces austerity discourse and anti-​welfare common sense by making the connection between welfare and individual choice and behaviour. Priya, a 35-​year-​old Pakistani middle-​class woman living in Brighton, was on Disability Living Allowance at the time of the interview. Unable to narrate her position using economic terms, like Lucy, Priya instead emphasized her moral value. Despite acknowledging that she received help, she highlighted that she only takes one benefit out of many possible others. Ruth Patrick (2017) calls this ‘claims stigma’; the need to demonstrate deservingness through the under-​claiming of benefits to which people are entitled. Priya then uses moral judgments to discuss others who also received similar amounts of state support: ‘I see some of my peers on benefits, and I hate the way they are. I don’t see them doing what I do, going and getting therapy, I’m very active, I’m on benefits to get better, not to stay at this level. I  pay for my own therapies as I  get hardly anything on the NHS. I found this women’s centre so I can get low-​cost treatments and save waiting so I don’t have to be on benefits even longer. I’m hard on myself and this is why I’m getting treatment myself. I don’t want

103

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

to get comfortable. I’m quite intelligent and I do know myself and if I wasn’t uncomfortable, I’d get complacent like some of them. And I’m getting better. I don’t belong in the working world yet, but I  don’t belong with my peers. I’m an honourable person and none of this that I’m on benefits for is my fault.’ Throughout her narrative, Priya categories herself as active, hard on herself, not comfortable, quite intelligent and honourable. Her peers, in contrast, are figured differently. They are said to be inactive, unintelligent and comfortable. Differentiating herself through these moral values, Priya, like Lucy, reproduces one of austerity’s dominant narratives: connecting welfare use with individual choice and behaviour. In this particular case, however, Priya links the use of disability and sickness benefit with issues of dependency and disincentivization, a description which contributes to, and reinforces, the notion that not everyone who receives such benefits are in need or deserving of support.

Blaming the bad feckless subject Blame was another means by which women positively constructed themselves in contrast to ‘others’ who were believed, variously, to be work-​shy, to claim benefits illegitimately and to be unable to manage. It was them upon whom the stigma of being undeserving was cast and when women did subscribe to the rhetoric of ‘poverty propaganda’ (Shildrick, 2018). As Ruth Lister (2004: 103) discussed, ‘[o]‌thering has been largely understood as a discursive practice which shapes how the “non-​poor” think and talk about and act towards “the poor” ’ —​ used by middle-​class women mentioned earlier. However, as Tracey Shildrick and Robert MacDonald note, ‘ideological discourses about the “undeserving poor” are not simply “top-​down” rhetoric of the powerful (or the “non-​poor”) but are shared and enacted by those at the bottom, skewed downwards towards others, objectively, like them’ (2013: 299–​300). Like Robert MacDonald and Jane Marsh (2005) have previously claimed, some of the most vociferous critics of those using benefits are themselves unemployed. Interviews were heavily loaded with moral assessments. Women distanced themselves from others, who were blamed particularly for their unwillingness to work or ‘being unable to manage’. Scarlett discussed those around her area of Leeds, equating being in receipt of welfare with being ‘work-​shy’. She said:

104

Austerity Talk

‘Some people are lazy and don’t want to work. I’ve lived around here all my life and I know some sorts. I know they genuinely sit on their backsides ’cause they know they can. They know the more they breed children, the more income that comes. Thinking the government’s their second husband. I’m sorry but it’s true. That’s the people who need punishing, people that don’t want to do anything, want to sit on their backsides and take, take, take. If I ran this country, believe me, they wouldn’t be taking from me.’ Having talked about those who did not want to work and who ‘take, take, take’, Scarlett’s narrative followed with a discussion of the immorality and failings of others, specifically mothers, in terms of provision and consumption practices. As argued in Chapter 1, mothers have long held the main responsibility for maintaining respectability in working-​class communities. Adhering to high standards of household cleanliness and being able to make ends meet is, as Skeggs (1997) notes, a visible marker of being ‘a good mother’. Kathy Hamilton (2012) has shown how ‘stigma management’ by low-​income mothers required coping strategies through which to protect their social identity. Hamilton explained how castigation of the ‘undeserving’ by her participants often focused on the perceived unwillingness or inability of mothers to maintain standards and make sacrifices for the sake of the children. This type of critique can be seen in Scarlett’s narrative, as she went on to say, “Some women won’t spend on their children, they’ll look all one million dollars and their kids are sat there in dirty clothes and holes in their shoes.” Patrick (2014) has demonstrated that her out-​of-​work participants often gave anecdotes and examples of ‘other’ benefit claimants who saw benefits as a lifestyle choice, who claimed fraudulently or received more than they were entitled to. During discussion with women there was no shortage of disparagement of the allegedly disabled ‘undeserving poor’, even by those receiving sickness and disability benefits. Rita claimed Incapacity Benefit and described how she felt about some others who did the same: “I think to myself, you’ve never worked or earned money. This is supposed to help people in difficulties and I know they don’t need it, none of them.” Here Rita reproduces the dominant austerity discourse by saying “you’ve never worked or earned money”. She indirectly reinforces the ‘undeserving’ narrative —​that those who are disabled are scroungers —​by saying “this is supposed to help people in difficulties and I know they don’t need it.”

105

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Although most women had emphasized their ability to get by with limited resources, they compared their situation to those who were ‘getting something for nothing’, or who were ‘getting something they were not entitled to’. This reinforces division and blame between and within groups who are reliant on welfare. Those caught between low-​paid jobs and unemployment, referred to as the working poor, were the ones who became most enraged by those they perceived to be ‘living it up at their expense’ or ‘receiving something they should not’. For instance, both Marie, previously discussed, and Fiona, a 23-​ year-​old white working-​class single parent who worked part-​time at a nursery in London, directed anger towards those who were receiving food bank vouchers and who were eligible for social housing. Both these women had tried on different occasions to access food banks, but as Marie said, “I’m not entitled to it because I work.” They were also on the waiting list for social housing, but had been deemed to be of lowest priority and as a result were allocated to band D.2 Anger and frustration had therefore turned towards those who were eligible for such help and resources. For Fiona, who described herself as white, this was in relation to the ‘non-​whites’, whom she said were more likely to receive resources because they had “bigger families, more children and more mouths to feed”. For Marie, who described herself as black, this was in relation to “immigrants” who were described in exactly the same terms. Those who expressed difficulty in finding employment also drew attention towards groups who were seen to be unfairly taking jobs and resources —​often those who were non-​British-​born. For south Asian women, these were non-​British-​born people and for white women, non-​white ‘immigrants’. ‘Immigrants’ were berated both for allegedly coming to the UK and taking all the jobs and, paradoxically, for being a drain on the welfare state because they did not want to work. Such contradictions can be seen with the two quotes from Heather and Faye: ‘They love England, thank you London, and thank you Britain because they can send it [the benefit payment] to their country and sit on their backside all day doing nothing. Come to the UK and drain us, get benefits, buy clothes, get a car and a house given. But then the person born here isn’t entitled because they’ve taken it all.’ (Heather) ‘If we didn’t have so many people coming over and they’re not meant to be coming over then there would be a lot more jobs left for people to get and we wouldn’t need

106

Austerity Talk

cuts, I know it might sound harsh but I’ve always said there would be a lot more jobs if that wasn’t happening, a lot more jobs.’ (Faye) These extracts show that despite the contradictory narratives that circulate, the figure of the immigrant was blamed for the lack of resources and employment available. This narrative is similar to findings from previous times of crisis. As discussed in Chapter 1, in the climate of Thatcherism, anti-​immigrant rhetoric was used as a scapegoat for high unemployment and recession. The working class became divided on racial grounds —​the white working class was encouraged to direct its frustrations towards the black working class for ‘taking’ their jobs, housing and public services. What can be seen from the women’s narratives previously discussed is black and white working-​class women directing their frustrations towards ‘immigrants’ for taking their jobs and housing and draining their public services. Such arguments thus reproduce and reinforce current austerity discourse, pitting groups against one another. This bid for recognition and legitimacy via a process of distinction-​making has also been used by recent migrants. Within a context of tightening immigration controls and the vilification of migrants, research by Sukhwant Dhaliwal and Kirsten Forkert (2015) has highlighted how in focus groups with people from established minority backgrounds, there was a tendency to make this distinction between deserving and undeserving, or good and bad migrants and citizens. What becomes evident in the discussions of these women when blaming the ‘poor’ and migrants is the idea of investment, that is, the placing of investment into those who have invested something and those who have not. Although these descriptions were often met with nameless examples, comments from social media and political discussions served to reinforce their understanding and legitimation of blame and distancing towards certain groups. In addition, examples from the cultural mechanism of reality television helped to solidify representation of those reliant on the welfare state as undeserving or tricking the system. For instance, Scarlett said: ‘There are people who are ruining it out there, who literally laugh when they walk out the Jobcentre, did you not watch that programme on Channel 4? It was disgusting, it was about us as well as people coming into the country. There was a man, he was at the bank at 12 o’clock and I thought, you disgust me.’

107

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Reality television is once again generating what Jensen and Tyler (2015) call figures of welfare disgust. They provide Scarlett, for example, with evidence that some people are not working and are tricking the system, reinforcing anti-​welfare common sense, which thus enables her to draw distance between this figure and herself.

Critically reflecting on austerity talk While blame, othering and distancing was a common practice among women, during these discussions there were also instances and moments of critical reflection which fractured and muddied some of the comments mentioned earlier. As Skeggs reminds us, ‘capital does not necessarily commandeer all social relations, and, even where it does, it produces its own contradictions’ (2014a:  15). Although emerging in different ways and dependent upon their position within the context of austerity, some women reached for, as Skeggs notes, ‘values beyond (exchange) value’ (15), bringing to the fore the effects of class and ‘raced’ prejudice, as well as making fractures within the well-​worn austerity discourse. Women reflected upon structural dimensions when thinking about ‘hard work’ within the context of austerity. Discussing their space of possibilities, Rita and Scarlett wrestled back and forth with the neoliberal meritocratic idea that hard work generates endless opportunities. Rita began: Rita: Scarlett: Rita: Scarlett: Rita: Scarlett:

‘The point is, in our country, if I wanted to be Prime Minister, if I had worked hard enough, I could have been. You can do anything you want to.’ ‘Do you think you can do that?’ ‘I can’t, no.’ ‘No, I can’t either.’ ‘I can’t afford to send my daughter to university, but you can’t get anywhere without going to university, point is, you need tools to do it.’ ‘Yeah, I  wouldn’t have been able to go. I  love and embrace university but I think them poor people that spend all that money getting their self to the end of it to have nothing at the end of it, and I’ve seen people on the telly crying saying I can’t believe I’ve worked my backside off and been penniless, living in a student flat on nothing to get through and then to be told, well all those qualifications count for nothing because

108

Austerity Talk

there’s no work for you. I feel sorry for them as well because every penny they’ve got has gone into building themselves a life and they can’t even do it then.’ In their reflexive account, both these women acknowledge that they could not become the Prime Minster if they worked hard enough. This immediately breaks with the meritocratic view circulating that the ‘good citizen’ works hard and thus succeeds (see Littler, 2017). Secondly, by emphasizing that their space of possibility is dependent on economic means  —​as Rita notes, she can’t afford to send her daughter to university —​Rita and Scarlett uncover class differences and examine how these social markers affect their space of possibilities. Discussing how those with university degrees (typically middle-​class students whose parents are deemed to be ‘good’ citizens in political terms) are also struggling to find work within the current context, both these women complicate the common-​sense understanding that austerity’s casualties are suffering because of individual failure and pathological deviance. This meritocratic idea is further muddied and becomes harder to swallow for Rita when she notes, “There are also people that do go to work, I know them, and there’s no money left, they still need to use food banks.” Others complicated the anti-​immigration and anti-​welfare rhetoric, discussing the ways in which communities and groups were pitted against each other. Despite previously blaming certain groups for the lack of resources, Scarlett then went on to say, “Crime’s gone up, depression’s gone up, everything like that is up because the world itself is not surviving, because people are fighting in lumps. Groups are fighting for the same things, thinking they have it better, but literally everyone is depressed in themselves.” Ruth Raynor (2016) calls this process ‘tangled cycles of micro-​othering and micro-​care’, in which women blame others for the lack of resources, but simultaneously are alert to the fallacy that some benefit more than others. In a similar vein, when discussing anti-​immigration rhetoric during a group discussion with other Bangladeshi women, Layla said: ‘Communities blame each other, there is a lot of migration going on so if there’s one pot of money and everyone wants some of that then you get blame … People say British-​born are given less priority and others are given more, but it’s not the case. People think that people who are newly arrived get more money and it causes problems. When you have cuts, it brings out all sorts of negative outcomes. My niece

109

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

is at university and she can’t get a decent job, her surname is Islam and because of the media hype about the religion Islam it got to a point where she was thinking I can’t get a job and there are people less qualified that were applying for the same job and the careers officer changed her surname and it helped her. That’s not due to migration; it’s bigger than that.’ Here, Layla acknowledges that communities blame each other because there is “one pot of money and everyone wants some of that”. Reflecting upon the claim that British-​born people are given less priority than non-​British-​born people, she instead says that it is the welfare cuts themselves that produce negative outcomes. It is this, she argues, that leads to and reinforces blame and resentment. Using the example of her niece who struggled to gain employment, she complicates the understanding that migration is to blame for the difficult economic climate. Values that counter the predominance of moralistic narratives were also found in discussions by Dhaliwal and Forkert (2015) with ethnic minority British citizens and recent immigrants. As these authors note, they partly resist a dominant discourse that seeks to intensify hostility towards migrants and instead assert other values, such as compassion, empathy and solidarity.

Conclusion Women talk to and against austerity discourse in complex ways. Speech is layered with contradictions and intricacies through which women not only legitimize and reproduce the austerity agenda but, sometimes, fracture and rupture the ideals of the ‘good austere citizen’ and a country that is implementing austerity for the good of the nation. Middle-​class women who have been less affected by austerity often draw boundaries between themselves and the ‘undeserving poor’, focusing on their perceived moral failings and worklessness. Discussions thus largely reinforce austerity discourse, fostering consent for welfare reform, since poverty and insecurity become understood to be the fault of the individual. As in other times of crisis and periods of austerity, these categorizations therefore enable, legitimate and are mapped onto material inequality. Women who are devalued and made abject through dominant anti-​ welfare discourse, dialogue with certain stereotypes by creating multiple layers of differentiation. These often vary according to the resources and capitals available to be mobilized  —​through the use of work,

110

Austerity Talk

parenting skills, moral value, nationality, ‘race’ and so on —​to try and legitimize themselves as distinct from ‘other’/​abject figures. Mirroring previous times of crisis, socially conservative codes of respectability are drawn upon to express disgust towards other social groups, who are, at the same time, blamed for the lack of employment and diminishing resources. These processes of distancing, blame and ‘othering’ reinforce and reproduce divisions between and across different groups. Some women do challenge the established anti-​welfare discourse, resisting the imperative for groups to pit themselves against each other. Producing values that counter the predominance of moralistic narratives of economic productivity and aspiration, certain women reflect on how structural constraints such as income may complicate ideas of individualism and meritocracy and limit their ability to become ‘austere good citizens’. Discussions presented here are further explored in the following chapter, in which it is argued that feminism is a productive site through which to examine austerity discourse and practices, and further understand the challenges to, and reproduction of, austerity’s moral project.

111

5

Austerity and Feminism(s) ‘I’m a feminist … it’s important, but some [women] need it more than others. Some cultures are already three quarters of the way there … those who have been brought up white, middle class, generally will be, I  guess, educated and feminist as a result. But there are other cultures and classes, so, Middle Eastern, Asian, where education isn’t that widespread and old belief systems are in power and have a huge influence on how society runs. I guess yeah, those groups, they need feminism more.’ (Mia, 27, middle-​class, Anglo-​Indian, GP, London, February 2014) ‘It’s exciting that there has been a real resurgence of feminist conversations. I’m quite a committed feminist … it’s needed more than ever because women’s rights and quality of life is being eroded so rapidly and savagely. You just need to look at how savagely they [the government] cut women’s services for abuse … refuges hardly exist anymore! What I hope is that this resurgence will have practical applications for women’s lives, especially to counter the effects of austerity. As it stands, I don’t think this resurgence is having a huge amount of practical effect though … I don’t know yet if that’s translated into any more services.’ (Rebecca, 28, middle-​class, white, Debt and Benefit Advisor, Brighton, April 2015)

113

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

It is important to find other unexplored avenues that permit us to further unpack the complex ways in which austerity is produced, sustained and being challenged in the everyday. Feminism, as this chapter illustrates, is a productive site through which to examine austerity discourses and practices. Drawing on narratives from women such as Mia and Rebecca, the chapter exposes how feminism becomes an active force field that reinforces and questions certain aspects of the austerity project, and a way through which moral, classed and racialized differences are opposed and further reproduced. This might seem strange for the reader, when previous chapters have documented the ways in which women’s inequality has been further entrenched by the material and symbolic violence born from the austerity programme. Feminism can seek to destroy existing social systems through collective, emancipatory and intersectional gender politics, but it can, as Mary Evans notes, also assist forms of ‘social inequality that support and sustain gender inequality’ (2017: 76). The following sections explore what women are saying about feminism —​if and how they identify with it, what they understand it to be and for whom they think it is necessary. These discussions highlight how neoliberal and more affirmative, collective and interventionist accounts of feminism are coexisting alongside a rejection of, or detachment from the label, within the context of austerity. This chapter concludes by suggesting how we might raise questions to comprehend the limits as well as the emancipatory potential of different forms of feminism.

Unpacking feminism and austerity Rising to prominence in the 1990s, the term post-​feminism (Gill, 2007; McRobbie, 2009) developed to understand the shift in women’s relationship with feminism. Previously marked by a ‘distance from feminism’, Angela McRobbie (and others) argued that women had entered a ‘cultural space of post-​feminism’ characterized by an ‘active, sustained, and repetitive repudiation or repression of feminism’ (2004: 257). Summing up this passing of feminism as being ‘instrumentalized’, McRobbie in her book The Aftermath of Feminism (2009:1) argued that feminism had been ‘brought forward and claimed by Western governments, as a signal to the rest of the world that this is a key part of what freedom now means’. Drawing on a vocabulary that includes words such as ‘empowerment’ and ‘choice’, these elements, she explained, were then converted into a much more individualistic discourse, deployed in this new guise, particularly in media and popular

114

Austerity and Feminism(s)

culture but also by agencies of the state, as a kind of substitute for feminism. These new and seemingly ‘modern’ ideas about women, especially young women, McRobbie noted, were then ‘disseminated more aggressively, to ensure that a new women’s movement would not re-​emerge’ (1). Empirical research exploring women’s relationships with feminism during this period highlighted how women drew on these post-​feminist, un-​gendered, individualistic discourses to suggest that feminism was in fact, redundant (for examples, see Budgeon, 2001; Hughes, 2005; Rich, 2005; Scharff, 2012). In the current context, feminism has (in various forms) become highly visible and a subject of interest. Feminist scholars have mapped this complex terrain, highlighting the emergence of diverse and (often) conflicting modalities of feminist thought and action. Attention has thus been drawn to representations of, and women’s engagements with, feminism, within and across different social spheres:  in popular culture (Banet-​Weiser, 2018; Favaro and Gill, 2018), across digital media (Gunn, 2015; Keller, 2015), within the corporate sphere (Gill, 2016; Rottenberg, 2018), the global marketplace (Farris, 2017; Farris and Rottenberg, 2017; Rottenberg, 2018) and through emergent or ongoing anti-​austerity, environmental, intersectional and collective forms of feminist activism (Bassel and Emejulu, 2017; Craddock, 2017). Some scholars have examined the link between certain forms of contemporary feminism and notions of visibility, autonomy, authenticity and radicalism. Feminist researchers have, for example, drawn attention to emerging forms of resistance, highlighting the ways in which working-​class and black and minority ethnic women have made feminist interventions in the austerity project to advance an intersectional politics of social justice and equality (Bassel and Emejulu, 2017; Craddock, 2017). These scholars have, however, also highlighted the difficulties women face within spaces of resistance and anti-​austerity activism (also see Maiguashca et  al., 2016). The profoundly uneven visibility that forms of feminism generate on a public scale has also been questioned (Jonsson, 2014; Gill, 2016). As Gill (2016: 8) notes, ‘spectacular’ protests will ‘generate vastly more coverage than typical demonstrations, marches or petitions, even if the latter involve significantly more people’. This uneven visibility has also been linked to the ideological appearance of the politics and the campaign’s degree of challenge to the status quo (Gill, 2016: 8; also see Rottenberg, 2014).1 The celebratory and optimistic framing of specific forms of ‘popular feminism’ has also been questioned, with feminist writers observing how various iterations —​most notably ‘corporate’,

115

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

‘lean in’ and/​or ‘neoliberal feminism’ —​do not critique or challenge the hegemony of neoliberal capitalism (see McRobbie, 2015; Farris, 2017; Rottenberg, 2018). Catherine Rottenberg (2018) argues that with the ‘neoliberalization’ of feminism, political critique and collective struggle to change society are replaced by psychologies of positivity, confidence and an entrepreneurial spirit to transform the self. Examining mainstream feminist self-​help books from high-​powered elite women in the US, Rottenberg demonstrates how, in the clear majority of these texts, emphasis is placed on crafting a ‘work–​family balance’. Since it is most often working-​class, black and minority ethnic and migrant women who serve as ‘unacknowledged care workers that enable professional women to strive towards balance in their lives’, ‘neoliberal feminism’, Rottenberg (2018: 20) posits, is ‘helping to produce and legitimise the exploitation of these Other female subjects’. Her argument here is that neoliberal feminism produces a splitting of selfhood: the worthy capital-​enhancing feminist subject and the unworthy disposable female ‘other’ who performs the reproductive and care work (20). This form of feminism thus becomes complicit with, rather than critical of, capitalism and of other systems of (classed, racialized and transnational) injustice (Gill, 2016: 617). From a somewhat different perspective, Sara Farris (2017) unpacks the entanglement of feminism with reactionary policies in Europe. Coining the term ‘femonationalism’, Farris documents attempts by right-​wing parties and neoliberals to push xenophobic and racist politics through a women’s rights agenda. She also highlights the involvement of various well-​known feminists and femocrats in the framing of Islam as a characteristically misogynistic religion and culture. Despite the particularity and contingency of the contexts in which they occur, Farris and Rottenberg note that these examinations (and others)2 not only underscore ‘the righting of feminism’ but that it has become ‘a global phenomenon’ (2017: 8).

Speaking feminism in the context of austerity Such observations by feminist scholars discussed previously thus call for careful analyses of the processes of identification, contestation and transformation of women’s relationship with feminism. Arguments made in this chapter thus give visibility to the ways in which this entanglement of feminism with neoliberalism is unfolding within a context of UK austerity. It is this concern, with how broader political

116

Austerity and Feminism(s)

and socio-​economic shifts interact and converge with feminist self-​ identification, that this chapter will now focus its attention upon. Discussions described in this chapter arose from various stages of the interviews, in which issues of feminism and equality were voiced. During these interviews, some topics were explicitly addressed: the participants’ opinions on gender roles and the state of gender inequality in the current context, and attitudes towards, and feelings about, feminism. Of the women interviewed, 30 self-​identified with the term ‘feminist’. Feminism, for these women, was synonymous with gender equality, describing the movement in terms of equal rights, equality and being treated in the same way as men. Trisha, a 34-​year-​ old charity worker from Brighton, said, “Yeah! Of course I  am [a feminist].” Similarly, when I asked Celia, a 28-​year-​old HR manager from London, if she was a feminist she said, “Yes! I’m a feminist. We should all be feminists!” Discussing feminism, Polly, a 27-​year-​old Occupational Therapist from Leeds, said, “I guess my main view of feminism is equal opportunities, behaving the same as men, that’s what feminism is.” This idea of equality and opportunity resonated through all discussions with these women and feminism was understood as being important for and relevant to their lives. However, it is important to note that the issue of feminist identification is complex and contradictory. Not all the women who self-​identified as feminists adopted the same discourse or the same feminist practices. Feminism and feminist issues were discussed in various ways, in which they exhibited a broad range of ideas and stances on feminism. Women had come to feminism at different stages and articulating their feminist position came more easily for some than others. What they understood feminism to be and what it was useful for also differed. Nevertheless, two interpretive repertories have emerged from their discussions. For some women, feminism was laced with an individualistic discourse, which embodied characteristics of neoliberal feminism. This was opposed to other women, who advocated a more collective, emancipatory and intersectional approach to feminism and gender politics.

Neoliberal feminism This section of the chapter focuses on interviews with 17 women who identified with feminism, and who adopted the ‘neoliberal feminist’ subject position. These women were all middle-​class. Of these women, 14 were white, one Anglo-​Indian, one Indian and one mixed other. Ten

117

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

of these women worked in the public sector, five in the private sector and two were full-​time students. These women had been affected to a lesser degree than others by austerity measures and had high volumes and different types of capital. Before unpacking this in further detail, it is important to note that despite the focus on middle-​class women in this section, this chapter does not argue that only middle-​class women hold such values. Nor, as will be shown, that all middle-​class feminism is, and should be understood as, neoliberal. Forms of middle-​ class feminism have, and do, powerfully critique and intervene within neoliberal projects in a variety of ways. Additionally, I do not state that so-​called neoliberal feminists have no empathy for those most affected by the austerity agenda. This distinct feminist position can be held in tandem with a concern for women as a group more widely. Despite women noting that feminism was important for and relevant to their lives, feminist identification was also marked by contestations and ambiguities. Many answers had caveats: feminism should not go over the top, should not try to make women be better than men or should not be too radical or extreme. Comparisons were made between so-​called ‘new’ feminism and ‘serious, staunch’ feminism, as Susan, a 30-​year-​old white middle-​class Account Manager from Brighton noted:  “It doesn’t have to be serious, staunch, it’s not man-​hating, it’s just fun, self-​loving … has more of an edge.” Similarly, Francesca, a 28-​year-​old Indian middle-​class Accountant living in Leeds, also described her feminism by contrasting it to another form of feminism that she did not want to embody: ‘We [feminists] have our choices and beliefs, which we incorporate into our lives, but not actively fighting, burning bras, shouting and stuff. We have beliefs, which we incorporate into society and our lives.’ Contrarily, as shown by Susan and Francesca, feminist values of self-​ love and having choice were manifestly valued and deemed appropriate characteristics to take up and embody. Serious, staunch, actively fighting, bra-​burning feminism was, on the other hand, not. Two types of feminism were therefore identified, which can be seen to be in direct conflict with each other: the ‘old’, appearing to produce hostility and rejection, and the ‘new’, which is valued and seen as necessary. Women who self-​identified as this new type of feminist articulated their identification through neoliberal values of individualism and character. Polly, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class Occupational Therapist from Leeds, described her feminism as being “an approach

118

Austerity and Feminism(s)

to life”. Continuing, she said, “It’s about the way you are and the way that you think.” Madeline, a 24-​year-​old white middle-​class Complaints Mediation Officer living in Brighton, also described her feminism using similar terms. Explaining, she said, “I am a feminist, I’m pro-​ women, about equality, it’s part of my lifestyle, it’s part of who I am as an individual, what I think.” Finishing she said, “I’m not actively [feminist] but yes, I’m a feminist.” Madeline and Polly’s choice of words  —​“individual”, “approach” and “lifestyle”  —​thus produce a specific kind of feminist consciousness, internalizing rather than collectivizing feminist action. This internalization of feminist action was evidenced when women would discuss solutions to help to eradicate continued signs of gender inequality. Most commonly, it was thought that individual women should be encouraged to ask and do. When discussing inequality between men and women in the workplace, Francesca said, “There is unfairness, but how many [women] would ask for a pay rise or promotion themselves? Sometimes I  think it just comes down to being assertive and confident.” Assertiveness and confidence were thus displayed as necessary traits that would aid women’s progression. Likewise, noting that it was “tough out there”, Polly again drew on individual solutions to combat continued signs of gender inequality —​ women needed to be “strong” and “not pathetic” or “weak”. According to Polly, a strong woman had certain attributes: she would ask, she would speak up and she would be assertive. By contrast, pathetic and weak women would not. Asking for more and being proactive echoes, as Evans notes (2016: 444), ‘the exhortations from highly paid female employees in the corporations of the United States who believe that individual women have only to ask and they will be given’. For instance, Sheryl Sandberg, the Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Facebook (2008–​present), in her book Lean In (2013), urges women to be more assertive in their workplace through individualized means. By ‘internalizing the revolution’, ‘triumphing over their internal obstacles’ and ‘actively leaning in to their careers’, women, Sandberg argues, will be poised to ‘close the leadership ambition gap’ (Rottenberg, 2018: 66). A similar message can also be seen more recently within Ivanka Trump’s (advisor to, and daughter of, US President Donald Trump) how-​to guide, Women Who Work: Rewriting the Rules for Success (2018). Despite discussing the importance of feminism and gender equality, individualizing discourses about the importance of agency, self-​ management and personal responsibility were thus present within women’s interviews. In the case of such middle-​class feminism, in line with the neoliberal emphasis on self-​improvement, solutions are

119

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

proposed via the individual. Challenges and effects brought about by the context of austerity are recoded as private matters to be managed individually by asking and doing. This not only shuns feminism’s commitment to social solidarity, care and interdependence, as noted by Wendy Larner (2000) and Wendy Brown (2005), but also erases any acknowledgment of classed, gendered and racialized power differentials.

Creating and reinforcing distance and distinctions Women’s discussions about austerity, like their relationships with feminism, were complex and often contradictory. As noted in the previous chapter, women would question and talk back to austerity discourse, expressing disaffection and distrust towards those in positions of privilege and power. When considering other women’s experiences of austerity, middle-​class women did show empathy towards their situations. It was women they felt —​especially mothers —​that had been most affected by welfare cuts and reform. Yet, when discussing this in further detail, women would often reproduce the dominant narrative circulating within the socio-​political register. Women were expected, for example, to overcome and navigate through the effects of austerity and welfare reform using a combination of intensive self-​management and a positive mental attitude. Being resilient and bouncing back were deemed as traits that were extremely necessary. The notion of resilience has become prominent in the last decade. Not only promoted and demanded within austerity discourse (Bramall, 2013), Rosalind Gill and Shani Orgad (2018) have tracked where it has appeared across, and within, other domains such as: public policy (Allen and Bull, 2018; Burman, 2018); the workplace (Gill and Orgad, 2015) and within different cultural and media forms (Gill and Orgad, 2018). Employed to train people (particularly women) with how to cope with stress, overwork and precariousness, Gill and Orgad (2018: 478) argue that, ‘at the heart of these very different iterations is the promotion of the capacity to “bounce-​back” from difficulties and shocks whether this is getting divorced, being made redundant, or having one’s benefits cut’ (also see Neocleous, 2013). It is middle-​class women, these scholars suggest, that have gradually taken centre stage as the ‘idealized “bounce-​backable” resilient neoliberal subject’, which in turn, ‘renders “non-​resilient” women redundant and disposable’ (Gill and Orgad, 2018: 490). Figured as another domain resilience discourse has colonized, the need to be resilient and bounce back was promoted as a key feminist message when middle-​class women spoke about how to navigate

120

Austerity and Feminism(s)

through the impacts of austerity. Working as a Content Producer in London, Pippa, 27, noted that she had seen many redundancies in her firm during the early period of austerity (2011), most of those being female middle managers. When discussing how women might weather the storm of redundancy, Pippa said: ‘I can imagine women who were affected by the recession, who lost their jobs, going into reflection mode, thinking, “What can I do?” To move them out of the hole they are in, they need to think outside the box, think about how to transfer skills.’ Recognizing that these women had been placed in a hole through no fault of their own, Pippa understood that changes to their employment were beyond their control. Nevertheless, resilience was promoted as a way to navigate through and survive the current context, assumed as a solution that would allow women to move out of the hole that they were placed in. Women who were unable to actualize resilience and bounce back were then labelled by Pippa as being “dwellers” or of “dwelling”. Explaining, she said, “I don’t mean that unkindly, but individuals who cannot see past an obstacle, who just make do.” As Mark Neocleous (2013:  no pagination) has argued, it is the ‘good subject’ that will survive and thrive in any situation. In this instance, the dweller becomes the ‘bad subject’, unable to construct and/​or transform themselves into the resilient austere citizen. Neoliberal feminism thus converges here with the political rhetoric surrounding austerity. The figure of speech regarding those who ‘just make do’ (the dweller) is interesting —​it mirrors that of the skiver or shirker. Theoretically, those who dwell are simply not able to adapt and withstand disruption. Pippa continued, “Opportunities are there for everyone, it depends whether you have a glimmer of get up and go that will push you.” Pippa saw success (or the lack of it) as a product of differing levels of self-​responsibility, self-​management and resilience. Those who do not have the “glimmer of get up and go” are thus understood through the lens of individual pathologies and deficits —​ weakness, laziness, lack of motivation and poor choices. Other women who also saw the gendered unfairness of the austerity programme drew on heroic individual stories as evidence that bouncing back was possible with a positive attitude and the ‘right’ values. Erica, a 25-​year-​old black woman working as an Account Manager in London, acknowledged that women’s experiences of austerity had been difficult; she herself had had trouble finding work

121

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

after a year living abroad. During that time, she had navigated her way through the benefit system and been witness to women struggling to find work, while having to care for children, with the constant threat of sanctioning and benefit changes. Yet, she labelled most of those women that she had observed struggling at the Jobcentre as “not having the right attitude”. This, she said, had affected their ability to bounce back. Contrasting her experience with “a lot of people in that situation”, Erica suggested that the reason she could bounce back was because of her strength of character. Resilience discourse, in the case of neoliberal feminism —​and with other forms and iterations —​has heavily classed undertones. Through an emphasis on, or idealization of, character and resilience, middle-​class feminists produce particular subjectivities and understandings of social problems and their solutions. Women who appropriate ‘productive’ feminist values (by having the resources  —​ economic, physical, psychological —​to actualize resilience) are seen to possess the necessary tools to weather the storm. If women cannot become resilient and bounce back, their struggles become framed, as Dorothy Bottrell notes, as ‘personal crises or accomplishments decoupled from economic and social circuits of accumulation and dispossession’ (2013 in Gill and Orgad, 2018: 479). Despite initially having sympathy for their situation, neoliberal feminism attributes the situation of less affluent women to a lack of the psychological as well as material substance needed to overcome poverty and vulnerability (also see Jensen, 2016; Gill and Orgad, 2018). The particularity of neoliberal feminism in the context of the UK can therefore be seen here —​situations outside women’s control become seen as a consequence of personal characteristics, rather than an outcome of structural inequalities reinforced by austerity and uneven wealth distribution. This framing of women’s experience thus helps to silence any critique of structural inequality.

Classed narratives: feminism would help them Those women unable to be resilient and bounce back were understood by middle-​class neoliberal feminists as being in need of feminism. Feminism, it was argued, would equip women with the skills necessary for them to weather any storm. By framing feminism in this way, moral difference, hierarchy and distinction could be further drawn by women through feminist identification, and legitimizing and further reproducing the moral project of austerity. Emphasizing moral codes through feminism is nothing new; establishing difference through morality and hierarchy have underpinned particular forms of feminism

122

Austerity and Feminism(s)

throughout history. Victorian ‘bourgeois feminist’ campaigns, for example, assumed class and ‘racial’ division and moral hierarchy through forms of intervention and moral reform (Hall, 1992; Rendall, 1994). In the current context, this division and hierarchy are assumed through self-​identification. Anna, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class Physiotherapist living in London, made this distinction clearly in relation to working-​class women. Explaining why she thought feminism would be helpful for working-​class women, she said, “I think … it might encourage them.” Explaining further, Anna went on to say, “It might help the girls to do more at school, work harder and have a goal, instead of thinking ‘I don’t need to do this as I am just going to bring up a family’ or whatever.” Here, Anna indirectly draws distance between the traditional and the modern —​‘them’, who will just stay at home and bring up a family, and ‘her’, who already possessed and embodied all these feminist characteristics by working hard, having a goal and through practising ‘self-​encouragement’. As Christina Scharff (2012) notes, the neoliberal self is often constructed in opposition to an allegedly powerless ‘other’ (also see Williams, 2014). Such a form of ‘othering’ becomes explicit in neoliberal feminism and within a context of austerity. When explaining why the working classes needed feminism, Anna said: ‘A lot of working-​class women don’t know what feminism is. If they are brought up into a life where they claim benefits, have kids, stay at home and don’t work, they won’t strive for anything different. I think that’s why they don’t. I just think they wouldn’t have much of an understanding of feminism and kind of care about it because they will think that’s what my life’s going to be like.’ Anna’s narrative supports Beverley Skeggs’ (1997, 2004) claim that definitions of class often entwine ideas of a person’s moral as well as economic value, linking the working class with a non-​modern, degenerate lifestyle. Working-​c lass women’s (assumed) lack of feminist identification is thus characterized by Anna through a focus on morality and lifestyle. This description of women  —​as being uneducated, claiming benefits, not working and not striving for anything different —​mirrors the depiction of the gendered figure of the skiver within austerity discourse and the reason it is claimed that they are suffering within a context of cuts and reform. Women’s differing morals, values and lifestyle are also assumed by Anna as the reason why feminism is neither understood nor cared about. The ‘inferior’,

123

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

‘uneducated’, ‘dependent’ working-​class woman is thus said to need feminism to release her from the dependency of her lifestyle, and to enable her to overcome her struggle independently. Middle-​class women drew on the attributes of ‘drive’ and ‘ambition’ to define and defend their own position as knowing about feminism, and thinking that they need feminism less than other women. As Anna said, “Maybe we don’t need it as much; we already have the drive and ambition to do what we want to do.” For Anna, drive and ambition are characteristics of feminism that she already had, which allowed her to be able to do what she wants to do. This statement reasserts her class position, in which she distanced herself from uneducated, traditional women in need of feminism. As Stephanie Lawler (2005: 429) argues, ‘to distinguish oneself from the working-​class is crucial to middle-​ class identity’  —​this is of utmost importance when the precarity produced by neoliberalism and crisis is not restricted to those living and experiencing poverty. The idea of ‘needing feminism’ is thus a way of building and reinforcing such class boundaries among women because, as Skeggs (2004) notes, ‘middle-​classness’ is about what is good, normal, appropriate and proper. Middle-​classness in the context of austerity encompasses those “hard-​working” people’ who as Evans (2015: 148) states ‘have properly understood the ideal relationship of the citizen to the state’ —​they provide for themselves and they work hard. Neoliberal feminism is thus understood and framed as being middle class, used to draw distinctions between middle-​class feminists and those in ‘need’ of feminism.

Culture and feminism: non-​white women and ‘other’ cultures Middle-​class women also pointed to other cultures and parts of the world that they thought needed feminism. ‘Culture’, like ‘class’, was used to dismiss these women as ‘victims of culture’ and to cement their own position as self-​responsible, individualized feminists. Liberal feminists from Mary Wollstonecraft onwards have drawn upon histories of ‘civilization’, which frame the progressive history of women and the family in the West, and their idealized and domesticated role as characterizing the modern commercial societies of the West. Such progress was indicated through comparisons with the harems and polygamy of an undifferentiated Orient, and the burdened and labouring women of ‘savage’ populations (Ware, 1992). In the current context, progress has now been framed in comparison to the figure of the Muslim woman, which has taken shape amidst the

124

Austerity and Feminism(s)

backdrop of shifts in multiculturalism, and the production of ‘dangerous’ Muslim ‘others’ (Mirza and Meetoo, 2018). The reification of their cultural/​religious difference, and in particular, the preoccupation with their over-​determined dress, has, Heidi Mirza and Veena Meetoo noted, made them an Islamophobic signifier, symbolic of the ‘barbaric Muslim other’ that has become more sustained in the contemporary Western imagination since the terrorist attacks of 9/​11 (2018; also see Mirza, 2013; Rashid, 2016). This, Angela McRobbie has argued, pre-​ empted ‘the formation of critical solidarities amongst women from a range of backgrounds and [displaced] possible post-​colonial criticism of the construction of the west as progressive’ (in Scharff, 2012: 62). When discussing her life in the UK, Mia told me that she felt happy and lucky to live here, having seen the “horrendous” treatment of Muslim women abroad on the news. Explaining that she felt the Muslim world was “particularly hostile to women”, Mia can be seen to be drawing on the well-​worn binary that positions the liberated West in opposition to the subjugated rest (in this case the ‘Muslim world’) (Khan, 2005; Pedwell, 2012; Scharff, 2012). In order to reinforce her understanding of non-​Western women as oppressed subjects, Mia drew on examples of cultural practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM) and forced marriage. Talking about FGM, Mia said, “It’s horrible, I  mean it’s atrocious, these poor women having to go through that over there, it’s just awful.” Such cases of ‘ethnicized’ forms of gender-​based violence often feature, not only in these women’s narratives, but also in state multicultural discourses, some feminist literature and Western media. These cases are often held up as evidence of backward and barbaric Muslim traditions and used to represent their lack of civility relative to Western models of gender equality (Mirza and Meetoo, 2018; also see Meetoo and Mirza, 2007). The rationalized European woman therefore, Sara Farris writes, becomes seen as ‘the standard against which to measure women from elsewhere’ (2012: 186; also see Farris, 2017) —​a standard employed to justify an anti-​immigrant agenda and imperialist interventions in countries with majority Muslim populations. Yet the feminist gaze was not simply turned towards other parts of the world, but looked inwards at the continued oppression and inequality of women in the UK. This inward gaze was largely focused on the plight of Muslim women. Yet, despite black and Asian women being most affected by the economic and symbolic effects of austerity —​ Asian women in some of the poorest families will be £2,247 worse off per year, and black and Asian lone mothers stand to lose about 15 and 17 per cent of their net income by 2020 (WBG and Runnymede

125

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Trust, 2017) —​inequality was assumed to be the result of a cultural lack of feminist values. Describing herself as an empowered feminist woman, Anna said, “All my doors have been opened for me as far as they can be.” This, she noted, was partly due to her family pushing her to be successful and independent. She then imagined her experience in relation to others, saying, “Maybe if I was brought up in a Muslim family, rather than a white British family, I might not find myself in a similar situation.” Continuing, she said: ‘Each culture is very different. I work a lot with the Bengali Muslim culture at work and they don’t have feminism at all, they are the complete opposite, women must cover up, cook, clean, look after the kids, a male must be present when they are with another male, like it’s the completely opposite way.’ Through this prolonged focus on cultural difference, Anna draws a distinction between her own experience —​growing up in a white British family —​and the experience of (racialized) ‘others’ —​in this case, Bengali Muslim women. Describing these women’s experiences as opposite to her own, Anna infers from her observation that familial regulation, specifically patriarchal gendered control, mean Bengali Muslim women do not have feminism and thus have less doors open to them. In other words, governed by culture, Bengali Muslim women do not possess the same values that allow white British women to be successful and independent. Inequality is therefore explained through culture. Culture thus becomes a structuring force, homogeneously determining the behaviour of those who share it, a position which fails to account for its constant creation and revision (see Alexander, 1996; Brah, 1996). Yet, it was not just white women, but women from minority groups who also drew on this Islamophobic discourse in order to position themselves in progressive, neoliberal feminist terms. Mia, who identified as Anglo-​Indian distinguished between Indian culture and Muslim culture, employing the traditional/​progressive dichotomy. Mia stated that Indians were less traditional because they “wanted their children to be successful”, they “valued education” and “wanted girls to have good jobs”. Success was therefore framed in neoliberal terms; education, employment and economic capital. In contrast, Mia described Muslim culture as “having a lot of inequality” stating that Muslim women had “a lack of freedom” and “a lack of education”. Through this discussion, despite not being able to fully embody a

126

Austerity and Feminism(s)

white British subject position, through this use of boundary-​making, Mia could position herself closer to the ‘enlightened’ trajectory of middle-​class neoliberal feminism and away from the racialized non-​ feminist ‘other’. When speaking about (assumed) non-​feminist ‘others’, feminism was seen as a tool which would enlighten these women and help to save them from the dependency of their traditional culture and backward religious ways. Appropriating feminist values was the route to empowerment, which would raise them out of their hapless plight (also see Mohanty, 1988; Spivak, 1994; Abu-​Lughod, 2002). Explaining inequality through culture, the solution for these women was to ‘step out of culture’ (Scharff, 2012), and appropriate white, middle-​class feminism. Instead of, as Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (1994: 93) notes, ‘white men saving brown women from brown men’, brown women can now save themselves, using feminism. Therefore, if those women are unequal, it is due to their backward culture, and not structural inequalities born of the austerity programme. This indifference from the ‘good/​productive’ feminist towards such ‘victims’ is once again constitutive of this feminist position.

Feminism and austerity: collective intersectional politics In contrast to the neoliberal feminist position discussed previously, not all women who self-​identified as feminists adopted the same discourse. For 13 women, feminism was spoken about in a different way. These women were from diverse classed and ethnic backgrounds; nine were middle-​class and four were working-​class. Nine of these women were white, two were black and two were south Asian. Four women worked in the public sector and one in the private sector; one woman was in full-​time higher education, three women were unemployed and looking for work, and four women were in receipt of state support. These women had been affected to differing degrees, and in different ways, by austerity measures. Some of these women were active within, or worked for, grassroots and women’s sector organizations. Several were new to feminism; they had developed an interest at school or university, or been introduced to debates by social media. Others stated that they had been feminists for a long time, having parents who strongly self-​identified with the label. Austerity was deemed by all to be a feminist issue. Women often stated that “women have got the worst of it”, and that austerity measures had caused a “roll back on equality”. Rebecca, a 28-​year-​old

127

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

white middle-​class Debt and Benefits Advisor from Brighton, for example, said that feminism was needed because “women’s rights and their quality of life is being eroded really rapidly and savagely”. Nina, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class teacher who also lived in Brighton, also felt that the need for feminism had become more urgent within the current context. Explaining further, she stated: ‘I don’t doubt that it’s from developments of austerity and the widening of social inequality. I think it is at those times when people do begin to look around them and think things are changing for the worst. And on top of that, women thinking, “Well, I’m the one being expected to stay at home and look after the children.” And it’s almost like it becomes more urgent. Whereas at times when the economy has become a lot better, the urgency hasn’t been there.’ The disproportionate impact on some groups of women was also acknowledged —​women with disabilities, black and minority ethnic women, working-​class women and single mothers were said to be the hardest hit. The need for feminism was located in both the public and the private sphere, in which priorities were given to sexual harassment, abuse and violence; issues of welfare reform; housing and care work. Such accounts were infused with personal experiences and/​or general observations. Contrary to the opinions of neoliberal feminist women discussed previously, solutions were not placed in the hands of the individual. Doing something, speaking out, reacting and questioning things were understood to be very important to try to counteract decisions taken by the government. Different types and examples of collective, intersectional and anti-​ neoliberal forms of feminism were discussed, and the ‘exciting’ ways in which these groups were making interventions in the austerity project were noted. Women in London would often mention the housing campaigns organization Focus E15 as a group that were reacting.3 This organization was formed by a small number of young mothers in East London. In 2013, these women were living in the Focus E15 Foyer supported housing unit for young people in Newham. They were subsequently threatened with eviction because of welfare cuts. After successfully challenging the eviction, the campaign shifted to the broader struggle for affordable and permanent social housing for everyone in the UK. Women also spoke about the work local campaigns and organizations were undertaking in their areas, such

128

Austerity and Feminism(s)

as campaigns against the closure of refuges and women-​led ethnic minority community centres. Larger anti-​austerity campaigns were also discussed, in which some women told me that they had joined various marches or attended “the odd meeting”. Some women did however note that they preferred mobilizing and publicising campaigns and injustices on social media or in women-​led groups, rather than joining larger collectives. Reasons for this differed; investing time became an issue for those with caring responsibilities. Some also explained that they found gendered critiques of austerity to be largely absent from these larger campaigns. Highlighting these two issues, Uzma, a 27-​year-​old middle-​class south Asian woman, who worked as a Recruitment Consultant in London said: ‘With activist groups at a grass roots level I kind of think they are helping, creating awareness for the wider issue, but also not. The same people dominate them, the same key issues are talked about. And it’s activism, by the nature of it, you need time and energy to do it.’ In previous research on feminist activism, scholars have also noted similar issues. In her work on anti-​austerity activist culture, Emma Craddock (2017) explored how women face significant structural availability barriers related to traditional gendered roles and caring responsibilities, that prevent them from participating politically. Craddock (2017) and Akwugo Emejulu (2017) have also highlighted that when feminist anti-​austerity activism occurs, it tends to be isolated from these main groups and organized by women, for women. In conversation with minority women activists, Emejulu (2017) explained how these women often felt excluded from anti-​austerity movements when attempting to raise gendered and racialized critiques of austerity (also see Bassel and Emejulu, 2017). Criticism was not solely limited to wider anti-​austerity movements. Mirroring observations made by feminist scholars such as Catherine Rottenberg (2018) and Sarah Banet-​Weiser (2018), many women said they had become cautious of a noticeable resurgence of feminism in recent years. Despite the noted importance of wider visibility and open conversation, scepticism centred on certain messages popular feminism was sending, as well as the lack of direct action to combat forms of inequality. Ruth, a 29-​year-​old white middle-​class woman from Brighton, for example, said she hoped that the resurgence of feminism would have practical applications for women’s lives, especially

129

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

to counter the effects of austerity. Her observations however, had made her notice things which made her feel uneasy. ‘A lot of what I see seems to be done by middle-​class women and I worry that those voices are too strong or get picked up easily in the media. I feel like … how do I put this? A lot of the conversation is about objectification of women in the media … these are important issues, but you can’t combat one thing without combatting all of them … but there isn’t that conversation there. I think they sometimes assume that because they are in a position where they have experience of oppression, there is sort of an assumption that women are a homogenous group. That we are all the same and have the same experience, or know what needs to be done. But it’s totally not the case.’ These reflections had led Ruth to worry that feminism’s focus was becoming narrower, speaking from one position —​an observation that reinforced arguments which have been made by scholars about certain forms of feminism for decades (see for example, Spivak, 1994; Skeggs, 1997; Foster, 2016). This focus, Ruth went on to argue, could risk minimizing, silencing or erasing other women’s experience of, and challenges to, austerity. Kate, a 30-​year-​old middle-​class white woman living in Leeds, who worked as a teacher, also grappled with what she called “a noticeable elite style feminism” on social media; “the kind of middle-​class feminism that talks only about their experiences”. Reflecting on her own journey as a feminist, she said that she could see her earlier feminist self within these discussions. Explaining what she meant by this, she noted: ‘I feel like my feminism has changed a lot over the years. I  was very taken with, and spoke to my experiences. It took me a while to take the time to listen to other voices and as soon as I did, I became embarrassed about things I used to think. Like my views on sex work have changed. I used to be very confident in saying what feminism should “do”, I was very vocal about it. I do this a lot less now. Not because I feel less strongly about it, but because I realized it comes with a lot of baggage that means that people feel they can’t talk back to you. Am I speaking over people who have more relevant things to say? I think I’ve become far

130

Austerity and Feminism(s)

more careful about speaking and listening. I feel that I have become much more considered.’ Women disclosed that they had experienced being ‘spoken for’ on various feminist issues. Talking at length about the representation of Muslim women within feminist discourse, Uzma said that she often found women talking for her on issues to do with gender equality and Islam. Like the neoliberal feminists discussed previously, Uzma said that certain feminists she had read, or listened to, had made connections with parts of her religion and gender inequality. She often heard women stating that the headscarf was a form of oppression —​a symbol for her which meant the opposite (also see Mohanty, 1988; Spivak, 1994; Abu-L ​ ughod, 2002). Some feminists, she argued, also assumed that her relationship with feminism was absent, that she could not be religious and also be a feminist. Contradicting these statements, Uzma said: ‘My sister’s a feminist and she’s a hijabi. She feels comfortable wearing it. I don’t wear it, I wasn’t forced to wear it, so some people might look at her and think she was forced to wear the hijab but it’s a choice that she makes. She said now she’s wearing a scarf, men respect her a lot more. I think it’s women’s fault as well. I was at work and I was having a similar conversation with my colleagues that I’m having now, about feminism and I said that I don’t show my legs. This woman said that was inequality because women should be able to do what they want. Why does she think that’s inequality when it’s my choice of life? I said to my colleague, my sister wears the hijab and I don’t, so if we were to go on norms I should be wearing it. She does loads of things, she skates. She’s a hijabi and she skates, listens to music, goes out with friends, she does everything that I do and my colleague does, but with a scarf on.’ Discussing feminism, her own experience and that of her sister, ‘a hijabi’, Uzma complicates the arguments made by both her work colleague and some self-​identifying feminists previously mentioned. By doing so, Uzma moves away from the essentializing argument that positions the headscarf, gender equality and feminism in opposition, noting that her sister does everything that she and her colleagues do, but with a scarf on.

131

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Not speaking feminism in the context of austerity Seven women interviewed did not identify as a feminist and three women did not know if they considered themselves to be a feminist or not. Six of these women were middle class and four of these women were working class. Eight women were white and two women were south Asian. Most of these women believed in equal rights and equality, however there was a reluctance to engage in a critical and politicized analysis of gender relations. Reasons for this differed; several women said that they had not thought about feminism —​it had never come up in any topics of conversation that they had been part of. For others, when experiencing difficulties of any kind, the significance of gender was diminished. In considerations about work-​related struggles for example, age and work experience were often located as reasons for any setbacks. Sophie, a 25-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, working as a Marketing Officer in Leeds for instance, cited her age as the main reason why she felt like she had a lack of respect from her male colleagues at work. Moving on to discuss the potential benefits of being a woman in the workplace, she said, “I can get away with way more than a man can. What I say, how I say it. I’d say if anything, being a woman is a huge benefit.” As in previous empirical research exploring reasons for women’s disidentification with feminism (see Budgeon, 2001; Hughes, 2005; Rich, 2005; Scharff, 2012), gender as a category that describes broader social structures disappeared from women’s narratives and was substituted by individualism. Kiran, a 28-​year-​old Indian middle-​class woman from London for example, argued against the use of positive discrimination in the workforce.4 According to her, who a company decides to employ should be made on an individual, competitive basis. Women, she noted, should not be given any special treatment and gender should have no bearing on their suitability for a job. Explaining her point further, Kiran said: ‘I believe we should live in a world where you are judged on you as an individual, it shouldn’t be to do with where you come from. How are we supposed to live in a competitive world, and how are the best people supposed to get to the top if it’s about balancing everyone out? And that goes for male and female as well, a woman shouldn’t get a job because she’s a woman, even though the man was better.’

132

Austerity and Feminism(s)

When asked for more detail with regard to the reasons for these women’s reluctance to claim a feminist position, a recurrent theme was the problem women had with the label itself. Ivy, a 20-​year-​old white middle-​class university student from Leeds told me that despite believing in gender equality, the feminist label was not something that she identified with. Expanding, she said the label itself seemed toxic. For Ivy, being a feminist meant you were “argumentative and always taking offence”. Similarly, Molly, a 26-​year-​old black middle-​class woman from London, stated that she found the term feminism to be problematic. Explaining further she said: ‘I’m easy … I just go through life, I’m very easy. I don’t need to make any problems. There’s nothing impossible, the only impossibility is in your head. There’s no problem with me being able to do what I want to do … I don’t see any reason to cry about it … and label myself and make problems, so someone can tell me to cry about un-​spilt milk [laughs] you know?’ By describing herself —​a non-​feminist —​as easy, Molly indirectly labels feminism as a movement that is, by contrast, not easy and causes problems. According to Molly, situations outside her control are a consequence of personal characteristics rather than an outcome of structural inequalities. As she notes, “the only impossibility is in your head”. To therefore label herself a feminist would be to “cry over un-​ spilt milk” —​to speak about an issue that is not in fact there. Noting that she is not crying about “un-​spilt milk” is her way of saying she has no issues and feels there is no need for her to adopt a feminist stance.

Interpretive frameworks in hard times There were other times within the interviews themselves, where we did not speak about feminism or gender equality. Sometimes, this was due to time constraints, in which some interviews only lasted half an hour and so it was not possible to touch upon the subject. Several of the women had countless criticisms of the austerity agenda, felt the injustice and the unfairness of the system and used the interview to vent these frustrations. When attempting to move the conversation on, the women resisted, wanting to instead continue talking about their experiences. Of the women interviewed, 20 did not use the words feminism, feminist or feminist movement during the interview.

133

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

These women were from working-​class backgrounds. This is not to say that feminism did not speak to these women. Nor that silences in their narratives meant that feminism was made irrelevant. The topic of austerity and its impacts perhaps spoke louder in that particular time and setting. Interpretive acts of noticing injustice are not always easily translated into the spoken word. Interpretive frameworks that are placed within everyday experiences that are fragmented and differing can also enable understandings of identification or dis-​identification. Although feminism was not specifically addressed within these interviews —​as it had been by those women who named themselves feminists —​women often spoke about their experiences of harassment, abuse and feelings of prejudice when discussing their everyday worries and life experiences. The driving down of wages, living standards and working conditions; closures and funding cuts to women’s refuges and childcare services; and the removal of Housing, Child and Disability Benefit dominated discussions. Some women also disclosed experiences of sexual abuse, street harassment and domestic violence. Despite the inherent contradictions and complexities within women’s narratives (as described in Chapter 4), phrases such as “women, always women” followed on from questions about who was most affected by government cuts. Single mothers on a low income or who were reliant on state support were often thought to be bearing the brunt of the austerity measures. Consideration was given to the financial burden single mothers were facing —​the lack of part-​time and full-​time jobs and affordable childcare made things difficult. The way single mothers were being stigmatized and treated by the system also caused anger and frustration during interviews and group discussions. Anti-​welfare sentiment had, according to Nicky, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class woman from Leeds, made many single mothers she knew not take any form of benefit from the state. They felt too ashamed and embarrassed to do so. Noting that most single parents tend to be women, Nicky was angry that this anti-​welfare sentiment was causing women to lose out from help they were entitled to. Such feelings of injustice and unfairness in relation to their experiences of austerity were not however solely expressed about themselves as women:  men were also seen to be struggling from the effects. Stories would often include fathers, uncles, brothers and partners who had lost jobs, who were unable to find alternative contracts or who had struggled with state benefit because of the policy changes. As noted in Chapter 3, women would often draw on their family members as being lifelines when state support was being

134

Austerity and Feminism(s)

withdrawn. Differing from the understanding of the contemporary family (under capitalism) as the source of women’s oppression (see Barrett, 1989), feminists such as Hazel Carby (1997) have argued that the family is a source of resistance to cultural and political racism and oppression. As Skeggs (1997) has maintained, representations of patriarchy as always oppressive, and men as always powerful, do not resonate with working-​class women’s experiences, in which issues of loyalty, support and community position men and women together in tension with their hostile surroundings (also see Mirza, 1992). Allegiances may be produced as much through dependency and inequality as through empathy and pity (Skeggs, 1997). Although these experiences and responses did not fit within a coherent or consistent feminist framework, many of the struggles of these women can be classified as feminist and produce a feminist analysis. Although feminism is not directly spoken, all the experiences that were shared were real and immediate issues enforced by existing structures of power. This can propagate entry into feminist understandings, and provide an interpretive framework for the experiences they were having.

Conclusion An analysis of women’s understandings of, affiliations with, and positioning within feminism has illustrated that there are shifting and multi-​layered negotiations of feminism taking place within the context of austerity. These are both helping to reproduce and to challenge the moral and economic project of austerity. As this chapter highlights, some women do not claim a feminist position, or are unsure about the label. This does not mean, as has been argued earlier, that feminism is rejected by all. Some women’s locations do not mediate feminist consciousness in predictable ways and their struggle is not narrated solely in terms of gender relations. Interpretive frameworks can provide entry into feminist understandings and produce a feminist analysis. Many women, on the other hand, do claim a feminist position. Some women identify with a particular form of neoliberal feminism which, this chapter has argued, converges with, and reinforces austerity policies and discourses. This takes place via narratives of morality, culture, distance, distinction and blame. Helping to mute the language of inequality and unfairness under an ‘equalities umbrella’, neoliberal feminism thus becomes a means through which inequality is exacerbated, not reduced. The convergence of neoliberal feminism and

135

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

austerity’s moral project is crucial in understanding how contemporary forms of inequality are produced and justified through ‘good’, ‘bad’ and, as a result, ‘indifferent’ gendered subject positions and sensibilities. While it might be tempting to see neoliberal feminism as undermining feminist goals of collective change, this chapter has also shown how women are also identifying with and advocating for antineoliberal forms of feminism. Making interventions in the austerity project, collective action was seen as necessary to aid social justice and the common good. By challenging austerity discourse, women, in diff erent ways dismantled and called out certain discourses and practices adopted by austerity’s architects. It is by understanding these processes of affiliations, within such a context, that we can raise questions to comprehend the limits of a particular type of neoliberal feminism, and document where other forms strive to challenge it. Acknowledgments Chapter 5 is a revised and adapted version of ‘“Neoliberal Feminism”: Legitimising the Gendered Moral Project of Austerity’, Sociological Review. DOI: 10.1177/0038026120938289.

136

6

Austerity Future(s)? ‘I think the world is my oyster. I’m of the mindset that I can do whatever I want if I set my mind to it. No I’m not worried at all [about the future].’ (Celia, 27, middle-​class, white, HR Manager, London, December 2014, emphasis added) ‘I am worried [about the future] to a certain extent, but I think everybody is. I’m anxious about where I am going to be in ten years’ time and how that’s going to affect things in the long term. Am I going to be able to buy a house? Or will I be renting forever? And also, there’s the general worries: will we be with the person that we want, will we have a family, will we feel secure in this scary world?’ (Rose, 26, middle-​class, white, university student, Brighton, May 2015, emphasis added) ‘Sometimes I just sit there thinking, what does the future hold for me? What am I going to do with my life? I can’t see it. It’s bad now, I’m sure it’s going to get a lot worse in years to come. Everybody wants a good future, but I just don’t know if it’s possible.’ (Scarlett, 23, working-​class, white, receiving Income Support, Leeds, August 2014, emphasis added) While previous chapters have focused on how austerity is made present through the lived experiences of women, this chapter pays particular attention to how women’s future imaginaries are felt in the present. It explores how austerity affects these imaginaries and asks which types of futures have women begun to imagine in the

137

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

context of austerity? Women’s future imaginings are multiple and, as this chapter shows, are affected particularly by class positioning. This is because, Rebecca Coleman (2014a, 2014b) notes, inequality and power are produced and reinforced through women’s different kinds of imagined and real futures. Economic, political, technological and social changes, which began in the 1970s and intensified in the following decades, delivered new and different expectations for the future. Many authors (Sennett, 1998; Bauman, 2005; Ehrenreich, 2005) have explored how such changes have resulted in a situation where people no longer work with the possibility of long-​term planning, and without consideration for the directed construction of a future. This is reflected by the formation of a contemporary moral code that is linked to the increase of individualism, the laxity of social bonds, the creation of a culture of narcissism, the prospect of a society of uncertainty, extreme competition and the dismantlement of the guarantees of stability. This moment has therefore been marked by the idea that people are living in the ​​ ‘permanent present’ (Bauman, 2001). The 2008 global financial crisis provides fertile ground to further examine the discussion of the permanent present, as scholars, political elites and activists have emphasized the impact of austerity on the future. In the wake of the crisis, political discourse centred around the threat that the crisis would have on our shared future, particularly the impact on the ‘children of austerity’ if the country failed to act. As David Cameron stated in 2009, ‘if we stick together and tackle this crisis our children and grandchildren will thank us for what we did for them and for our country’ (no pagination). In a different vein, critics and challengers of austerity have imagined the future casualties that austerity will produce. In this sense, concern has been directed to the futures that austerity has begun to install, in which there has been a focus on ‘both the material constrains that fiscal tightening grants the future and the ways in which people living with austerity have begun to imagine their own and others’ futures’ (Bramall, 2016: 1). Bruce Bennett and Imogen Tyler (2013) note, for instance, that there is an understanding that austerity ‘will effectively mark the end of the [post-​war] social contract’ (no pagination), and as a result, also mark the end of the better future that the social contract delivered. In a similar vein, in Cruel Optimism (2011) Lauren Berlant states that despite the limitations of the fantasy of the ‘good life’, the idea, made possible by the post-​war social contract, no longer seems possible or sustainable. This fantasy, she argues, is ‘fraying’ (2011:  3), since the promise of upward mobility has been replaced with an ongoing sense of crisis —​a

138

Austerity Future(s)?

‘precarious present’. Therefore, as Berlant suggests, ‘as the possibility of the good life at a social, cultural, economic and political level seems to become more distant, the fantasy as a collectively invested form of life has become more fantasmatic’ (2011:  11 in Coleman, 2012:  2). However, it is important to unpack, as Beverley Skeggs (2012) has argued, the classed assumptions of the argument that the fantasies of the good life are fraying and the possibility of the good life is becoming more distant. Skeggs highlights that, for working-​class people, the fantasy has always been unstable. It is therefore middle-​class people, she notes, who are currently most affected by the destabilizing of social mobility and aspiration. Scholars have begun to focus on the austerity-​induced unravelling of promises for the future, and the new expectations that have been offered and embraced in their place (Bramall, 2016: 1). Yet, as has been shown within previous chapters, insecurities, risks and uncertainties of the permanent present have not been equally felt. Such experiences differentially affect how people (can) imagine and speak about their future. Celia, Rose and Scarlett, in the quotes at the beginning of this chapter, discuss their futures differently. Celia can imagine and speaks about her future with ease and clarity, in her words she is “not worried at all”. For Rose, this becomes harder since certain aspects of her future hold uncertainty and evoke feelings of anxiety. In contrast, the future is something that Scarlett can’t see and finds difficult to look towards. The objects, temporalities and affective registers that the future therefore becomes attached to, are not the same for these women. Austerity can, in different ways, structure, seize and suspend the way the future is imagined and spoken about, depending on its level of symbolic and material constraint. To attend to the points raised, this chapter presents a nuanced analysis of how women imagine but also plan their future. The first part of this chapter demonstrates how class differently shapes how women (can) imagine their futures —​focusing on the themes of retirement and pensions, employment and housing, the day-​to-​day and the figure of the child. It then moves on to explore the differing ways in which these women are able to anticipate or pre-​empt the future.1

Austerity shaping the future: changing expectations aided by supportive cushions The future and the idea of the good life were easily imagined by Celia. She voiced optimism about her future with little consideration of possible hardships ahead. Being on the property ladder in London, having a stable career and feeling an added sense of stability in her

139

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

relationship, she noted that the austerity programme had barely affected her. Likewise, Pippa, who also owned a house in London and who worked in publishing, described her future in positive terms. Having been told by senior management she was one of “the special ones” who was being tracked up the management ladder, Pippa discussed her future in terms of her long-​term career goals. Describing the company benefits and pension packet as “amazing”, she hoped to remain in her current job in the private sector. Pippa did discuss the potential problems she might face when reaching a certain stage of her career, and spoke about the possibility of redundancy when entering a mid-​tier management level if the situation in her industry did not improve. However, she felt she would be able to overcome obstacles if these were thrown at her —​she knew that having a property, qualifications, a large social network and many years of experience would stand her in good stead for any such changes. In the words of Pierre Bourdieu (1983: 317), the variety and volume of her capital made her a desired professional and therefore provided her with a great ‘space of possibilities’ to act within the field. Despite Pippa’s discussion of her “incredible pension packet”, retirement was a bone of contention for other middle-​class women. Tiffany, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class  Marketing Manager who owned a property with her partner in Leeds, commented that despite feeling general calmness about her future, her expectations of when and what she would be entitled to at retirement age were beginning to change. She explained: ‘The idea of working until I’m 75 terrifies me and I’m willing to accept that there won’t be a state pension by the time I retire. I can accept that right now. We will be expected as individuals to support ourselves and as much as they [the government] wouldn’t admit that right now, that’s exactly the way it’s going. Eventually there won’t be such a thing as a retirement age. This really worries me.’ The need to support herself without any help or incentives from the state was a prospect that was very worrying for Tiffany.2 The ‘promise’ of the future that the post-​war social contract had delivered to generations before her, could not be easily imagined. Instead, her expectations of the future were being modified and scaled back —​ having to work for longer and support herself once she retired. Yet despite this eliciting apprehension, the future was described through a linear model of time —​decades that inevitably followed on from

140

Austerity Future(s)?

each other. Looking forwards towards her retirement 40 years in the future was thus seen as something that was necessary for her to plan for. Despite Tiffany’s anxiety surrounding the future being attached to her pension and retirement age, for other women this was in addition to more pressing concerns. The increasing trend towards casualization caused some women to imagine their futures in progressively negative terms. This was especially the case for those women who were working in areas of the public sector (such as NGOs) where contracts were increasingly being given on a short-​term rather than a permanent basis. As discussed in Chapter 3, Rebecca, a 28-​year-​old white middle-​class woman who worked in debt and benefit advice in Brighton, said that her lack of a permanent contract would count against her, even if she had a deposit for a mortgage. As she described, living project-​by-​project impacted her ability to make long-​term decisions in other aspects of her life. Knowing this, she said, “I’m certainly not going to be able to have one of those Saga-​holiday-​type retirements, where you swan off on holiday every six months.” Similarly, Emma, a 25-​year-​old white middle-​class woman who had recently been made redundant from her job in the charity sector in London, also framed her future around property ownership. She noted, “I do worry that I will be renting. Well, the immediate fear, the terror is I  am going to be living with my parents until I’m 40 [laughs]. I don’t think I’m going to be able to buy a house on my own without help. I’m certainly not going to be in the same position as my parents were at 40.” Comparing herself to her parents, who, at her age, owned their own home, Emma described how her transition to adulthood had been affected by her current situation. This caused her to worry. Data from the Institute for Fiscal Studies reinforces Emma’s observation, noting that for 25–​34 year olds earning between £22,200 and £30,600 per year, home ownership fell to just 27 per cent in 2016 from 65 per cent two decades ago (Crib, Hood and Hoyle, 2018). Normative expectations for what she had believed she would accomplish in her life —​for example, property ownership —​ became increasingly unachievable. The good life was not materializing in the same way for her as it had done for her parents. Emma did not however have to modify or scale back her expectations of property ownership, neither navigate the negative affects this change produced. Continuing, she said: ‘I had a similar conversation with my mum the other day and I was like, “I’m never going to be able to buy a house, never. I  just want to buy a house. I  want to have that

141

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

security.” But my mum calmed me down and said, “It’s okay, don’t worry about it, you will.” She said, “All of us in this family, we buy houses, all of your aunts and uncles, they all own their houses, we don’t have the culture of renting.” So, she said, “Don’t worry, you will have a house, it will be okay, we have money to help you, don’t worry.” ’ Economic support from the so-​called ‘bank of mum and dad’ thus allows Emma to be able to look positively towards the longer-​term future and live the good life, even without present job security. Although her future imagining is being closed down by her experience in the present, she is still able to envisage her long-​term future, since she has the ‘cushions’ to do so. In contrast, Rebecca said that she would not be in a position to get help from her family. Her parents had lost their business and home during the recession, moved to social housing and now had less material security than when she was a child. Her parents would not be able to help her onto the property ladder. Rebecca continued, “If I was homeless and I needed to move home to live with my parents, of course I could. But help with getting a house, it’s just not possible for them because they don’t have financial security themselves.” Without the cushion of financial family support, her likelihood of getting on the property market in the near future was reduced and the expectation became more distant. For Rebecca and Emma, their experiences of the unstable present affect their expectations of what the future holds. Yet, even in similar sectors, with similar experiences, Emma could better navigate her expectations of the future and feelings towards it, because of the trajectory of her social and economic capital.

Trapped in the present: anxiety, alertness and anticipation For those who were yet to enter the labour market having recently finished higher education, the future was discussed in anxious terms. Women described themselves as having to “just live in the moment” or not being able to think “too far ahead”. Hannah, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class woman living in London, had graduated from Cardiff University in the summer of 2014 and had been looking for a full-​time job with no success. As discussed in Chapters 2 and 3, she was now working three zero-​hour contract jobs and living back home with her parents. Trying to describe her future, she said, “I’m not one that looks to the future, I’m someone that takes it as it comes, that’s

142

Austerity Future(s)?

all I can do.” Continuing, she explained, “Since finishing uni, it’s the only thing that I can do because you never know, you never know what’s going to happen.” For Hannah, the anxiety she had described shortened her ability to imagine the future, thus making her live in the moment. Alice, a 23-​year-​old white middle-​class woman from London, who had also graduated from university at the same time and was also unable to find permanent work, discussed her immediate future in the same terms. Unlike Hannah, Alice was however able to look towards the long-​term future: ‘I’m not worried about if I will have a house or whatever, because I have help and inheritance, so I can think that I don’t want to have a house or settle down now and not be worried about it, which is a great thing to be able to say [laughs] … I think, I guess I take it for granted that it’s going to work out … So, I guess I don’t think about it in the long term, but the short term, yeah that worries me a lot.’ Alice could comfortably imagine her long-​term future. What she found difficult was her ability to envision anything in the short term. Hannah, in comparison, found it difficult to imagine either. Due to her ‘cushions’, Alice spoke of the short term with a level of anxiety —​ “it makes me anxious to think about the immediate future” —​but also with excitement, “I suppose you just need to think of it as being a bit exciting not knowing what will happen.” In contrast, Hannah’s concept of having to live in the moment was all she could do. On the surface, both these women describe their anxiety when thinking of the short-​term future, in which they cannot look far ahead. However, the unknown is very different for those with less resources and types, volumes and trajectory of capital. As a result, the present and future figure differently. For those women who were heavily or solely reliant on the welfare system, owning a property was not seen as being possible, nor was it an expectation that the future was necessarily built around. Heather, a 26-​year-​old black working-​class single mother from London laughed when we began discussing home ownership, saying, “I’m going to have to die and come back again to own a home [laughs], unless I win the lottery, but I don’t play. Unless somebody leaves me a fortune, that isn’t on my radar [laughs].” Leoni, also a 26-​year-​old black working-​ class single mother living in London, solely reliant on state support, depicted property ownership in similar terms. She said, “I wish I could say that I had money to buy a house but it’s never going to happen.”

143

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Instead, discussions of these women’s futures became built upon more immediate concerns of the precarious present. This was largely centred around the constant changes to welfare reform. Leoni spoke of feeling in a state of constant worry and alertness waiting to see each month if a brown envelope from the Department for Work and Pensions would come through her door to tell her that her claim had been reassessed. Finding it hard to make ends meet with her current benefit payment, thinking about any change to her circumstance generated a very high level of stress and anxiety. Women who were reliant on welfare support due to illness anticipated the arrival of the brown envelope in similar terms. Louise, a 35-​year-​old white working-​class woman living in Leeds, who was in receipt of Disability Living Allowance, noted that the persistent anticipation of this letter left her feeling “very unsafe”, “stressed” and “stuck in limbo”. Like the women previously discussed, Louise’s future imaginings became focused on, and shaped around, anticipating these potential changes. Discussing consumer credit default and collections, Joe Deville (2015) explains how the materiality of debt collection letters —​a parallel with these brown envelopes —​can generate a diffuse, embodied sense of worry which coalesces into a moment of attention. The panic elicited by the letter, he argues, is not necessarily a result of the ‘precise contents of the particular letter in hand’, but the anticipation that it generates of a ‘yet to be unveiled future’ (60). Enmeshed within systems that perpetuate instability, this dependence forecloses the privilege of a person to be able to imagine or project themselves in the long term, since attention is trapped in the unstable, precarious present and immediate future. As these women noted, it was very difficult for them to look too far ahead when they relied on systems that were constantly changing and being scaled back. For Scarlett, a 23-​year-​old white working-​class woman from Leeds, the future was even less certain —​she was solely reliant on welfare, a single mother and was heavily in debt. Joe Deville and Gregory Seigworth note that in the current context ‘debt has been seen as a generalised phenomenon, with the power to seep into “everywhere” and affect “everyone” ’ (2015: 619). Continuing, they argue that this ‘occludes not just a plethora of quite distinct financial circumstances and cultural/​national regulatory practices and proclivities, but also the innumerable ways in which different financial instruments are organised, encountered and come to resonate with daily life’ (619). Yet, the normalization of indebtedness has affected some social groups more than others, changing the ways in which they encounter credit

144

Austerity Future(s)?

or experience debt (Coleman, 2016; Pitcher, 2016). One such group consists of women heavily or solely reliant on state support. As noted in Chapter 3, Scarlett was heavily in debt having taken out loans from a money lender. With high interest repayments, she struggled trying to keep up with payments and dealing with the often hostile and aggressive behaviour she faced from collectors. With payment amounts and collection dates constantly changing, Scarlett felt unsure of whether she was “coming or going”. Explaining further, she said, “I can’t keep up with them [debt collectors], I don’t know what I’m paying, when I’m paying it, plans keep changing, it’s a mess. Sometimes they give me a week, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes I can’t pay.” Unsure of whether she was coming or going meant that Scarlett’s future could not unfold from the present. But instead, as Lisa Adkins notes, when questioning the temporality via which debt and repayment is understood to work, Scarlett’s present is ‘remediated by futures which have not yet –​and may never –​arrive’ (2017: 9). Living day-​to-​day, solely reliant on systems that perpetuate instability, mounting debt and interest means that her present and future come to be ‘drawn and redrawn, assembled and disassembled, set and reset’ (11–​12). Fluctuating payment plans, anticipation of payment dates and changes to state support result in Scarlett describing her situation as a mess, because the present, past and future (and their relations to each other) are always in a constant state of revision (Adkins, 2014).

Imagining the future through the figure of the child: hope versus expectation Regardless of the degree to which women could imagine their own future, when mothers spoke about their children’s future, this was framed in the long term. Women without children also discussed how the future would be when they had children. They often felt that the future would be harder, using illustrative examples, such as the rise in university fees, the changing face of the job market, the state of the NHS and the rise in the cost of living. Heather, a 26-​year-​old black working-​class woman, who up until this point had directed much of her attention to the present, thought about the long term in the context of her four children. ‘Can you imagine when my kids go to get a bag of chips when they’re older? A can of Coke used to be 30p, now it’s 99p … chips will be a fiver. Remember when a Big Mac used to be a Big Mac? [Laughs]. A Big Mac used to be

145

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

big, now it’s like a cheeseburger with an extra bit of bread [laughs]. Can you imagine the size of a Big Mac when my kids get older?’ Framing her discussion around everyday consumption practices, Heather describes the shrinking size of the Big Mac and the increasing cost of a bag of chips, indirectly suggesting a tougher future. Other women shared this view. Marie anticipated financial hardship for her children, stating: “We have all these things that have made things easier, like we don’t have to wash nappies anymore and stuff like that, but their life is going to be harder financially.” Similarly, Trisha, a 34-​year-​old white middle-​class single parent, who worked part-​time, wondered if her son would be able to experience the same coming of age markers that she herself had, such as living independently. She explained, “It’s a shame, because I think his experience of his teens and twenties will be different from mine and others before him. It’s getting a lot harder, even to move in with his mates and experience growing up in that way. What a brilliant thing to leave home and live with a bunch of mates and grow up.” For Heather, Marie and Trisha, despite their children’s futures being discussed through different objects  —​food consumption, financial hardship and independent living —​these women all anticipated their children’s futures through negative affective registers. This was however tempered with better hopes and expectations for their children’s future, which all focused around education. Heather discussed her hopes for her son’s future in terms of his movement through the education system, noting, “When my son leaves school, I hope he goes to college and university, that’s what I hope.” In a similar vein, Marie, a 28-​year-​old black middle-​class woman from London also spoke about university in hopeful terms: ‘I hope my son will go university. I would hope so; I hope he can be that little bit better than I was. I would love him to go to university and socialize and meet new, different people. I hope the future will be better for him but with the whole spending on tuition fees and stuff … yeah, I hope it will work out for him.’ Despite finding it difficult to imagine her own long-​term future, the use of ‘hope’ five times in Marie’s narrative demonstrates that the way in which the future can and is being spoken about is figured differently when discussing her son. These can be seen as vague aspirations to,

146

Austerity Future(s)?

and hopeful imaginations of, the future, that emerge through the non-​linear affective temporality. As Coleman (2016: 101) states, for women significantly affected by austerity, the future does not become irrelevant or wiped out, but rather the future is regarded more in terms of hope rather than expectation. In contrast, Trisha describes her son’s academic future slightly differently, not through hope, but rather, muddied expectations: ‘I do think about that a lot, I don’t know that he will go to uni at this point. He might go a bit later, or not at all. When he was younger and uni fees came in, that did worry me. I didn’t want him to not have that opportunity and obviously because I’m on my own, it’s more difficult. But it’s again a shame because you kind of expect that your children will get a degree, get the same qualifications that you did, but it seems these expectations are changing a lot. If he wants to go, he will, but it’s funny how you need to be prepared for things like this these days. It’s not a given.’ Her initial expectation that her son would obtain the same level of qualifications that she has, is no longer a given. This, she noted, was due to the increase in university tuition fees implemented by the Conservative–​Lib Dem government in 2012. Trisha noted that she felt that expectations were changing a lot, indirectly suggesting that the middle-​class lifestyle and the option of the good life is in flux and no longer a given. Other middle-​class women also reflected on the changing nature of these middle-​class expectations and the effects this would have on their children or younger relatives. Yet Trisha went on to say, “If he [her son] wants to go, he will,” alluding to her possessing the necessary amounts of capital and resources to aid her son’s entrance into higher education. Material necessity will not prevent her son from attending university. However, as Trisha notes, if this becomes an eventuality, this will be something that she will need to prepare for. Her expectations for her son are therefore changing in the current context —​demonstrating that there are cracks in the idea of generational improvement and mobility. The relationship between capital, hope and expectation is therefore important when thinking about the futures that can be imagined within the context of austerity. Despite the inherent difficulties and the closing down of certain possibilities, women who are further from material necessity and with access to different types of capital and resources, can still frame their children’s futures in terms of expectations —​whether or

147

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

not these will come to fruition. Women like Marie and Heather, who are closer to material necessity, do not have the luxury of expectation —​ they can only hope.

Adapting to, and anticipating the imagined future through investment Austerity, this chapter has shown, is an apparatus that works on the future —​women can imagine and become alert to their futures in different ways. The remainder of this chapter will now explore how this alertness makes women act on the future, detailing the variety of strategies women use to circumnavigate it. Yet, as will be highlighted, women’s ability to act, plan, anticipate or pre-​ empt the future yet again depends on the future scenarios women imagine and the capital and resources they possess. Some women can invest in their future, some must invest in their present, while others become trapped in the present. In this sense, as Bourdieu notes, ‘the real ambition to control the future varies with the real power to control that future’ (2000: 221). Pippa, as previously mentioned, described her pension packet as “incredible”, but said that she was also driven by making her own income at retirement age. Describing herself as being in the mindset of ‘making it for herself ’, she noted that she did not want to sit and wait nor have to rely on her company pension. Property development would allow her to have an income when she retired —​she would turn properties over and renovate them. Not explicitly stating that it would be necessary to put her passion for property development to use when reaching that age, using a neoliberal individualized outlook she reasoned that she wanted to remain active and keep her “brain cells ticking over”. Discussing this further, she did however anticipate that she might need an additional income during her retirement years, due to the fact that, as she said, “Many things were changing.” Despite not elaborating on this in any more detail, this changing context can be seen to make Pippa more alert. Property development therefore becomes a strategy for not only keeping her brain cells ticking over but also providing an additional income. Nadia showed this alertness to the present in a different way. A 32-​ year-​old, mixed other, middle-​class high school teacher from Leeds, Nadia, as discussed in Chapter 4, was worried about her future in the education sector and had become increasingly concerned about the state of her pension when she came to retire. Becoming progressively apprehensive about “not having a good enough pension”, Nadia

148

Austerity Future(s)?

decided to undertake a postgraduate degree in a different field. This, she hoped, would enable her to make more money and either become self-​employed or work for a company in the private sector. “Such an investment,” she noted, “is for the future so I don’t need to rely on pensions when I get to that stage.” In a similar vein, Nina, a 27-​year-​old white middle-​class teacher living in Brighton, navigated her future by deciding to find work in London with the understanding that her pay would accelerate at a higher rate. She said, “If I stay in Brighton, my pay accelerates at, like, £1,000 a year, but for a job in London we are talking £8,000 more.” With such a large increase in pay, she deemed this a sensible investment which would enable her to be able to save money towards a house deposit in the mid-​term future. Continuing, she said, “The rent in London and Brighton are pretty much the same, everything else is pretty much the same, so to even think about home ownership in the future, I need to move to London.” As Coleman (2012) notes, pre-​emption of the future is, in part, a gendered process, so that the future is felt by women who are responsible for others (especially children), and/​or whose presents are difficult and who aspire to change. For those mothers who described their futures in more precarious terms, in anticipation of their children’s futures, some made investments with the use of savings accounts and paying into life insurance policies. Although it is important to note that this is not something brought about by austerity, those who discussed such tactics described how the current context made them feel the increased need to take such action. For Leoni, a single mother of four, taking out life insurance was necessary with “all this stuff going on”. Explaining in further detail, she said: ‘I’ve had life insurance for the last five years. I think I need it, so if anything does happen to me, there will be something left for them [her children]. It’s like £10 a month for the next 40 years. I get like £80,000 pay out for them. I’m lucky it’s an old one because the new ones aren’t any good. It’s so I know they have something because they will be left with nothing, do you know what I mean? I just hope they have the best.’ Leoni used her small amount of economic capital to pay £10 per month into a life insurance bond to invest money for her children and their futures. Without this, Leoni noted that her children would “be left with nothing”. Likewise, Lucy, a 21-​year-​old white working-​class woman from Brighton had recently opened a savings account for her

149

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

daughter. She explained that if she had any money spare at the end of the month, she would deposit it in this account. Yet with the changing context, Lucy worried if she would be able to keep this strategy going for long, saying, “Let’s just hope it doesn’t change again for now anyway because I won’t be able to put anything away.” Leoni and Lucy are both reliant on systems that propagate their insecurity, but still try to save for their children’s long-​term future. For these women to be able to think and prepare for a longer future, their present and immediate future had to stay the same.

Living through the precarious permanent present While some women are animated by, alert to, or mobilized by their fears or worries for the future, others have futures eclipsed or overshadowed by problems in the present. Helga Nowotny (1994) calls this ‘the extended present’ in which, she argues, ‘mapped out in linear terms’, the future ‘draws dangerously close to the present’ (49–​50): [The future] is increasingly overshadowed by the problems which are opening up in the present. The future no longer offers that projection space into which all desires, hopes and fears could be projected without many inhibitions, because it seemed sufficiently remote to be able to absorb everything which had no place or was unwelcome in the present. The future has become more realistic, not least because the horizon of planning has been extended (50). Yet, women’s narratives demonstrate that instead of thinking of the future as drawing ‘dangerously close to the present’, it is the need for women to plan in or for the present that actually discourages or even halts certain women’s plans for the future. This was the case for middle-​class women who had recently entered the job market, earned less than the average graduate salary3 and lived independently. Madeline, a 24-​year-​old white middle-​class woman, who was working in the charity sector in Brighton, had just entered the job market after finishing her master’s degree in 2014. She struggled monthly because her wage was less than the average graduate salary, she had to pay off her student loan4, live independently and pay into her pension. Madeline had therefore decided to opt out of her pension. Being able to afford to live in the present meant that she was unable to save for the future. Emma, who at the time of the interview had been made redundant, spoke of conversations she had had with ex-​colleagues

150

Austerity Future(s)?

about the difficulty of being able to live in the present and save for the future. Explaining how one of her colleagues had decided to opt out of her pension, she said: ‘Pensions, I mean, I had a pension at my last job, I don’t know what’s in it, and I was talking to my colleague and she cancelled it, she opted out of it, she’s 29, she was like, the thing is, we are going to be working until we drop dead, like we aren’t going to enjoy our pension, there is no point, I might as well have that money now so I can pay off my credit card, it’s just something that’s so far away and the retirement age keeps creeping up and unless you are loaded, which not many people are, you’re just not going to be able to do it. You can’t properly live now and save for then.’ Emma’s colleague felt that a pension was unnecessary due to the increasing age of retirement and the fact that it was “so far away”. Noting how it was impossible to “properly live now and save for then”, paying off debts in the present seemed to be more beneficial and make more sense than putting money away for the future. Similarly, Rebecca, who worked in the charity sector in Brighton, discussed how the implementation of a mandatory pension by the government, which would theoretically help those on precarious contracts, would negatively affect her in the short-​term. ‘At the moment, we don’t get a pension but the government is bringing that thing in where they have to at least offer you a pension. And I was looking at it and thinking well how much is that going to take out of what I am getting already, because already a big bit is going out for my student loan and tax and national insurance. It is hard because you are living, just getting by on the money that you have. And now there might be some more money coming out, which you need to think about, but if you’re not getting enough in the first place, it doesn’t seem worth it to think and prepare for your future if you can’t afford things now.’ Rebecca felt that paying into a pension at this stage of her career would hinder rather than help her. It would merely add to the “big bit going out” for her student loan, tax and National Insurance. Rebecca felt that it was not worth thinking about or trying to prepare for her

151

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

future, when she was unable to afford to live in the present. In the case of recent graduates such as Emma or Rebecca, austerity closes down certain possibilities to invest in or navigate the future, since the present becomes equally as unstable and necessary to navigate through. This experience contrasts with that of other middle-​class women who have more stability (in the form of properties), more established careers and higher incomes.

Conclusion This chapter has analyzed the ways in which austerity affects women’s access to different kinds of imagined and real futures. It highlighted how, for the majority of women, the future was imagined as increasingly insecure and precarious. Yet class plays an important role in how futures are imagined, the timeframes in which the future is spoken about, the objects the future becomes attached to, the feelings it generates and the differing abilities of these women to adapt and plan for these imagined futures. Typically, those women with more security —​those in permanent jobs, who own property and have family and/​or partner support  —​generally imagine their futures through longer-​term frameworks. They can look ahead and have the ability to plan for any issues that they might encounter. For those who have always lived with such precarity and insecurity constraining their futures, these are now further restricted in a context of austerity. The scope of the future becomes more immediate; for some, reduced or halted in the present and related to everyday basic needs. Adapting and planning for the future also becomes increasingly harder, and in some cases even impossible. In this sense, there is a classed and gendered relationship to time. Yet this relationship is not straightforward and it would be overly simplistic to make the argument that only middle-​class women can imagine their futures, while working-​class women only live in or become trapped in the permanent present. Women’s narratives showed a much more complex situation. The possibility of thinking and investing in the future is different in terms of class, but this has also differently affected women within class fractions, effects which, this chapter has highlighted, are due to their differing ages, the timing of their entrance into the labour market and the type of sector in which they are employed. Thus, the ways in which middle-​class women can think of and plan for their futures are differently shaped by the ways in which they are able to play with their capital according to their circumstance and trajectory. Insecurity is penetrating the lives

152

Austerity Future(s)?

of women, in areas which, pre-​crisis, might not have created such apprehension (such as stable employment and home ownership). Entitlements and expectations are changing. However, varying levels of anxiety, for some women, is ‘cushioned’ most notably by the ‘bank of mum and dad’. Living the good life is therefore easier to imagine. For others, this becomes harder without access to these ‘cushions’.

153

Conclusion: The State Women are Now In The state has become the generator of destitution. (Frank Field, Independent Labour MP, 2017) It has been ten years since the Conservative–​Lib Dem government first enacted their programme of austerity and welfare reform. Records from the House of Commons Library show that since then, there has been approximately £90.8 billion of cuts made to public spending (Cracknel and Keen, 2016). These cuts have been vigorously pursued and have translated into a wide range of punitive policies. Despite the softening of political rhetoric around austerity by Conservative leaders and members of the cabinet since 2017, such policies have had devastating consequences, which will slowly continue to unravel for years to come. Poverty, hunger, high levels of debt, unemployment, homelessness, rising levels of physical and mental ill health, rising levels of crime, infant and adult mortality and ‘austerity suicides’ are just some of the effects that have become commonplace in the last decade (see Garthwaite, 2016; McCulloch, 2017; Mills, 2017; O’Hara, 2017). A  United Nations expert ruled in June 2016 that welfare reforms and austerity measures implemented by successive Conservative governments in the UK are in breach of international human rights (UN Economic and Social Council, 20161). The government, however, disputed those findings and refused to change course. Austerity has been framed by political elites as an era of ‘years of hard slog’ (Hammond, 2017), in which everyone pulled together in the face of adversity (Cameron, 2012a; Osborne, 2012). Yet this façade of togetherness slips when it is reported that Britain is now one of the most unequal countries in the developed world (The Equality Trust, 2017). Since 2014, there has been an explosion of wealth at the top, whereby the richest 1,000 people own more wealth than 40 per cent of households. In the five years leading up to 2017, the combined wealth of Britain’s 1,000 richest people had increased by £253 billion (The

155

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Equality Trust, 2019). In contrast, 14 million people in the UK —​one fifth of the population —​now live in poverty (Alston, 2018). Running alongside this, through the political justification for austerity policies, there has been the endless targeting, vilification, humiliation and scapegoating of certain groups, mainly those on the lowest incomes or who have experienced poverty and other forms of deprivation. Such groups have been unfairly blamed and shamed for the crisis of financial capitalism, portrayed as being irresponsible, feckless, draining national resources, failing to aspire to work hard enough or simply not wanting to work at all. Women, this book has shown, form one particular group that has been both affected by, and blamed for, the ‘years of hard slog’. Through a careful analysis, Austerity, Women and the Role of the State has understood the symbiotic relationship between austerity as a gendered state project and its gendered social effects. It has unpacked the multiple ways in which austerity is produced and legitimized by the state, and situated austerity within its historical context. This approach was crucial to understanding the nuances of the gendered austerity project, and the way in which it (re)produces economic, symbolic and institutional violence. Supplementing this understanding with interviews and group discussions with 61 women from diverse backgrounds in Leeds, London and Brighton during 2014 and 2015, it explored how austerity was experienced and articulated in women’s everyday lives. This allowed for a deeper understanding of the multifarious ways in which difference affects how women navigate, negotiate, speak about, question, reproduce and resist the austerity programme. By studying austerity as a repeating gendered state project that has gendered social effects, this book explored how the particular configurations of gender and class relations are being produced in the specific context of UK austerity.

Living historical legacies with a vengeance Austerity reproduces difference and inequality —​it does not exist in a vacuum, and neither do the configurations that it produces. Rather, they build on a previous history. Austerity, Women and the Role of the State traced this history through the mutual crafting and shaping of the categories of gender and class in different times of crisis and state formations. These relations have been configured and reconfigured by the state to suit the needs of the particular moment. Categorizations and representations change and shift, doing different work at different

156

Conclusion: The State Women are Now In

times. However, certain central features remain. Particular inscriptions and labels circulate and repeat over time and space. This book has shown that both black and white working-​class women have been interchangeably used, seen as the solution or labelled as the problem, depending on the interests of the state and capitalism. Used as the solution to social order, working-​class women have been made to shoulder the impact of austerity and government reform, or take on the dual role of active citizen worker and good mother by juggling paid employment and childcare, as state services are withdrawn. The same working-​class figure has also been repeatedly blamed and shamed for the lack of social order and problems of the nation through a politics of difference. These women have come to be recognized as carriers of immorality, degeneracy and danger, as the anti-​citizen, the undeserving poor and as the black and/​or (dirty) white welfare mother. In all these configurations, they come to be known as figures who deplete or are undeserving of national resources, who need confinement, regulation or moral reform. In different forms, at different times, and through particular configurations, the state has not only controlled and penalized women for the things that they have ‘done’, but also has used and mobilized them in the interests of capital. These historical legacies survive, reproduce and live with vengeance in the current context of austerity. These configurations have been invested in by people who have the power to claim, as Beverley Skeggs notes, ‘the moral high ground and legitimate their privilege in a world of blatant inequality’ (2014b: no pagination). In the absence and silencing of alternative knowledge, it is these inscriptions and representations that are reused, repeated and violently played out by the state, as a way to blame and shame black and white working-​ class women for the crisis of capitalism, and legitimize their unequal punishment, through subsequent punitive policies of welfare reform. These representations are consequently used to vilify and condemn those women, who, due to the material deprivation and moral stigmatization exacerbated by austerity, find it impossible to successfully navigate through the context in the preferred way of the government. It is this long repetitive history that makes these current configurations so powerful, and yet equally, so toxic.

Moral condemnation through an accident of birth Austerity has had the greatest effect on the lives of white and black and ethnic minority working-​class women. This is because conditions of

157

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

existence have not been undermined, but rather, exacerbated in the current context. This has thus reconfigured the value of one’s capital, the range of possibilities open and the degree to which economic necessity has taken hold. The lower volume, composition and trajectory of working-​class women’s capitals and resources thus decreases their space of possibilities and draws them closer to necessity. Austerity thus makes it harder for these women to navigate within this context and to accumulate, convert and legitimize their already meagre capitals. This is in spite of the multiple strategies employed, and the very hard work and time taken to keep their heads above rising water. Yet the disavowal of the continuing structuring force of the configurations of gender, class and ‘race’ makes it difficult for women to discuss how these differences and processes of inequality continue to be unfairly reproduced. The moral project of austerity both decontextualizes and individualizes the conditions of deepening poverty and inequality. Morality and lifestyle are also used to produce, legitimate and sustain the austerity programme and the roll back of welfare through the enactment of the binaries of work/​workless, striver/​skiver and good citizen/​bad citizen. These binaries are divisive, used to blame and attack specific groups for taking advantage of the hard work of the majority. The ‘skiving welfare mother’, for instance, is constructed as the antithesis of ‘the hard-​working family’. Their differing experiences of austerity are depicted as being due to their different morals and values, rather than a result of the inequality exacted by austerity. It is because of this accident of birth that working-​class women are morally condemned and blamed for the crisis of capitalism and for not being able to weather the storm correctly. Thus, lifestyle and morality work as important markers in reproducing solidarity and division through symbolic violence. These discourses have resulted in the reinforcement and production of social divisions, processes of discrimination, stigmatization, prejudice, exclusion and blame in the everyday. Scapegoating particular people for the financial crisis, for instance, has a consequence  —​women draw classed and ‘racialized’ divisions between and within groups. This does not mean, as Austerity, Women and the Role of the State has shown, that women do not resist or contest these valuations. Yet such moral condemnation strongly constrains their space of possibilities with regard to the ways in which they are able to live and construct their lives. Often this condemnation results in processes of differentiation, through blame and distancing of others  —​neighbours, members of their community, recently arrived or more established migrants, reality TV participants or people who feature in damning tabloid news

158

Conclusion: The State Women are Now In

stories —​who are also morally condemned. Such processes reinforce the notion that inequality is the result of moral values instead of unequal austerity policies.

Drawing differences through feminism Despite gender inequality being further entrenched by the austerity programme, a particular form of feminism, this book has argued, has become a key site through which austerity discourse is legitimized and a way through which these moral, classed, gendered and racialized differences have been further reproduced. Feminism can seek to destroy existing social systems through collective, emancipatory and intersectional gender politics, but it can also assist forms of ‘social inequality that support and sustain gender inequality’ (Evans, 2017: 76). Neoliberal feminism does just that. Previous forms of feminism have converged with wider cultural, political and economic frames and contexts —​this one is no different. This feminist subject becomes an active force field which reinforces current political values and discourses, since resilience, hard work, responsibility and being able to bounce back are framed as necessary feminist traits. This feminist position helps to displace the current social, cultural and economic forces producing inequality, especially in relation to gendered, classed and ‘racial’ differences. This is done by placing an individual’s misfortunes into their own hands. Yet it is not just its focus on individualism and responsibility, but the production of the feminist through a moral hierarchy, which makes this form of feminism particularly dangerous. The ‘proper/​good feminist’ and the ‘woman in need of feminism’ become the binaries through which classed and racialized differences are drawn. Narratives of morality and culture thereby reproduce and reinforce inequality; it is women’s morals and culture, their lack of education, their different customs and traditional values, not their experiences of the austerity programme, which limit their ability to cope and be an individuated, responsible feminist. Adoption of this form of feminism thus becomes a means by which women can obvert such inequality. These feminists blame and vilify those who cannot manage such changes, becoming indifferent to their situation. This therefore precludes any kind of solidarity or collective struggle across gender, class or ‘race’. This form of feminism thus becomes a means through which inequality is exacerbated, not reduced.

159

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

In conclusion: the violence of austerity The state we are in is therefore a punishing state and, to quote Frank Field (2017), a generator of destitution. It unfairly targets the most vulnerable and disregards inherited positions that leave social positions firmly entrenched. The state we are in determines, as Tyler notes, ‘the value of life adjudicating on who is expendable and who is of worth’ (2013a: 46). If you have no value for capital, the state makes it harder for you to live. It is not surprising then, that we hear so little about the amounts of corporate welfare payments that go to private companies, specifically government procurement from the private sector. Yet, at the same time, we are exposed to multiple reports on the ‘vast’ amounts lavished on the ‘skivers’ or the ‘undeserving poor’. As Kevin Farnsworth (2015:  no pagination) argues, ‘unemployed citizens on benefits are told they have “no rights without responsibilities” and face financial and other penalties if they deviate from their contract with the state. Corporations, in contrast, are provided with “financial support without strings” ’. In 2012–​13, companies such as Capita, Atos, G4S and Serco, who, in different ways, have been responsible for aiding the state’s enforcement of punitive welfare policies, received £4 billion worth of public sector contracts. Atos and Capita, firms that have carried out controversial disability assessments, received a £40 million increase in funding in 2017. This was despite the widespread concerns from the public with the system and its violent and, in some cases, deadly consequences. Figures from a Freedom of Information request found that more than a third of disability assessment reports completed by Capita had been found to be significantly flawed (Pring, 2019). Corporate profit, in this present context, thus seems to be more valuable than, and to come at the cost of, human life. Those of us who have access to the bigger picture and comprehend the workings of capitalism in its cunning forms (Skeggs, 2014b) need to question, challenge and resist the delegitimization of those who have no value for capital. This book has therefore attempted to do just that: delegitimize the ‘legitimate’, unpack how alternatives are silenced, reveal how unjust policies are produced and legitimized, and expose how women are used and/​or blamed. This book has also aimed to lay bare the ways in which women are navigating through this punishing, punitive context, highlighting the divergence with which austerity affects and shapes women’s lives.

160

Notes Introduction 1

2

3

4

5

6

People living in London can receive a maximum benefit income of £23,000 per year; those outside of London can receive £20,000 per year. Since April 2017, people are no longer automatically entitled to Housing Benefit. This benefit can be claimed if you are a parent with dependent children, classed as a vulnerable adult, or if you have worked continuously for six months before making a claim. People with one spare bedroom have 14 per cent of their eligible rent withdrawn, and those with two or more spare bedrooms lose 25 per cent of their eligible rent. Despite using ‘women’ throughout this book, I understand this category is contested and socially constructed, rather than a biological category (see Butler, 1990). In addition, all participants that agreed to be interviewed for the research project self-​identified as women when asked. For example, the Household Benefit cap impacts overwhelmingly on London; all 20 worst-​affected local authorities in Britain are London boroughs. The benefit cap mostly comes into play for households that have been claiming large sums in Housing Benefit, claimants in London are therefore hard hit due to the exceptionally high rent levels in the capital. Compared to ‘racial’ orientations, discussing class was sometimes problematic. There was often an unwillingness by working-​class women to directly answer questions about class. They often avoided or rejected classed categorizations or reiterated that they were ‘just getting by’, a ‘hard-​working parent’ or ‘normal’. Like the work of Beverly Skeggs, Nancy Thumim and Helen Wood (2008) who when faced with this disinclination and vagueness, asked participants further questions such as, “Do you think you get a fair deal in life?”, I asked similar questions. This focused discussion more easily around the subject, such as their opinions on the fairness of austerity and the impact it had on their lives. Such questions did allow for some women who had avoided initial classification to make distinctions away from, or towards, certain classed groups. Others had difficulty discussing class due to their trans-​national experience. Again, following the work of Skeggs, Thumim and Wood (2008: 5–​6), class was thus translated through women’s movement from one national classification system to another. Some forms of capital travel and convert while others do not (for example, education, occupational knowledge and religion).

161

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Chapter 1 1

2

3

This was the worst economic downturn in the history of the industrialized world. It began after the stock market crash of October 1929 in the US. Women were being forced to leave employment before the crisis of the 1920s due to the 1919 Restoration of Pre-​war Practices Act. However, its application went far beyond the original agreement, and was often used to dismiss women in firms that did not exist before 1914 (Bruley, 1999: 61). In the summer of 1944, delegates from 44 countries met to reshape the world’s international financial system in Bretton Woods. The delegates focused on how to establish a stable system of exchange rates and how to pay for rebuilding the war-​damaged economies of Europe.

Chapter 2 1

2

3

4

5

6

7 8

The Department of Health has rewritten the employment contracts of all new doctors below consultant level in England, who started employment from August 2016. The contract affects the amount that junior doctors get paid, and their decisions surrounding which specialties they choose to train in. Such as the right to know what hours you are going to work in a week, the right to know what you could expect to be paid and the allied right to sick pay and holiday pay. As noted by Jon Burnett and David Whyte (2017: 59) workfare schemes were first introduced as part of the ‘community action scheme’ by the Conservative government in 1993. Workfare schemes became a central part of welfare policy reforms under New Labour’s ‘new deal policy for the unemployed’ in 1998. According to Boycott Workfare, the last referral to this programme was in March 2017. For more details on their work, see: www.boycottworkfare.org. Former Jobcentre worker Angela Neville has been vocal about her experience and the harsh reality of the sanction regime in the media. She has since written a play about how claimants are treated, titled Can this be England? The introduction of Universal Credit was delayed for all claimants due to issues with government administration. It was then confirmed that the transfer of all claimants to Universal Credit would not make the 2017 target. By October 2018, more than one million households were receiving the new benefit, with seven million households expected to receive it once it was fully rolled out. As of September 2019, this has now been reduced to a 35-​day period. According to Patrick Butler (2019), in May 2019, government regulations that would leave thousands of people with severe disabilities worse off by about £100 a month as a result of moving on to Universal Credit were also ruled unlawful in the High Court.

Chapter 4 1

The ideas of learning how to be thrifty, disciplined and restrained can be traced back to Samuel Smiles’s books Self-​Help (1859) and Thrift (1875) which promoted such practices and claimed that poverty was caused largely by irresponsible habits. Such ideas have been used throughout history to reinforce (especially gendered) class and racial boundaries. For example, during the Victorian era, when the conflict between the classes was remade as a problem of morality, middle-​class women (as a source of ‘moral authority’ [Skeggs, 2014b]) both taught and scrutinized working-​class

162

Notes

2

women on the importance of restraint, responsibility, thrift and respectability in order to ‘civilize them’ (David, 1980; Skeggs, 1997) (see as an example, Octavia Hill, founder of social work and the ‘School for Mothers’). When applying for social housing an assessment is made that allocates the applicant to a certain priority band and bedroom category. Using the banding scheme to allocate properties gives those with the greatest need highest priority. The bandings are as follows: Band A is for households with an urgent need to move; Band B is for households with a high priority to move; Band C is for households with an identified housing need; and Band D is for households with no other housing need but interested in affordable social housing and Homebuy.

Chapter 5 1

2

3 4

For Gill (2016: 8) ‘I am Malala’ and ‘Bring back our girls’ represent what she calls ‘comfortable’ feminist campaigns for Western/​northern audiences. This is since, she argues, such campaigns are suffused in racist and colonial discourse, which project the need for feminism ‘there’. Black feminist organizations in the UK, on the other hand, find it difficult to garner such media prominence for their campaigns (for example, Southall Black Sisters). This, Gill notes, drawing on the work of Terese Jonsson (2014), reflects an ongoing racism and classism within reporting of feminism. See, for example, the work of Bernstein (2007), Eisenstein (2017) and Fekete (2006). For more on Focus E15, see: https://​focuse15.org/​. Positive discrimination is the act of favouring someone based on a ‘protected characteristic’ such as gender.

Chapter 6 1

2

Anticipation and pre-​emption are two specific modes of orienting towards the future. Anticipation is where the future is anticipated and worked towards. Pre-​ emption is where the future is brought into the present to prevent or forestall an action happening (Coleman, 2016). Both modes, identified and discussed in recent social, cultural and feminist theory, are important for understanding contemporary temporalities and power relations. Vincanne Adams, Michelle Murphy and Adele E. Clarke (2009: 247) argue that anticipation involves the present being directed towards a ‘contingent’ and ‘ever-​changing’ future. While what may happen in the future is a potentiality, it ‘must be acted on’. Therefore, events that may or may not happen in the future come to shape the present. Despite their connections, anticipatory and pre-​emptive regimes can helpfully be understood in terms of whether or not temporality is conceived as linear, in which anticipation often operates through prevention. As Brian Massumi notes, prevention is underpinned by a linear temporality; it is rooted in the present and seeks to prevent an event happening in the future (2005: 8). In contrast, linear temporality is disturbed or disrupted through pre-​emption. For Massumi (2005) the present is not concerned with preventing an event in the future, but rather the future is brought into the present by pre-​emptive measures. In July 2017, the government announced its intention to increase the state pension age from 67 to 68 between 2037 and 2039 —​seven years earlier than previously

163

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

3

4

planned. This was previously scheduled to happen between 2044 and 2046. It is therefore likely that this will continue to rise (Davies, 2018). The average graduate starting salary is between £19,000 and £22,000 according to graduatejob.com. Figures from 2019. For graduates earning £17,495 per year or above, repayments of the student loan are 9 per cent of £17,495 before tax per year.

Conclusion 1

The report also expressed concerns over: • unemployment, which, despite a small rise in the employment rate, continues to disproportionately affect people with disabilities, young people and people belonging to ethnic, religious or other minorities; • the high incidence of part-​time work, precarious self-​employment, temporary employment and the use of zero hour contracts; • the ‘persistent discrimination’ against migrant workers; • the challenges faced by asylum seekers due to restrictions in accessing employment and the insufficient level of support provided through the daily allowance; • the national minimum wage, which ‘is not sufficient to ensure a decent standard of living in the State Party, particularly in London, and does not apply for workers under the age of 25’; • increases in the inheritance tax limit and value added tax, and reductions to corporation tax, in encouraging ‘persistent social inequality’; • the new Trade Union Act (2016), which limits the right of workers to undertake industrial action; • sanctions in relation to benefit fraud and the absence of due process and access to justice for those affected by the use of sanctions; • the limited availability and high costs of childcare and the lack of involvement of men in childcare responsibilities; • persistent underrepresentation of women in decision-​making positions in the public and private sectors; • violence against women with disabilities; • the increased risk of poverty for people with disabilities, people belonging to ethnic, religious or other minorities, single-​parent families and families with children; • the persistent critical situation in terms of availability, affordability and accessibility of adequate housing (in part as a result of cuts in state benefits), the lack of social housing and lack of adequate access to basic services, such as water and sanitation, for travellers; • reforms to the legal aid system and the introduction of employment tribunal fees, and the resulting restriction of access to justice, in areas including employment, housing, education and social welfare benefits; • the significant rise in homelessness; • the country-​wide reliance on foodbanks; • discrimination in accessing health care services against refugees, asylum seekers, refused asylum seekers and travellers; • the lack of adequate resources provided to mental health services; • persistent serious shortcomings in the care and treatment of older persons, including those with dementia;

164

Notes

• significant inequalities in educational attainment, especially for children belonging to ethnic, religious or other minorities and children from low-​income families which has the effect of limiting social mobility; • increasing university fees, which affects equal access to higher education; • lack of corporate regulation; • the way international development funds are used overseas; • the announced plan of replacing the Human Rights Act of 1998 by a new British Bill of Rights; • the criminalization of termination of pregnancy in Northern Ireland; • the lack of effective measures adopted by the State Party to promote the use of Irish Language in Northern Ireland; • the lack of involvement and participation of Northern Ireland in this review process, and the limited information available on the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights in the British Overseas Territories and the Crown Dependencies.

165

References Abu-​Lughod, L. (2002) ‘Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and its Others’, American Anthropologist, 104(3): 783–​90. Adams, V., Murphy, M. and Clarke, A.E. (2009) ‘Anticipation: Technoscience, Life, Affect, Temporality’, Subjectivity, 28(1): 246–​65. Adkins, L. (2004) ‘Passing on Feminism:  From Consciousness to Reflexivity’, European Journal of Women’s Studies, 11(4): 427–​44. Adkins, L. (2014) ‘Luc Boltanski and the Problem of Time: Notes Towards a Pragmatic Sociology of the Future’, in S. Susen and B.S. Turner (eds) The Spirit of Luc Boltanski: Essays on the Pragmatic Sociology of Critique, London: Athlone Press, pp 517–​38. Adkins, L. (2017) ‘Speculative Futures in a Time of Debt’, The Sociological Review, 65(3): 448–​62. Alexander, C.E. (1996) The Art of Being Black: The Creation of Black British Youth Identities, Oxford and New York: Clarendon Press. Allen, K. and Taylor, Y. (2012) ‘Placing Parenting, Locating Unrest: Failed Femininities, Troubled Mothers and Riotous Subjects’, Studies in the Maternal, 4(2): 1–​25. Allen, K. and Bull, A. (2018) ‘Following Policy:  A Network Ethnography of the UK Character Education Policy Community’, Sociological Research Online, 23(2): 152–​72. Allen, K., Tyler, I. and De Benedictis, S. (2014) ‘Thinking with “White Dee”: The Gendered Politics of “Austerity Porn” ’, Sociological Research Online, 19(3): 2. Allen, K., Mendick, H., Harvey, L. and Ahmad, A. (2015) ‘Welfare Queens, Thrifty Housewives, and Do-​It-​All Mums’, Feminist Media Studies, 15(6): 907–​25.

167

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Alston, P. (2018) ‘Statement on Visit to the United Kingdom, by Professor Philip Alston, United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights’, OHCHR, 16 November [Online]. Available from: https://​www.ohchr.org/​en/​NewsEvents/​ Pages/​DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=23881&LangID=E (Accessed 6 March 2020). Atkinson, W., Roberts, S. and Savage, M. (2013a) ‘Introduction: A Critical Sociology of the Age of Austerity’, in W. Atkinson, S. Roberts and M. Savage (eds) Class Inequality in Austerity Britain: Power, Difference and Suffering, Farnham: Palgrave Macmillan, pp 1–​12. Atkinson, W., Roberts, S. and Savage, M. (eds) (2013b) Class Inequality in Austerity Britain: Power, Difference and Suffering, Farnham: Palgrave Macmillan. Bakshi, P., Goodwin, M., Painter, J. and Southern, A. (1995) ‘Gender, Race, and Class in the Local Welfare State:  Moving Beyond Regulation Theory in Analysing the Transition from Fordism’, Environment and Planning, 27(10): 1539–​54. Banet-​Weiser, S. (2018) Empowered:  Popular Feminism and Popular Misogyny, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Barrett, M. (1989) Women’s Oppression Today:  The Marxist/​Feminist Encounter, London: Verso. Bassel, L. and Emejulu, A. (2017) Minority Women and Austerity: Survival and Resistance in France and Britain, Bristol: Policy Press. Bauman, Z. (2001) ‘Consuming Life’, Journal of Consumer Culture, 1(1): 9–​29. Bauman, Z. (2005) Liquid Life, Cambridge: Polity Press. BBC News (2018) ‘House pr ice g rowth slowed in 2017, says Nationwide’, BBC News, 4 January [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.bbc.co.uk/​news/b​ usiness-​42555351 (Accessed 12 December 2019). Beatty, C. and Fothergill, S. (2013) Hitting the Poorest Place Hardest: The Local and Regional Impact of Welfare Reform, Sheffield:  Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research, Sheffield Hallam University. Bennett, B. and Tyler, I. (2013) ‘The war on welfare: from “social security” to “social insecurity” ’, New Left Project, 26 November [Online]. Available from: http://w ​ ww.newleftproject.org/i​ ndex.php/​ site/​article_​comments/​the_​war_​on_​welfare_​from_​social_​security_​ to_s​ ocial_i​ nsecurity (Accessed 23 March 2014, link no longer active). Bentley, A. (1998) Eating for Victory: Food Rationing and the Politics of Domesticity, Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. Berlant, L. (2011) Cruel Optimism, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

168

References

Bernstein, E. (2007) Temporarily Yours: Intimacy, Authenticity, and the Commerce of Sex, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Bhattacharyya, G. (2015) Crisis, Austerity and Everyday Life, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Bienkov, A. (2013) ‘Michael Gove: Poor to blame for food banks’, Politics Home, 11 September [Online]. Available from: https://​www. politics.co.uk/n ​ ews/2​ 013/0​ 9/1​ 1/m ​ ichael-​gove-​poor-​to-​blame-​for-​ food-​banks (Accessed 5 April 2017). Blyth, M. (2013) Austerity:  The History of a Dangerous Idea, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bourdieu, P. (1979) ‘Symbolic Power’, Critique of Anthropology, 4(1): 316–​40. Bourdieu, P. (1983) ‘The Field of Cultural Production, Or:  The Economic World Reversed’, Poetics, 12(4–​5): 311–​56. Bourdieu, P. (1984) Distinction, London: Routledge. Bourdieu, P. (1986) ‘The Forms of Capital’, in J.G. Richardson (ed) Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, New York: Greenwood Press, pp 241–​58. Bourdieu, P. (1987) ‘The Force of Law: Towards a Sociology of the Juridical Field’, Hastings Law Journal, 38(5): 814–​53. Bourdieu, P. (1989) ‘Social Space and Symbolic Power’, Sociological Theory, 7(1): 14–​25. Bourdieu, P. (1991) Language and Symbolic Power, Cambridge: Polity Press. Bourdieu, P. (2000) Pascalian Meditations, Stanford: Polity Press. Bourdieu, P. (2014) On the State: Lectures at the College de France 1989–​ 1992, Cambridge: Polity Press. Brah, A. (1996) Cartographies of Diaspora:  Contesting Identities, London: Routledge. Bramall, R. (2013) The Cultural Politics of Austerity: Past and Present in Austere Times, Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan. Bramall, R. (2016) ‘Introduction:  The Future of Austerity’, New Formations, 87: 1–​10. Brenner, J. and Laslett, B. (1991) ‘Gender, Social Reproduction, and Women’s Self-​Organization’, Gender & Society, 5(3): 311–​33. Brenner, N., Peck, J. and Theodore, N. (2010) ‘After Neoliberalization?’, Globalizations, 7(3): 327–​45. Brown, W. (2005) ‘Neo-​Liberalism and the End of Liberal Democracy’, Theory & Event, 7(1): 37–​59. Bruley, S. (1999) Women in Britain since 1900 (Social History in Perspective), London: Palgrave.

169

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Budgeon, S. (2001) ‘Emergent Feminist(?) Identities: Young Women and the Practice of Micropolitics’, European Journal of Women’s Studies, 8(1): 7–​28. Burman, E. (2018) ‘(Re)sourcing the Character and Resilience Manifesto:  Suppressions and Slippages of (Re)presentation and Selective Affectivities’, Sociological Research Online, 23(2): 130–​51. Burnett, J. (2017) ‘Austerity and the Production of Hate’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 217–​25. Burnett, J. and Whyte, D. (2017) ‘The Violence of Workfare’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 59–​67. Butler, J. (1990) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, London: Routledge. Butler, P. (2014a) ‘Tory peer says poor people go hungry because they do not know how to cook’, The Guardian, 8 December [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.theguardian.com/​society/​2014/​dec/​ 08/​tory-​peer-a​ pologises-p​ oor-h ​ ungry-d​ o-n ​ ot-k​ now-c​ ook (Accessed 10 May 2016). Butler, P. (2014b) ‘Food poverty:  Panorama, Edwina Currie and the missing ministers’, The Guardian, 3 March [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.theguardian.com/​society/​patrick-​butler-​cuts-​ blog/​2014/​mar/0​ 3/f​ ood-p​ overty-p​ anorama-​edwina-​currie-​and-​the-​ missing-​ministers-​food-​banks (Accessed 6 March 2016). Butler, P. (2019) ‘Universal credit regulations ruled unlawful by high court’, The Guardian, 3 May [Online]. Available from:  https://​ www.theguardian.com/​society/​2019/​may/​03/​universal-​credit-​ discrepancies-r​ uled-u ​ nlawful-b​ y-h ​ igh-c​ ourt (Accessed 7 May 2019). Cameron, D. (2009) ‘The age of austerity’, Speech to the Spring Forum, Cheltenham, Politics.co.uk, 29 April [Online]. Available from:  https://​conservative-​speeches.sayit.mysociety.org/​speech/​ 601367 (Accessed 17 June 2020). Cameron, D. (2010) ‘David Cameron: We must tackle Britain’s massive deficit and growing debt’, The Conservative Party, 7 June [Online]. Available from:  https://​conservative-​speeches.sayit.mysociety.org/​ speech/​601466 (Accessed 17 June 2020). Cameron, D. (2011a) ‘Troubled families speech’, GOV.UK, 15 December [Online]. Available from:  https:// ​ w ww.gov.uk/​ government/​ s peeches/​ t roubled-​ f amilies-​ s peech (Accessed 5 December 2013).

170

References

Cameron, D. (2011b) ‘Speech on the Big Society’, GOV.UK, 15 February [Online]. Available from: https://​www.gov.uk/​government/​ speeches/​pms-​speech-​on-​big-​society (Accessed 13 May 2016). Cameron, D. (2011c) ‘PM’s speech on Welfare Reform Bill’, GOV. UK, 17 February [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.gov.uk/​ government/​speeches/​pms-​speech-​on-​welfare-​reform-​bill (Accessed 13 May 2016). Cameron, D. (2012a) ‘David Cameron’s 2013 New Year message’, GOV.UK, 30 December [Online]. Available from:  https://​www. gov.uk/g​ overnment/n ​ ews/d​ avid-c​ amerons-2​ 013-n ​ ew-y​ ear-m ​ essage (Accessed 14 December 2014). Cameron, D. (2012b) ‘David Cameron’s welfare speech in full’, The Telegraph, 25 June [Online]. Available from: http://​www.telegraph. co.uk/​news/​politics/​david-​cameron/​9354163/​David-​Camerons-​ welfare-​speech-​in-​full.html (Accessed 4 April 2014). Cameron, D. (2016) ‘Charities blast David Cameron’s claim that benefits are a “lifestyle choice” ’, The Mirror, 3 February [Online]. Available from: http://​www.mirror.co.uk/n ​ ews/u ​ k-n ​ ews/c​ harities-​ blast-​david-​camerons-​claim-​7303329 (Accessed 4 May 2017). Carby, H. (1997) ‘White Women Listen!’ in H.S. Mirza (ed) Black British Feminism: A Reader, London: Routledge, pp 45–​92. Centre for Cities (2015) Cities Outlook 2015, London:  Centre for Cities. Cheregi, B.F. (2015) ‘The Visual Framing of Romanian Migrants in the British Television Documentaries: A Constructivist Approach’, Journal of Media Research, 8(2): 96–​114. Clarke, J. and Newman, J. (2012) ‘The Alchemy of Austerity’, Critical Social Policy, 32(3): 299–​319. Coleman, R. (2012) Transforming Images: Screens, Affect, Futures, London and New York: Routledge. Coleman, R. (2014a) ‘Austerity has hampered our ability to imagine a better future’, The Conversation, 29 August [Online]. Available from:  https://​theconversation.com/​austerity-​has-​hampered-​our-​ ability-​to-​imagine-​a-​better-​future-​30435 (Accessed 1 March 2015). Coleman, R. (2014b) ‘Inventive Feminist Theory:  Representation, Materiality and Intensive Time’, Women:  A Cultural Review, 25(1): 27–​45. Coleman, R. (2016) ‘Austerity Futures:  Debt, Temporality and (Hopeful) Pessimism as an Austerity Mood’, New Formations, 87: 83–​101. Connell, R.W. (1990) ‘The State, Gender, and Sexual Politics: Theory and Appraisal’, Theory and Society, 19(5): 507–​44.

171

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Cooper, R. (2014) ‘The only person who should be depressed is the taxpayer: Questions over how Benefits Street's White Dee can appear repeatedly on TV while deemed too ill to work’, Daily Mail, 19 February [Online]. Available from: https://​www.dailymail.co.uk/​ news/​article-​2563069/​amp/​Questions-​Benefits-S​ treets-W ​ hite-D ​ ee-​ appear-​TV-​ill-​work.html (Accessed 26 June 2020). Cooper, V. and Whyte, D. (2017) ‘Introduction:  The Violence of Austerity’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 1–​33. Cracknell, R. and Keen, R. (2016) Briefing Paper Number SN06758 Estimating the Gender Impact of Tax and Benefits Changes, London: House of Commons Library. Craddock, E. (2017) ‘Caring About and For the Cuts: A Case Study of the Gendered Dimension of Austerity and Anti-​Austerity Activism’, Gender, Work and Organization, 24(1): 69–​82. Crib, J., Hood, A. and Hoyle, J. (2018) The Decline of Homeownership Among Young Adults, London: Institute for Fiscal Studies. Crossley, S. (2016) ‘Realising the (Troubled) Family, Crafting the Neoliberal State’, Families, Relationships and Societies, 5(2): 263–​79. D’Arcy, C. and Gardiner, L. (2014) Just the Job  –​ Or a Working Compromise? The Changing Nature of Self-​Employment in the UK, London: The Resolution Foundation. Dardot, P. and Laval, C. (2013) The New Way of the World: On Neoliberal Society, London: Verso. David, M. (1980) The State, the Family and Education, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Davies, P. (2018) ‘State pension age calculator’, Which?, 1 February [Online]. Available from:  https:// ​ w ww.which.co.uk/ ​ m oney/​ pensions-a​ nd-​retirement/​state-​pension/​state-​pension-​age-​calculator-​ asfz43c0xp8q (Accessed 6 December 2019). De Benedictis, S. (2012) ‘Feral Parents:  Austerity Parenting under Neoliberalism’, Studies in the Maternal, 4(2): 1–​21. Demianyk, G. (2018) ‘ “A Housing Emergency”: 50,000 Homeless Households Moved out of Their Communities in Five Years’, Huffington Post, 25 October [Online]. Available from: https://​www. huffingtonpost.co.uk/​entry/​homeless-​households-​placements_​uk_​ 5bbb9099e4b01470d053d2a6 (Accessed 6 December 2019). Department for Work and Pensions (2010) Disability Living Allowance and Work: Exploratory Research and Evidence Review, Norwich: The Stationary Office Ltd. Deville, J. (2015) Lived Economies of Default:  Consumer Credit, Debt Collection and the Capture of Affect, London: Routledge.

172

References

Deville, J. and Seigworth, G.J. (2015) ‘Everyday Debt and Credit’, Cultural Studies, 29(5–​6): 615–​29. Dhaliwal, S. and Forkert, K. (2015) ‘Deserving and Undeserving Migrants’, Soundings, 61(61): 49–​61. Donzelot, J. (1991) ‘Pleasure in Work’, in G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P.M. Miller (eds) The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, Chicago: Chicago University Press, pp 251–​81. Dorling, D. (2010) Injustice:  Why Social Inequality Persists, Bristol: Policy Press. Douglas, M. (1966) Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo, London: Routledge. Duncan-​Smith, I. (2011a) ‘Iain Duncan-​Smith:  Reforming our pensions and welfare system’, The Conservative Party, 6 March [Online]. Available from:  http://​www.conservatives.com/​News/​ Speeches/​2011/0​ 3/I​ ain_D ​ uncan_S​ mith_R ​ eforming_​our_​ pensions_​ and_​welfare_​system.aspx (Accessed 29 December 2014, link no longer active). Duncan-​Smith, I. (2011b) ‘Duncan-​Smith: Restoring fairness to the welfare system’, The Conservative Party, 3 October [web address no longer available due to deletion by the Conservative Party]. Duncan-​Smith, I. (2014) ‘Ian Duncan Smith’s speech on welfare reform  –​full text’, The Spectator, 23 January [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.spectator.co.uk/​article/​iain-​duncan-​smith-​s-​ speech-​on-​welfare-​reform-​--​ f​ ull-​text (Accessed 29 December 2014). Duncan-​Smith, I. (2016) ‘Iain Duncan Smith: Speech on why the EU is a force for social injustice’, Conservative Home, 10 May [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.conservativehome.com/​parliament/​ 2016/0​ 5/i​ ain-​duncan-​smith-​speech-​on-​why-​the-​eu-​is-​a-​force-​for-​ social-​injustice-​full-​text.html (Accessed 29 December 2014). Ehrenreich, B. (2005) Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream, New York: Metropolitan Books. Eisenstein, H. (2017) ‘Hegemonic Feminism, Neoliberalism and Womenomics:  “Empowerment” Instead of Liberation?’, New Formations, 91(3): 35–​49. Elliot, L. (2013) ‘Reinhart and Rogoff ’s latest paper warns on financial repression’, The Guardian, 20 November [Online]. Available from: http://w ​ ww.theguardian.com/b​ usiness/e​ conomics-b​ log/2​ 013/​ nov/​20/​reinhart-​rogoff-​latest-​paper-​harvard-​financial-​repression (Accessed 3 June 2017).

173

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Elliot, L., Inman, P. and Smith, H. (2013) ‘IMF admits: we failed to realise the damage austerity would do to Greece’, The Guardian, 5 June [Online]. Available from: https://​www.theguardian.com/​business/​ 2013/​jun/​05/​imf-​underestimated-​damage-​austerity-​would-​do-​to-​ greece (Accessed 4 October 2015). Ellis, D. (2017) ‘The Violence of the Debtfare State’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 110–​17. Emejulu, A. (2017) ‘Feminism for the 99%:  Towards a Populist Feminism?’, Soundings, 66 (Summer). Evans, M. (2013) ‘Gender in an Age of Austerity’, Women’s History Review, 22(5): 838–​40. Evans, M. (2015) ‘Feminism and the Implications of Austerity’, Feminist Review, 109(1): 146–​55. Evans, M. (2016) ‘Women and the Politics of Austerity: New Forms of Respectability’, British Politics, 11(4): 438–​51. Evans, M. (2017) The Persistence of Gender Inequality, Cambridge: Polity Press. Evans, P. and Sewell Jr, W. (2013) ‘Neoliberalism: Policy Regimes, International Regimes, and Social Effects’, in P. Hall and M. Lamont (eds) Social Resilience in the Neoliberal Era, Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, pp 35–​68. Farnsworth, K. (2015) ‘The British Corporate Welfare State: Public Provision for Private Businesses’, SPERI paper No. 24, Sheffield: The University of Sheffield. Farris, S.R. (2012) ‘Femonationalism and the “Regular” Army of Labor Called Migrant Women’, History of the Present, 2(2): 184–​99. Farris, S. (2017) In the Name of Women’s Rights:  The Rise of Femonationalism, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Farris, S. and Rottenberg, C. (2017) ‘Introduction:  Righting Feminism’, New Formations, 91(3): 5–​15. Favaro, L. and Gill, R. (2018) ‘Feminism Rebranded: Women’s Magazines Online and the Return of the F-​word’, Revista Dıgitos, 4: 37–​66. Fekete, L. (2006) ‘Enlightened Fundamentalism? Immigration, Feminism and the Right’, Race & Class, 48(2): 1–​22. Field, F. (2017) ‘Destitution is the new British disease’, The Spectator, 28 October [Online]. Available from: https://​www.spectator.co.uk/​ 2017/​10/​lets-​face-​it-​the-​welfare-​system-​isnt-​working/​ (Accessed 6 December 2019). Financial Conduct Authority (2017) Shining a Light on Illegal Money Lending:  Consumer Experiences of Unauthorised Lending in the UK, London: FCA.

174

References

Fitzpatrick, S., Pawson, H., Bramely, G., Wilcox, S. and Watts, B. (2016) The Homeless Monitor: England 2016, London: Crisis. Forkert, K. (2017) Austerity as Public Mood: Social Anxieties and Social Struggles, London: Rowman & Littlefield International. Foster, D. (2016) Lean Out, London: Repeater Books. Fraser, N. (1989) Unruly Practices:  Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory, Cambridge: Polity Press. Fraser, N. (2016) ‘Contradictions of Capital and Care’, New Left Review, 100: 99–​117. Gardiner, J. (1983) ‘Women, Recession and the Tories’, in S.  Hall and M. Jacques (eds) The Politics of Thatcherism, London: Lawrence & Wishart Limited, pp 196. Garfield, S. (2005) Our Hidden Lives: The Remarkable Diaries of Post-​War Britain, London: Ebury Press. Garthwaite, K. (2016) Hunger Pains:  Life Inside Foodbank Britain, Bristol: Policy Press. Gedalof, I. (2018) Narratives of Difference in an Age of Austerity, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Gill, R. (2007) ‘Postfeminist Media Culture: Elements of a Sensibility’, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 10(2): 147–​66. Gill, R. (2016) ‘Post-​Postfeminism? New Feminist Visibilities in Postfeminist Times’, Feminist Media Studies, 16(4): 610–​30. Gill, R. and Orgad, S. (2015) ‘The Confidence Cult(ure)’, Australian Feminist Studies, 30(86): 324–​44. Gill, R. and Orgad, S. (2018) ‘The Amazing Bounce-​Backable Woman: Resilience and the Psychological Turn in Neoliberalism’, Sociological Research Online, 23(2): 191–​209. Gillies, V. (2005) ‘Raising the Meritocracy:  Parenting and the Individualisation of Social Class’, Sociology, 39(5): 835–​52. Gilroy, P. (1987) There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack, London: Hutchinson. GMB Union (2019) ‘Rent in London up 21.7% since 2011 compared to 9.1% rise’, GMB Union, 13 June [Online]. Available from: https://​ www.gmblondon.org.uk/ ​ n ews/ ​ rent- ​ a nd- ​ e arnings- ​ i n- ​ l ondon (Accessed 6 December 2019). Graeber, D. (2013) ‘There’s no need for all this economic sadomasochism’, The Guardian, 21 April [Online]. Available from: https://​www.theguardian.com/​commentisfree/​2013/​apr/​21/​ no-​need-​for-​economic-​sadomasochism (Accessed 7 September). Greenwood, W. (1934) Love on the Dole, London: Jonathan Cape.

175

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Gunn, C. (2015) ‘Hashtagging for the Margins:  Women of Color Engaged in Feminist Consciousness-​R aising on Twitter’, in K.  Edwards Tassie and S.M. Brown Givens (eds) Women of Color and Social Media Multitasking: Blogs, Timelines, Feeds, and Community, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, pp 21–​34. Hall, C. (1992) White, Male and Middle-​Class: Explorations in Feminism and History, Cambridge: Polity Press. Hall, S. (1988a) The Hard Road to Renewal: Thatcherism and the Crisis of the Left, London: Verso. Hall, S. (1988b) ‘The Toad in the Garden: Thatcherism among the Theorists’, in C.  Nelson and L.  Grossberg (eds) Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, Urbana, IL:  University of Illinois Press, pp  35–​73. Hall, S.M. (2015) ‘Everyday Family Experiences of the Financial Crisis: Getting by in the Recent Economic Recession’, Journal of Economic Geography, 116(2): 305–​30. Hall, S.M. (2019) Everyday Life in Austerity: Family, Friends and Intimate Relations, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Hall, S. and Jacques, M. (1983) The Politics of Thatcherism, London: Lawrence & Wishart Limited. Hall, S., Critcher, C., Jefferson, T., Clarke, J. and Roberts, B. ([1978] 2013) Policing the Crisis:  Mugging, the State and Law and Order, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Hamilton, K. (2012) ‘Low-​Income Families and Coping through Brands: Inclusion or Stigma?’, Sociology, 46(1): 74–​90. Hammond, P. (2017) ‘Mansion House 2017: Speech by the Chancellor of the Exchequer’, GOV.UK, 20 June [Online]. Available from: https://​ www.gov.uk/​government/​speeches/​mansion-​house-​2017-​speech-​by-​ the-​chancellor-​of-​the-​exchequer (Accessed 6 December 2019). Harari, D. (2018) ‘Household Debt: Statistics and Impact on Economy’, Briefing Paper Number 7584, 21 December 2018, London: House of Commons. Haylett, C. (2001) ‘Illegitimate Subjects? Abject Whites, Neoliberal Modernization and Middle Class Multiculturalism’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 19(3): 351–​70. Hitchen, E. (2016) ‘Living and Feeling the Austere’, New Formations, 87: 101–​18. Home Office (2018) ‘Hate Crime, England and Wales, 2017/​18’, Statistical Bulletin 20/​18, UK: Home Office. Hughes, K. (2005) ‘ “I Have Been Pondering Whether You Can Be a Part-​Time Feminist”: Young Australian Women’s Studies students discuss gender’, Women’s Studies International Forum, 28(1): 37–​49.

176

References

I, Daniel Blake (2016) Directed by Ken Loach and Laura Obiols. London and Newcastle: Sixteen Films et al. Illegal Money Lending Team England (2016) Witness Statistics –​Report for January –​December 2016, Birmingham: IMLT. Inman, P. (2019) ‘Has the age of austerity really come to an end?’, The Guardian, 5 September [Online]. Available from: https://​www. theguardian.com/​business/​2019/​sep/​05/​has-​the-​age-​of-​austerity-​ really-​come-​to-​an-​end-​sajid-​javid (Accessed 7 January 2020). Jarrett, K. (2014) ‘The Alternative to Post-​Hegemony: Reproduction and Austerity’s Social Factory’, Culture Unbound: Journal of Current Cultural Research, 6(8): 137–​57. Jensen, T. (2012) ‘Tough Love in Tough Times’, Studies in The Maternal, 4(2): 1–​26. Jensen, T. (2014) ‘Welfare Commonsense, Poverty Porn and Doxosophy’, Sociological Research Online, 19(3):  3. Available from: https://www.socresonline.org.uk/19/3/3.html. Jensen, T. (2016) ‘Against Resilience’, in R. Garrett, T. Jensen and E. Voela (eds) We Need to Talk about Family: Essays on Neoliberalism, The Family and Popular Culture, Cambridge:  Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp 76–​94. Jensen, T. and Tyler, I. (2012) ‘Austerity Parenting: New Economies of Parent Citizenship’, Studies in the Maternal, 4(2): 1. Jensen, T. and Tyler, I. (2015) ‘Benefits Broods:  The Cultural and Political Crafting of Welfare Common Sense’, Critical Social Policy, 35(4): 470–​91. Jonsson, T. (2014) ‘White Feminist Stories:  Locating Race in Representations of Feminism in The Guardian’, Feminist Media Studies, 14(6): 1012–​27. Keller, J. (2015) Girls’ Feminist Blogging in a Postfeminst Age, Abingdon: Routledge. Khan, S. (2005) ‘Reconfiguring the Native Informant: Positionality in the Global Age’, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 30(4): 2017–​35. Kiernan, K., Land, H. and Lewis, J. (1998) Lone Motherhood in Twentieth Century Britain: From Footnote to Front Page, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Kirkman, J. (2014) ‘George Osborne to cut taxes by extending austerity and creating a smaller state’, The Telegraph, 5 January [Online]. Available from:  http://​ w ww.telegraph.co.uk/​ n ews/​ politics/​georgeosborne/​10552454/​George-​Osborne-​to-​cut-​taxes-​ by-​extending-​austerity-​and-​creating-​smaller-​state.html (Accessed 5 January 2015).

177

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Krugman, P. (2015) ‘The austerity delusion’, The Guardian, 29 April [Online]. Available from:  http://​www.theguardian.com/​business/​ ng-​interactive/​2015/​apr/​29/​the-​austerity-​delusion (Accessed 1 May 2016). Kulz, C. (2014) ‘ “Structure Liberates?”:  Making Compliant, Consumable Bodies in a London Academy’, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London. Kynaston, D. (2008) Austerity Britain: 1945–5 ​ 1, London: Bloomsbury. Lambie-​Mumford, H. and Snell, C. (2015) ‘Heat or Eat: Food and Austerity in Rural England’, Working Papers of the Communities & Culture Network. Available from: http://w ​ ww.communitiesandculture. org/​projects/​heat-​or-​eat-​food-​and-​austerity-​in-​r ural-​england/​ (Accessed 1 May 2017). Larner, W. (2000) ‘Neo-​Liberalism: Policy, Ideology, Governmentality’, Studies in Political Economy, 63(1): 5–​25. Lawler, S. (2005) ‘Disgusted Subjects:  The Making of Middle-​ Class Identities’, The Sociological Review, 53(3): 429–​46. LEEDS.GOV.UK (n.d) ‘Leeds economy’, LEEDS.GOV.UK. Available from: https://​www.leeds.gov.uk/​business/l​ eeds-e​ conomy (Accessed 6 December 2019). Leigh Day (2019) ‘High Court finds DWP unlawful on universal credit assessments’, LeighDay, 6 September [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.leighday.co.uk/​News/​2019/​January-​2019/​ High-​Court-​finds-​DWP-​unlawful-​on-​universal-​credit (Accessed 6 December 2019). Lister, R. (2004) Poverty, Chichester: Wiley. Littler, J. (2017) Against Meritocracy: Culture, Power and Myths of Mobility, London: Routledge. London, R. (2017) ‘The Deadly Impact of Fuel Poverty’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 101–​10. Lonergan, G. (2015) ‘Migrant Women and Social Reproduction under Austerity’, Feminist Review, 109(1): 124–​45. Loyal, S. (2014) ‘From the Sanctity of the Family to State Sovereignty:  The Irish Supreme Courts Changing Role in Maintaining National Sovereignty’, Critical Sociology, 43(1): 1–​18. MacDonald, R. and Marsh, J. (2005) Disconnected Youth? Growing Up in Britain’s Poor Neighbourhoods, London: Palgrave. Maiguashca, B., Dean, J. and Keith, D. (2016) ‘Pulling Together in a Crisis? Anarchism, Feminism and the Limits of Left-​Wing Convergence in Austerity Britain’, Capital and Class, 40(1): 37–​57.

178

References

Mama, A. (1992) ‘Black Women and the British State: Race, Class and Gender Analysis for the 1990’s’, in P. Braham, A. Rattansi and R. Skellington (eds) Racism and Anti-​racism, London: Sage, pp 79–​101. Mason, R. (2014) ‘Lord Tebbit scorns food bank demand’, The Guardian, 20 March [Online]. Available from:  https:// ​ w ww. theguardian.com/​politics/​2014/​mar/​20/​lord-​tebbit-​scorns-​food-​ bank-​demand (Accessed 6 December 2019). Massumi, B. (2005) ‘The Future Birth of the Affective Fact’, The Ethics and Politics of Virtuality and Indexicality Conference, paper presented at University of Leeds, 30 June–​3 July. McCulloch, D. (2017) ‘Austerity’s Impact on Rough Sleeping and Violence’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 171–​81. McDowell, L. (2004) ‘Work, Workfare, Work/​Life Balance and an Ethics of Care’, Progress in Human Geography, 28(2): 145–​63. McDowell, L. (2008) ‘The New Economy, Class Condescension and Caring Labour: Changing Formations of Class and Gender’, NORA –​ Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research, 16(3): 150–​65. McDowell, L., Perrons, D., Fagan, C., Ray, K. and Ward, K. (2006) ‘The Contradictions and Intersections of Class and Gender in a Global City:  Placing Working Women’s Lives on the Research Agenda’, Environment and Planning, A, 37(3): 441–​61. McRobbie, A. (2004) ‘Postfeminism and Popular Culture’, Feminist Media Studies, 4(3): 255–​64. McRobbie, A. (2009) The Aftermath of Feminism: Gender, Culture and Social Change, London: Sage. McRobbie, A. (2015) Be Creative: Making a Living in the New Culture Industries, Cambridge: Polity Press. Meetoo, V. and Mirza. H. S. (2007) ‘ “There’s Nothing Honourable about Honour Killings”:  Gender, Violence and the Limits of Multiculturalism’, Women’s Studies International Forum, 30(3): 187–​200. Mendoza, K. E. (2015) Austerity: The Demolition of the Welfare State and the Rise of the Zombie Economy, Oxford:  New International Publications Limited. Mills, C. (2017) ‘Suicides linked to austerity: From a psychocentric to a psychopolitical autopsy’, Discover Society, 1 February [Blog]. Available from:  https://​discoversociety.org/​2017/​02/​01/​suicides-​linked-​ to-​austerity-​from-​a-​psychocentric-​to-​a-​psychopolitical-​autopsy/​ (Accessed 12 December 2018). Minns, R. (1980) Bombers and Mash: The Domestic Front, 1939–​45, London: Virago Press.

179

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Mirza, H.S. (1992) Black British Feminism, London: Routledge. Mirza, H.S. (2013) ‘ “A Second Skin”:  Embodied Intersectionality, Transnationalism and Narratives of Identity and Belonging among Muslim Women in Britain’, Women’s Studies International Forum, 36: 5–​16. Mirza, H.S. and Meetoo, V. (2018) ‘Empowering Muslim Girls? Post-​ Feminism, Multiculturalism and the Production of the “Model” Muslim Female Student in British Schools’, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 39(2): 227–​41. Misra, J. and Akins, F. (1998) ‘The Welfare State and Women: Structure, Agency, and Diversity’, Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State and Society, 5(3): 259–​85. Mohanty, C.T. (1988) ‘Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses’, Feminist Review, 30: 65–​88. Montgomerie, J. (2015) ‘The Children of Austerity’, PERC Blog, 20 July [Blog]. Available from: http://​www.perc.org.uk/​project_​posts/​ the-​children-​of-​austerity-​debt-​creates-​a-​future-​of-​always-​paying-​ for-​the/​ (Accessed 24 August 2017). Montgomerie, J. (2016) ‘Austerity and the Household: The Politics of Economic Storytelling’, British Politics, 11(4): 418–​37. Neocleous, M. (2013) ‘Resisting resilience’, Radical Philosophy, RP 178, March/​April [Online]. Available from:  https://​www. radicalphilosophy.com/​commentary/​resisting-​resilience (Accessed 6 December 2019). Netto, G. and Fraser, A. (2009) Navigating the Maze: Refugee Routes to Housing, Support and Settlement in Scotland, Glasgow: Scottish Refugee Council. NEWomen’s Network and Women’s Resource Centre (NEWN and WRC) (2012) The Impact of Austerity Measures upon Women in the North East of England, Newcastle upon Tyne and London:  NEWomen’s Network and Women’s Resource Centre. Noakes, L. (1998) War and the British:  Gender and National Identity, 1939–​91, London: I.B. Tauris. Nowotny, H. (1994) Time:  The Modern and Postmodern Experience, Cambridge: Polity Press. O’Connell, R. and Hamilton, L. (2017) ‘Hunger and Food Poverty’, in V. Cooper and D. Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London: Pluto Press, pp 94–​101. Office for National Statistics (2014) ‘ONS Labour Market Statistics’, ONS.GOV.UK, 5 July [Online]. Available from: http://​webarchive. nationalarchives.gov.uk/​20160106174742/​http://​www.ons.gov.uk/​ ons/​rel/​lms/​labour-​market-​statistics/​july-​2014/​statistical-​bulletin. html (Accessed 21 September 2017).

180

References

Office for National Statistics (2015) ‘UK Labour Market:  July 2015’, ONS.GOV.UK, 15 July [Online]. Available from:  https://​ www.ons.gov.uk/​employmentandlabourmarket/​peopleinwork/​ employmentandemployeetypes/b​ ulletins/​uklabourmarket/​2015-​07-​ 15 (Accessed 2 September 2017). O’Hara, M. (2014) Austerity Bites: A Journey to the Sharp End of Cuts in the UK, Bristol: Polity Press. O’Hara, M. (2017) ‘Mental Health and Suicide’, in V. Cooper and D.  Whyte (eds) The Violence of Austerity, London:  Pluto Press, pp  35–​44. Orgad, S. and De Benedictis, S. (2015) ‘The “Stay-​at-​Home” Mother, Postfeminism and Neoliberalism:  Content Analysis of UK News Coverage’, European Journal of Communication, 30(4): 418–​36. Orwell, G. (1937) The Road to Wigan Pier, London: Penguin Books. Osborne, G. (2009) ‘Conservative 2009:  George Osborne’, The Guardian, 6 October [Online]. Available from:  https://​w ww. theguardian.com/​politics/​2009/​oct/​06/​george-​osborne-​spending-​ cuts (Accessed 4 February 2014). Osborne, G. (2010a) ‘George Osborne: The foundations for a more prosperous future’, The Conservative Party, 22 June [Online]. Available from:  https://​conservative-​speeches.sayit.mysociety.org/​speech/​ 601464 (Accessed 15 June 2020). Osborne, G. (2010b) ‘Chancellor delivers emergency Budget 2010 statement’, Parliament UK, 22 June [Online]. Available from: https://​ www.parliament.uk/​business/​news/​2010/​06/​emergency-​budget-​ 2010-​statement (Accessed 5 May 2013). Osborne, G. (2011) ‘George Osborne: We have to put fuel into the tank of the British economy’, The Conservative Party, 23 March [web address no longer available due to deletion by the Conservative Party]. Osborne, G. (2012) ‘Conference 2012:  George Osborne’, The Conservative Party, 8 October [web address no longer available due to deletion by the Conservative Party]. Osborne, G. (2015) ‘Osborne’s speech in full’, Conservative Home, 5 October [Online]. Available from: https://​www.conservativehome. com/​parliament/​2015/​10/​george-​osbornes-​speech-​in-​full.html (Accessed 6 October 2016). Ostry, J.D., Loungani, P. and Furceri, D. (2016) ‘Neoliberalism Oversold’, Finance & Development, 53(2): 38–​41. Pateman, C. (1988) The Sexual Contract, Stanford:  Stanford University Press.

181

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Patrick, R. (2014) ‘Working on Welfare: Findings from a Qualitative Longitudinal Study Into the Lived Experiences of Welfare Reform in the UK’, Journal of Social Policy, 43(4): 705–​25. Patrick, R. (2017) ‘Wither Social Citizenship? Lived Experiences of Citizenship In/​Exclusion for Recipients of Out-​of-​Work Benefits’, Social Policy and Society, 16(2): 293–​304. Pawson, H. and Wilcox, S. (2012) UK Housing Review 2012 Briefing Paper, Coventry: Chartered Institute of Housing. Pearson, R. (2019) ‘A Feminist Analysis of Neoliberalism and Austerity Policies in the UK’, Soundings, 71: 28–​39. Pearson, R. and Elson, D. (2015) ‘Transcending the Impact of the Financial Crisis in the United Kingdom: Towards Plan F –​A Feminist Economic Strategy’, Feminist Review, 109(1): 8–​30. Pedwell, C. (2012) ‘Affective (Self-​) Transformations:  Empathy, Neoliberalism and International Development’, Feminist Theory, 13(2): 163–​79. Pemberton, S., Sutton, E., Fahmy, E. and Bell, K. (2014) Life on a Low Income in Austere Times, Bristol: PSE/​ESRC. Pitcher, B. (2016) ‘Race, Debt and the Welfare State’, New Formations, 87: 47–​63. Pratten, B. (2014) Stepping Up? Investing in Women in Post-​Recession UK, London: Rosa Fund. Pring, J. (2019) ‘Secret PIP files show one in three assessments by Capita had significant flaws’, Disability News Service, 11 July [Online]. Available from: https://​www.disabilitynewsservice.com/​secret-​pip-​ files-s​ how-o ​ ne-​in-​three-​assessments-​by-​capita-​had-​significant-​flaws/​ (Accessed 6 December 2019). Public and Commercial Services Union (2015) ‘Supplementary written evidence submitted by Public and Commercial Services Union’, Parliament.uk. Available from:  http://​www.parliament. uk/​documents/​PCS%20(SAN0161)%20300115.pdf (Accessed 9 September 2017). Rabindrakumar, S. (2017) On the Rise Single Parent Sanctions in Numbers, London: Gingerbread. Rashid, N. (2016) Veiled Threats: Representing the Muslim Woman in Public Policy Discourses, Bristol: Policy Press. Raynor, R. (2016) ‘Dramatising Austerity: Holding a Story Together (and Why it Falls Apart…)’, Cultural Geographies, 24(2): 193–​212. Reinhart, C.M. and Rogoff, K.S. (2010) ‘Growth in a Time of Debt’, American Economic Review: Papers and Proceedings, 100(2): 573–​578.

182

References

Reinhart, C.M. and Rogoff, K.S. (2014) ‘Recovery from Financial Crises: Evidence from 100 Episodes’, American Economic Review: Papers and Proceedings, 104(5): 50–​55. Rendall, J. (1994) ‘Citizenship, Culture and Civilisation:  The Languages of British Suffragists 1866–​1874’, in C.  Daley and M. Nolan (eds) Suffrage and Beyond: International Feminist Perspectives, Auckland: Auckland University Press, pp 127–​50. Rich, E. (2005) ‘Young Women, Feminist Identities and Neo-​ Liberalism’, Women’s Studies International Forum, 28(6): 495–​508. Rooke, A. and Gidley, B. (2010) ‘Asdatown: The Intersections of Classed Places and Identities’, in Y. Taylor (ed) Classed Intersections: Spaces, Selves, Knowledges, Surrey: Ashgate, pp 95–​116. Rose, S.O. (1998) ‘Sex, Citizenship, and the Nation in World War 2 Britain’, The American Historical Review, 103(4): 1147–​76. Rottenberg, C. (2014) ‘The Rise of Neoliberal Feminism’, Cultural Studies, 28(3): 418–​37. Rottenberg, C. (2018) The Rise of Neoliberal Feminism, New York: Oxford University Press. Sandberg, S. (2013) Lean In:  Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, New York: Knopf. Sandhu, S. and Stevenson, M. (2015) ‘Layers of Inequality—​A Human Rights and Equality Impact Assessment of the Public Spending Cuts on Black Asian and Minority Ethnic Women in Coventry’, Feminist Review, 109(1): 169–​79. Scharff, C. (2012) Repudiating Feminism: Young Women in a Neoliberal World, Farnham: Ashgate. Schäuble, W. (2011) ‘Why austerity is only cure for Eurozone’, The Financial Times, 5 September [Online]. Available from: https://​www. ft.com/​content/​97b826e2-​d7ab-​11e0-​a06b-0​ 0144feabdc0 (Accessed 5 June 2019). Sennett, R. (1998) The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism, New York: Norton. Shildrick, T. (2018) ‘Lessons from Grenfell: Poverty Propaganda, Stigma and Class Power’, The Sociological Review, 66(4): 783–​98. Shildrick, T. and MacDonald, R. (2013) ‘Poverty Talk: How People Experiencing Poverty Deny Their Poverty and Why They Blame the Poor’, The Sociological Review, 61(2): 286–​303. Shildrick, T., Macdonald, R., Webster, C. and Garthwaite, K. (2012) Poverty and Insecurity:  Life in Low-​Pay, No-​Pay Britain, Bristol: Policy Press. Skeggs, B. (1997) Formations of Class and Gender, London: Sage.

183

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Skeggs, B. (2004) Class, Self, Culture, London: Routledge. Skeggs, B. (2005) ‘The Making of Class and Gender through Visualizing Moral Subject Formation’, Sociology, 39(5): 965–​82. Skeggs, B. (2009) ‘Haunted by the Spectre of Judgement: Respectability, Value and Affect in Class Relations’, in P. Sveinsson (ed) Who Cares about the White Working Class?, London: Runnymede, pp 36–​45. Skeggs, B. (2012) ‘Thinking Allowed: Obesity –​Cruel Optimism’, BBC4, 13 February [Online]. Available from: http://​www.bbc.co.uk/​ programmes/​b01bm0pk (Accessed 7 September 2017). Skeggs, B. (2014a) ‘Values Beyond Value? Is Anything Beyond the Logic of Capital?’, British Journal of Sociology, 65(1): 1–​20. Skeggs, B. (2014b) ‘Legitimating Slow Death: A Brief but Long History of the Use, Abuse and Demonization of Labour by the Media’, Values Blog. Available from: https://​values.doc.gold.ac.uk/​blog/​17/​ (Accessed 28 August 2017, link no longer active). Skeggs, B. (2015) ‘Introduction:  Stratification or Exploitation, Domination, Dispossession and Devaluation?’, The Sociological Review, 63(2): 205–​22. Skeggs, B., Thumim, N. and Wood, H. (2008) ‘ “Oh Goodness, I am Watching Reality TV”:  How Methods Make Class in Audience Research’, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 11(1): 5–​24. Smiles, S. (2007 [1875]) Thrift, London: Kessinger Publishing. Smiles, S. (2008 [1859]) Self-​Help, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Soldatic, K. and Meekosha, H. (2012) ‘The Place of Disgust: Disability, Class and Gender in Spaces of Workfare’, Societies, 2(3): 139–​56. Sosenko, F., Netto, G., Emejulu, A. and Bassel, L. (2013) In It Together? Perceptions on Ethnicity, Recession and Austerity in Three Glasgow Communities Report, Glasgow: Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights. Spivak, G.C. (1994) ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’, in P. Williams and L.  Chrisman (eds) Colonial Discourse and Post-​Colonial Theory:  A Reader, Hertfordshire: Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp 90–105. Spring Rice, M. (1939) Working Class Wives: Their Health and their Conditions, London: Pelican Books. Stanley, L. (2013) ‘The Meaning of Austerity’, New Left Project, December 2013 [Online]. Available from: http://​www.newleftproject. org/​index.php/​site/​article_​comments/​the_​meaning_​of_​austerity (Accessed 7 September 2017, link no longer active). Stanley, L. (2016) ‘Legitimacy Gaps, Taxpayer Conflict, and the Politics of Austerity in the UK’, The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 18(2): 389–​406.

184

References

Steedman, C. (2000) ‘Enforced Narratives: Stories of Another Self ’, in T.  Cosslett, C. Lury and P.  Summerfield (eds) Feminism and Autobiography: Texts, Theories, Methods, London: Routledge, pp 25–​39. StepChange Debt Charity (2016) Rapid Rise in Single Parent Debt Problems, London: Step Change Debt Charity. Stiglitz, J.E. (2012) The Price of Inequality: How Today’s Divided Society Endangers Our Future, London: W. W. Norton & Company. Stoler, A. (1995) Race and the Education of Desire:  Foucault’s History of Sexuality and the Colonial Order of Things, Durham, NC:  Duke University Press. Sussex Community Foundation (2019) Sussex Uncovered, Lewes: Sussex Community Foundation. Tasker, Y. and Negra, D. (2013) ‘Neoliberal Frames and Genres of Inequality: Recession-​Era Chick Flicks and Male-​Centred Corporate Melodrama’, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 16(3): 344–​61. Temple, W. (1938) Men Without Work: A Report Made to the Pilgrim Trust, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. The Equality Trust (2017) Equality Matters to Human Rights: We Need a Socio-​Economic Duty, London: The Equality Trust. The Equality Trust (2019) Billionaire Britain, London:  The Equality Trust. The Fawcett Society (2012) The Impact of Austerity on Women, London: Fawcett. The Fawcett Society (2013) Budget 2013 -​Helping or Hurting Women?, London: Fawcett Society. The Fawcett Society (2015) Where’s the Benefit? An Independent Inquiry into Women and Jobseeker’s Allowance, London: Fawcett Society. The Lancet (2014) ‘Economic Austerity, Food Poverty, and Health’, The Lancet, 383(10): 1069. Todd, S. (2014) The People:  The Rise and Fall of the Working Class, 1910–​2010, London: John Murray. Trades Union Congress (2015) The Impact on Women of Recession and Austerity, London: TUC. Trades Union Congress (2019) ‘Unsecured debt hits new peak of £15,400 per household –​new TUC analysis’, TUC, 7 Jan [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.tuc.org.uk/​news/​unsecured-​debt-​ hits-​new-​peak-​%C2%A315400-​household-​%E2%80%93-​new-​tuc-​ analysis (Accessed 6 December 2019). Trump, I. (2018) Women Who Work:  Rewriting the Rules for Success, New York: Portfolio/​Penguin.

185

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Trussell Trust (2018) ‘End of year stats’, Trussell Trust, [Blog]. Available from: https://w ​ ww.trusselltrust.org/n ​ ews-​and-​blog/​latest-​stats/​end-​ year-​stats/​ (Accessed 6 December 2019). Turvey, R. (2008) ‘The Depression years in Wales and England 1930–​ 1939’, Online resource. Available from:  http://​resource.download. wjec.co.uk.s3.amazonaws.com/​vtc/​2013–​14/​History/​Depression/​ Part_​1%20Dep.pdf (Accessed 6 May 2014, link no longer active). Tyler, I. (2008) ‘“Chav Mum Chav Scum”:  Class Disgust in Contemporary Britain’, Feminist Media Studies, 8(1): 17–​34. Tyler, I. (2013a) Revolting Subjects:  Social Abjection and Resistance in Neo-​Liberal Britain, London: Zed Books. Tyler, I. (2013b) ‘Riots of the Underclass: Stigmatisation, Mediation and the Government of Poverty and Disadvantage in Neoliberal Britain’, Sociological Research Online, 18(4): 25–35. Tyler, I. (2015) ‘Classificatory Struggles: Class, Culture and Inequality in Neoliberal Times’, The Sociological Review, 63(2): 493–​511. UNCSBRP (2016) ‘The Development of London’s Economy’, London’s Economic Plan and Major Industries. Available from: http://​ www.uncsbrp.org/​ e conomicdevelopment.htm (Accessed 23 March 2016). UN Economic and Social Council, Committee on Economic and Social Rights (2016) Concluding Observations on the Sixth Periodic Report of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, E/​C.12/​ GBR/​CO/​6. Available from: http://​tbinternet.ohchr.org/​_​layouts/​ treatybodyexternal/​Download.aspx?symbolno =E%2fC.12%2fGBR %2fCO%2f6&Lang=en (Accessed 6 December 2019). UNISON (2013) Community and Voluntary Services in the Age of Austerity, London: UNISON. Vacchelli, E., Kathrecha, P. and Gyte, N. (2015) ‘Is it Really Just the Cuts? Neo-​Liberal Tales from the Women’s Voluntary and Community Sector in London’, Feminist Review, 109(1): 180–​89. Virdee, S. (2014) Racism, Class and the Racialised Outsider, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Wacquant, L. (2009) Punishing the Poor: The Neoliberal Government of Social Insecurity, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Wacquant, L. (2010) ‘Crafting the Neoliberal State:  Workfare, Prisonfare, and Social Insecurity’, Sociological Forum, 25(2): 197–​220. Ware, S. (1981) Beyond Suffrage: Women in the New Deal, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Ware, V. (1992) Beyond the Pale:  White Women, Racism and History, London: Verso.

186

References

Waylen, G. (1998) ‘Gender, Feminism and the State: An Overview’, in V. Randall and G. Waylen (eds) Gender, Feminism and the State, London: Routledge, pp 1–​17. Weaver, M. and Laville, S. (2016) ‘European embassies in UK log more alleged hate crimes since Brexit vote’, The Guardian, 19 September [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.theguardian.com/​society/​ 2016/​sep/​19/​ embassies-​ a lleged-​ h ate-​ crimes-​since-​brexit-​vote (Accessed 6 December 2019). Weber, M. (2001 [1905]) The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, London: Routledge. Weir, A. and Wilson, E. (1984) ‘The British Women’s Movement’, New Left Review, 148: 74–​103. Wilkinson, M. (2016) ‘Philip Hammond warns Britain’s economy heading for post-​Brexit “rollercoaster” ride as he drops pledge for budget surplus by 2020’, The Telegraph, 3 October [Online]. Available from:  https://​www.telegraph.co.uk/​news/​2016/​10/​03/​philip-​ hammond-​budget-​surplus-​conservative-​conference-​live/​ (Accessed 6 January 2017). Williams, R. (2014) ‘Eat, Pray, Love: Producing the Female Neoliberal Spiritual Subject’, The Journal of Popular Culture, 47(3): 613–​33. Wilson, E. (1987) ‘Thatcherism and Women:  After Seven Years’, in R.  Miliband, I. Panitch and J.  Saville (eds) Socialist Register, London: Merlin Press, pp 199–​235. Women’s Budget Group (2014a) Budget 2014: Giveaways to Men, Paid for by Women, London: WBG. Women’s Budget Group (2014b) The Impact of Women of the Budget 2014: No Recovery for Women, London: Women’s Budget Group. Women’s Budget Group (2016) A Cumulative Gender Impact Assessment of Ten Years of Austerity Policies, London: WBG. Women’s Budget Group (2017) A Chancellor Tinkering at the Margins:  Women’s Budget Group Response to Autumn Budget 2017, London: WBG. Women’s Budget Group (2020) ‘Budget 2020:  Massive increase in public spending but no action to address crisis in social care and rising child poverty’, Press Release, 11 March [Online]. Available from: https://w ​ bg.org.uk/m ​ edia/p​ ress-r​ eleases/​massive-​increase-​in-​ public-​spending-b​ ut-n ​ o-a​ ction-t​ o-a​ ddress-​crisis-​in-​social-​care-​and-​ rising-​child-​poverty/​ (Accessed 12 March 2020). Women’s Budget Group and Runnymede Trust (2017) Outcry Over NICs Hides the Biggest Losers of Government Tax and Benefit Policy, London: WBG.

187

AUSTERITY, WOMEN AND THE ROLE OF THE STATE

Woods, C., Cheetman, P. and Gregory, T. (2012) Coping with the Cuts, London: Demos. Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, I. (2000) Austerity in Britain Rationing, Controls, and Consumption, 1939–​1955, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

188

Index A abject figures  11, 35, 90, 110–​11 activism  115, 128–​9, 163n1 Adams, V.  163n1 Adele (case study)  61, 78 Adkins, L.  145 advice services  78–​84 affordable housing  64, 65, 128 Alice (case study)  75–​6, 143 ‘all in this together’  37–​40, 47, 155–​6 Allen, K.  11, 41 ambition  124 Amira (case study)  56 Anna (case study)  1, 2, 48, 73, 74–​5, 92–​3, 123–​4, 126 anti-​austerity movements  115, 128–​9 anti-​welfare common-​sense  90, 94, 103, 108 anticipation  142–​5, 163n1 anxiety for the future  142–​5 arrears  1, 56, 64, 67, 77–​8 assertiveness  119 asylum seekers  56 Atkinson, W.  31 Atos  62, 160 austerity (general)  economic argument for  9–​10 figurations of  11 as gendered state project  7–​13, 21, 26–​30 historical legacies  156–​7 legitimization of  10–​12, 37–​45, 89–​90 women as solution or problem  157 women’s lived experience of  12–​14 see also feminism and austerity; history of austerity; state discourses; women’s austerity narratives austerity discourses  see state discourses; women’s austerity narratives austerity programme  3–​7, 155 Australia  100–​1 authoritarian populism  32

B back-​to-​work policies  53–​8 Bakshi, P.  29 Banet-​Weiser,  S.  129 banking  8, 97 bedroom tax  5, 16, 64, 66–​7, 91 benefit claimants  and anxiety  143–​5 benefit scrounger figure  11, 92, 100–​8 claims stigma  103 disability assessments  44–​5, 62, 160 and fairness  43–​4 and responsibility  42–​3, 44, 160 sanctions  36, 47, 44, 54, 57–​8, 78 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 under Thatcherism  33 and workfare  53–​8 benefits  caps on  6, 16, 60–​1, 66–​7 cuts/​changes to  60–​3 discriminatory nature of system  30 Great Depression  23–​4 impact of austerity on  5 incorrect payment of  56 and unemployment  23–​4, 25 see also welfare state/​system Benefits Street (TV programme)  42, 89, 90, 93 Bennett, B.  138 Berlant, L.  138–​9 Bhattacharyya, G.  12, 21 binary divisions  38, 158 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 black and minority ethnic women  discriminatory nature of welfare state  30 and employment  33, 52, 55, 66 and feminism  124–​7, 131 and Housing Benefit cuts  66 impact of austerity on  6–​7, 11 moral condemnation of  157–​9

189

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

support centres  79–​80 blame  of the government/​politicians  97–​8 state’s use of  24–​5, 38, 45, 97–​8, 156–​9 women’s view of  95–​8, 104–​11 Blyth, M.  22 Bottrell, D.  122 boundary formation  14, 92–​7, 127 Bourdieu, P.  13, 47–​8, 51, 72, 75, 96, 102, 140, 148 Boycott Workfare  56 Bramall, R.  26, 138 Brighton  background information  15–​16 community organizations  79–​80 housing  15, 16, 64–​5, 66–​7, 75, 77 British Medical Association  24 broken family  41–​2 Brown, W.  120 Bruley, S.  25 C Cameron, David  7–​8, 9, 39, 40, 41, 43, 44, 54, 97–​8, 138 campaign groups  115, 128–​9, 163n1 Capita  160 capitalism  corporate profit  160 economic crisis of the 1970s  31 financialized capitalism  31–​4 state-​managed capitalism  28–​31 and violence of austerity  160 Carby, H.  135 casualization of employment  50–​3, 56–​7, 141 Celia (case study)  58–​9, 68, 117, 137, 139–​40 charity sector  49, 51 Chartered Institute of Housing  66 Cheregi, B.F.  99 Cherry (case study)  82–​4 Child Benefit  6 childcare  35, 77, 134, 157 children, future imaginaries for  145–​8 see also families; mothers/​motherhood; single mothers choice  34, 39–​40, 98, 103, 104, 105 citizenship  35–​6, 39–​40, 41 claims stigma  103 Clarke, J.  8 class  and austerity  12–​14 and feminism  122–​4 and future imaginaries  138, 139 historically  26–​7, 32 and legitimization of austerity  11–​12 and morality  95–​7, 162n1 and parenting  41–​2

problematic concept  161n6 and race  32, 33, 35–​6, 107 and resilience  122 space of possibilities  109 underclass  32, 36, 38 see also middle-​class women; working class/​working-​class  women Coleman, R.  138, 139, 147, 149 community centres/​services  78–​84 Connell, R.  12, 21 consumerism  29, 35, 39 Cooper, V.  12 cost of living  58–​60, 61, 72–​5 Craddock, E.  129 credit cards  60, 85–​6 cultural capital  50, 53, 55, 71–​2 cultural homogeneity  32 culture, and feminism  124–​7, 131 cutting back  72–​5 D Dardot, P.  22, 30 Davies, Philip (MP)  42, 89 day-​to-​day living  58–​62 De Benedictis, S.  41–​2 debt, government  7–​10 debt, private  84–​5, 90, 144–​5, 151 deserving/​undeserving  30, 41, 44–​5, 90, 97, 100, 102–​5, 107, 157 Deville, J.  144 Dhaliwal, S.  90, 107, 110 disabilities, people with  disability assessments  44–​5, 62, 160 hostility towards  100–​2, 105 and partner support  77–​8 and welfare reforms  62–​3 Disability Hate Crime Network  101 Disability Living Allowance  44, 63 discourses  see state discourses; women’s austerity narratives disgust  99 distancing strategies  84, 102–​5, 110–​11, 158 Douglas, M.  99 Duncan-​Smith, I.  42, 44, 89 E economic capital  49, 50, 52, 53, 59–​60, 74–​5, 76, 139–​40, 149 education  see higher education education sector, employment in  48–​9, 70, 71 Elaine (case study)  62, 63, 77–​8, 100–​2 Ellis, D.  86 Emejulu, A.  129 emergency loans  85 Emma (case study)  141–​2, 150–​1 employment 

190

Index

assertiveness in workplace  119 casualization trend  50–​3, 56–​7, 70, 141 changes to public sector  48–​50 and citizenship  35 disabilities, people with  44–​5, 62–​3 future imaginaries  142–​3 and gender  33–​4, 132 graduates  49–​52, 55, 70–​1, 75–​6, 142–​3, 149, 150, 152 immigration status  106–​7 morally weighted rhetoric  94–​5 and motherhood  35 and New Labour  35 part-​time work  33–​4, 50–​3, 60 re-​skilling  70–​2 redundancies  48, 49, 50, 56, 121 and striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42, 93–​5 and Thatcherism  33 and traditionalism  32–​3 workfare  53–​8 see also unemployment Employment and Support Allowance  62 Erica (case study)  121–​2 Evans, M.  33, 39, 114, 119, 124, 159 eviction  64–​5, 128 expropriation  29 extended present  150–​2 F fairness discourse  43–​5, 91 families  broken family  41–​2 extended families  66 figurations of austerity politics  11 and neoliberalism  34 and responsibility  41 strong family  41, 42 support from  75–​8, 134–​5, 142 see also mothers/​motherhood; single mothers Farnsworth, K.  160 Farris, S.  116, 125 fashion industry  52, 53 Fawcett Society  6, 57 Faye (case study)  61, 77, 78, 106–​7 feminism and austerity  113–​36, 159 and class  122–​4 collective intersectional politics  127–​31 and culture  124–​7 disidentification with feminism  132–​3 and impact of austerity  13 and legitimization of austerity  10–​12 and morality  122–​4 neoliberal feminism  116, 117–​24, 126–​7, 132–​6, 159 post-​feminism  114–​15 and resilience  120–​2

and resistance  115 women’s feminist identification  117, 118 femonationalism  116 feral parent figure  11, 41–​2 Field, F.  155 Financial Conduct Authority  87 Financial Times, The  8 financialized capitalism  31–​4 Fiona (case study)  106 Fitzpatrick, S.  82 Focus E15  128 food poverty  food banks  80–​2, 83, 106 government rhetoric  69 heat or eat dilemma  74 rising costs of  72 shopping habits  72–​5 Forkert, K.  32, 33, 90, 107, 110 Francesca (case study)  118, 119 Fraser, N.  28–​9, 30 fuel bills/​prices  58, 72, 74 future imaginaries  137–​53 acting on  148–​50 and anxiety  142–​5 and children  145–​8, 149–​50 housing  141–​2, 143 investing in  148–​50 permanent present  150–​2 and supportive cushions  139–​43, 152–​3 trapped in precarious present  142–​5, 150–​3 G Gardiner, J.  33 Garthwaite, K.  82, 84 gender  and employment  33–​4, 119 impact of austerity on  5–​6, 13, 134–​5, 156, 159 and legitimization of austerity  10–​12 and neoliberalism  33–​4 New Labour  35–​6 and obligations of citizenship  39 state and austerity  7–​13, 21, 26–​30 and Thatcherism  33–​4 see also feminism and austerity Gill, R.  115, 120, 122, 163n1 Gillies, V.  35 ‘good mother’  35, 41, 84, 105 Gove, M.  69 graduate employment  49–​52, 55, 70–​1, 75–​6, 142–​3, 149, 150, 152 Great Depression  22–​5 Greece  10 H Hall, S.  32, 33, 36, 93

191

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

Hall, S.M  13 Hamilton, K.  105 Hammond, P.  3, 155 Hannah (case study)  51–​2, 53, 76, 142–​3 hard-​working people  distancing strategies  14, 102–​3 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 hardship money  57, 58 hate crimes  100–​2 Haylett, C.  35, 36 health care, access to  7 heat or eat dilemma  74 Heather (case study)  81, 84, 85–​6, 87, 106, 143, 145–​6 heating bills  74 higher education  further study  70–​2 and future imaginaries  146, 147 graduate employment  49–​52, 55, 70–​1, 75–​6, 142–​3, 149, 150, 152 unaffordability of  108–​9 history of austerity  21–​36 1920s and 1930s  22–​5 austerity Britain  25–​8 neoliberalism  31–​4 New Labour  34–​6 state-​managed capitalism  28–​31 see also austerity (general) home ownership  64, 141–​2, 143 homelessness  65–​6, 82–​3 hostility  99–​102 housewives  25, 26–​7 housing  bedroom tax  5, 16, 64, 66–​7, 91 campaign groups  128 crisis in  64–​7 eviction  64–​5, 128 furnishing  85–​6 future imaginaries  139–​40, 141–​3 home ownership  64, 141–​2, 143 homelessness  65–​6, 82–​3 living with family  43, 44, 53, 58, 64, 75–​7, 141–​3 rental sector  1, 64–​5, 66–​7 in the research cities  15, 16, 64–​7, 75, 77, 128 social housing  64, 65, 163n2 Housing Benefit  1, 5, 16, 61, 65–​7 human rights  155 Hume, David  22 I I, Daniel Blake (film)  80 idleness  42, 93–​4, 95, 96, 104–​5 Ila (case study)  54–​5, 66, 79 ill health, welfare reforms  62–​3 immigration/​immigrants 

and access to jobs and welfare  106–​7 authoritarian populism  32 and blame  109–​10 and employment  33 and hostility  99–​100 Islamophobia  124–​7 migrant women  33, 35, 42, 55, 99–​100, 106–​7, 110, 116 income  and casualization of employment  50–​2 and cost of living  58–​60 and debt  84–​5, 90, 144–​5, 151 economic capital  50, 52, 53, 59–​60, 74–​5, 76, 139–​40, 149 and food poverty  83–​4 loans  77, 84–​7 low pay, no pay cycle  56–​7 and shopping habits  1–​2, 59, 60, 72–​5 wages  1–​2, 15, 23, 29, 33–​4, 43, 48–​50, 53, 56–​7, 74, 75, 149–​50 see also benefit claimants; benefits individualism  32, 34 and neoliberal feminism  116, 117–​24, 126–​7, 132–​6, 159 inequalities  in the research cities  16 widening gap  155–​6 inflation  31 International Monetary Fund (IMF)  10, 31 internships  53, 75–​6 irresponsible spending discourse  8 Islamophobia  124–​7 Ivy (case study)  133 J Janeway, B.  23 Jarrett, K.  10 Javid, Sajid  3–​4 Jenkin, Baroness  69 Jensen, T.  29, 38, 39, 40, 90, 92, 94, 97, 108 Jobcentre employees  47, 54, 55, 56, 57–​8 jobs  see employment Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)  5, 54–​8 K Kate (case study)  48–​9, 130–​1 Keynesianism  10, 31 Kiernan, K.  34 Kiran (case study)  93, 132 Kulz, C.  36 Kynaston, D.  25, 27 L labour market  6, 25, 33–​5, 50–​3 see also employment Lancet  72

192

Index

Larner, W.  120 Lauren (case study)  56–​7, 78, 81 Laval, C.  22, 30 law-​and-​order politics  32 Lawler, S.  96, 124 Layla (case study)  109–​10 laziness  42, 93–​4, 95, 96, 104–​5 Leeds  background information  15–​16 budget cuts  4 support services  78, 79, 97 legitimization of austerity  10–​12, 37–​45, 89–​90 Leoni (case study)  57–​8, 68, 143–​4, 149–​50 liberalism  22 life insurance  149 Lister, R.  104 living standards  58–​60, 72–​5 loan sharks  86–​7, 145 loans  84–​7, 145 Locke, John  22 London  background information  15–​16 employment in  149 food banks  82 housing  15, 16, 64–​6, 128 London, R.  74 lone mothers  see single mothers Lonergan, G.  55 Louise (case study)  62–​3, 67, 144 low pay, no pay cycle  56 Lucy (case study)  60, 65, 73, 74, 75, 102–​3, 149–​50 luxuries  73 Lydia (case study)  55–​6 M MacDonald, R.  104 Madeline (case study)  119, 150 Mama, A.  29–​30 Marie (case study)  1–​2, 60–​1, 68, 71–​2, 102, 106, 146 Marsh, J.  104 Marta (case study)  64–​5, 79, 81, 99–​100 Massumi, B.  163n1 maternal health  24 McDowell, L.  35 McRobbie, A.  53, 114–​15, 125 means testing  23–​4 media  historical narratives in  24 negative discourses in  34, 93, 101, 108 reality television  11, 14, 42, 90, 93, 107–​8 Meekosha, H.  100–​1 Meetoo, V.  125 men, impact of austerity  134–​5

Mendoza, K.E.  12 meritocracy  108–​9 Mia (case study)  49, 59, 68, 92, 93–​4, 95–​7, 113, 125, 126–​7 middle-​class  women  cost of living  59 and elite feminism  130 future imaginaries  139–​41, 147 and labour market  25 neoliberal feminism  117–​24, 126–​7 pensions  150–​1 and public sector  48 and resilience  120–​2 strong family  41–​2 views about working-​class women  95–​6 migrant women  33, 35, 42, 55, 99–​100, 106–​7, 110, 116 Mirza, H.S  125 Mobility Allowance  62–​3, 67 Molly (case study)  52–​3, 133 moneylenders  86–​7, 145 Montgomerie, J.  84 morality  and class  95–​7, 162n1 and feminism  122–​4 and hard work  102–​4 historically  27–​8 and lifestyle  95–​7, 104–​5, 158 mothers/​motherhood  broken family  41–​2 childcare  35 and employment  35 and family support  76–​7 figurations of austerity politics  11 future imaginaries  145–​8, 149–​50 ‘good mother’  35, 41, 84, 105 heat or eat  74 and neoliberalism  34, 41 and New Labour  35 and responsibility  41 and Second World War  26–​7 strong family  41, 42 support centres  79 women’s view of  105 see also families; single mothers Muslim women  124–​7, 131 N Nadia (case study)  48, 71, 148–​9 National Health Service (NHS), changes to  48, 49–​50 national unity, discourse of  37–​8, 39 Neocleous, M.  121 neoliberal feminism  116, 117–​24, 126–​7, 132–​6, 159 neoliberalism  31–​6 New Labour  34–​6 Newman, J.  8

193

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

Ngai, S.  99 Nicky (case study)  134 Nicola (case study)  76–​7 Nina (case study)  70–​1, 128, 149 Nowotny, H.  150 O O’Hara, M.  12, 57, 66, 67 Orgad, S.  41, 120, 122 Osborne, George  3, 5, 8–​9, 10, 38, 39, 41 othering  14, 97, 104–​8, 110–​11, 123 P parenting  11, 35, 41–​2 see also mothers/​motherhood part-​time work  33–​4, 50–​3, 60 partners, support from  77–​8 Patrick, R.  103, 105 Pearson, R.  6, 7 pensions  140–​1, 148–​9, 150–​1 permanent present  138, 150–​2 Personal Independence Payment  63 Pippa (case study)  121, 140, 148 politicians  austerity discourse of  3–​4, 7–​10, 37–​44, 47, 54, 69, 89, 138 women’s view of  91–​2, 97–​8 Polly (case study)  117, 118–​19 popular feminism  115–​16 post-​feminism  114–​15 poverty  blame  24–​5 causes of  24 levels of in UK  156 punitive policies  36 poverty propaganda  90–​2, 104–​8 pre-​emption  149–​50, 163n1 precarious employment  50–​3, 56–​7, 70 prepayment meters  74 private sector  33, 62, 160 Priya (case study)  66–​7, 79–​80, 102, 103–​4 propaganda  poverty propaganda  90–​2, 104–​8 Second World War  27 Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS)  57 public sector  changes to  48–​50 changing jobs  71 cuts to  7 future imaginaries  141 R race  and class  32, 33, 35–​6, 107 and culture  35–​6

and employment  110 and feminism  124–​7 interracial marriage  27–​8 Islamophobia  124–​7 and New Labour  35–​6 and parenting  41–​2 state-​managed capitalism  29–​30 state racism  32 rationing  25–​7 Raynor, R.  109 re-​skilling  70–​2 reality television  11, 14, 42, 90, 93, 107–​8 Rebecca (case study)  51, 55, 79, 113, 127–​8, 141, 142, 151–​2 redundancies  48, 49, 50, 56, 121 Reinhart, C.  9–​10 rental sector  1, 64–​5, 66–​7 reproduction strategy  75 research methodology  14–​17 resilience  120–​2 responsibility  34, 37–​8, 40–​3, 44, 96–​7 see also neoliberal feminism retirement  140–​1, 148–​9, 150–​1 Rita (case study)  74, 75, 97, 105, 108–​9 Rogoff, C.  9–​10 Romanian migrants  64, 79, 99–​100 Rose (case study)  137, 139 Rose, S.O.  27–​8 Rottenberg, C.  116, 119, 129 rough sleeping  82–​3 Runnymede Trust  6–​7 Ruth (case study)  129–​30 S sanctions (benefit)  36, 47, 44, 54, 57–​8, 78 Sandberg, S.  119 Sandhu, K.  6 savings  39, 50, 52, 53, 75, 76, 149–​51 Scarlett (case study)  74–​5, 77, 78, 86–​7, 97–​8, 104–​5, 107–​9, 137, 139, 144–​5 Scharff, C.  123, 125, 127 Schäuble, W.  8 Second World War  26–​7 Seigworth, G.  144 Shildrick, T.  56, 90–​1, 104 shopping habits  1–​2, 59, 60, 72–​5 short-​term contracts  50–​1, 56, 141 single mothers  34, 35, 41 bearing brunt of austerity  134 changes to state support  61 cost of living  59–​60 distancing strategies  102–​3 employment  50–​1, 57 and family support  76–​7 and further education  71–​2 housing  66–​7

194

Index

and loans/​debt  85 sanctions  57–​8 shopping habits  73, 75 support from outside agencies  78 Skeggs, B.  26, 29, 35–​6, 45, 94, 103, 105, 108, 123, 124, 135, 139, 157 Skills Conditionality course  57–​8 Smith, Adam  22 social capital  48, 50, 53, 67, 71, 76 social contract  41, 138, 140 social housing  64, 65, 163n2 social mobility  138–​9 social reproduction  28–​30 Soldatic, K.  100–​1 Sophie (case study)  49–​50, 132 space of possibilities  48, 51, 72, 108–​9, 140, 158 Spivak, G.C.  127 stagflation  31 standard of living  58–​60, 72–​5 Stanley, L.  37–​8 state  austerity programme of  3–​7 debt of  7–​10 and gender and austerity  7–​13, 21, 26–​30 generator of destitution  160 legitimization of austerity  10–​12, 37–​45 likened to a household  37–​8 and neoliberalism  31–​4 and New Labour  34–​6 punishing state  160 state-​managed capitalism  28–​31 see also history of austerity state discourses  37–​45, 89–​92, 155–​7 all in this together  37–​40, 47, 155–​6 fairness  43–​5 responsibility  40–​3, 44, 69 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 women’s view of  91–​2 StepChange Debt Charity  85 Stevenson, M.  6 stigma  84, 90–​1, 99, 103, 105, 134, 157–​8 Stoler, A.  28 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 strong family  41, 42 Sunak, Rishi  4 support networks  family and partners  75–​8, 134–​5, 142 outside agencies  78–​84 Susan (case study)  118 Sussex Community Foundation  65 symbolic capital  55 symbolic injury  99–​101

T taxpayers  43–​5, 92 Taylor, Y.  41 temporary work  50–​3, 56 Thatcherism  31–​4 thrift  26, 39, 96–​7, 162n1 Tiffany (case study)  92, 140–​1 Times Newspaper  24 Titley, G.  10 Todd, S.  24, 26 traditionalism  32–​3 Trisha (case study)  49, 50–​1, 59–​60, 91–​2, 117, 146, 147 Trussell Trust  80 TUC  16, 50, 85 Tyler, I.  29, 92, 93, 94, 99, 108, 138, 160 U underclass  32, 36, 38 unemployment  benefits  23–​4, 25 blame for  25, 32 discourse of  23–​5 Great Depression  22–​5 and inflation  31 as personal choice  40 protests  24 punitive measures  23–​4 responsibility  40 workfare  53–​8 see also employment United Nations expert report  155, 164n1 United States  30, 36 Universal Credit  5, 6, 61–​2 Universal Jobsmatch  54, 55 unpaid work, welfare-​to-​work schemes  55–​6 utility prices  58, 72, 74 Uzma (case study)  129, 131 V Virdee, S.  32 W Wacquant, L.  36 wages  1–​2, 15, 23, 29, 33–​4, 43, 48–​50, 53, 56, 74, 75, 149–​50 Waylen, G.  12, 18 Weber, M.  94 Weir, A.  33 welfare dependency  11, 40, 42–​3, 44–​5 welfare disgust  94, 107–​8 welfare gap  43 welfare state/​system  changes to state support  60–​3 depiction of claimants  33 discriminatory nature of  29–​30 establishment of  28–​31

195

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

and fairness  43–​5 generosity of  92 legitimizing cuts to  8–​9 punitive policies  36 reforms to  16, 42, 43–​4, 60–​4, 144 and responsibility  40–​3 striver/​skiver binary  38–​40, 42–​5, 89, 91–​7, 103–​6, 121, 158 see also benefit claimants; benefits Whyte, D.  12, 162n3 Wilson, E.  33, 34 Winlow, S.  92 women’s austerity narratives  89–​111 blaming politicians  97–​8 boundary-​making and blame  92–​7, 104–​8 critical reflection on  108–​10 distancing strategies  102–​4 poverty propaganda  90–​2 symbolic injury  99–​102

Women’s Budget Group (WBG)  5, 6, 7, 13 work  see employment; unemployment workfare  53–​8 working class/​working-​class  women  and employment  25, 33 family support  135 and feminism  123–​4, 133–​4 middle-​class women's view of  95–​6 punitive policies  36 and race  32, 33, 35, 107 and Second World War  26–​7 social exclusion  35–​6 state-​managed capitalism  29–​30 state’s view/​portrayal of  21, 24–​6, 35–​6, 45, 157–​9 working poor  68, 106 Z zero-​hour contracts  51–​3, 56 Zweiniger-​Bargielowska, I.  25, 27

196

Gender and Sociology is a new series bringing together high-quality research. It includes different theories and approaches to questions of gender; debates and contemporary issues in the sociological study of gender; historical, cultural, social and political dimensions; and the relationships between continuities and change, inequalities and gendered identities. Series editors: Sue Scott, Newcastle University and Stevi Jackson, Centre for Women’s Studies, University of York

Beverley Skeggs, Lancaster University

“Many people know (or should) that austerity policies impact particularly harshly on women. This exceptional study shows exactly how. It is essential reading about brutal politics.” Mary Evans, University of Kent

Using interviews with women from diverse backgrounds, Dabrowski makes an invaluable contribution to the debates around the gendered politics of austerity in the UK. Exploring the symbiotic relationship between the state’s legitimization of austerity and women’s everyday experiences, she reveals how unjust policies are produced, how alternatives are silenced and highlights the different ways in which women are used or blamed.

Vicki Dabrowski is Associate Lecturer in Sociology at the University of York.

@BrisUniPress BristolUniversityPress bristoluniversitypress.co.uk

@policypress

9 781529 210521

B R I S TO L

ISBN 978-1-5292-1052-1

Vicki Dabrowski

By understanding austerity as more than simply an economic project, this book fills important gaps in existing knowledge on state, gender and class relations in the context of UK austerity.

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State

“A unique account of how austerity is lived in radically different ways and how state policies are about the distribution of intimate feelings, not just economics.”

Austerity, Women and the Role of the State Lived Experiences of the Crisis Vicki Dabrowski GENDER and SOCIOLOGY