Farmfare

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harald Bauder
Keyword(s):  
Provincial Government ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
West Indians ◽  
Social Advocacy ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
United Farm Workers ◽  
Agricultural Industries ◽  
Policy Agendas ◽  
Seasonal Labor ◽  
The Unemployed

In the summer of 1999, the provincial government of Ontario proposed to make Canadian welfare recipients work as seasonal labor in the horticulture sector. This idea came to be known as farmfare. Farmfare was not an entirely new idea. In 1971, Canada’s Parliament debated this topic under the rubric “Manpower: Use of Unemployed and Students Instead of West Indians to Pick Fruit.” Pierre Elliot Trudeau, then prime minister of Canada, defended the offshore program as necessary to fill jobs “which the unemployed and the students refuse to do” (quoted in Sharma 2001: 432). In August 1999, with neoliberalism at the top of the provincial policy agendas, the idea was floated again by a conservative member of the provincial parliament, Toni Skarica. This time, farmfare was not presented as an employment opportunity for desperate workers but as a disincentive to sign up for welfare. Ontario premier Mike Harris added momentum to the debate by raising the issue to reporters. Harris suggested that manual labor on Ontario’s farms could change the supposedly negative attitudes toward work among welfare recipients: “Getting up in the morning, getting regular, managing your time, getting out and doing things, feeling good about producing something, doing some work, they are all important . . . to help break that cycle of dependency” (quoted in Ibbitson 1999: A12). He also suggested that farmfare could help Ontario’s agricultural industries to deal with seasonal labor shortages (Gray 1999). In September 1999, Ontario’s Social Service Department confirmed that farmfare could be justified under Ontario’s workfare requirement that “able-bodied” welfare recipients should either train or work or lose their benefits. These were harsh words and tough measures proposed by the provincial government. Little wonder that farmfare generated fierce debate over the merits and potential consequences of such a program. Social advocacy groups, such as the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, labor unions, and churches, including the United Church of Canada, mobilized opposition against farmfare. The United Farm Workers initiated a petition against the implementation of farmfare, which opposition politicians presented on several occasions to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

scholarly journals Emotional Compliance and Emotion as Resistance: Shame and Anger among the Long-Term Unemployed

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (5) ◽  
pp. 794-811 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Peterie ◽  
Gaby Ramia ◽  
Greg Marston ◽  
Roger Patulny
Keyword(s):  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
Policy Tools ◽  
Sociology Of Emotions ◽  
Unemployed People ◽  
Everyday Resistance ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
Emotional Resistance ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Important Form

Contemporary governments employ a range of policy tools to ‘activate’ the unemployed to look for work. Framing unemployment as a consequence of personal shortcoming, these policies incentivise the unemployed to become ‘productive’ members of society. While Foucault’s governmentality framework has been used to foreground the operation of power within these policies, ‘job-seeker’ resistance has received less attention. In particular, forms of emotional resistance have rarely been studied. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 80 unemployed welfare recipients in Australia, this article shows that many unemployed people internalise activation’s discourses of personal failure, experiencing shame and worthlessness as a result. It also reveals, however, that a significant minority reject this framing and the ‘feeling rules’ it implies, expressing not shame but anger regarding their circumstances. Bringing together insights from resistance studies and the sociology of emotions, this article argues that ‘job-seeker’ anger should be recognised as an important form of ‘everyday resistance’.

Support for conditional unemployment benefit in European countries: The role of income inequality

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 498-514
Author(s):  
Renzo Carriero ◽  
Marianna Filandri
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Social Distance ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
Unemployment Benefit ◽  
The People ◽  
The Social ◽  
European Values ◽  
Country Analysis ◽  
The Unemployed

This article investigates attitudes towards the conditionality of benefits targeted to a specific needy group, the unemployed, and analyses their relationship with the structure of income inequality. The focus is on the deservingness of welfare recipients. The public seems to use five criteria to define deservingness and, consequently, the conditionality to which public support is subjected: need, attitude (i.e. gratefulness), control (over neediness), reciprocity (of giving and receiving) and identity, that is the similarity or proximity between the providers of public support (the taxpayers) and the people who should receive it. People’s willingness to help depends on how close they consider benefit recipients to be to themselves (i.e. the extent to which they belong to the same in-group). The identity criterion is the main object of our investigation. We argue that the operation of this criterion at the micro-level can be affected by macro-level variables. Specifically, we focus on different measures of the structure of income inequality which are indicators of the social distance between welfare recipients and taxpayers. Based on data from three waves of the European Values Study (1990–2008) collected in 30 countries, the study offers a comparative and longitudinal analysis. The picture emerging from the within-country analysis – which removed much of the between-country heterogeneity − shows that when the social distance grows, it is more difficult for the majority of citizens (upper and middle classes) to identify with the unemployed.

scholarly journals Finnish attitudes towards immigrants in 1987-1999

2000 ◽  
pp. 129-161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Magdalena Jaakkola
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Groups ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Young Men ◽  
Conflict Theory ◽  
Entire Population ◽  
Contact Theory ◽  
Social Benefits ◽  
Job Seekers ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
The Unemployed

The attitudes of Finns towards foreigners were more negative during the time of widespread unemployment in 1993 than before (1987) or afterwards (1998-1999). Interviews with about 1000 person representing the entire population showed that the most educated and those who were personally acquainted with migrants were more positive - in accordance with the contact theory - than the others in their attitudes toward refugees and foreign job seekers and all the ethnic groups mentioned. Those with little education, pensioners, the unemployed, men supporters of the Central Party and those living in rural areas had more negative attitudes and believed - in accordance with the conflict theory - that they would take jobs and social benefits away from the Finns. In 1998 over one-third of the young men living in the rural areas supported the actions of skinheads against immigrants.

(Neo)Liberal populism and Ireland’s ‘squeezed middle’

Race & Class ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 29-49
Author(s):  
Rosie R. Meade ◽  
Elizabeth Kiely
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
The Political ◽  
Discursive Construction ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Parliamentary Debates ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Media Narratives ◽  
The Unemployed

Acknowledging definitional problems associated with the concept of ‘populism’, this article shifts the analytic gaze away from actors or politics that are conventionally characterised as populist, on to an analysis of the doing of populism by those who typically evade the populist label. Tracing the discursive construction of the ‘squeezed middle’ in Irish mainstream media and parliamentary debates between January 2014 and March 2019, the authors analyse how this signifier was mobilised to fuel and foment ressentiment among middle-earning taxpayers. This article analyses how the discourses of the ‘squeezed middle’ functioned ideologically, as a form of anti-welfare populism, redirecting blame for middle-class ontological and material insecurities on to unemployed welfare recipients who were depicted as immoral, lazy and insulated from hardship. This article highlights how populism operates from the so-called moderate centres of liberal democracy and not exclusively from the political margins. Irish political and media narratives of the ‘squeezed middle’ are seen as part of a larger project whereby damaging myths about the unemployed are propagated in service of ideological class warfare; legitimising neoliberal austerity and normalising unequal economic relations.

Unemployment and social stigma

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (7/8) ◽  
pp. 543-558
Author(s):  
Rahat Shah ◽  
Qurat-Ul-Ain Jafeer ◽  
Sadia Saeed ◽  
Saba Aslam ◽  
Ijaz Ali
Keyword(s):  
Social Support ◽  
Family System ◽  
Social Stigma ◽  
Subjective Experiences ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Unemployed Youth ◽  
The Unemployed

PurposeThis article aims to highlight the stigmatization attached to the unemployment of educated youth in rural regions of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan.Design/methodology/approachThe study explicates the subjective experiences of the youth as being unemployed and societal attitudes toward them through an in-depth qualitative approach. A total of 30 unemployed male individuals were interviewed through an interview guide.FindingsThe study reveals that unemployed individuals are stigmatized and discriminately treated. They experience the difference in social support from their family and friends during unemployment, which is a discouraging aspect. This finding is in contrast to the existing literature on the subject in which family and friends are described as a major source of social support. As the study is conducted in the rural context, it is observed that local factors coupled with the joint family system have intensified negative attitudes toward the unemployed youth. Subsequently, the negative societal treatment serves as a factor for psychological challenges in their lives.Originality/valueThis article serves the need of exploring the experiences of unemployed individuals precisely in the Pakistani context.

Comparing Negative Attitudes Toward the Unemployed Across European Countries in 2008 and 2016: The Role of the Unemployment Rate and Job Insecurity

2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 419-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Veerle Buffel ◽  
Sarah Van de Velde
Keyword(s):  
Unemployment Rate ◽  
Job Insecurity ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Migration Literature ◽  
Conflict Model ◽  
Risk Attribution ◽  
Job Conditions ◽  
The Unemployed

Abstract We explore how negative attitudes toward the unemployed are related to countries’ overall and long-term (LT) unemployment rate. Insights from the risk attribution and position theory are combined with the in-group–out-group conflict model, derived from migration literature. Multilevel analyses are performed on two waves (2008 and 2016) of the European Social Survey. Negative attitudes toward the unemployed are measured via the item “most unemployed people do not really try to find a job.” Results show that in countries with a high LT unemployment rate and/or an increase in this rate, people are more likely to hold negative attitudes toward the unemployed. Moreover, this is more pronounced among people in secure job conditions (those with a permanent contract and/or perceiving job security).

scholarly journals Hidden figures: A longitudinal analysis of the relationship between local context and beliefs about the causes of unemployment

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel McArthur
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Unemployment Benefit ◽  
Unemployed People ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
The Relationship

Public support for the welfare state is shaped by beliefs about whether recipients are deserving or not. In the case of unemployed people, beliefs about whether they are at fault for their situation or not play a central role in shaping deservingness perceptions. Political actors and lay accounts suggest that living in disadvantaged places can shape attitudes towards welfare recipients. Existing research disagrees on whether higher local unemployment improves attitudes by providing information about the labour market, or worsens them by priming fears of welfare dependency. Thus, this study investigates whether individuals living in areas with higher unemployment benefit claims are more or less likely to believe that the unemployed are responsible for their situation. I innovate using a large sample of longitudinal data from the British Election Study to investigate the role of measuring unemployment benefit claims at multiple spatial scales, and over time. The results provide little evidence of a relationship between local unemployment and beliefs about the causes of unemployment, especially among affluent people. These findings challenge claims that antipathy towards unemployment benefits is shaped by exposure to unemployed people and undermine arguments that spatial segregation by income leads to decreased solidarity with the unemployed.

scholarly journals The Social Construction of Retirement and Evolving Policy Discourse of Working Longer

2015 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 251-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
PHILIP TAYLOR ◽  
CATHERINE EARL
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Older Workers ◽  
Policy Development ◽  
Policy Discourse ◽  
Weak Basis ◽  
World Views ◽  
Social Advocacy ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
The Social

AbstractThis article is concerned with the evolving social construction of older workers and retirement. Evolving and competing ‘world-views’ from public policy, and social advocacy of productive and vulnerable older workers, are described and critiqued. Contradictions and disjunctions, in terms of public policies aimed at changing employer behaviour towards older workers, are identified. It is argued that present representations of older workers have serious flaws that provide a weak basis for policy development and may not only undermine the prospects for overcoming prejudicial societal attitudes but may in fact strengthen them. It is further argued that sheltering older workers in employment placements will inevitably limit the extent and nature of their participation. Instead, the mainstreaming of their employment is justified, bearing in mind negative attitudes towards ageing.

Adaptability and Self-Management: A New Ethic of Employability for the Young Unemployed?

2003 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 607-621 ◽  
Author(s):  
SEAN WORTH
Keyword(s):  
Social Inclusion ◽  
Self Management ◽  
Temporary Work ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Active Labour ◽  
Work Education ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
To Receive ◽  
Qualitative Phase

Encouraging individuals' adaptability to more flexible patterns of work and learning, and promoting greater self-management of employment security, are central to UK policies aiming to improve employability and social inclusion. Little is known, however, about the responses to these issues of those deemed to have employability problems. This article presents the results of a qualitative phase of research with young people not in work, education or training to determine the extent to which these policy-espoused concepts of adaptability and self-management were reflected in their attitudes and jobsearch activity. The findings indicate generally negative attitudes and avoidance in jobsearch towards working outside a traditional ideal of standard, permanent employment and also towards improving prospects by updating skills. Reasons included a disincentive to enter training or temporary work due to short-term risks to benefit status, but more significant concerns reflected the increasing problem of the ‘churning’ of low-skilled youth between work and welfare. It is argued that inconsistencies between policy dictums about how the unemployed should behave in order to receive benefits and how they should behave in order to become more employable are not conducive to long-term employability and may actually contradict the aims of ‘active’ labour market policies.

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