The purgatorial ethic and the spirit of welfare

Boland, Tom and Griffin, Ray (2018) The purgatorial ethic and the spirit of welfare. Journal of Classical Sociology, 18 (2). pp. 87-103. ISSN 1468-795X

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Abstract

Drawing on the Weberian spirit, our key problem is trying to understand the irrational rationality of Active Labour Market Policies adopted across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries, despite their limited utility. Rather than explaining these as inefficient policy formation or reflecting neo-liberal ideology, we suggest that the experience and governmentality of welfare is historically informed by the idea of purgatory. Drawing from the genealogical impulse in Weber, Foucault and Agamben, and adapting Weber’s concept of ‘world-images’, we suggest that the history of welfare, from workhouses to Active Labour Market Policies, is animated by the purgatorial logic of judging, punishing and purifying individuals. This resonance is clearest in the interpretation that jobseekers give to the time they spend unemployed, but also in political speeches, policy making and the creation of welfare systems. Counter-intuitively, this analysis is drawn from Ireland, a latecomer to Active Labour Market Policies, where the imposition of an increasedly purgatorial conception of welfare is clearly visible.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	Funding Information: This research agenda informed the reform of services by the Department of Social Protection (DSP) in Ireland, which had largely supported and promoted activation policies for decades in theory, but without political support until the Great Financial Crash: Publisher Copyright: © 2017, © The Author(s) 2017.
Uncontrolled Keywords:	/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3300/3312
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Depositing User:	Admin SSL
Date Deposited:	19 Oct 2022 23:07
Last Modified:	04 Jul 2023 07:05
URI:	http://repository-testing.wit.ie/id/eprint/4202

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