Insecure Times: Living with Insecurity in Modern Times

250 Pages·1999·1.66 MB·English

Insecure Times
‘This student-friendly text is a welcome addition to current social
policy literature. The theme of “insecurity” integrates a wide range
of contemporary issues in an original and stimulating manner.’
Nick Ellison, University of Durham
As we enter the new millennium, a concern for insecurity has resurfaced at the
core of the social science project. Insecure Times brings together a diverse group
of editors and contributors to provide a systematic and holistic analysis of
insecurity—and security—that is long overdue. Insecurity has unquestionably
generated intolerable levels of fear, anxiety, hopelessness and powerlessness in
European and North American societies, yet it can sometimes be a force for
empowerment and liberation.
The first section of the book develops a political economy of insecurity and
looks at how insecurity is generated. The second part examines some of the more
specific and immediate causes of insecurity. How is it, for example, that
insecurity has been fostered by an important range of institutions: labour markets,
the welfare state, housing and in the family? The final section portrays insecurity
as a lived experience in a selection of case studies, and the conclusion
acknowledges the dialectical quality of insecurity. When uncertainty and
complexity are permanent features of a society, a material basis for security
remains a necessary component for a better life, yet it must be complemented
with an equal concern for autonomy and empowerment.
The editors: John Vail is Lecturer and in the Department of Social Policy at the
University of Newcastle. He is the author of Peace, Land and Bread. Jane
Wheelock is Reader in the Department of Social Policy at the University of
Newcastle. She has jointly edited a number of books, including most recently
Work and Idleness: The Political Economy of Full Employment (with John Vail),
and Households, Work and Economic Change: A Comparative Institutional
Perspective (with Åge Mariussen). Michael Hill is Visiting Professor in the
Department of Social Policy and Politics at Goldsmiths’ College, University of
London. He is the author of a number of books, including Social Policy: A
ii
Comparative Analysis, The Policy Process: A Reader, and The Policy Process in
the Modern State, now in its third edition.
Insecure Times
Living with insecurity in
contemporary society
Edited by
John Vail, Jane Wheelock and Michael Hill
London and New York
First published 1999
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection
of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
© 1999 selection and editorial matter, John Vail, Jane Wheelock and
Michael Hill; individual chapters, the contributors
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Insecure Times: Living with insecurity in contemporary society/
Edited by John Vail, Jane Wheelock and Michael Hill.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Social security—Great Britain. 2. Security (psychology)—
Great Britain. 3. Family—Great Britain. 4. Great Britain—
economic conditions—1997–. 5. Great Britain—
social conditions—1945–. I.Vail, John, 1955–II. Wheelock, Jane,
1944–. III. Hill, Michael J. (Michael James), 1937–.
HD7165.I57 1999 99–22355
368.4•00941–dc21 CIP
ISBN 0-203-98439-0 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-415-17093-1 (hbk)
ISBN 0-415-17094-X (pbk)
Contents
Contributors ix
Preface x
1 Insecure times: conceptualising insecurity and security 1
JOHN VAIL
Introduction 1
Living in insecure times 1
Why we are writing 3
Security, insecurity and risk 5
Conceptual issues in insecurity 9
Readers’ guide 18
PART I Generating insecurity
2 Who dreams of failure? Insecurity in modern 23
capitalism
JANE WHEELOCK
Does insecurity matter? 23
Different views of the significance of insecurity 25
The golden age and insecurity 30
A new regime of insecurity? 35
Who dreams of failure? 38
3 States of insecurity: the political foundations of 41
insecurity
JOHN VAIL
The state and arenas of security 41
The political foundations of insecurity 48
vi
Paradoxes of security and insecurity: contemporary 52
reflections
4 Insecurity: philosophy and psychology 59
ALEX HOWARD
Feelings of insecurity 59
Facts about insecurity 60
Forms of insecurity 64
Philosophies of insecurity 65
Philosophy and coping strategies for insecurity 66
PART II Institutionalising insecurity
5 Fear or opportunity? Insecurity in employment 77
JANE WHEELOCK
The growth in insecurity 77
The sources of the problem: working all the hours God sends 81
Market competition and opportunity 85
Fear of failure: the impact of insecurity 86
The wider costs and benefits: self-exploitation or self- 89
fulfilment?
6 Insecurity and social security 91
MICHAEL HILL
Introduction 91
Defining social security 91
Social security: replacing morality by mathematics? 93
Social security and the security of the state 94
Who benefits from social security? 96
Who does not benefit from social security policies? 98
The insecurity of social security 98
The contemporary attack on social security 100
Conclusions 105
7 No place like home? Insecurity and housing 107
ROBERTA WOODS
vii
The security of housing? 107
The recommodification of housing 108
Residualisation 108
Tenant participation 111
Homelessness 112
Housing agencies 114
Mortgage default, repossession and negative equity 115
An insecure future? 117
Conclusions 120
8 Nuclear fallout: divorce, kinship and the insecurities of 121
contemporary family life
BOB SIMPSON
Personhood, place and family life 122
Nuclear fallout 124
The unclear family 128
Managing continuity and transformation in the late twentieth 131
century
Conclusion 135
PART III Insecurity as lived experience
9 Narratives of insecurity in Teesside: environmental 139
politics and health risks
PETER PHILLIMORESUZANNE MOFFATT
Introduction 139
Teesside: historical background 142
Environmental insecurity and environmental politics in 144
Teesside
Experiences of insecurity 151
Concluding remarks 152
10 Insecurities in contemporary country life: rural 156
communities and social change
NEIL WARDPHILIP LOWE
Introduction 156
viii
Rural restructuring and contemporary country life 158
Country life and insecurity 162
Case study: the environmental regulation of farming 164
practices
Case study: hunting wild mammals with dogs 166
Insecurity and lived experience: lessons from the countryside 168
11 The road to nowhere: youth, insecurity and marginal 171
transitions
ROBERT MACDONALD
The insecurity of youth transitions 171
Insecure transitions: the case of Teesside 173
Solving insecurity: from welfare to work? 182
12 Boys will be boys: social insecurity and crime 187
BEATRIX CAMPBELL
Boys will be boys… 187
…and girls will be women 188
Crime and masculinity 189
Back to basics? 191
The collapse of civilisation as we know it 195
Communities and crime 197
13 Democratic vistas: imagining a twenty-first-century 202
security
JOHN VAIL
The democratic imagination and security 202
An egalitarian political economy of security 205
Security policies: redistribution of work 211
Bibliography 216
Index 235
Contributors
Beatrix Campbell, freelance writer and journalist
Michael Hill, Visiting Professor, Goldsmiths’ College, London; Emeritus
Professor, Department of Social Policy, University of Newcastle
Alex Howard, Tutor Organiser, Workers’ Educational Association, Northern
District
Philip Lowe, Duke of Northumberland Professor of Rural Economy; Director,
Centre for Rural Economy, University of Newcastle
Robert MacDonald, Reader in Sociology, University of Teesside
Suzanne Moffatt, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University
of Newcastle
Peter Phillimore, Department of Social Policy, University of Newcastle
Bob Simpson, Department of Anthropology, University of Durham
John Vail, Department of Social Policy, University of Newcastle
Neil Ward, Department of Geography, University of Newcastle
Jane Wheelock, Reader in Social Policy, University of Newcastle
Roberta Woods, Staff Tutor in Social Sciences, The Open University