EXTENDED SUMMARY

Basic Income (BI) is a social policy instrument based on the principle of providing everyone with sufficient income security to meet their basic needs. Individuals who receive a basic income do not have to find a job or undertake any other obligation. It is envisaged to be paid to everyone, not just the poor. The proponents argue that this would save the costs, bureaucratic processes and time involved in identifying recipients. Moreover, since the payment is made to everyone, recipients would not be stigmatized as poor. BI is an individual-based payment that can weaken traditional power relations within the family. With all these features, BI is presented as a break from the social policy approach centered on labor relations. Furthermore, it has an economic function of purchasing power of low-income social segments and this is supported with some social functions such as combating poverty, unemployment, income inequality, and precarity.

The BI approaches are built on a strict criticism of traditional social policy. In other words, the theoretical background of BI approaches is founded on the critique of traditional social policy in terms of its philosophy, ethics and political codes as well as its outputs. This article, on the contrary, develops counter arguments against BI by three ways. These are, respectively, drawing attention to the contradictions within BI, comparing it with traditional social policy, and finally pointing out the compatibility between the BI and the neoliberal transformation in social policy.

As for our conclusions, contrary to the arguments in favor of it, in the absence of waged labor, BI does not correspond to a level of payment that would meet people’s basic needs. This is evidenced by the fact that, without exception, all proposals and practices are below minimum wage levels. Moreover, again without exception, the proponents always highlight that BI is an income support that will not result in withdrawal from the labor market. This is definitely a contradiction for those who has a claim of a break from an employment-oriented social policy approach. In addition, claims that BI will strengthen the hand of women in the fight against gender discrimination and the hand of employees in their economic class struggle against employers are, at best, one-sided and neglectful of counter-arguments. Finally, it should be noted that the BI does not include any direct institutional arrangements against commodification of public services, low wage policies, privatizations, and normalization of a flexible and unregulated working life. The only solution BI can provide is to alleviate the consequences of the grave situation through cash support.

The only fact we have about BI is that it is a proposal for regular cash support in small amounts. Through such a proposal, the poor can breathe a bit. However, far from being a means of building a new vision of society or civilization, BI falls far short of the gains made by traditional social policy. Moreover, BI approaches do not contradict the free market mechanism itself, so they do not make any proposals to limit it, but rather legitimize it in the context of respect for individual preferences. This points to a fundamental distinction in social policy, the difference between a strategy of strengthening the position of the poor in the market through transfers that leave the functioning of the market untouched, and a strategy of directly constraining the functioning of the market through institutional arrangements such as minimum wages, severance pay, social insurances, and limiting the employer’s right to manage. BI unquestionably adopts the first strategy while the concept of inclusive social protection, which emerged after the Second World War and ended with neoliberal attacks, is based on the latter. Moreover, if there is a scientific discipline called social policy today, it is closely related to the timely adoption of the second strategy.

As stated in the relevant sections of the study, the proponents have claims that go far beyond cash support. In other words, there is a non-negligible gap between what is claimed and what is actually proposed or implemented. If this gap can be closed in favor of the latter, and if the proposals can be purged of unrealistic claims such as creating a paradigm shift in social policy, it will pave the way for a debate that will contribute to the field. Otherwise, it is inevitable that it will remain as an ambitious social policy instrument, presented like a medicinal herb with positive effects on every social problem, but far from fulfilling the requirements of that claim.