Modernization, welfare and `third way' politics: limits to theorizing in `thirds'?

Author: Haylett, Chris

Source: Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, Volume 26, Number 1, March 2001 , pp. 43-56(14)

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Abstract:

The current period of welfare reform in British politics is taking place within a discourse of modernization described in terms of a `third way'. The ideas which constitute this discourse resonate with recent developments within human geography, namely a movement to theorizing `in-between' spaces, a turn to culture and to issues of globalization. This paper suggests that welfare reform is a restructuring project which allows the nature of thinking and acting `in thirds' to be questioned. It problematizes the `third way' approach to cultural modernization and economic globalization as a de-politicized discourse, and argues for the cultural politics and political economics which underpin welfare reform to be foregrounded. As a form of political discourse analysis, it points to the developing need for a welfare geography that is attuned to the languages and practices through which dominant systems of social and economic distribution are constituted.

Keywords: Britain; welfare reform; discourse; culture; globalization; class

Document Type: Original article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1475-5661.00005

Affiliations: 1: University of Birmingham, School of Geography, Edgbaston, Birmingham, UK

Publication date: 2001-03-01