Austerity and the Big Society

This chapter will examine welfare and penal policy under the Coalition Government. The politics of austerity will be explored arguing that the Coalition used the cover of the financial crisis to undertake a fundamental retrenchment of the welfare state. This chapter will argue that Cameron’s notion of the Big Society should not be dismissed as a political gimmick or rhetoric. It reflects an aspiration for a recasting of the relationship between citizens and the social state. This recasting is presented as a fiscal necessity but is actually driven by a politics that is underpinned by the othering of the poor. Cameron and the Coalition’s claims to social liberalism followed a series of policies that shredded the social state.