Game On! Is Basic Income Experiencing a Global Window of Opportunity?

Kela Workshop “Basic Income in a Global World”, Helsinki 13 April 2016

Jurgen De Wispelaere, University of Tampere Email: jurgen.dewispelaere@gmail.com

Basic income media attention, 20162

Source: Scott Santens, Basic Income on the March (Google Trends)

Policy attention, 2015-2016! Switzerland: Referendum in June 2016 (2013 Citizen’s Initiative) ! Finland: first national experiment planned (prelim report

delivered, anticipated start 2017) ! Netherlands: municipal experiments (20plus municipalities,

anticipated start 2017) ! Canada: strong political interest at both Federal (2016 Ontario

Budget) and Provincial level (Quebec) ! France: systematic review/consultation of basic income by the

Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE)

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A global window of opportunity?

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Kingdon on policy windows! Window of opportunity opens when three streams are aligned:

! Problem stream: problem definition and recognition ! Policy stream: production of alternatives and proposals,

typically mediated through policy entrepreneurs/communities

! Political stream: reception of policy proposals by general public, stakeholders/interest groups, and political agents

! Policy windows typically open because of changes in the problem or political streams, provided they are coupled through a specific policy proposal (Kingdon 1984).

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Problem Stream: Basic Income is the Solution, But What’s the Problem?

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! “Classical” arguments for basic income: poverty, social exclusion, citizenship, life-cycle, gender, ecology, …

! Recent developments: a new BIG agenda? ! Precariat and income security ! Automatisation (“robots stealing our jobs”) ! Health and SDH (poverty, income inequality)

! Chetty et al JAMA 2016: gap between richest and poorest 1% in US 2001-2014 is 14 years (men)/10 years (women)

! Austerity and the new social contract ! Recalibrating complex and costly welfare programs

! Overlapping concerns, but variation in emphasis across stakeholders and jurisdictions (e.g., strong health focus in Canada)

Policy Stream: The Basic Income Alternative (but which one?)

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! BIG advocates are policy entrepreneurs formulating basic income as a genuine alternative solution

! Problem-specific BIG advocates: strong “local” legitimacy ! Health: letter to Ontario Minister of Health by 194 physicians, backed

by official statements by CMA, CPHA, CASW ! Automation: Silicon Valley tech elite recent support for BIG

! BIG advocates as instrument constituencies (Beland & Howlett 2015) ! Focus on basic income as a key policy solution across problem areas ! Core drivers for building social support by linking problem areas ! Primary interest in securing a basic income solution, comparatively

less interest in which specific BIG model gets adopted (now)

Political Stream: Securing Political Support (“Here Be Dragons …”)

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! Getting basic income on the political agenda requires genuine support from general public, key stakeholders and political agents. ! Problem of cheap support: much support by political agents is

cheap to give (no cost) but also of little value (no real commitment) (De Wispelaere 2015)

! How do we distinguish/measure political support? ! Survey evidence? ! Political statements? (party manifestos, parliamentary motions,

written questions, etc) ! Tangible policy initiatives? (official consultation, Green Paper,

commitment to experiment)

Measuring BIG political support as a latent value (with Johanna Perkiö and Lindsay Stirton)

! Two-pronged research project on the basic income debate in Finland ! Estimating Finnish political parties’ ideal points of political support for

basic income over time (9 election cycles, 1980-2015) ! Data: party manifestos, parliamentary motions, written questions,

interventions in plenary sessions ! Preliminary results: estimations of party ideal support points and

an environmental variable (difficulty of supporting basic income)

! Media content analysis, with specific focus on distinguishing between political support for different basic income models (design and goal parameters)

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● Swedish.People.s.Party

● Finnish.Cristian.League.Christian.Democrats

● Finnish.Rural.Party

● National.Coalition.Party

● Social.Democratic.Party

● Aland.Coalition

● Reform.Group

● Ecological.Party.The.Greens

● Constitutional.Right.Party

● Democratic.Alternative

● True.Finns

● Finnish.People.s.Democratic.League

● Liberal.People.s.Party

● Young.Finns

● Centre.Party

● Left.Alliance

● Greens

−5 −4 −3 −2 −1 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5

−5 −4 −3 −2 −1 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5

Preliminary results (1): static/average ideal points for BIG support amongst Finnish political parties (1980-2015), selective data only

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Preliminary results (2a): dynamic ideal points for BIG support amongst Finnish political parties (1980-2015)

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Greens

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Centre Party

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Finnish People's Democratic League/Left Alliance

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Young Finns

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Ecological Party The Greens

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Liberal People's Party

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Democratic Alternative

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Reform Group

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Constitutional Right Party

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Preliminary results (2b): dynamic ideal points for BIG support amongst Finnish political parties (1980-2015)

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Constitutional Right Party

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Social Democratic Party

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

National Coalition Party

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Finnish Rural Party/Finns

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Finnish Cristian League/Christian Democrats

−2

0

2

1980 1990 2000 2010Election cycle

Supp

ort f

or B

I

Swedish People's Party

Linking policy attention and political support! Hypothesis:

! Increased policy attention/political support is dependent on broadening the basic income debate in terms of problems/models

! The dominant model parameters of BIG may shift as policy attention increases.

! Policy implications: the basic income model that gathers strong support may differ extensively from that which motivated the original debate

! Political implications: policy entrepreneurs/stakeholders must decide whether to support or not support a BIG model that may fail to address core problem areas (a type of “policy fiasco”)

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A global window of opportunity?14

! Increased media/policy attention across the world is very promising but awareness of the many hurdles ahead suggest caution: ! Problem stream: broadening basic income as a

catch-all solution comes at a cost (risk) ! Policy stream: basic income is not a single

alternative but a set of competing models, with implications of how each is linked to the problem stream

! Political stream: the nature, extent and structure of political support for basic income is of critical importance, but so far little understood

! Political hurdles are embedded in the local policy constellation and political structure, making it more difficult to generalise across jurisdictions.

Kiitos!

Comments always welcome at jurgen.dewispelaere@gmail.com Download my research at https://uta-fi.academia.edu/JurgenDeWispelaere

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