Introduction

Central to any discussion of the changing role of the State in relation to welfare provision is the concept of citizenship, both as a status attributed to individual members of society and as a social practice involving participation and governance. Citizenship is a fundamentally contested concept that has lately re-emerged as a subject of political discourse and academic inquiry. Prior to the 1992 General Election, Britain's main political parties vied with each other to establish different visions of a ‘citizen's charter’ (Dean, 1994, pp 103-4). Although such rhetoric did not feature so explicitly in the 1997 election campaign, the language of citizenship continues to lie at the heart of New Labour's project, and in particular, in its proposals for welfare reform. The welfare reform Green Paper, for example, envisages a forthcoming age in which “the new welfare contract between government and the people will give all our citizens the means to achieve their full potential” (DSS, 1998a, p 21). Meanwhile, there has been a daunting proliferation of literature on citizenship theory (for example, Culpitt, 1992; Roche, 1992; Turner, 1993; Oliver and Heater, 1994; Twine, 1994; van Steenbergen, 1994; Bulmer and Rees, 1996; Lister, 1997b).

This chapter will:

• • outline the competing traditions which underpin concepts of citizenship, the different ways in which notions of ‘social citizenship’ have informed modern welfare state regimes and the manner by which conceptions of citizenship were reconstructed within New Right thinking prior to New Labour's election;

• • analyse the significance of New Labour's communitarian agenda and the extent to which this represents an emerging new orthodoxy with regard to the basis of our citizenship;

• • draw on evidence from recent research in order to discuss the relationship between popular expectations of the welfare state and New Labour's political discourse and the possible implications of New Labour's approach.

Competing traditions of citizenship

Conceptual legacy

In its original meaning ‘citizenship’ denoted residence in a city, or more precisely, the status of the free men of that city. Citizenship implied freedom: the freedom reserved to a self-governing patrician elite, or a freedom ‘earned’ from feudal servitude. However, neither in the cities of ancient Greece or Rome, nor the early modern cities of Europe were women, slaves or servants counted as citizens.