A basic income for every crisis? Building blocks of a political economy framework

Abstract

In the wake of several recent crises, universal basic income has emerged as a serious policy solution. Not only is basic income pitched as a tool to mitigate the effects of a diverse set of emergencies, it has been argued that successive crises have importantly contributed to the surge in media and policy interest in basic income. In this article we critically examine this proposition. We first argue against the inherent functionalism of many accounts and instead propose a political economy framework that ties basic income directly to a series of mechanisms that may explain the opening up of basic income policy windows during recent crises, including the Covid-19 pandemic. It is equally important to carefully distinguish between different types of crises and we argue that two key competing types – cyclical and permanent crises – face a distinctive set of political economy constraints. We illustrate our approach by analysing the prospects of basic income in six distinct crisis events.

Introduction: Emergency basic income: Distraction or opportunity?

“…6. A critical distinction in terms of EBI design may be the difference between short-term or cyclical emergencies and slow-burning long-term or quasi-permanent crises (Chrisp and De Wispelaere, 2023). The latter may end up requiring EBI effectively merging into a permanent UBI to ensure continued effectiveness.…”

“…10 But the flipside of this coin is precisely that when robust universal social protection systems are lacking or failing, EBI may become a "second best" policy with unpredictable effects on the future trajectory of underdeveloped social protection systems. 11 Third, despite the clear effectiveness ofand concomitant support for -EBI-type measures in at least some countries or regions, the key question remains whether this could translate into opening a genuine policy window for basic income more broadly (Weisstanner, 2022;Chrisp and De Wispelaere, 2023). The Maricá case offers a pandemic-related argument for introducing a modest permanent basic income, which can be "dialed up" to a full EBI in crisis situations, but the argument merely assumes such a basic income is already in place.…”

“…12. Chrisp and De Wispelaere (2023) argue this type of functionalist argument should be replaced by a political economy account to provide a genuine window of opportunity. shift in terms of the level of government driving policy experimentation, allowing numerous basic income pilots to bloom at local level even while policy development at national level remains stuck.…”

Basic income as a pandemic social protection instrument: Lessons from Maricá, Brazil

“…First, increased support may mask continued political dividing lines that prevent it from coalescing into a robust coalition willing and able to put pressure on decision makers (Weisstanner, 2022). 6 Second, increased support in the midst of a one-off or cyclical crisis event may not lead to continued support once the emergency has abated, which effectively means a policy window may shut before it has fully opened (Chrisp and De Wispelaere, 2023). The last point seems very much in line with recent research suggesting that COVID-19 may not have disrupted welfare state configurations all that much (Hogan, Howlett and Murphy, 2022).…”

Diversity within universality: Explaining pandemic universal cash transfers in East Asia

“…This article does not discuss whether universality is desirable, but instead zooms into the practical experience with one particular universal programme, i.e., universal basic income (UBI). Such UBI schemes have been widely examined (e.g., Gentilini et al, 2020; Hanna and Olken, 2018; Widerquist et al, 2013), including recent work to situate UBI within various types of crises (Chrisp and De Wispelaere, 2023).…”