Poor Relief as ‘Improvement’: Moral and Spatial Economies of Care in Scotland, c.1720s–1790s

Abstract

This article takes as a point of departure the paucity of scholarship on Scottish poor relief, which has been predominantly depicted as an inferior and underdeveloped version of its southern counterpart. We adopt a case study approach looking at two examples of Lowland and Highland urban infrastructures of poor relief to illustrate the application of the ideology of ‘improvement’ philosophy onto the treatment of the poor between c.1720 and 1790. Situating the study within the context of Scottish ‘improvement’, we explore the ways theoretical and practical approaches towards the poor were shaped by the combination of commercial and evangelical attitudes to human capital investment and long-term reform, echoing similar developments across Europe. At the close of the eighteenth century, the Scottish system transitioned from a community based, localised system of reciprocal hierarchy operated by the parish and kirk structures to a system increasingly rooted in legalism and the concept of rights based social provision.