Politicians Unwilling to Use Resources to Support BI
Noguera et. al 15 (Jurgen De Wispelaere and José Antonio Noguera. Jurgen De Wispelaere taught political philosophy, moral philosophy and applied ethics at Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin, has held several visiting fellowships at international institutions, including the Department of Sociology (GSADI), Autonomous University of Barcelona and research fellowships at the Centre for the Study of Social Justice (CSSJ), Oxford University, the TCD Policy Institute and the Chaire Hoover d’éthique économique et sociale, Université Catholique de Louvain. José A. Noguera is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, and Director of the Analytical Sociology and Institutional Design Group (GSADI). His empirical research is currently focused on tax compliance, social influence dynamics, prosocial motivations, and the feasibility of universal welfare policies such as basic income. He is also an editorial board member of Basic Income Studies, and has served on the editorial board of Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas. He is a member of the Board of the Spanish Basic Income Network. “On the Political Feasibility of Universal Basic Income: An Analytic Framework” McGill University. May 21, 2015. Accessed 7/11/23)//EKW
Strategic Feasibility: The Search for a Robust BI Coalition. When thinking about political feasibility, we customarily have some form of strategic feasibility in mind. Political entrepreneurs engaging in all sorts of strategic interventions to build a political coalition enabling the legislation and subsequent implementation of a policy proposal has indeed become one of the hallmarks of modern politics (Sabbatier and Jenkins-Smith 1993). In a very real sense, coalition building constitutes the building block of successful policy advocacy in present-day democracy. Despite this centrality of coalition building, the literature on BI is surprisingly void of systematic discussion of the political strategies required to securing an enduring BI coalition. In this section, we briefly examine a key challenge affecting the strategic feasibility of BI. 2 When challenged about the political feasibility of BI, its advocates typically refer to numerous instances of individual politicians, political Table 2.1 Typology of political feasibility Prospective constraints (“achievability”) Retrospective constraints (“viability”) Discrete agency A. Strategic feasibility B. Institutional feasibility Diffuse agency C. Psychological feasibility D. Behavioral feasibility parties, social movements, or interest groups (e.g., trade unions) on record as supportive of BI. This response rapidly takes the form of a simple numbers game, in which the level of support for BI can be read— more or less directly—off the instances of expressed support elicited from such individuals, associations, or organizations. The idea that increased expressed support for BI from a variety of social and political actors is directly conducive to building a sustained political coalition is flawed, however. The reason is that not all instances of expressed support for a policy imply a sustained commitment to promoting this policy. It is one thing for a social or political agent to vocally express a preference in favor of BI, quite a different matter to actively canvass support amongst constituents, party members, or like-minded associations and groups; build a shared platform across political factions; utilize scarce political resources (money, time, and above all political capital) to further the cause; bargain and possibly compromise on other political goals; and so on. Expressed support without either the commitment or the capacity to engage in the necessary political action to build a sustainable coalition around the policy of granting each citizen an unconditional BI is “cheap”: it seems of little practical worth to BI advocates.