The New Right Approach

The New Right Approach believes that the capitalist system is capable of providing stability and wealth for all. However, government interference in the market place distorts the balance of supply and demand. They stress that the government should not be involved in the economy except for four main functions: to maintain law and order, defence of the country, to provide protection from members of community who are not considered safe and the provision of help to those in need (s-cool.co.uk, 2011).

The New Right Approach suggests that single parenthood is a significant cause of poverty and a drain on the welfare system. The approach states that there are an increased number of single mothers now dependant on the state and illegitimacy rates have also risen rapidly. The rising numbers of absent fathers who do not pay child support has resulted in poorer mothers and poorer children. The New Right suggests that there are too many young people who are dependant on the welfare state. The rising unemployment levels, 20.5% from 1889-1999 in 18-24 year olds, concerns them as they believe benefits are now too easy to claim (sociology.org.uk, 2012). Moreover, they suggest that people are now earning more living on benefits than they would be in employment and therefore continue to claim from the government. This state of ‘dependency’, the New Right claims, is why benefits should be cut (Haralambos and Holburn, 2004).

The New Right Approach stresses that universal benefits such as child benefit and pensions are a huge drain on the economy. They argue that the demand for these benefits is constantly rising and the government cannot continue to supply them. They suggest the introduction of means testing across benefits so that only those who desperately need them, or the ‘deserving poor’, receive them. They suggest that the privatisation of the welfare state would encourage individual responsibility and family ‘self-help’ in order for people to wean themselves off of benefits. This, they argue, would allow for money to be channelled back in to the economy. Finally, as mentioned previously, they discourage single parenthood as mothers and fathers living apart may draw more money from the state then when living together. Furthermore, previously mothers would not have been able to afford being single. Now, however, the numbers of single mothers are increasing rapidly as benefits provide them with the ability to be independent. The New Right Approach suggests that the elimination of benefits for single mothers would tackle this issue.

Charles Murray, an American Theorist, identified the materialization of an ‘underclass’. He stated, “When I use the term underclass I am indeed focusing on a certain type of poor person defined not by his condition, e.g. long term unemployed, but by his deplorable behaviour in response to that condition, e.g. unwilling to take the jobs that is available to him” (peterjepson.com, 2012). Murray claimed that there were three forms of behaviour that defines underclass status; parenting behaviour, criminal behaviour and labour market behaviour. Murray suggested that the poor themselves are to blame for their own poverty as they choose to act a certain way or, rather, are conditioned to act like this by an over-generous government. Murray argued that the problems with the underclass in Britain were getting increasingly worse with illegitimacy rates rising from 1889, were one in four births were outwith marriage, to 1999 were 38% were (Murray.C, 2001).

There are a number of criticisms of the New Right Approach. Firstly, the approach blames the victims for the position they are in. The approach does not take in to consideration an individuals circumstances that have caused them to be unemployed or a single parent. The approach generalises all single parents as the cause of a drain of the welfare state and fails to consider other causes such as people with illness who cannot work, those with addictions who cannot work and those who simply choose not to work. In addition, the attitudes of the ‘underclass’ may have been emphasised through the media within newspapers and television programmes. Charles Murray’s studies, Underclass and Underclass +10 have been criticised as being inaccurate and exaggerated.