Disciplining Political Imagination: the universal basic income debate

Longstanding yet largely abandoned, the debate over an Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) has gained public visibility in Europe over the past decade, notably with the Swiss referendum of 2016 and the European Citizens’ Initiatives of 2014 and 2020. Although these initiatives failed to meet the formal requirements, they contributed to inscribing the UBI onto the political agendas of both the EU and national governments. Tracing its discursive trajectory and legacies, this paper explores some dimensions of the political and academic debates surrounding the UBI, seeking to demonstrate how this proposal – simple but with extensive normative, social, and political ramifications – constitutes a paradigmatic object for reflecting on disciplinary dialogues, tensions, and crossroads. Within the framework of critical perspectives on democracy and social justice, the literature produced since the 1990s reveals a remarkable theoretical and disciplinary diversity – from political science to economics, from sociology to political philosophy – which, despite differing starting points and endpoints, converges on the discussion of the emancipatory potential or, conversely, the erosive effect on the welfare state associated with this proposal (or promise). Likewise, in the field of feminist studies, from 'the problem with the social contract' (inherently sexual) to 'the problem with work', authors such as Carole Pateman (2004) and Kathi Weeks (2011) have mobilised the UBI as an enunciation and instrument of liberation, conferring upon subjects control over their own lives and over their participation – to the extent they desire – in cultural, economic, social, and political spheres. The gradual cooling of public and scholarly enthusiasm for the UBI raises a broader question: whether the apparent retreat of this proposal signals a failure of the "intelligent multidisciplinary speculation" – identified by Philippe Van Parijs (2013) as a requirement for any utopia – capable of renewing both democratic tools and political imagination. From the value and function of utopia in democracy studies to the apparent propositional impotence of the humanities and social sciences in the face of the growing influence of economics on public policy and on the hegemonic production of common-sense, the case of the UBI illustrates how disciplinary characteristics and imperatives configure – and are simultaneously reshaped by – the formulation and framing of problems, including the one of an epistemic nature at the centre of this workshop: the science of democracy. Bibliographical references: Pateman, Carole (2004), “Democratizing Citizenship: Some Advantages of a Basic Income”, Politics & Society, 32: 89. Van Parijs, Philippe (2013), “The Universal Basic Income: Why Utopian Thinking Matters, and How Sociologists Can Contribute to It”, Politics & Society, 41: 171. Weeks, Kathi (2011), The Problem with Work. Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries. Durham: Duke University Press.