It can be contended that ‘In contemporary Australian society the emphasis on the surveillance and discipline of welfare recipients ignores the structural factors that generate and maintain inequality.’ Australia’s free-market capitalist structure is evidence of the fundamental shift to a society increasingly based on economic imperatives. Capitalism encourages inequality as it empowers private corporations and restricts the welfare state. The Australian Government has increasingly diffused responsibility for unemployment onto individuals and alienated welfare recipients through prejudiced media coverage. This entrenched prejudice against welfare recipients in contemporary society is often enculturated through the ideologies, beliefs and values of a person’s socio-economic status. The alienation of welfare recipients through prejudice and discrimination creates social division and decreases social capital within society, thus devaluing our society.
Although there is no easy solution to reducing inequality, by embracing the characteristics of a socially and culturally literate person we are able to make informed and appropriate decisions. We need to focus on what is underlying the surveillance and discipline of welfare recipients and why there is little macroeconomic reform to counteract inequality. By challenging the established ideologies on a micro and macro scale we will be able to confront the social structures that generate and maintain inequality, rather than the present trend of reducing support for the disadvantaged whilst at the same time promoting the idea of ‘blaming the victim.’ |
