Ownership society
Encyclopedia
Ownership society is a slogan for a model of society
promoted by former United States
President George W. Bush
. It takes as lead values personal responsibility
, economic liberty
, and the owning of property
. The ownership society discussed by Bush also extends to certain proposals of specific models of health care
and social security
.
, Georgia
) as a phrase to rally support for his tax-cut proposals (Pittsburgh Post - Gazette, Bush OKs Funding Bill for Fiscal '03, Feb 21, 2003 Scott Lindlaw). From 2004 Bush supporters described the ownership society in much broader and more ambitious terms, including specific policy proposals concerning home ownership, medicine
, education
and savings.
The idea that the welfare of individuals is directly related to their ability to control their own lives and wealth, rather than relying on government transfer payments, is a longstanding one, particularly in British conservatism
.
In a modern form its implementation was developed as a main plank of Thatcherism
, and is traced back to David Howell
, before 1970, with help from the phrase-maker Peter Drucker
.
In political practice under Margaret Thatcher
's administration, it was implemented by measures such as the sale at affordable prices of public housing
to tenants (right to buy program), and privatization
.
(see original quote and external link below), the goals are that
Here the comments in brackets are an interpretation or paraphrase, consistent with a generalised idea of ownership
. The conceptual link here is by means of the idea that private property
, the most familiar and everyday form of ownership, is being extended. Control is closely associated with ownership in that sense.
This Cato Institute formulation is not, however, in terms of positive policies. It is more accurately a definition of ownership by taking the state out of the loop. So, for example, in health care ownership is not being defined just on the basis of informed consent
.
There is no real originality, politically speaking, in the connection made between individual ownership of property and political stake-holding. This was an idea discussed in Europe and America in the eighteenth century. (For example that the franchise
should only be for property holders.)
The novelty of the Cato Institute formulation would lie in the extrapolation. In the case of savings, for example, the extension would be an assertion of property rights in money held in savings or collected tax revenues.
The first desiderata was part of John McCain
's campaign platform as the 2008 Republican presidential nominee. McCain's website says,
"John McCain believes [that] the key to health care reform is to restore control to the patients themselves."http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing/Issues/19ba2f1c-c03f-4ac2-8cd5-5cf2edb527cf.htm
, and oppose inheritance tax
es and wealth tax
es. They are also likely to favour a pattern of property ownership based on the purchase, rather than rental, of accommodation.
The consequences for health and education are heavily dependent on details of implementation. For example, ownership in one's child's education, for a parent, might be in the form of an education voucher
, a vote in the running of a school, influence on the school curriculum, or a generalised 'right' to have a child educated in line with one's own values.
One example from the UK of an unexpected or unintended consequence
of government policy favouring direct share ownership, through some oversubscribed privatisation issues, was the holding of small parcels of shares by individuals numbered in millions. This broad-based ownership created an administrative overhead, for example in relation to every shareholder vote.
conference speech 1991.
...if you own something, you have a vital stake in the future of our country. The more ownership there is in America, the more vitality there is in America, and the more people have a vital stake in the future of this country. - President George W. Bush, June 17, 2004
We're creating... an ownership society in this country, where more Americans than ever will be able to open up their door where they live and say, welcome to my house, welcome to my piece of property. - President George W. Bush, October 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080218/klein
Individuals are empowered by freeing them from dependence on government handouts and making them owners instead, in control of their own lives and destinies. In the ownership society, patients control their own health care, parents control their own children's education, and workers control their retirement savings. - Cato Institute
Many people don't have the time, inclination, or expertise necessary to take full responsibility for their own well-being in areas that are so complex as assuring they have sufficient income for retirement or choosing a health plan appropriate for their circumstances. - Robert Reischauer, president of the Urban Institute
, a Washington think tank
.
...the key to health care reform is to restore control to the patients themselves. - John McCain
's campaign website, 2008.
George Bush called this the ownership society, but what he really meant was 'you're-on-your-own' society. - Barack Obama
, 2008
Society
A society, or a human society, is a group of people related to each other through persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory, subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations...
promoted by former United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
President George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
. It takes as lead values personal responsibility
Moral responsibility
Moral responsibility usually refers to the idea that a person has moral obligations in certain situations. Disobeying moral obligations, then, becomes grounds for justified punishment. Deciding what justifies punishment, if anything, is a principle concern of ethics.People who have moral...
, economic liberty
Liberty
Liberty is a moral and political principle, or Right, that identifies the condition in which human beings are able to govern themselves, to behave according to their own free will, and take responsibility for their actions...
, and the owning of property
Property
Property is any physical or intangible entity that is owned by a person or jointly by a group of people or a legal entity like a corporation...
. The ownership society discussed by Bush also extends to certain proposals of specific models of health care
Health care
Health care is the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in humans. Health care is delivered by practitioners in medicine, chiropractic, dentistry, nursing, pharmacy, allied health, and other care providers...
and social security
Social security
Social security is primarily a social insurance program providing social protection or protection against socially recognized conditions, including poverty, old age, disability, unemployment and others. Social security may refer to:...
.
History
The term appears to have been used originally by President Bush (for example in a speech February 20, 2003 in KennesawKennesaw, Georgia
Kennesaw is a city in Cobb County, Georgia, United States. It had a population of 29,783 according to the 2010 census. It is part of the Atlanta metropolitan area. Founded in 1887, Kennesaw has a past surrounded with railroad history...
, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
) as a phrase to rally support for his tax-cut proposals (Pittsburgh Post - Gazette, Bush OKs Funding Bill for Fiscal '03, Feb 21, 2003 Scott Lindlaw). From 2004 Bush supporters described the ownership society in much broader and more ambitious terms, including specific policy proposals concerning home ownership, medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
, education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
and savings.
The idea that the welfare of individuals is directly related to their ability to control their own lives and wealth, rather than relying on government transfer payments, is a longstanding one, particularly in British conservatism
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
.
In a modern form its implementation was developed as a main plank of Thatcherism
Thatcherism
Thatcherism describes the conviction politics, economic and social policy, and political style of the British Conservative politician Margaret Thatcher, who was leader of her party from 1975 to 1990...
, and is traced back to David Howell
David Howell, Baron Howell of Guildford
David Arthur Russell Howell, Baron Howell of Guildford, PC , is a British Conservative politician, journalist, and economic consultant. Having been successively Secretary of State for Energy and then for Transport under Margaret Thatcher, Howell is now a Minister of State in the Foreign Office...
, before 1970, with help from the phrase-maker Peter Drucker
Peter Drucker
Peter Ferdinand Drucker was an influential writer, management consultant, and self-described “social ecologist.”-Introduction:...
.
In political practice under Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
's administration, it was implemented by measures such as the sale at affordable prices of public housing
Public housing
Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is owned by a government authority, which may be central or local. Social housing is an umbrella term referring to rental housing which may be owned and managed by the state, by non-profit organizations, or by a combination of the...
to tenants (right to buy program), and privatization
Privatization
Privatization is the incidence or process of transferring ownership of a business, enterprise, agency or public service from the public sector to the private sector or to private non-profit organizations...
.
Ownership and control
As formulated by the Cato InstituteCato Institute
The Cato Institute is a libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane, who remains president and CEO, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc., the largest privately held...
(see original quote and external link below), the goals are that
- patients have control of [decisions on] their personal health care,
- parents control [i.e. have power over] their children's educationEducationEducation in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
, and - workers control [i.e. have some responsibility for the investment of, or explicit property rights in] their retirement savings.
Here the comments in brackets are an interpretation or paraphrase, consistent with a generalised idea of ownership
Ownership
Ownership is the state or fact of exclusive rights and control over property, which may be an object, land/real estate or intellectual property. Ownership involves multiple rights, collectively referred to as title, which may be separated and held by different parties. The concept of ownership has...
. The conceptual link here is by means of the idea that private property
Private property
Private property is the right of persons and firms to obtain, own, control, employ, dispose of, and bequeath land, capital, and other forms of property. Private property is distinguishable from public property, which refers to assets owned by a state, community or government rather than by...
, the most familiar and everyday form of ownership, is being extended. Control is closely associated with ownership in that sense.
This Cato Institute formulation is not, however, in terms of positive policies. It is more accurately a definition of ownership by taking the state out of the loop. So, for example, in health care ownership is not being defined just on the basis of informed consent
Informed consent
Informed consent is a phrase often used in law to indicate that the consent a person gives meets certain minimum standards. As a literal matter, in the absence of fraud, it is redundant. An informed consent can be said to have been given based upon a clear appreciation and understanding of the...
.
There is no real originality, politically speaking, in the connection made between individual ownership of property and political stake-holding. This was an idea discussed in Europe and America in the eighteenth century. (For example that the franchise
Suffrage
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply the franchise, distinct from mere voting rights, is the civil right to vote gained through the democratic process...
should only be for property holders.)
The novelty of the Cato Institute formulation would lie in the extrapolation. In the case of savings, for example, the extension would be an assertion of property rights in money held in savings or collected tax revenues.
The first desiderata was part of John McCain
John McCain
John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....
's campaign platform as the 2008 Republican presidential nominee. McCain's website says,
"John McCain believes [that] the key to health care reform is to restore control to the patients themselves."http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing/Issues/19ba2f1c-c03f-4ac2-8cd5-5cf2edb527cf.htm
Political consequences and unexpected consequences
Consistently with the basic tenet, proponents of an ownership society usually support inherited wealthInheritance
Inheritance is the practice of passing on property, titles, debts, rights and obligations upon the death of an individual. It has long played an important role in human societies...
, and oppose inheritance tax
Inheritance tax
An inheritance tax or estate tax is a levy paid by a person who inherits money or property or a tax on the estate of a person who has died...
es and wealth tax
Wealth tax
A wealth tax is generally conceived of as a levy based on the aggregate value of all household holdings actually accumulated as purchasing power stock , including owner-occupied housing; cash, bank deposits, money funds, and savings in insurance and pension plans; investment in real estate and...
es. They are also likely to favour a pattern of property ownership based on the purchase, rather than rental, of accommodation.
The consequences for health and education are heavily dependent on details of implementation. For example, ownership in one's child's education, for a parent, might be in the form of an education voucher
Education voucher
A school voucher, also called an education voucher, is a certificate issued by the government, which parents can apply toward tuition at a private school , rather than at the state school to which their child is assigned...
, a vote in the running of a school, influence on the school curriculum, or a generalised 'right' to have a child educated in line with one's own values.
One example from the UK of an unexpected or unintended consequence
Unintended consequence
In the social sciences, unintended consequences are outcomes that are not the outcomes intended by a purposeful action. The concept has long existed but was named and popularised in the 20th century by American sociologist Robert K. Merton...
of government policy favouring direct share ownership, through some oversubscribed privatisation issues, was the holding of small parcels of shares by individuals numbered in millions. This broad-based ownership created an administrative overhead, for example in relation to every shareholder vote.
Quotations
We Conservatives have always passed our values from generation to generation. I believe that personal prosperity should follow the same course. I want to see wealth cascading down the generations. We do not see each generation starting out anew, with the past cut off and the future ignored. - John MajorJohn Major
Sir John Major, is a British Conservative politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990–1997...
conference speech 1991.
...if you own something, you have a vital stake in the future of our country. The more ownership there is in America, the more vitality there is in America, and the more people have a vital stake in the future of this country. - President George W. Bush, June 17, 2004
We're creating... an ownership society in this country, where more Americans than ever will be able to open up their door where they live and say, welcome to my house, welcome to my piece of property. - President George W. Bush, October 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080218/klein
Individuals are empowered by freeing them from dependence on government handouts and making them owners instead, in control of their own lives and destinies. In the ownership society, patients control their own health care, parents control their own children's education, and workers control their retirement savings. - Cato Institute
Many people don't have the time, inclination, or expertise necessary to take full responsibility for their own well-being in areas that are so complex as assuring they have sufficient income for retirement or choosing a health plan appropriate for their circumstances. - Robert Reischauer, president of the Urban Institute
Urban Institute
The Urban Institute is a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that carries out nonpartisan economic and social policy research, collects data, evaluates social programs, educates the public on key domestic issues, and provides advice and technical assistance to developing governments abroad...
, a Washington think tank
Think tank
A think tank is an organization that conducts research and engages in advocacy in areas such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, and technology issues. Most think tanks are non-profit organizations, which some countries such as the United States and Canada provide with tax...
.
...the key to health care reform is to restore control to the patients themselves. - John McCain
John McCain
John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....
's campaign website, 2008.
George Bush called this the ownership society, but what he really meant was 'you're-on-your-own' society. - Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
, 2008
External links
- Fact Sheet: America's Ownership Society: Expanding Opportunities - White House press release 9 August 2004
- Cato Institute page
- Ownership Society Institute
- Naomi Klein. 2008. Disowning the ownership society. The Nation, Feb. 18. Online at http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080218/klein
- Frank Luntz. 2006. The New American Lexicon. (produced for republican Congressional candidates for the 2006 elections). Accessible online at http://www.politicalcortex.com/special/Luntz_NAL_Introduction.
- Paul Glastris. 2005. Bush's ownership society: Why no one's buying. Washington Monthly, December. Online at http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2005/0512.glastris.html
- Mark Weisbrot. 2005. Owning up to the ownership society. Miami Herald, Mar 26. Online at http://www.cepr.net/content/view/475/45/.
- Bill Grigsby. 2005. Who owns the ownership society? Scoop, March 10. Online at http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/print.html?path=HL0503/S00078.htm
- Joy-Ann Reid. 2005. The 'you're on your ownership society.' CommonDreams.org, Feb 9. Online at http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0209-21.htm
- Robert Reich. 2004. What ownership society? TomPaine.com, Sept. 2. Online at http://www.tompaine.com/articles/what_ownership_society.php
- Zachary Karabell, Oct 11, 2008. "End of the ‘Ownership Society’", NEWSWEEK, online at http://www.newsweek.com/id/163451/page/1
- Michael & Susan Klonsky, 2008. Small Schools: Public School Reform Meets the Ownership Society.(Routledge) http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415961233/
- Schooling in the Ownership Society blog. http://schoolingintheownershipsociety.blogspot.com/