Working Outside the Box

Community Currencies, Time Banks and Social Inclusion

Bibliographic Data

ID2114553
AuthorsGill Seyfang (0000-0003-4696-0798, University of East Anglia, corresponding author)
Year2004
Volume33
Issue1
Pages49-71
Publication date2004-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Social Policy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0047-2794 • E-ISSN: 1469-7823
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0047279403007232
OpenAlexW2163241884
LanguageEN
Citations received32
References cited16

A conceptual framework is developed for analysing UK social policy with respect to work, employment, inclusion and income. A range of possibilities for 'productive engagement in work' (PEW) outside the home are identified, ranging from formal employment, through informal employment, working for local community currencies, to unpaid voluntary work, each attracting particular policy responses, according to the hegemonic discourse of social exclusion, namely a liberal individualistic model which sees insertion into the labour market as the solution to exclusion. A new initiative is examined which is increasingly being adopted by local authorities in their efforts to tackle social exclusion and build social capital, namely 'time banks': a type of community currency which rewards people in time credits for the work they put into their neighbourhoods. Time banks are found to occupy a space in between what is already known about informal employment, LETS (Local Exchange Trading Schemes) and volunteering, raising a number of issues for policy makers and practitioners. While time banks may be promoted within the UK government's social inclusion remit as a means of increasing job-readiness through volunteering, they have wider and deeper implications. They represent a response to a radical social democratic understanding of social exclusion and hence exert a collective effort to redefine what is considered 'valuable work', and thus present an alternative to hegemonic paradigms of work and welfare; their greatest potential is as a radical tool for collective social capital building, resulting in more effective social, economic and political citizenship, and hence social inclusion. Policy recommendations are made to enable time banks to flourish and provide a powerful tool for achieving social inclusion objectives

Economic growth · Economics · Inclusion (mineral) · Market economy · Social capital · Social exclusion · Social policy · Social science · Sociology · Employment and Welfare Studies · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Social Policy and Reform Studies

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