The ongoing issue re: statist dependency
. . . is the latest iteration of a continual discussion about collectivized welfare provision. The liberal position is usually: “We’re all better off if poverty and its corollaries (ill-health and sociopathologies) are minimized. The country can afford it, so be generous about welfare provision.” The conservative position is usually: “Being overly-generous breeds dependency. Move people from dependence to independence as soon as possible.”
It’s been a perpetual discussion of statist modernity. It puts a liberal person with a communitarian perspective in a slightly awkward position. Cutting people off from needed provision is a bad idea. But dependency on the teat of the state is an impersonal, institutional, mega-system-based solution. Ultimately we want to work toward revamped lifeways where sustenance and support are local and direct.
Some in our movement make a utilitarian argument for such: “It will figure to be more resilient when the mega-state institutions start to fail.” But no one knows if or when they might start to fail.
I think our advocacy should take a positive framing: It’s just a way of life that’s more ecological, more communitarian, and more satisfying . . .
