by Andre Coelho | Jan 9, 2019 | News
Indian woman worker with spectacles. Picture credit to: Sarah Day
New ideas seem to be running dry in the Indian political context. Within Congress, Government (BJP – Bharatiya Janata Party) and opposition parties (ex.: AAP – Aam Aadmi Party). Tweaking with the minimum support prices for food production and/or with the multiplicity of welfare programs is not going to substantially change rural population’s main concern, which is declining real wages (purchasing power after adjustment for price variations). These have been steadily falling since 2014, ever since the BJP came to power, which means that to stay too focused on the former issues will not probably get BJP reelected this year. Also farm loan waivers (credit write off) has been used as a political tool, especially by the opposition (mostly center and left-wing) parties, given the high indebtedness rates of rural families (over 50%) and their dependency on predatory lenders (also over 50%).
However, according to political analyst Saubhik Chakrabarti, from The Economic Times, loan waiver is not going to be decisive for these next elections, even though it has been flagged by the opposition in regional suffrage (which has won three states from BJP). This decisiveness might very well come from pushing the basic income policy, an old new idea that has been hot in India ever since the 2016-2017 Economic Survey Report featured a whole chapter to it. And this applies to both parties / coalitions with a shot at forming a government in 2019, because what really impacts real wages is not topping crop prices or forever trying to fix a broken welfare distribution system (very complex and prone to corruption). A real difference may come from directly and unconditionally giving people what they need the most, economically: money.
Even though there will be no time to properly design, let alone implement a basic income scheme regionally – and even less likely a national implementation – before this year’s elections (latest in May), Chakrabarti suggests that one or more pilot tests could be tried out. According to him, that could be done “in chosen districts, accompanied by a blaze of political publicity, [being] enough to take to voters, with the promise that re-election will lead to an across-India UBI program.”
More information at:
Saubhik Chakrabarti, “Doling out a universal basic income scheme may be Narendra Modi’s best chance to win 2019 mandate”, The Economic Times, 24th December 2018
“Farm loan waiver: How to nip it in the bud”, The Economic Times, 7th January 2019
Kate McFarland, “India: Government Economic Survey presents case for basic income”, Basic Income News, February 4th 2017
by Andre Coelho | Jan 4, 2019 | News
The Call for Papers for the 19th Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) Congress, in Hyderabad, India, has been released. From the 22nd through the 25th of August 2019, scholars, community organizers and artists are invited to make presentations pertaining to any of the following thematic areas. The abstracts (maximum 500 words) must reach the Local Organizing Committee by February 25th 2019. Please mail your abstracts (in MS Word document between 300 and 500 words) to: 19biencongress.india@gmail.com.
Thematic areas:
1. Ideological Perspectives on Basic Income
2. Basic Income, Unpaid Work and Women in the Informal Economy
3. Basic Income in Development Aid Debate: Is there a Paradigm-shift?
4. Religious Perspectives on Basic Income
5. Basic Income as a Foundation of a Caring Economy and Society?
6. What forms of Freedom and What kind of Community Life does Basic Income promote?
7. Basic Income and Blockchain Technology: Are there Synergies?
8. Basic Income, Poverty and Rural Livelihoods
9. Basic Income, the Commons, and Sovereign Wealth Funds: Is Public Inheritance an emerging issue?
10. Basic Income Pilots: Opportunities and Limits
11. Basic Income and Political Action: What does it take to transform an Idea into Policy?
12. Basic Income and Corporate Philanthropy: Is Basic Income a better paradigm and way forward?
13. Basic Income and Children
14. Basic Income and Mental Health
15. Basic Income and Intentional Communities: What does this Experience Teach us?
Congress Theme: Basic Income as Freedom and
Development
The theme of the Congress is ‘Basic Income as Freedom and Development’. Basic Income is an idea that is evoking curiosity and attention of people from a wide variety of national and cultural contexts, from leaders of different socio-political domains. Irrespective of the generic meaning that we attempt to give it, the groundswell that we witness today is producing its own local meanings. Each of these meanings seems to emerge from its own unique contextual starting point. The year 2019 is virtually being declared as the ‘Year of the Basic Income’, because the idea is reverberating across the world.
In this chaotic multiple renderings and interpretations, we observe that Basic Income is being seen both as Freedom and Development. These two notions are not mutually exclusive or distinctively apart, as often they are made out to be. Development ideally ought to lead to Freedom, and equally so the other way round. In certain contexts, the immediate appeal of the idea of Basic Income seems to be ‘Development’ in terms of addressing hunger and other forms of deprivation, access to education and healthcare. In other contexts, the immediacy may be felt as Freedom from alienating jobs that most of us are forced to do for a living. In either case, what emerges is that an unconditional Basic Income is seen as having tremendous potential to liberate us from the new forms of slavery that the current phase of capitalist economy subjects us to.
BIEN Civic Forum
The Congress will be held for four days. The first day, on the 22nd August, will be India Day which is being organised under the new BIEN initiative Civic Forum. The deliberations of this day will focus on the Basic Income debate and policy initiatives and the ground level experience in India. All the delegates are encouraged to attend the India Day. The main Congress will be inaugurated on 23rd morning and will conclude at 2:45 pm on 25th August 2019. The General assembly of BIEN will be convened at 3 pm on the 25th August 2019.
Registration of Delegates Those who wish to attend the Congress, please register by filling out the online form. The Delegate Fee structure is as follows:
| Type of Fee | In Euro | In US Dollars |
| Solidarity Fee | 200 and above | 229 |
| Regular Fee | 125 | 143 |
| Delegates from low-income countries | 50 | 57 |
Delegates from low-income countries are encouraged to attend the Congress, and this fee is at a highly subsidized rate. Those who can afford to pay, please consider opting for Solidarity Fee of 200 Euros and above. Those who have institutional support, please opt for Regular Fee even if from low-income countries.
The Congress is supported by:
LocalHi – travel and logistics
NALSAR University of Law
SEWA Madhya Pradesh
WiseCoLab
Mustardseed Trust
Everyday.earth
OpenDemocracy
by Andre Coelho | Dec 31, 2018 | News
Picture credit to: Opportunity for All (Government of Canada)
Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development for the Canadian Federal Government, has launched a call for applications to assemble a so-called National Advisory Council on Poverty. This council will be comprised of experts in poverty-related issues, and “people who have lived experienced or are currently living in poverty (…) indigenous peoples, women, persons with disabilities, visible minorities and other vulnerable groups”. The purpose is, not only having actual experience of poverty in the group, but also for it to be “representative of Canada’s linguistic, gender and regional diversity.”
This advisory group will be responsible for giving advice about programs and funding strategies which can contribute to poverty reduction, as well as produce a yearly report with detailed information on how poverty reduction goals are being met, according to agreed metrics. On top of that, the group shall also engage the public, including the academic community, several experts, indigenous people and others which experience or have experienced poverty. Applications to work with the group can be done online, until the 29th of January 2019.
The creation of this Council derives from the overarching Program “Opportunity for All”, a Canadian Federal Government initiative which it considers Canada’s first poverty reduction strategy. According to the Program’s website, the purpose of “Opportunity for All is to eradicate poverty because we are all better off when no one is left behind. Opportunity for All supports a human rights-based approach to poverty reduction, reflecting principles that include universality, non-discrimination and equality, participation of those living in poverty, accountability and working together.” It may be worth mentioning that “universality” is only mentioned on this one occasion throughout the explanation of the whole program, but nonetheless it is clearly stated here. Furthermore, the Program states that:
“Opportunity for All is about working together to end poverty so that all Canadians can live with dignity, have real and fair access to opportunities to succeed, and be resilient enough to get through difficult times. Living with dignity means that Canadians would be living without hunger and would have enough income to meet their basic needs (…)”
Jean-Yves Duclos
Although basic income is not mentioned, the reference to a universal “all Canadians” linked with “enough income to meet their needs” might point in the direction of some unconditional cash transfer program as one of the tools for poverty reduction in Canada. That would be aligned with Jean-Yves Duclos recent statements on the subject. Furthermore, the Program is based an a civic approach to problem-solving, since consultation was done to the wider population:
“Opportunity for All is guided by the thousands of voices we have heard and, in particular, the voices of those with lived experience of poverty. Canadians told us that poverty is complex, that different groups experience different risks of poverty and different challenges in getting out of poverty, and that reducing it requires a long-term commitment as well as calls for a coordinated approach with diverse groups—government and non-government alike. Canadians told us that the Strategy must contribute to a national effort to reduce poverty. It must also recognize that when some members of our communities cannot reach their full potential, we are all affected. More specifically, Canadians have said that the Poverty Reduction Strategy should be about:
Dignity – Lifting Canadians out of poverty by ensuring everyone’s basic needs are met;
Opportunity and Inclusion – Helping Canadians join the middle class by promoting full participation in society and equality of opportunity;
Resilience and Security – Supporting the middle class by protecting Canadians from falling into poverty and by supporting income security and resilience.”
Again, focusing on the needs of everyone, ensuring the full participation of all people in society and creating a solid ground so that no one falls into poverty, suggests a basic income type of policy, without explicitly mentioning it. This could mean that the National Advisory Council on Poverty will study or consider basic income somehow within its mandate, although no direct information exists to confirm it, at this moment.
More information at:
André Coelho, “Canada: Ontario’s basic income experiment ended, but the ground is fertile for more pilots”, Basic Income News, December 22nd 2018
Canada’s First Poverty Reduction Strategy website
by Andre Coelho | Dec 25, 2018 | News
ARTE, the franco-german TV channel, dedicated to cultural content and dissemination, has launched (on the 20th November 2018), an interactive documentary on work, money and basic income, named “Gagner sa vie” (“Earn a living”). Over seven episodes transmitted on the Internet, in four languages (French, English, German and Dutch), it poses questions to the internauts and shows them the episodes, according to their choices. These questions are focused on employment, work, automation, trust, wealth distribution and basic income, inviting thought on present-day societal issues, particularly those revolving around work.
Each episode is eleven minutes long. These combine real life footage with animated cartoons, and cover experiences from the United States (the Cherokee casino dividends), Japan (excess work culture), Kenya (Give Directly’s basic income pilot in Kenyan villages), the Netherlands (Bitnation founders account), Israel (sharing in the rural community of Arava) and France (Gironde’s wish to start a basic income experiment). A seventh episode, launched later (already on December 2018), explores a possible future when machines do most work and a basic income already exists, financed by the tech companies that own those robots.
More information at:
Claire Bott, “BBC UBI radio programme”, Basic Income News, May 29th 2018
Cameron McLeod, “BitNation: Recent advances in cryptocurrency see basic income tested”, Basic Income News, 30th March 2017
Tomas Klemm, “The importance of indigenous voice and experience in the UBI discussion”, Basic Income News, June 15th 2018
André Coelho, “France: The Gironde region’s path to a basic income experiment”, Basic Income News, May 17th 2018
by Guest Contributor | Dec 24, 2018 | Opinion
“You should not discuss Basic income in Russia. You should not implement pilot projects in the country,” a representative of the Russian government preaches to Russian citizens. He is an adviser to the Analytical Center of the Russian government.
On November 14, 2018, a conference was held in Moscow: “Basic Income: is it a prologue to social policy of the 21st century?” In the best traditions of «Russia Today», the English version of the conference was framed as: “Basic Income as a prologue to social policy of the 21st century”. Thus, Russian society was initially forced to doubt the need for implementing basic income.
The organizers for the conference were: The Institute for Social Policy of the Federal State Institute, National Research University’s Higher School of Economics, the European Dialogue group, and Russia’s Friedrich Ebert Foundation. This is one of the first international conferences on basic income in Russia. The Russian public was very interested in the experience of other countries.
A panel discussion was moderated by Peer Teschendorf, the Director of the German Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Russia. The speakers for the panel included: Miska Simanainen, KELA (Finland) – “Experiment with basic income in Finland”; Giuliano Bonoli, University of Lausanne (Switzerland) – “The 2016 Swiss referendum on basic income”.
Presentations by Russian speakers gave new insight from the Russian point of view. These speeches included: “Basic income and goals of reforming social assistance systems”, “Transformation of compulsory pension insurance: the next paradigm is the unconditional basic income”.
In general, the conference ended like the old Soviet joke: “Whatever Russians do, it always turns into Kalashnikov`s AK-47“.
Participants brought many arguments in favor of basic income, but the organizers made the opposite conclusion: Basic income is not necessary for Russia. The organizers argued it is better to increase targeting of social support; in authoritarian regimes, since the president is always “good,” something like basic income is “not necessary”! This was the expected conclusion from a state-run university and “experts” dependent on the state budget.
“Experts have already moved far away from a primitive understanding of basic income as a guaranteed payment to all members of society regardless of the level of their income, employment, health status, and other factors,” Russian organizers said.
Solovyev Alexander SM “Basic Income Russia Tomorrow” spoke in favor of the need for the widest and most open discussion of basic income in Russia, as well as consideration for Russian pilot projects. Experimentation is essential to grasp the truth. The world’s support of basic income is constantly growing: US presidential candidate Andrew Yang, former US President Barack Obama, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Tesla founder Elon Musk and many other prominent figures from across the world have expressed interest and support in UBI.
Solovyev emphasized that BIEN and “Basic Income Russia Tomorrow” consider universalism and unconditionality as the main principles of basic income.
We would like to believe that Russian citizens, the scientific community and government officials will understand the importance of basic income for Russia. Basic income is really “a prologue to social policy of the 21st century”. Only the implementation of basic income will provide an opportunity to reduce social tension, eliminate social inequality, ensure equal rights for citizens, reduce poverty level and corruption in the country.
For Russia of this century, UBI is an essential policy.
