Paper short abstract:

The excitement around cash transfers as an expansionary innovation in social policy ignores the fact that the poor themselves can be wary of such policies. We explore this reluctance in South Africa, arguing that it stems from the moral role of work in people's cosmologies and social categories.

Paper long abstract:

The case is building for expanded forms of social protection. The ILO is a strong supporter of creating universal social protection floors, the World Bank is enthusiastic about cash transfers to the poor, and an increasing number of NGOs, experiments and supporters are springing up around the world promoting unconditional cash transfers and universal basic income grants. However, despite the excitement generated by positive results in experiments and the triumphalism of development scholars who claim that this is a quiet revolution across the South (Ferguson 2015; Hanlon, Barrientos and Hulme 2010), not only have cash transfers been rejected repeatedly by policy makers, but they are at times viewed with suspicion and disdain by the poor, the very people who stand to benefit the most from universal grants and transfers.

This paper builds on in-depth qualitative work in South Africa's informal settlements and villages to explore the poor's reluctance around the idea of universal cash transfers. In particular it focuses on the construct of the "lazy" person to explore the link between the rejection of cash grants and the moral role that work plays in people's cosmologies and social categories. The moral goods in question are thus not generosity and equity, but rather just desserts and industriousness. We argue that the moral role of wage labour has been largely ignored in both academic and policy debates around cash transfers, but is a vital factor in garnering - or losing - both grassroots and political support for the universalization of social welfare regimes.