Introduction

This chapter examines how the republican theory of non-domination, as developed by Pettit (1999, 2012) and Lovett (2010, 2016) can be used for a normative analysis of welfare to work (WTW) relationships such as that between the social assistance recipient, the welfare officer (or frontline worker) and the work supervisor.

According to the republican theory of non-domination, relationships between citizens (horizontal relations), and citizens and the state (vertical relationships), should be guided as much as possible by the ideal of freedom as non-domination, defined as the absence of arbitrary power. In his book on domination and justice Lovett (2010) points out that the dependent party in a social relationship characterized by an imbalance in power (for example a WTW relationship), is at risk of being subjected to the exercise of arbitrary power of the dominant party, unless the social power that the dominant party exercises over the dependent party is constrained by effective external rules. Considering the implications of this argument for WTW relationships, this chapter first scrutinizes Lovett's (republican) theory of non-domination. Consequently, it is argued that Lovett not only focuses too much on rules as mechanisms preventing people from being subjected to arbitrary power, but his conception of rules is also (too) strongly rooted in the ideas of reasonability and impartiality. As a result, vulnerable people (such as recipients of social assistance) in particular are at risk of being excluded from its potentially protective scope. This argument is further elaborated by an analysis of Lovett's republican defence of the rule of law. After having examined Pettit's more inclusive, democratic account of the republican theory of non-domination, the chapter concludes that a republican normative analysis of WTW practices ideally takes account of both Lovett's and Pettit's approaches to non-domination, in that it considers both the need for rules protecting social assistance recipients and the need for democratic oversight of discretionary spaces of the welfare officer and the work supervisor.

In order to clarify the arguments, this chapter draws on empirical research on WTW practices conducted in the Netherlands between 2013 and 2018.