Set up to fail? Responsibilisation, debt and home loss in the social rented sector

Abstract

This article contributes to an understanding of the effects of the ‘responsibilisation agenda’ on social housing tenants in the UK, drawing on their testimonies to offer an evaluation of the impact of policies designed to discipline them into taking responsibility for maintaining their tenancy. While the focus of the investigation is on the UK, the themes explored herein will resonate with those in developed economies, including Australia, the US, and the Netherlands, that have experienced attempts by the state to transfer responsibility for managing social problems and risks to the individual. What our data reveal is that the responsibilisation agenda has proven, in practice, to be both incoherent and counterproductive. Rather than empowering social tenants to take responsibility for meeting their housing needs, it has reinforced the structural causes of rent arrears, creating a spiral of debt that is, for some, both inevitable and inescapable. These tenants, are, in effect, being set up to fail. The article concludes by arguing that our data serve both to evidence the consequences of the responsibilisation agenda for social housing tenants, and the value of putting the voices of those with lived experience of housing debt at the centre of policy reform.