What do we mean by responsibility? The case of UK housing benefit reform

There have been increasing attempts by the UK government to link welfare provision to personal responsibility, trying to alter behaviour through the introduction of new policy instruments. This paper explores what it means to be responsible and what implications this has for policy. The first part of the paper discusses the UK government’s 2002 proposals to reform Housing Benefit and how the document refers to responsibility. In the second part I discuss what we mean by responsibility and explore some of the philosophical complexities of the concept. In the final part of the paper I attempt to suggest what form of responsibility is implied in the reform proposals and what implications this has for the proposed policy.