Financialization as Welfare - Social Impact Investing and British Social Policy, 1997-2016

Foreword

Acknowledgements

Contents

Abbreviations

List of Figures

List of Tables

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Financialization and Social Impact Investing

2.1 What is Financialization?

2.1.1 Financialization in Markets and Institutionalist Perspectives on Capitalism

2.1.2 Financialization Beyond Markets and the Role of the State

2.2 Social Impact Investing in the UK: Linking Financialization and Institutionalist Scholarship

2.2.1 What Is Social Impact Investing?

2.2.2 Social Impact Investing and Social Policy Dynamics in the UK

Chapter 3: Financialization, Fields, and Change

3.1 Fields and Financialization

3.1.1 The Use of Fields for the Study of Financialization

3.1.2 Neo-Institutional Field Theories and Their Limitations

3.1.3 Fligstein and McAdam´s Alternative

3.2 Strategic Action Fields and Financialization

3.2.1 Financialization Revisited

3.2.2 Social Skill, Cooperation, and Field Interdependence

3.2.3 Settlements and Field Dynamics

3.3 Understanding the Void: Cooperation, Opportunities, and Mechanisms

3.3.1 Opportunities and the Problem of Horizontal Cooperation

3.3.2 Pragmatist Mechanisms and the Emergence of Cooperation

Chapter 4: Methodology and Research Methods

4.1 Abductive Analysis

4.2 Research Process

4.3 Research Design

4.3.1 Single Case Study Design

4.3.2 Material

4.3.3 Data Analysis

Chapter 5: The Financialization of Welfare

5.1 The Field of Social Impact Investing in the UK

5.2 Social Impact: Definitions and Governance

5.3 Social Impact Investing and Redistribution

5.3.1 Financial Intermediation

5.3.2 Capital Mobilization and Public Subsidies

5.3.3 Private Subsidies

5.3.4 Labor and Redistribution

Chapter 6: Financialization as Welfare

6.1 Entrenched Social Problems

6.1.1 What Counts as a Social Problem

6.1.2 What Does Not Count as a Social Problem

6.2 Theorizing Causes: The Impact and Investment Narratives

6.2.1 The Under-Investment Narrative

6.2.2 The Impact Narrative

6.3 Financialization as Welfare

6.3.1 Celebrating Disruption: The Social Innovation Discourse

6.3.2 Prognostic Framing: Impact Investing and the Solution of Social Problems

6.3.3 Motivational Framing and the Impact Investing Field Frame

Chapter 7: Field Emergence and Stabilization

7.1 1997-2002: Policy Innovation and Disparate Fields

7.1.1 Setting the Stage: British Social Policy Around the Millennium

7.1.2 Precursors of Social Impact Investing

7.2 2001-2005: Contesting Social Enterprise Policy and Public Service Delivery

7.2.1 Social Enterprise: Settling the Rules, Expanding the Scope

7.2.2 Early Dynamics in Social Investment and Social Enterprise Finance

7.2.3 Treasury Appropriating Social Policy: Towards Hybridization and Resonance

7.3 2006: Critical Juncture

7.3.1 Unclaimed Assets and the Birth of Social Impact Investing

7.3.2 The Office of the Third Sector: Hybridizing Social Enterprise Policy

7.4 2007-2010: Piloting Social Impact Investing

7.4.1 Gordon Brown as Prime Minister

7.4.2 Creating Resonance for the Financialization of Welfare

7.4.3 Bridging the Disconnect: The Birth of Social Impact Bonds

7.5 2010-2016: Field Expansion

7.5.1 Conservatives and the Emergence of a New Settlement

7.5.2 Maintaining Investors´ Expectations Through Subsidies: The Leveraging State

Chapter 8: Financialization, Resonance, and the Emergence of Cross-Field Ties

8.1 Pragmatist Mechanisms and Cooperation in Social Impact Investing

8.2 Resonance

8.3 Resonance Spaces and Field Dynamics

8.4 Resonance Spaces and Financialization

Chapter 9: Discussion and Conclusion

9.1 Implications for Sociological Theorizing

9.2 Implications for Financialization Scholarship

9.3 Limitations and Future Research

9.4 Is Social Impact Investing a Bad Thing?

Appendix A: Central Government Subsidies

Appendix B: Cited Material

Interviews

Sample 1

Sample 2

Appendix C: Analyzed Material

Data Set 1

Data Set 2

Government Strategy Documents (Labour Government)

Government Strategy Documents (Coalition Government)

Government Strategy Documents (Conservative Government)

Speeches

Election Manifestos (winning parties)

Government-related Commissions

Public Bodies and Regulators (alphabetically)

Legislation and directives

House of Commons

Other Commissions

Social Organizations Discourse (alphabetically)

Social Impact Investing Actors

Think Tanks

Unions

EU Organizations

References