Punitive penal preferences and support for welfare: Applying the ‘governance of social marginality’ thesis to the individual level

Abstract

The individual has, until recently, been generally excluded from law and society explorations of the twin increases in penal and welfare punitiveness. However, public opinion enjoys an implicit role in policy change that is only now beginning to receive attention. This study explores the presence and nature of the correlation between attitudes toward welfare and penal policy at the individual level in general and across time. Using individual-level data from the General Social Survey (1972—2006), this study concludes that individuals’ punitiveness in penal policy preferences is well correlated with opposition to welfare spending, and that this relationship has persisted across time, though with significant variation. Moreover, we find that much of the correlation across time is due to cross-policy punitiveness, and that cross-policy welfarism is responsible for only a small (though growing since the late 1990s) portion of the correlation. We suggest that further research exploring this correlation may help us to understand the mechanism that links penal and welfare policy at the state level as well.