This is a CTP of initiative: BIEN/Vereniging Basisinkomen (Netherlands)
The CTP is about the publication of the article ‘Why we should give free money to everybody’ by the Dutch critical author Rutger Bregman. The article was published on October 14th 2013 in the online critical journalism bulletin ‘De Correspondent’. According to the interviewee, it was a CTP because this article reinvigorated a societal discussion on the basic income social innovation that had faded away into standstill. “well, that has been a very much read and discussed article. With that article the discussion on the basic income in the Netherlands, which for a long time had been silent, really took off again. It has also been translated into English, receiving a publishing prize...This article has really brought home that that basic income, that it really is something. Before that, for a long time it was just not even mentioned in the media, and now it suddenly became a hot issue”. The article gave an important impulse to the Dutch basic income debate for its appealing writing style, its convincing use of concrete examples, and its visionary-utopian approach. It can be considered an example of evangelizing.
The publication also contributed to the particular turn towards basic-income inspired experimentation and pragmatic activism, through the activist call of “why don’t we just do it”. The article “also referred to many examples of other experiments taking place”, Reminding the public of experimentation undertaken elsewhere, and the existence of basic income initiatives in other places in the world, this CTP achieved a certain legitimization/reputation for basic income-related experimentation. It did a certain agenda-setting of how to practically pursue the basic income concept.
The interviewee considers that this CTP was to a large extent the achievement of a singular individual, starting a societal discussion on a topic nearly non-existent in the public sphere.
Still, the actions of the social innovation initiative and BIEN affiliate VBI, and the European civic petition for basic income undertaken by Unconditional Basic Income Europe (UBIE) had prepared the ground, through awareness-raising activities in the preceding years (2011-2013). “Before that article, there was just nothing out there about the basic income , as far as I can remember. Well, except that the VBI [Basic Income Association] has long been existent of course, and always has been occupied with this [giving exposure to basic income]...and there was that civic petition going on in Europe, of course...that’s how I myself became involved..that also had its impact, surely, but the real broad discussion was triggered by that article”
Apart from the ground-preparing work of VBI in creating attention for the basic income, another important actor that contributed to this CTP possible was the publication platform for critical journalism, the Correspondent. This newly launched online publishing platform was itself attracting much attention with its new media concept. “The Correspondent, that was a quite new phenomenon, a new form of media, a new concept, that in itself attracted quite some attention for its quite profound reports. Well, amongst a small part of the public, the progressive, intellectual public – which of course plays an important part in societal debates.” The online publishing concept was so important for the CTP to happen, as “that allowed it be read by many people, and shared online by many people...so, it kind of went viral then”. “Over a few months it spread rapidly, and it is still shared a lot now [2,5 years later] ...whilst an article in a regular newspaper, that is being shared for some two days, or a week maybe, and after it is being surpassed by other articles.” The new journalism concept, involved engaged, change-oriented journalism with an online distribution, empowered the article into becoming an influential CTP, apart from its own strengths.
Even if very much a one man’s achievement, the CTP was also amplified by another perfectly matching and powerful media platform. “I’m inclined to really giving him [Bregman] the credits for this CTP. He has really started the fire. Of course, as the discussion came up, other people have joined in to play their parts...(...) surely there were various people ready to join in ...(...) but this CTP, that was really Rutger Bregman did it – well, together with the VPRO Tegenlicht documentary makers [Cf. ‘related events], I should say, and the Correspondent.”
Next to the aformentioned online publishers of the Correspondent, the series of critical documentaries by VPRO Tegenlicht were important facilitating platforms for the diffusion of Bregman's message. Both platforms formed “perfect matches”, for their engaged, profound research journalism that typically challenged dominant institutions and ideologies.
Societal developments that somehow evoked the CTP or facilitated the success of the article are difficult to point out for the interviewee. “Well, maybe the economic crisis, and the search for alternative systems, that is one thing, one could hypothesize...” “These basic income-inspired experiments in particular, these have very much to do with dissatisfaction about the current social security arrangements ..but this article, that’s not so much addressing these social security issues – it rather sketches that future vision, that utopia, as Bregman calls it, that we in the Netherlands could be heading towards”. The general awareness of crisis seems to have been a circumstance that facilitated the CTP, Apparently the publication was very timely with its openly utopian approach. Somehow there must have been a growing interest in society for this utopian message, for this search for alternatives out of the crisis.
There were not significant preceding events to this CTP, the interviewee indicates, it came quite out of the blue. Apart from the aformentioned awareness-raising activities in 2011-2013, the very absence of contemporary, recent writings and the lack of debate on the basic income can be marked as a preceding ‘event’. Around early 2013, as he started writing, Bregman’s conclusion of a lacking or evaporated basic income debate can be marked as a related event. The standstill encouraged him, there was a clear lacuna to fill. “He told me once, as I recall, that he was just busy reading a lot about the topic, and as he was Google-ing it, he found that there was nothing out there... that there was nothing to be found in the Dutch literature, until some 10 years back...”
The interviewee adds that he is well aware that a more intensive debate on basic income in the Netherlands took place in the 1990s (see earlier CTPs). To him the CTP was rather a starting point that evoked further events that were important in the Dutch basic income social innovation process. Bregman's article had a ‘ripple effect’, setting in motion a series of media events [see the timeline] that made the basic income into a ‘hot issue’ from the 14/10/2013 publication onwards until the present. “Well, I assume that at one point the VPRO Tegenlicht documentary makers have contacted Bregman, some time after that article publication, and so it can be said to have evoked that first television broadcast of them, which in turn had that ‘ripple effect’ – and of course that later book of his, which also had much influence”. Immediately after the CTP (the article publication) took place, there followed some two or three months of intensive media coverage and discussion. Around that time, the article was picked up by the documentary makers of VPRO Tegenlicht. The article’s nomination for the European Press Prize award for the English translation, in the first half of 2014, added to the wide exposure.
A further event that increased the impact of the article was the publication of Bregman’s book on ‘free money’, on 15/09/2014. Especially that book release evoked various other communications by the ‘old media’, like television and newspapers. In fact, there is been a rather continuous following and reacting by other ‘traditional’ media – from soon after the CTP until the present, but with a peak after the September 2014 book publication. The CTP was the “pebble in the pond”, making waves. Notable media events that were directly evoked by the CTP are –amongst many others – the three episodes from the Tegenlicht (‘backlight’) documentary series. These were broadcasted on national television by the VPRO leftist-progressive broadcast organisation, who also broadcasted through internet.
Importantly, the Tegenlicht documentary makers also organized public discussion evenings on the documentaries in collaboration with societal debate platforms, inviting opinion leaders, researchers and people from basic income advocating initiatives to stage the debates. The first were in Amsterdam, but after the second documentary, once the basic income –inspired experimentation plans of municipalities started to gain attention, they were also being organised in various other Dutch cities. Especially after the second Tegenlicht documentary, on 21/09/2014, the organization of meet-ups continued for months. “This first Tegenlicht episode, a Tegenlicht ‘lab’ episode, this is a documentary that Bregman was almost the director of...he got the opportunity to come explain the concept. The second episode was not exclusively dedicated to Bregman, but has been due to the success of that first episode. So, these events are directly related to the success of his article, and the last ones that could be connected to it, are these ‘meet-ups’ that the VPRO Tegenlicht organized. “
These documentary discussion meet-ups have in turn incited several other important events – see the CTP on the experimentation network that formed partly through these events. “Some of the meet-ups, they in turn have led to, amongst others, that I initiated that motion within the D’66 party, that I came into contact with MIES [basic income –inspired experimentation initiative], and many, many other connections between people have been developed around these meetings (..)...some have actually been a direct facilitator of subsequent experimentation initiatives, or have been inducing these discussions within municipalities.”. The second documentary seems to have been particularly influential for the overall development of the basic income discussion and activities in the Netherlands, as the theme of experimentation was prominent in that episode. “That one showed what was actually going on worldwide with that basic income, that it is considered more broadly as an idea that could be realized somehow...it was a reportage, not some Lab with Rutger Bregman, it showed things in Canada -Switzerland not, I think-, but they did cover Alaska, and it featured some economists with some comments on feasibility...(...) Well, during the meet-up after that second one, there we were really talking about the experimenting”. And then in the many meet-ups after the third episode, held in many places in the Netherlands, “there it was really about, hey, how can we do this in our municipality. By then a lot of enthusiasm had developed within various municipalities already, but then it really expanded further ”. The last-meet-ups, in the stage in which there were already many plans for experimentation in municipalities, featured relatively more local politicians, and citizens considering how their municipality could follow suit.
Finally, an important related event was the interviewees' initiative towards a motion in the D’66 (progressive-liberal democrats) party to be in favour of basic income inspired experimentation. It exemplifies how the media 'hype' on the basic income was intertwined with the formation of a network of people aiming for concrete experimentation projects. ·
The article publication gradually changed from a ‘trending topic’ discussion to political issue. Especially once the discussion sparked initiatives towards concrete action and experimentation, it became more a subject of political debate and political parties to relate to. “The discussion around that article publication, they took place mainly on the social media , in people’s homes...it was not yet a thing that the major political parties felt that they should speak out about. Initially it was rather like, hey, this is an odd idea, a nice idea...” The 'money for free' provided a new framing of the basic income that evoked some controversy and contestation, but at first the provocative idea mainly evoked interest for its 'shock value'.
The ‘money for free’ framing has been a mixed blessing for the promotion of the basic income discussion, the interviewee feels. Bregman’s expression ‘free money’ is “a ‘strong term’, in the sense that it attracted a lot of media attention. It simply appealed to a great many people, whether for fame or notoriety...but on the other hand, that expression has also drawn the [basic income] subject into the realm of controversy, it has made some people shy away from the topic, sometimes very strongly, in the sense of ‘this is outrageous’.” The ‘money for free’ framing has been a mixed blessing, as on the one hand, its ‘shock value’ generated attention, exposure and facilitated the ‘going viral’ of the basic income. On the other hand the framing had the negative side-effect of somewhat taking out the nuance in the debate – also alienating certain political strands that in principle needn't be that much offended by the basic income concept.
The ‘money for free’ framing was not only radical be also provocative, and therewith creating resistance. The article publication incited contestation as it made the basic income appear as a left-wing project rather than as the concept that crosses political divides - a political multi-sidedness that VBI and other affiliates of the BIEN network like to underline. Especially the right-wing-conservative-liberals – the major political strand in Dutch politics at the time -were offended by the money for free’ storyline. Such controversy and resistance did not occur in Finland, another country in which initiatives towards basic income experimentation are undertaken. The interviewee considers it relevant that the ‘money for free’ storyline did not enter into the debate there. In the Netherlands, the basic income concept has become identified a a bit of a left-wing-progressive initiative – a political colour that he considers not intrinsic to the concept. In other words, the article publication affected the identity of the basic income, and of those promoting it.
Before he published that article, the writer Bregman was unknown to the interviewee. He only learned later that this young author had in fact already made his mark with some publications. The CTP thus came unexpected to him; it happened through a new actor entering the scene of basic income discourse.
Neither was immediately obvious to the interviewee that the article publication was or would become a critical turning point. “It was obvious that a basic income discussion was triggered by it, but on the other hand, that discussion could have faded soon after, just as well. That has all happened earlier. (...) That ‘ripple effect’ [of media attention], neither I myself nor others saw that coming, even if we did perceive that something was happening there.” That ripple-effect, it has been a quite continuous, ongoing process. As such it is hard to say for the interviewee when he saw it starting, but it became evident to him around the third episode of the Tegenlicht documentaries, and during the meeting with the municipalities at which which he and other experimentation-minded actors discussed how to proceed and realize the experimentation ambitions. Giving it a second thought, he thinks he became aware of the ripple effect even earlier on, end 2014, as the network of experimentation-minded actors had already started to form [Cf. CTP and related events on the basic income- inspired experimentation].
Considered further, he thinks that the article publication was initially only of 'critical' significance in a quite limited circle, confined to particular social strata or groups in society, before it started to have wider effect. The event was particularly meaningful in leftist, intellectual, progressive circles: the earlier CTPs in the BIEN/VBI timeline clarify this, as the basic income discussion in the Netherlands has a longer history in which it has flared up through influential publications.
The main lessons the interviewee draws from this CTP, is that even such a publication can make that much of a difference. “The thing that I learnt...is that something like that is just possible...and that, if somebody has that idea whose time has come apparently, for which there turns out to be much interest, that only little things [like this article publication] can set this avalanching process in motion. Well, it’s not that simple, there always need to be people who pick it up, and pick it up once more, etcetera. But still, the apparent fact that something little like that publication can have such a large impact on the longer term...that is to me the big lesson here”.
A related lesson for him is that individuals by themselves – "and in this case it happened to be Rutger Bregman", - can make such a difference.
A third lesson resides in the convincing, persuasive and evidently appealing line of reasoning and new framing that the writer of the article presented. The interviewee is a policy entrepreneur for basic income-inspired experiments who has succeeded to have himself crowd-funded for two years of this full-time social innovation activity. Being a crucial actor in the formation of a broad network of experimentation initiatives and being concerned with the gaining of political support for these initiatives, he is very much concerned with the strategic-political issue of finding the right discourse, tone and approach. In these respects he has learnt from the CTP how to frame his social innovation, and what line of thinking to promote. “Neither Bregman nor myself are really basic income activists. We’re both people who try to get the discussion in motion, and to incite concrete action. And instead of claiming, ‘this is what should be implemented’, it’s more the approach of ‘try to look a bit further’. This is reflected in the way in which he writes about it. He presents the basic income as a direction, an orientation, and that has also been a reason for me to talk about it in those terms - as an orientation. To move beyond the ‘Basic income Yes or No’, and instead see what we can achieve with this concept, and how can we start working with this, and put it into action."
This introduction of an inquiring, experimentation-minded attitude to the basic income and the associated framing of it as an orientation further underlines how the article publication was a CTP. The VBI, just like most BIEN members, are more principled in their approach, convinced as they are that an unconditional basic income should be implemented rather than explored and experimented with. (See the Backhaus & Pel 2016 case study on BIEN and basic income initiatives in Germany and the Netherlands).
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