E-Galitarianism? The information society and New Labour's repositioning of welfare

In recent years, claims that epochal shifts in the socioeconomic landscape demand a reappraisal of the welfare state have become almost commonplace and postmodern, post-Fordist and postindustrial perspectives on the welfare state have all found a place in academic literature. However, while each of these discourses has noted the role of technological change in enabling the emergence of new societal models, in general the significance of such change for social policies has been overlooked. This article argues that there are significant connections between notions of a technologically driven information society and New Labour's vision for welfare. In support of this claim it considers New Labour's outlook on the role of the state in contemporary society and some of the specific policy mechanisms being put in place to help ease the `transition' to an `information age' and offers the notion of `e-galitarianism' as a label for their approach.