Book review: Cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment? Benefit sanctions in the UK
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1388262719870696 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
Book reviews
Michael Adler, Cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment? Benefit sanctions in the UK, 2018, Palgrave Socio-
Legal Studies, Basingstoke, U.K., 171 pages, ISBN 978-3-319-90356-9.
Reviewed by: Gijsbert Vonk, University of Groningen, the Netherlands
DOI: 10.1177/1388262719870696
This is a book about social security sanctions in the UK. It delves deep into the dark layers, which
have been deposited by years of activation policies pursued by governments on both sides of the
British political divide. Emphasising personal responsibility, these policies introduced increasingly
stringent behavioural conditions coupled with ever stricter sanctions for those who fail to meet the
activation expectations mounted upon them.
The author, who is one the two editors of this distinguished journal, wastes little time in making
clear that the world of sanctions is not a pretty one. Already in the title, this world is associated with
cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. This phrase derives its meaning from one of the absolute
human rights in international law: the prohibition of torture, also laid down in Article 3 the
European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). This is a hefty claim. But the author does not
set out to develop an intricate human rights argument from a legal point of view. The title is a
teaser, which disappears after the introduction and only reappears again in the conclusion. Its
purpose is not to argue that the UK sanctions regime violates Article 3 ECHR in the strict sense of
the word, but that this regime defies the very notion of justice. The chapters in between serve to
provide the evidence for this statement.
Whatever the opinions of the author are, they are always supported by logical reasoning and by
a variety of empirical evidence and anecdotal illustrations. This is the strong point of this book. It
can be seen as 360-degree reconnaissance of the world of sanctions. It approaches this world from a
variety of angles: public opinion, historical development, incidence and scope, conceptual impli-
cations, effectiveness, administrative justice, minimum legal standards, a comparison with court
fines, the rule of law and, finally, policy alternatives. The mixed normative/empirical scope makes
the study genuinely a socio-legal one. Some empirical evidence is secondary, in the sense that it
relies on other studies and reports, such as the studies carried out within the framework of the
Welfare Conditionality Programme of Peter Dwyer et al.
1
Other evidence, particularly in
the chapter on the impact and effectiveness of benefit sanctions, relies on official data from the
1. Available at http://www.welfareconditionality.ac.uk/
European Journal of Social Security
2019, Vol. 21(3) 289–303
ªThe Author(s) 2019
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/1388262719870696
journals.sagepub.com/home/ejs
EJSS
EJSS
To continue reading
Request your trial