What is the value of lived experience knowledge for welfare policy making in Australia? In recent years, there has been a growing recognition that people with lived experience have valuable insights which could be tapped into to improve the design of the policies which impact them. In some social policy domains - such as mental health, disability and health policy - engaging those with lived experience in policy design has become common practice. This is not the case in welfare policy making in Australia. The 2023 Final Report of the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme called on the Australian Government to establish a mechanism to engage welfare recipients in the policy process: where those with lived experience of welfare could inform the design of the policies which impact them.

However, even if such a mechanism existed, would the perspectives and insights of those who have been persistently marginalised by welfare stigma be considered valuable by policy makers for policy making? And furthermore, what does that value even look like?

This research project is exploring what value (if any) insights from lived experience of long-term unemployment welfare can offer welfare policy making in Australia. Through a multi-method, qualitative design, I will seek to better understand lived experiences of long-term unemployment and welfare, and then compare this with established policy practice and formal narratives on welfare reform. This study is field based, involving in-depth interviews with long-term recipients of JobSeeker Allowance. Following Bacchi’s What’s the problem represented to be approach, I will also undertake a critical policy analysis of key moments of welfare policy reform to explore how welfare and unemployment has been understood by policy makers in Australia. Exploring where lived experience offers insights and knowledge that differ from established policy thinking – where recipients understand things or hold knowledge that policy makers do not – provides an avenue to better articulate the value of lived experience knowledge for policy making.

In an increasingly complex world, policy makers need new ways to tackle ‘wicked’ policy challenges; new approaches for problem-thinking (rather than just problem-solving) are critically needed. The ‘other ways knowing’ offered by lived experience may provide the epistemic plurality needed to grapple with the complexity of long-term unemployment and intergenerational welfare dependence in Australia.

Biography - Gabrielle Lawrence

I am a PhD Candidate in the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University. I have over 15 years experience in the Australian Public Service, working across a diverse range of policy domains and portfolios. I commenced my PhD in 2023, and my research focus is how lived experience knowledge can be garnered to improve welfare policy making in Australia.

My research is supervised by Professor Janine O’Flynn (Crawford, ANU), Professor Ariadne Vromen (Crawford/ANZSOG, ANU) and Dr Liz Allen (Centre for Social Policy Research, ANU). I hold a Bachelor of Arts (Drama) and Bachelor of Social Work with Honours from the University of Queensland and a Masters of Philosophy and Public Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Meeting details:

In person: Seminar room 3, JG Crawford Building, Crawford School of Public Policy

Online Zoom:

https://anu.zoom.us/j/85900065269?pwd=z91pOohGoFgmoJ2h5VCCTaJrYfaR0g.1

Meeting ID: 859 0006 5269, Password: 709913