New Labour's teenage pregnancy policy: constituting knowing responsible citizens?

Carabine, Jean (2007). New Labour's teenage pregnancy policy: constituting knowing responsible citizens? Cultural Studies, 21(6) pp. 952–973.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09502380701470635

Abstract

This chapter explores the changing governmental approach to the problem of teenage pregnancy in the UK. It argues that there has been a shift from moral traditionalism towards individualized approaches based on promoting responsibility, agency and prudent choice-making. New Labour's approach to teenage pregnancy marks a decisive turning point in governmental regulation, documenting the failure of previous approaches and establishing three distinctive discursive strategies: risk management through knowledge acquisition; constituting active knowing welfare citizens; reconstituting blame. The paper ends by examining how this approach forms part of New Labour's combined and contradictory project of 'modernizing the social' and 'remoralizing welfare'.