The book draws on the results of a five-year programme of research supported by the Webb Memorial Trust as well as a wide range books, surveys, research experience and anecdotes.

It argues that the social administration approach to meeting social needs through centralised state policies and the neoliberal one (focused on growth, free market and low tax) have lost their purchase among the public. The most urgent task is therefore to articulate a new, more inclusive view of what a good society is. Drawing on a range of sources Knight argues that people demand (i) a decent basic standard of living, (ii) to be secure and free to choose how to lead their lives (iii) to develop their potential and flourishing materially and emotionally, (iv) participating, contributing and treating all with care and respect, and finally (v) building a fair and sustainable future for the next generation.

Chapter 1 provides a snapshot of the evidence on support for the welfare state and on people’s understanding of poverty. It argues that (1) the language that informed the development of the welfare state has lost its power and support, (2) the way that organisations working to reduce poverty describe their work may be doing more harm than good and that therefore we need to reframe the way we think about and discuss poverty. Although Knight presents in the first two chapters interesting research highlighting the clustered and diverse views of the UK in regards to poverty and how to reduce it, these first two propositions are not discussed in a comprehensive or reflexive way but given the length and focus of the book it would be too much to expect this. For example, the first point has been the subject of several publications in the last few years (e.g. Deeming, Reference Deeming2015), which drawing on attitudinal surveys shows a decline in the support for social security. Hudson et al. (Reference Hudson, Lunt, Hamilton, Mackinder, Meers and Swift2016) recently provoked further thoughts on whether we did indeed see a gradual decline in support or whether the fact that that the British Social Attitudes data was first collected in the 1980s has created a fake sense of steady decline of support for the welfare state. In their review of pre-1983 polls they present tentative evidence that the 1980s saw a surge in welfare state support and that health and pension reforms were always likely to be more supported than family allowances. Indeed, a very substantial minority of people were unwilling to pay more taxes for social benefits. This type of evidence could be used to argue that the UK’s current social services and benefits were developed over a long time, a time during which support was mixed and the concept of deserving and undeserving was very much alive. Knight instead argues that overall this shows declining support for welfare state spending since the 1960s, although a more fitting test would be to ask if people in the UK, once presented with clear information, would actually support repealing social security benefits that increased support for the poor since the Beveridge Report.

The review of the evidence on solutions to eradicating poverty presents a short but interesting summary. The conclusion seems to be that poverty is endemic to consumerist capitalism and that the welfare state cannot possibly end poverty by simply increasing spending. Once again the aim of the review is not to be systematic or nuanced. Knight concludes that there is no evidence out there on how to reduce poverty. Both social security measures and growth-centred strategies are therefore deemed to fail. This section suffers from the lack of a discussion of evidence from other countries: for example, countries with lower relative poverty figures. However, as Knight acknowledges, the book is meant to start a dialogue and to convince us that a better dialogue about poverty would beneficial. This attitude is key to enjoying the book because this is not a book aimed at convincing academics through detailed evidence and carefully crafted arguments. Once we set aside some of the sweeping statements from the first two chapters, it’s plain to see that the book clearly does not argue that the aim of reducing poverty should be abandoned. Indeed, the participatory research work presented in the book may be read as presenting clear support for the welfare state, including a benefits system that is needs-based and compassionate, childcare that makes work possible, a right to decent and affordable homes, providing for basic human needs. According to the 2015 YouGov survey commissioned by Knight and colleagues 90% of people think this is important, while only 25% think that this is the case in the UK. The real contribution of the book is the articulation of a different type of language which may bring together and empower a range of actors from opposite sides of the political spectrum in achieving a good society free of poverty.

Whether the actual society we should aim for is radically different from a society which does not exclude people from participating in one’s community because of lack of resources is not the concern of the book. This means that despite Knight’s attempt to differentiate his message from the one of current poverty researchers and advocates, the overall message of the book may sound incredibly similar to what the latter have been advocating for decades. But if the newly advocated language centred around security, fairness and independence can lead to widespread consensus on how we can stop people being excluded from society and communities this should not matter so much.

The book begins to reveal its real strength towards the end, where Knight provides a pragmatic review of the responsibility of business, planners, voluntary and community sector, fairness commissions and community activists in creating a good society. Knight discusses debt advice and counselling, financial aid schemes as well as insightful examples of community participation and engagement. It provides voices from the field and a wide range of anecdotes. The vision he articulates is of a central government that ensures security and decent housing for all citizens and a vibrant local government which has more responsibilities and gives more power and control to local people. Given that Knight argues that the current language used by poverty experts is too negative and that a more positive and empowering language (based on security, fairness and independence) should be used instead, the book could have benefited from asking whether contemporary movements which demand a better society (e.g. gender equality and environmental sustainability) have also gathered support using a similar language or have instead advocated the eradication of what is deemed negative. Nevertheless, the book has the potential to enhance conversations about poverty between a wide range of actors.