A/HRC/35/26 debated in 1943, Juliet Rhys-Williams proposed a basic income approach instead of Beveridge’s contributory welfare state plan.15 19. In the United States of America in the 1960s, Milton Friedman advocated a negative income tax, a concept that bears a close resemblance to a basic income. 16 In the late 1960s, Martin Luther King Jr. called for a guaranteed income as the solution to poverty. And by the end of that decade, Richard Nixon, the then President, came close to implementing a universal income supplement, but the scheme was defeated in the Senate by conservatives who thought the programme was too expensive and by liberals who thought the benefit was too low. C. The twenty-first century resurgence 20. In recent years, there has been a strong resurgence in support for the idea of a basic income. Its advocates include philosophers, economists, politicians, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, trade union leaders, futurists and others, and in addition to concerted promotional efforts by civil society groups, support has come from within governments in countries as diverse as Finland and India. Most strikingly, basic income proponents come from many different positions on the political spectrum, ranging from libertarians to socialists. 21. Scholars from different disciplines have played a key role in debating the merits of the concept and it is appropriate to undertake a brief review of their contributions. The most active proponent is a Belgian philosopher, Philippe van Parijs. In a highly influential paper in 1991 he focused on the fairness of making basic income unconditional, thus making it available even to those who opt to spend their life surfing waves. 17 Invoking the philosophy of John Rawls, he argued that “a defensible liberal theory of justice, that is, one that is truly committed to an equal concern for all and to non-discrimination among conceptions of the good life, does justify, under appropriate factual conditions, a substantial unconditional basic income”. 18 Others have strongly contested this element in the case for a basic income. 19 In a recent book, Van Parijs and Vanderborght go beyond the philosophical dimensions to explore the concept’s history, economic justifications and politics.20 22. While Van Parijs and Vanderborght write in the liberal-egalitarian tradition,21 basic income also has strong support from libertarians. Matt Zwolinski argues that in order to justify the system of property rights, it is necessary, as John Locke wrote, to leave “enough, and as good, in common for others”.22 Thus, a State-financed social safety net might be necessary. For that purpose, a basic income scheme would be preferable to the welfare state because the latter incentivizes wasteful competition among interest groups and is costly and invasive. 23 He avoids addressing questions of the design and implementation of a basic income system but is supportive of the approach developed by another libertarian, Charles Murray.24 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 8 Juliet Rhys-Williams, Something to Look Forward To: A Suggestion for a New Social Contract (Macdonald, 1943); and Sir William Beveridge, Social Insurance and Allied Services, HMSO Cmnd 6404 (1942). Discussed further in part III, section A, below. Philippe van Parijs, “Why surfers should be fed: the liberal case for an unconditional basic income”, Philosophy and Public Affairs (spring 1991), p. 101. Ibid., p. 102. David Piachaud, “Citizen’s income: rights and wrongs” (Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, London School of Economics, 2016). Van Parijs and Vanderborght, Basic Income. Ibid., p. 109. Matt Zwolinski, “Property rights, coercion, and the welfare state”, The Independent Review (spring 2015), p. 519. Ibid., pp. 524-526. Ibid., p. 527.