URL and Caritas address the problem of the social divide

Barcelona, 13 March 2015. Experts from URL and the charity organisation Caritas agreed that the social divide is a cross-cutting issue that remains unresolved, despite signs of economic recovery, and identified the need for a structural change in the economic model, during the Seminar on Social Divide organised jointly by Càritas Diocesana de Barcelona and Ramon Llull University (URL) at the Blanquerna-URL Faculty of Communication and International Relations.

URL Rector Josep Maria Garrell opened the event and stressed that seminars like this are needed to raise awareness throughout the university community about social problems "not to find a definitive solution, but to raise issues that deserve to be studied from the research field."

Msgr. Salvador Bacardit, the Episcopal delegate of Càritas Diocesana de Barcelona, recalled the Caritas campaign "Help us to help" to insist that conferences such as this can assist in examining the causes of this social reality.

Have we emerged from the crisis? Are we emerging from the crisis? "When people ask me these questions, I say that there is no short answer, because the situation is very complex" said Francisco Lorenzo, coordinator of the study team from Caritas Spain and the FOESSA Foundation, who gave a talk on the research conducted in the Seventh Report on social exclusion recently published by this Foundation.

Mr Lorenzo added that certain data indicate that there is growth, that jobs are being created and that poverty is being reduced, but that there are victims we cannot forget. Mr Lorenzo lamented that "A triumphalist attitude that we are emerging from the crisis is both unethical and self-serving".

Two out of three people in poverty were already in that situation before the crisis began. According to Mr Lorenzo, what is destroyed in times of crisis does not recover therefore economic growth must be channelled towards excluded groups.

In fact, the social divide is widening. "Poverty is more an economic term that only measures part of social exclusion. Poverty is multidimensional and does not refer only to job creation. Social decline extends to other areas - exclusion from the job market, from the consumption of politics, education, housing, healthcare, social conflict and social isolation."

Mr Lorenzo added that our prevailing social, economic and cultural model is wrong, in spite of pre-crisis macroindicators that suggested that some progress was being made. "It is better to live in a shanty town than in the street. Precarious work is better than having no job. Is that the model we want?" he asked.

There is a contradiction between the public sector's intention to be responsible and ensure the welfare state and its opposition to any measure to increase the tax burden or create new taxes. It is true that we have lived beyond our means, but we also have a model that prioritises the individual above the common good.

Round table with experts from various disciplines

The Social Divide, understood as the distance between a particular population group that is socially integrated and another comprising the excluded, has causes and consequences in four key areas: political, economic, sociological and technological.

This was the starting point of the round table moderated by Andreu Ibarz, General Director of Blanquerna-URL, which included the participation of various experts from URL and Caritas.

Òscar Mateos, lecturer and Associate Dean for Research and International Relations at the Pere Tarrés-URL Faculty of Social Education and Social Work, addressed the contextual elements (global and local, in a historical perspective) that help to explain the current social divide and argued that, in essence, this means the breakdown of the social contract of the few last decades within the European context. Mr Mateos believes that we are witnessing a mobilisation or a realisation of the situation, but warned of another crisis that no one is addressing and is environmental in nature "Our way of life is not universally applicable" he said.

Àngel Castiñeira, a lecturer at ESADE-URL, has linked social division to changes in the workplace and the emergence of a new class called the "Precariat". Dr Castiñeira recalled that the social divide is a much more cross-cutting concept that is generating unease: "The social divide does not respond to people without education - it is the middle classes who must keep up the pace."

Albert Florensa, a lecturer at IQS-URL, spoke in further depth about inequality and its destructive effects on society, following the ideas of Branko Milanovic, Richard G. Wilkinson and Kate Pickett.

"I will not give any details, and Caritas does have figures. Today I want to talk about divided lives." These were the opening words of Mercè Darnell, head of the area of Programmes and Services of Càritas Diocesana de Barcelona. Ms Darnell focused on people and the fact that these divided lives are the fault of divided responses that are nothing more than cosmetic approaches to the problem. Ms Darnell feels that the phenomenon of impoverishment and exclusion in situations such as child poverty, energy, housing, food, etc. are seen as separate issues, but they all add up to the same thing.

Jordi Riera, Vice Rector for Academic Policy at the URL, focused his presentation on research underway by the Research Group on Education, Innovation and Society with the support of the Information and Communications Technologies - PSITIC Blanquerna-URL. The principal investigator of this group stated that there is 15% relative poverty and 25% child poverty; in other words, one in four children have been in this situation for years. Mr Riera was optimistic in assuring that there is a model that will make it possible to escape poverty. "This historical chronic poverty that remains beyond cycles of economic boom is not acceptable. We have to work together to better address this painful reality". Mr Riera would like to see a relational state to rebuild the social contract.

The hash tag used during the event was #FracturaSocial [#SocialDivide].

For further information:
Anna Tosca
Head of Press and Social Networks Office
Ramon Llull University
Tel. 936 022 228 | 692 671 597
atosca@rectorat.url.edu | twitter.com/uramonllull