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UNIVERSAL BASIC INCOME AND THE CONCEPT OF CITIZENSHIP Michael Goldsmith University of Waikato INTRODUCTION Following the October 1996 New Zealand general election, the Briefing Papers for the new Minister of Social Welfare, Roger Sowry, were released. Newspapers reported them to contain a reference to something called a Universal Basic Income (UBI). Anticlimactically, however, the mention of UBI in the Briefing Papers amounted to the following paragraph (DSW 1996: 22): Basic income regimes, otherwise known as Universal Basic Incomes, where everyone receives a modest benefit from the government to cover basic needs, can reduce high abatement rates and accommodate casual or part-time employment. However, they are costly and can discourage people from working or earning more. A variant that targets those with part-time work capacity or with irregular or unpredictable earnings, but avoids the cost of a universal scheme might be feasible. An optional basic income, with a lower rate of payment and rate of tax that is around or marginally above the top general tax rate, could be made available to a defined group, such as sole parents. This approach is worth exploring. While many proponents of UBI would have welcomed the last sentence, the most striking feature of these comments is their demonstrable unfamiliarity with the concept and its history. First, it is difficult to see how a variant that targets those with part-time work capacity or with irregular or unpredictable earnings could work except by means of an extremely cumbersome bureaucratic system, thereby depriving UBI of the simplicity that is one of its most attractive features. Second, a targeted version of UBI is no version at all. While universalism is as contestable a notion in the field of social welfare as elsewhere, UBI-type proposals only make sense in relation to an eligibility regime that strives for inclusiveness. Inevitably, therefore, the issue of citizenship - the question of who falls within the