Proposed Title
Welfare without the Welfare: The Intersection of People and Unemployment Policy
Supervisors
Principal Supervisor - Dr Donna Bridges
Co-Supervisor - Dr Wilson Dobud
About my research
My research examines how people receiving unemployment benefits experience Australia’s unemployment welfare system in their day to day lives. It focuses on interactions with Centrelink, job providers, and mutual obligation requirements, and how these shape people’s routines, choices, and sense of control. The study aims to understand the subjective experiences of unemployment welfare recipients and how policy settings affect everyday living.
The research is based in Western Sydney, my local community. Western Sydney, particularly the Blacktown and Mt Druitt areas, experiences higher levels of socio-economic disadvantage, including above average poverty rates and long-term reliance on welfare benefits. Focusing the study in this context allows close attention to how unemployment welfare operates in places where contact with the system is most frequent and systemic.
Using a narrative approach, the study examines and tells the stories of how welfare policies are understood, managed, and lived over time by the people who are receiving them. It examines the theoretical underpinnings of unemployment welfare policy, drawing on neoliberalism, paternalism, and governmentality to understand how bureaucracy is experienced by the people who live within it.
The research is informed by my lived experience of poverty and welfare reliance, alongside academic and professional engagement with the welfare system. It also aims to inform policy decision making by drawing attention to people’s subjective experiences that are rarely considered in unemployment welfare policy.
Why I chose Charles Sturt
I chose to undertake my Doctorate at Charles Sturt University because of its strong emphasis on applied research that engages with real-world social issues, particularly socio-economic disadvantage.
As a CSU alumnus, having completed my Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Graduate Certificate at the university, I have developed a strong connection to the institution and benefited from sustained academic support across my studies. My research, which examines how people experience systems of disadvantage, is shaped by both my professional practice and my lived experience growing up within contexts of socio-economic disadvantage.
I am interested in understanding how systemic disadvantage is produced and maintained, and in contributing to research that informs practical and policy responses. CSU’s focus on applied, community-engaged research and its commitment to addressing social inequality align closely with my values and research aims, making it a suitable environment to continue my academic development and contribute to work that responds to structural disadvantage.
