Key Themes in Social Policy, 1st Edition

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 First published 2013
by Routledge
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© 2013 Patricia Kennedy

The right of Patricia Kennedy to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in
accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Kennedy, Patricia, 1963–
Key themes in social policy / Patricia Kennedy.
p. cm.
1. Social policy. I. Title.
HN18.3.K46 2013
361.2′5—dc23
2012033397

ISBN: 978-0-415-52096-6 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-0-415-52097-3 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-203-59418-6 (ebk)

Typeset in Sabon
by Prepress Projects Ltd, Perth, UK
This book is dedicated to my wonderful daughter Millie.

And a special thank you to Conor, Dylan and Fionn for their love, patience
and support.
 CONTENTS

Introduction
Abbreviations

Active welfare
Agency
Altruism
Assistance payments
Asylum seeker
Autonomy
Basic income
Benefit
Beveridgian welfare
Bismarckian model
Black economy
Body
Bureaucracy
Capabilities
Capitalism
Care/carer/caring
Categorical benefits
Child allowances
Citizenship
Class
Claw-back
Collectivism
Commodification and decommodification
Communitarian
Community
Comparative social policy
Conditionality
Convergence
Corporatism
Crisis of welfare
Critical junctures
Democracy
Dependency
Deserving/undeserving
Disability
Discretion
Discrimination
Diswelfares
Division of labour
Earnings
Eligibility
Employment
Entitlement
Environmentalism
Equality
Ethnicity
Fabianism
Families of nations
Family
Feminism
Fiscal welfare
Flexicurity
Functionings
Gender
Globalization
Global social policy
Health
Household
Human capital
Human trafficking
Ideology
Individualism
Individualization
Keynesian
Labour
Liberal
Liberty
Lone parents
Male breadwinner
Maternity
Marxism
Masculinities
Means testing
Migration
Mixed economy of welfare
Models of welfare
Needs
New social movements
Occupational welfare
Path dependency
Patriarchy
Poverty
Power
Power resources
Public policy
Quality of life
Race
Rationing
Redistribution
Resilience
Risk
Selectivity
Sexuality
Social administration
Social assistance
Social divisions
Social exclusion
Social insurance
Social justice
Social policy
Stigma
Stratification
Sustainable development
Theory
Universality
Wages
Welfare regimes
Welfare state
Welfare/well-being
Work–life balance

Bibliography
Index
 INTRODUCTION

Key Themes in Social Policy introduces students to some of the themes

which come to the fore again and again in social policy studies. Social
Policy as a subject evolved from the subject of Social Administration,
whose beginnings can be traced back to the end of the nineteenth century.
Some of the early empirical studies were carried out in Britain at the end of
the nineteenth century and focused on poverty. However, if we look at
policies we see examples as far back as the Elizabethan Poor Law of 1604.
Social insurance was introduced by Otto von Bismarck in the nineteenth
century. If one reads the classic texts in Social Policy associated with such
writers as Richard Titmuss and Amartya Sen, more recent classic feminist
approaches by Fiona Williams, or comparative studies such as those
associated with Esping-Andersen, one recognizes themes emerging. If one
reads government reports, pieces of legislation, for example the Poor Law,
the Beveridge Report, Obama’s Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act,
or reports published by the World Health Organization (WHO), the
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the
International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Union (EU), the
International Labour Organization (ILO) and the World Bank, similar
themes emerge. Even though different views are evident and a range of
explanations and empirical evidence is presented, themes exist. After a
while, one may begin to recognize these, but, when starting out as a student
of Social Policy, it is useful to have signposts to help in grasping these
themes, identifying and managing them so that when they are encountered
one has a working knowledge and adequate understanding to progress.
This is the aim of this book. It is concerned with equipping students with
a basic knowledge when they are engaging with social policy literature and
documents in various guises. It is a reference book which introduces a
broad range of concepts and theories, which need to be identifiable,
accessible and comprehensible to students as they launch an investigation
into social policy at third level. It is a guide to a more comprehensive
treatment of the topic. The types of themes which emerge are in relation to
defining welfare, welfare states, systems and regimes, redistribution and
what it involves. Broader philosophical ideas on justice, equality, needs and
rights are introduced in an accessible way. They are presented
alphabetically as a useful, accessible resource for students.
This book is based on over thirty years of reading social policy in various
forms, and over sixteen years introducing key concepts and theories in
social policy to undergraduate Social Policy students. Any two people will
choose different themes; however, there are many viewed as central.
Concepts are abstract and so can be difficult to grasp. In my teaching I have
drawn on a broad range of writing on a multitude of topics. They come
from a range of social sciences, including sociology, philosophy,
economics, politics and social psychology. This book is aimed at
undergraduate students. In explaining the themes, concepts are presented
and explained. Concepts enable us to ask intelligent questions. We need
consensus on the possible meaning of the concept to ensure we have a
shared understanding. That is not to say that a concept cannot have a variety
of meanings and standpoints, but we need to know this. To make sense of
the empirical evidence in social policy we need tools to understand and
analyse. To do this we need concepts. Concepts are words, abstract ideas
which we use daily to explain, understand and analyse. Many of them are
the common everyday words used in conversation. Even the youngest
children claim they have rights: ‘that’s not fair’, ‘he got more than me’.
When we start to interrogate the world as policy analysts, we need clarity.
Social policy analysis employs concepts to understand, explain, construct
and deconstruct empirical evidence. This is the task of this book. It is
concerned with clarifying the true definition of the words used in social
policy debates. Defining concepts will help us to use them precisely, to
understand their theoretical underpinnings. Some words have lost meaning
through overuse; for example power, exclusion and equality. What do these
mean? Many of the concepts presented in this book are contested. They are
also interconnected. Although each section ends with suggestions for
further reading, each will contain references that can be found in the
extensive bibliography, which is a resource. There will be cross-referencing
when useful. I have incorporated texts stretching back over several decades,
which are the foundation stones of social policy. I draw on recent material
from relevant journals and organizations and introduce examples of policy
from around the globe. It is my hope that this book will serve as a launch
pad for Social Policy students and help them on their journey of discovery
of this very important academic subject.
 ABBREVIATIONS

European Union (EU)

Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
International Labour Conference (ILC)
International Labour Organization (ILO)
International Monetary Fund (IMF)
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
World Health Organization (WHO)
KEY THEMES IN SOCIAL POLICY
ACTIVE WELFARE

Related entries: Labour

Active welfare is an approach to welfare which is concerned with

encouraging welfare participants to take action which will move them
towards employment. The corollary is passive and raises assumptions about
what it means to be active in society. For example, those involved in caring
work and in voluntary work participate actively in society but, because they
are not engaged in paid work, are often perceived as inactive. The active
welfare subject is often described as a citizen, customer, stakeholder or
consumer whose responsibilities rather than entitlement are emphasized.
Active welfare is associated with active labour market policies (ALMPs),
which consist of a range of strategies which involve assistance, training and
employment initiatives to support the unemployed to enter/re-enter the
labour market. In its Jobs Strategy the OECD (1994) states: ‘A progressive
shift of resources is needed from passive income support to active
measures. Active labour market policies improve access to the labour
market and jobs; develop job-related skills; and promote more efficient
labour markets’ (http://www1.oecd.org/sge/min/job94/part2d.htm (2 of 4),
accessed 15 March 2012).
The European Commission adopted the concept of active welfare in its
European Employment Strategy (1997). This was promoted and reiterated
by the OECD in its revised Jobs Strategy in 2007. Active welfare stresses
that payments are conditional on participation in some kind of programme
generally associated with training and/or work. Conditions regulating
income protection schemes are linked to stronger work incentives and to
labour and targeted at specific groups of unemployed people. Welfare
recipients have to show they are trying to obtain work or are taking steps to
retrain and improve their employment opportunities by up-skilling. The key
components of such a strategy are as follows: registration for placement and
assessment of work availability as preconditions for benefit payment;
regular and intense interventions in the period of unemployment; explicit
regulations regarding job search requirements; direct referrals to vacant
jobs; referrals to ALMPs (including education, training and employment
programmes), with compulsory participation for some jobseekers (OECD,
2007). The OECD is an important source of information on ongoing
developments in this area.
Van Berkel (2009), in a comparative study of the UK, the Netherlands,
Denmark and Germany, indicates that active welfare is an international
phenomenon and, although it can take different forms, it always involves a
stronger integration of income protection and activation programmes
alongside increased conditionality criteria. Such strategies demand greater
cooperation between income protection agencies and those responsible for
activation programmes. Van Berkel argues that:

the shift from income protection to activation as the core objective of

policy interventions targeted at unemployed people implies that the
agencies involved in the provision of services for the unemployed have
to change their ‘core business’ and introduce new technologies for
social interventions.
(Van Berkel, 2009: 29)

Van Berkel differentiates between services involved in ‘people-sustaining’

activities, concerned with the well-being of clients, and activation, which is
concerned with ‘people-changing’ (Van Berkel, 2009: 9). He indicates that
with active labour market policies a more individual response is required,
which means making room for discretion.
Kelly and colleagues (2011) indicate that, although research on the
impact of active labour market programmes is far from conclusive, it is
possible to identify types of programmes that have been found to enhance
employment prospects of participants. Kelly and colleagues (2011) present
a useful typology for understanding ALMPs. On the one hand they identify
strategies to assist jobseekers to reintegrate into the labour market which are
encouraging and supportive and can include personal development-type
activities such as counselling, vocational guidance and individual action
plans, as well as job search programmes. On the other hand, a more
punitive approach involves monitoring attempts to seek work and these can
include forfeiting a portion of income for non-compliance. Sometimes