Political Practices of Care: Needs and Rights*

Abstract. In this paper the authors argue that the exploration of the nature of needs and rights should begin with the actually existing organization of care and of justice in society. The authors raise two key concerns with this organization: 1) the invisibility of care to some, and 2) the inaccessibility of rights to others. Recent work by care scholars has called attention to the ways the current organization of care work perpetuates the myth of self‐sufficiency for some, while reducing others to mere dependents. Law and Society scholars have demonstrated the problems of uneven access to legal remedies within the current organization of the legal system. Addressing these concerns simultaneously reveals both the problems of the current organization of needs and rights as well as illuminating alternative possibilities. The authors argue, first, that a justice perspective, based on rights is inadequate because its presumed universality is belied by the reality of the inaccessibility of rights to many. Second, the authors argue that a care perspective, currently formulated upon the assumption that only some people have needs, is also flawed because its presumed particularity distorts the human experience and subsequent policies. Instead, the authors need to conceive of care in a public way that permits both rights and needs to be understood as applicable to all. The authors propose some initial thoughts about how to create such a public concept of care.     

THE DEMISE OF THE DISPARATE IMPACT THEORY

Books reviewed in this article: Book Reviewed in this article: Shortly after this article was completed and accepted for publication, Congress passed the 1991 Civil Rights Act. In order to understand and appreciate the significant implications of the new legislation, it is first necessary to review the legislative and litigation history of disparate impact discussed here. Immediately following is a legislative update entitled “The Resurrection of the Disparate Impact Theory?”     

Still Causing Trouble: The Conservative Parliamentary Party

There have been relatively few backbench rebellions on the Conservative benches in the Commons since 2001, but division manifested itself on three significant occasions: over the Children and Adoption Bill (when the leadership insisted on applying a whip to a vote that many thought should have been 'free'), over Lords reform (where on a free vote a majority of Conservative MPs voted against their leadership's preferred position) and over Iraq (where the divisions were smaller than on the Labour side of the House but where there was a qualitative dimension to the rebellion). Most importantly of all, the events of October 2003, when Iain Duncan Smith was removed as party leader, showed how much power remained with Conservative MPs: they initiated the vote of confidence, in which they alone participated, and the emergence of Michael Howard as the 'unity' candidate meant that the grassroots were denied any role in the change of leadership.     

The visibility of agricultural subsidies and market illusions in the Common Agricultural Policy: Some evidence from farmers' views in Germany, Portugal and the United Kingdom

Abstract.   This article demonstrates that the design and nature of agricultural support schemes has an influence on farmers' perception of their level of dependence on agricultural support. While direct aid payments inform farmers about the extent to which they are subsidised, indirect support mechanisms veil the level of subsidisation, and therefore they are not fully aware of the extent to which they are supported. To test this hypothesis, we applied data from a survey of 4,500 farmers in three countries: the United Kingdom, Germany and Portugal. It is demonstrated that indirect support, such as that provided through artificially high consumer prices, gives an illusion of free and competitive markets among farmers. This 'visibility' hypothesis is evaluated against an alternative hypothesis that assumes farmers have complete, or at least a fairly comprehensive level of, information on agricultural support schemes. Our findings show that this alternative hypothesis can be ruled out.