Accountability Practices in Public Child Welfare Services

The literature on child welfare caseworkers’ accountability practices is fairly scant. This article observes and unravels accountability in child welfare practices using interview data. Findings show that child welfare caseworkers (frontline workers) face multiple and conflicting goals and mandates imposed upon them by their organizations, systemic rules, procedures, their clients, and their own professional norms. There were conflicts among accountability sources and caseworkers manage accountability with multiple strategies. Most of the interviewees showed that they acknowledged the significance of accountability management. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Permanency for Children in Foster Care: Issues and Barriers for Adoption

The desired outcome for children in foster care is to be reunited with their parents or to be permanently placed in a stable home. Federal and state legislation directs increased efforts by the social welfare and judicial systems in the United States to act in the best interests of the child and to identify and reduce barriers to permanency. Records from two county dependency courts in Florida were examined and caregivers surveyed to identify issues that prevented them from adopting the child in their care, and to identify services that would have enhanced the likelihood of adoption. The findings and their implications suggest that more integration of the two systems and support for concrete assistance to caregivers are paramount to facilitating adoption of children in foster care.     

Talking With Teen Parents,Hearing Young Families: (In)forming Welfare Reform Through Local Relations

This article explores an engagement process undertaken by Australian government social workers in one disadvantaged locality prior to the introduction of federal “teenage parent” welfare reforms. The focus of engagement was to learn about young parents’ experiences and aspirations, and to draw on this to inform policy implementation. Findings from engagement, and how engagement between social workers and young parents impacted local policy implementation are discussed, including the subsequent development of family friendly school options. The authors suggest that problematizing early parenting may itself be “risky,” and may obscure opportunities for building on the parental role as a source of inspiration.     

Rethinking the livret d’ouvriers: time,space and ‘free’ labor in nineteenth century France

ABSTRACT

The paper analyses the control of labor mobility through the livret d’ouvriers (1803–1890): a sort of internal passport aiming to subordinate workers’ circulation to the abidance of contract terms. The effective enforcement of livrets had a limited scope for various reasons. Nevertheless, those same difficulties offer a privileged perspective from which to analyze the shifting meanings of freedom and coercion in relation to labor poverty. The politics of identification show that it has been necessary to politically act on the spatial organization of productive processes in order to control labor through time, reacting to workers’ mobility as a specific form of collective bargaining. Through the lens of labor defection we see the emergence of a form of integration deriving from the cash nexus, the vehicle of market concurrence. Such integration calls for a form of control which cannot be subsumed within common law and that is rather axed on the modulation of market pressure – which we analyze through the 1850 debate over advance pay. From this perspective, the issues of breach of contract, police identification and debt insolvency allow to rethink the notion of coercion beyond its penal criminalization and, consequently, to frame the continuities between the police des manufactures, and the modern welfare State.     

子代孝道类别对亲代福祉的影响探究——基于CFPS2014的实证检验

弘扬孝亲敬老传统美德在支持家庭养老保障机制的有效运转和提升老年福祉水平方面具有积极作用,亦是践行党的二十大报告中“弘扬中华传统美德,加强家庭家教家风建设”的有益探索。研究发现子代持有的孝道观念在具备相互性和权威性双元面向的基础上,可进一步被划分为“高认同型”“分化型”“矛盾型”“低认同型”四个潜在类别;“孝道—福祉增进效应”具有稳定性,子代对相互性孝道认同程度越高,其亲代产生高福祉水平的可能性更大;该效应在亲代群体间具有异质性,拥有养老资源较为匮乏的亲代,能够从孝道对福祉的正向效应中获得更多回报。下一步政策取向是强化新时代家庭观的制度保障,进一步发挥家风建设和家庭美德发展对实现代际之间紧密的情感联结和高度的责任认同的有效力量。     

Empowering local government or just passing the austerity buck? The changing balance of central and local government in welfare provision in England 2008–2015

This paper asks two questions: first, how did the balance of decision-making between central and local government in welfare policy in England change between 2010 and 2015? Second, to what extent has that led to divergence in the extent and manner of such provision? It finds significant areas of policy where local flexibility has been increased (such as council tax benefit, crisis loans, and funding for specialist housing), either through a change in the tier of government responsible, or ‘unringfencing’ of grants allowing local authorities greater discretion in whether to deliver particular services, although in other important areas decisions on welfare remain firmly centralized. It also concludes that in areas where responsibility has been localized, divergence has been immediate and substantial. Localization may well reduce entitlements where local authorities enjoy a financial reward for so doing and political costs are low.     

Groundwater irrigation management in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia： A case study of Al-Wajid aquifer

Groundwater is the primary source for water irrigation in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. As a result of lack of basic knowledge on irrigation practices, massive abstractions of groundwater occurred in 1980s. A decision support linear programming （LP） model was developed to help in allocation of optimal groundwater irrigation use, to assess policies implication for water management efficiency, and to estimate welfare impact on producer surplus is developed. Due to massive abstractions occurring in 1980s, Al-Wajid aquifer water levels have dropped in agricultural areas by more than 200 m. The total groundwater of Al-Wajid aquifer that can be saved is equal to 158.7 MCM for the first scenario, 211.9 MCM for the second scenario, and 15,087 MCM for the third scenario. Regarding welfare analysis impact, it is clear that the second scenario alternative is the best alternative, since the value of the producer surplus is the highest for the two study regions and also the two type schemes of modern and traditional irrigation, except the traditional irrigation of Najran region.     

Will employers hire welfare recipients? Recent survey evidence from Michigan

In this paper we present data from a survey of 900 employers in Michigan during 1997. The survey was designed to gauge employer demand for welfare recipients. The results show that, given the tightness of labor markets there, the prospective demand for recipients is quite high—employers report that 3 percent of all jobs currently, and almost 9 percent over the following year, might be available to unskilled recipients. On the other hand, prospective employment is quite highly correlated with measures of unmet labor demand, implying that much of it could disappear during the next recession. Many of the prospective jobs are also found in establishments to which innercity minorities might have limited access, such as small or suburban establishments that receive few black applicants or that recruit informally. Absenteeism and basic skill readiness are potential problems, based on jobs filled by recipients to date or those that are potentially available. The effects of a variety of potential policy responses targeted at private employers (such as job placement efforts and tax credits for employment or training) are considered as well. © 1999 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

The role of complexity theory and network analysis for examining child welfare service delivery systems

Abstract

In response to the ongoing call for a complex systems approach for understanding and informing child welfare practice and policy, this article presents a context-specific conceptual framework that combines complexity theory and network analysis. The conceptual framework rests on the complementary nature of these theoretical and methodological concepts for inter-organizational child welfare practice. Potential applications of this framework are discussed to promote network-oriented research that informs effective collaboration among organizations serving children and families.     

How to Realize the Legislation Objectives of The Charity Law an Inspiration Based on Related Japanese Legislation

The Charity Law of China attempted to use a large number of regulatory and supportive provisions to realize its legislation objectives of promoting charity. However, based on the relevant Japanese comparative prospective of related legislation, this paper argues that The Charity Law of China cannot clearly define “the concept and extent of charity” and “the extent of forbidding charities damaging the public interest”, and it also fails to reach basic agreements on “regulations and rules about qualification of charitable donations”. Therefore, the administrative departments are likely to create some vague discretion, which will further affect the development of charity.