Backing Away From Equality

Abstract

In his early work in political philosophy, Amartya Sen advanced an interesting and provocative thesis – the egalitarian thesis. This is the claim that every conception of social justice that has received support in recent times is egalitarian. This paper argues that Sen's account of capabilities and his more recent critique of transcendental justice have implications for the truth of the egalitarian thesis. It also discusses how the rejection of the egalitarian thesis bears on the larger, and more general, issue of the overall plausibility of egalitarian conceptions of social justice.     

Back for the future: a client centred analysis of social welfare and family law provision

The landscape of legal advice provision is entering a period of significant change in England and Wales. Whilst there is a great deal of uncertainty about how the future landscape of advice service provision will evolve, there are lessons to be drawn from past delivery models.

This article first looks back at the period following the Access to Justice Act 1999, setting out a range of delivery models initiated following the Act, as well as research and evaluation conducted in the millennium decade. Findings are then presented from a comprehensive qualitative study on how people experience and deal with social welfare and family problems, and on facilitators and barriers to integrated advice provision, including inter-organisational working. This is explored through the lens of a delivery model which emphasised partnership and the pooling of resources and specialisms to meet client needs: the Community Legal Advice Centre model.     

Inmates' Social Background and Living Conditions

Central criminological theoretical approaches, such as strain theory, control theory and critical theory, have as precondition that offenders often are marginalized and belong to the lower classes in society. Particularly the prison population has been assumed to suffer from severe material and social conditions. In the case of Norway, the empirical evidence on this assumption has been scarce and a broader and systematic approach has been lacking. This paper presents findings from a survey of the standard of living among a Norwegian prison population. Conventional measurements of welfare are examined, including accumulation of welfare deficiencies and situation at release. The findings indicate that the prison population live under very poor conditions, and are confronted with major difficulties at release concerning housing, money and work. The interpretation is emphasizing the living conditions as opportunity structures where welfare deficiencies put limits to the individuals' possibility to govern their own lives. Hence, inadequate living conditions should not necessarily be considered as causes of crime, but as a narrowed opportunity structure where other choices are limited.     

The Emergence of Crime Victims as a Target Group in the Swedish Social Services Act

This article examines the political motives behind the introduction of crime victim support provisions in the Swedish Social Services Act. The findings derive from a case study of the preparatory material that prefaced the legal changes that were adopted in 2001. The result shows that the explicit purpose of the provisions was to consider measures to improve the support to crime victims. To some degree the provisions can also be explained by symbolic factors. In fact, most actors in the law-making process indicate that their motives were communicative and symbolic. Support to crime victims was presumably a complicated issue for the social democratic government. Because of the economical crisis in the early 1990s, there was no scope for reforms that implied high increased costs. Yet expanding the crime victim's rights in relation to the offender, such as toughening the penal law and promoting victim impact statements, was not in line with social democratic ideology. By enacting the provisions in the Social Services Act the government demonstrated that support to crime victims was an important area of concern. At the same time, the provisions did not involve any increased costs or strengthen the crime victim's rights in relation to the offender. In this way, the provisions became a mediator that solved a difficult political dilemma for the government.     

公益法律援助的职业理性——对话丹宁勋爵对法律援助的诟病

法律援助作为制度福利的一种,对其有着多种不同声音的评价。丹宁勋爵对法律援助的批评具有代表性。只有将具体的法律援助行为纳入公益法律进程中去才能对回应各种批评意见。文章从社会保障思潮的演变、法律职业主义理论与律师职业伦理的张力三个方面理性分析了公益法律援助的价值、根源与运作模式。     

The Effect of State Welfare Waivers on Family Earnings and Income Growth of AFDC Recipients, 1993-1995

SUMMARY

Many observers of welfare reform have argued that self-sufficiency on the part of welfare recipients is desirable. This would require, at least, that recipients' economic well-being not fall as a result of welfare reform. That question is addressed here by analyzing the impact of early state-level welfare waivers on the growth of earnings and income received by welfare recipients. Analysis of data from the Current Population Survey found that among welfare recipients (1) early work-related welfare reforms generally did not improve the growth in family earnings, and (2) waivers often had a small but negative effect on the growth of family income. Waivers were less detrimental for rural than for urban recipients. Since research has shown that rural employment and earnings generally lag behind urban areas, this is an interesting finding. It suggests that even though rural residents face greater barriers to employment, welfare reform has a smaller marginal effect on rural recipients.     

The School Enrollment Process for Group Home Youth

Abstract

When children are moved into a new group home, best practices would suggest that collaboration is required between public child welfare workers, group home staff, and school staff to ensure an appropriate educational setting for the child with minimal delay. The purpose of this research was to examine the amount of time between placement in a new group home and enrollment and attendance in a new school. The study also sought to better understand the reasons for delays when they occur. The study included data on 45 newly placed group home youth served in 26 randomly selected group homes in 3 counties in California. Data were obtained through case record reviews and interviews conducted with social workers, group home personnel, and school staff. The data suggest that the tools and legal codes designed to facilitate the process of enrolling group home youth in school frequently are not complied with or used. Delays in enrollment and attendance were common, particularly for youth requiring special educational services; inter-agency communication among responsible parties was infrequent; and all parties too often erroneously relied on others to carry out fundamental tasks associated with school placement. Suggested procedures are offered for public child welfare workers and other parties to improve coordination and educational outcomes for youth.     

The prospects of egalitarian capitalism in the global South: Turkish social neoliberalism in comparative perspective

Abstract

This paper studies the transformation of economic and social policy in Turkey during the 2000s. The policy mix that has emerged can be usefully conceptualized as social neoliberalism, combining relatively orthodox neoliberal economic policies and retrenchment of the protective welfare state (e.g. labour market institutions) with a significant expansion, both in terms of public spending and population coverage, of the productive welfare state (e.g. public health care). Therefore, social neoliberalism as a development model is distinct both from social democracy and orthodox neoliberalism. Its rise in Turkey during the 2000s is arguably best understood with reference to the interests of the AKP's support coalition, the salience of inequalities in access to public services, and the disconnect of social policy-making from civil society mobilization. Turkey's experience with social neoliberalism provides an important reference point for theorizing the ‘social turn’ that since the 2000s has occurred in many late-developing countries with now maturing welfare states, including Brazil, South Africa, Mexico and Chile.     

Economic crisis,domestic politics and welfare state changes

Abstract

This essay re-examines the debate over the relationship between economic crises and welfare system changes and the role of domestic political factors which may refract the wave of influence from economic crisis. While acknowledging the inherent weakness of research design in a single case study, this study cautiously contends that an examination of the Korean case reveals that domestic factors continue to play an important role in welfare policy-making, even when decisive global economic forces are at work. Theoretically, this study argues not only for the continued theoretical relevance of the state-centered theory, but also in favor of a more integrated and configurational approach.     

Discourses of morality and truth in social welfare: the surveillance of British widows of the First World War

Drawing on Sarangi and Slembrouck's work on the language of State-sanctioned bureaucracy, this paper will explore one of the ways in which this developed in Britain in the early twentieth century. Looking in particular at the war widows' pension scheme as implemented under the Royal Warrant of 1916, this paper will explore how the first (financially) non-contributory pension, and the first specifically directed towards women in Britain, developed a system of State-sanctioned surveillance and parsimony that continues to this day. The data used draw upon a number of individual case studies, showing how the State saw part of its role as the obligation to subject women to scrutiny and judgement, making infidelity and misbehaviour grounds for the denial of their widows' pension. As this article will explore, a wide variety of agents positioned themselves as, in some way, responsible for the moral surveillance of widows and even the most gossipy reports appear to have been treated with some degree of seriousness. This article will illustrate how a “new” type of bureaucratic relationship developed between State and citizens in the early twentieth century that remains in place a century later.