Personal budgets in adult social care: the fact and the fiction of the Care Act 2014

ABSTRACT

Personal budgets have been heavily promoted in government policy in England as a means of increasing the personalisation of public services, particularly in the field of adult social care. The Care Act 2014 for the first time creates a statutory requirement for personal budgets to be allocated to all individuals using state funded social care. This article examines how a particular rhetoric has developed in social care policy around personal budgets, which draws freely on the language of the disabled people’s movement and suggests that grassroots ideas are the central purpose for the introduction of personal budgets into policy. It considers whether the promises made in policy are embedded in the 2014 Act and finds that there is a mismatch between claims in social care policy on the one hand and the model of personal budgets created by the 2014 Act on the other. It concludes that the policy rhetoric around personal budgets directly appropriates the language and ideas of the disabled people’s movement while promoting a wholly distinct agenda of public sector marketisation.     

中国文化背景下的社会工作赋权:文化相关性与本土化策略

赋权是社会工作领域的重要概念和实务方法。在中国文化背景下对案主进行赋权需要充分考量中西文化的差异,采取具有文化相关性的本土化策略。我国传统文化中的"赋权""权利""道法自然""无为"等思想与西方文化中的"个人主义""权利"观念存在显著区别。由此,在对个体进行赋权过程中应检视个体自我意识与家族意识的关系,对个体进行赋权的同时应强调案主的主体性。此外,通过引导案主觉察自身所处的客观环境,提高他们的自我意识、注意力与移情能力,在此基础上承担自我责任,进而推动问题的解决。     

Studying Peace in and with Central Eurasia: Starting from Local and Trans-Local Perspectives

ABSTRACT

In view of a crisis of liberal universalism peace research must reflect on how it is perceived, how peace is constructed in other places and how it can cope with diversity in ordering and peacebuilding. This Special Issue is an attempt to search starting points for peace research in and with Central Eurasia. The introductory concept clears a path through current research questions, normative problems and barriers of knowledge production. Considering ethnographic methodologies, it starts from the local everyday and takes an interest in how actors and institutions in concrete places and multiple socio-spatial configurations navigate conflict and peace.     

A political economy for social movements and revolution: popular media access,power and cultural hegemony

Abstract

One key marker of mass social movements transitioning to participatory democratic governance is popular media access. This essay argues that democratic media access by public constituencies becomes a site for constructing social revolution and simultaneously a manifest empirical measure of the extent of democratic participation in the production, distribution, and use of communication with new cultural possibilities. The participatory production practices (with citizens producing and hosting their own programs) and the democratic content (of oral histories, local issues, critiques of government and business, and everyday vernacular) reflect the hegemony of emerging ‘Bolivarian’ twenty-first century socialism expressed as popular participation in media production. Bolstered by constitutional changes and public funding, popular social movements of civil society, indigenous, women, and working class organizations have gained revolutionary ground by securing in practice the right of media production. Findings indicate that public and community media (that move beyond alternative sites of local expression and concerns) provide a startling revolutionary contrast to the commercial media operations in every nation. Popular media constructions suggest a new radically democratic cultural hegemony based on human solidarity with collective, participatory decision-making and cooperation offering real possibilities and experiences for increased equality and social justice.     

What Makes a Key Player in Interorganizational Social Policy Networks? The Case of Uruguay

ABSTRACT

Networks of organizations involved in public policy implementation require strong interaction, concerted action and high degrees of collaboration to be effective. However, little is known about how different types of organizations involved in implementation of multi-sectoral social policies interact in these networks. In this article the relationship between organizational characteristics and network position is explored, as well as how the intensity of collaborations can also determine organizations’ involvement in networks. The nature of funding (public/private) and the remit of activity of organizations are found to determine their influence and importance in social policy networks. Furthermore, the network position of the organizations also depends on the level of intensity of their interactions. These results can guide public administrators when developing and promoting networks to involve a particular type of actor and also policymakers as to which types of ties are more aligned with the implementation of a particular policy.     

Leaving Europe: New Crises,Entrenched Inequalities and Alternative Routes of Social Mobility

Abstract

This article addresses conceptual issues around contemporary forms of out-of-Europe migrations of various European publics. In particular, we ask how such moves contribute to both the decentring of Europe in migration debates, and to the ‘de-migranticization' (Dahinden, 2016 Dahinden, J. (2016). A plea for the ‘de-migranticization’ of research on migration and integration 1. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 39(13), 2207–2225. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2015.1124129[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) of the social scientific study of migration. This article also serves as the introduction to this special issue entitled “Leaving Europe: Alternative routes of up/outward mobility” that aims to document ethnographically new forms of European emigration and shed light on an imaginary of Europe which is not conceived as a place of prosperity and success but rather as a locus of disempowerment.     

Trapped between Promise and Reality in Colombia's Victims' Law: Reflections on Reparations,Development and Social Justice

Colombia's 2011 Victims' Law aims to return land to millions of internally displaced people and assist survivors in the difficult process of rebuilding their lives through individual and collective reparations. This article analyses the expectations, experiences and needs of two campesino communities involved in this process. Drawing on nine months of fieldwork using ethnographic and participatory visual methods, the article critically engages with transitional justice theory on transformative reparations, and identifies key lessons for the Colombian government to make the Victims' Law live up to its promise of transforming survivors' lives and restoring their trust in the state.     

乡村振兴中的社会治理体系建设

乡村振兴,治理有效是基础。持续的工业化、城镇化、市场化、信息化,加速了农村社会的分化,加之日益加剧的人口稀疏化、老年化,乡村大有衰落之势。在社会治理领域,农村内部矛盾不断增多,包括村霸在内的黑恶势力严重影响农村社会治安,各种突发公共安全事件频繁发生,基层社会治理领域的问题复杂多样,乡村治理面临巨大挑战。国家实施乡村振兴战略两年多来,围绕社会治理,制定并出台了一系列大政方针,为乡村有效治理指明了方向。按照共建共治共享社会治理制度的基本要求,在“七位一体”社会治理体系的总框架下,完善党组织领导的“三治”结合的乡村社区治理体系,落实县乡村联动的乡村治理工作体系,横向上要建立健全权责清晰、体制顺畅、多元互动的乡村社会治理体系,纵向上要建立健全指挥有方、服务到位、上下联动的乡村社会治理体系。     

Solidarity and Social Networks: The Invisible Backbone That Ethiopians and Eritreans in Washington D.C. used to Transform Adams Morgan and U Street

Abstract

This research depicts the social networks that the Ethiopian and Eritrean communities use to establish and support ethnic and non-cultural businesses in Washington D.C. It also showcases the solidarity expressions that, behind-the-scenes, sustain and help strengthen these migrant-led businesses in the area. Furthermore, it describes the opportunity structure found in Washington D.C. that has allowed Ethiopians and Eritreans to open businesses and progress in neighborhoods such as Adams Morgan and U Street. The study uses ethnographic research comprised of participant observation and in-depth interviews to analyze 20 case studies of successful Ethiopian and Eritrean entrepreneurs in D.C. This paper describes the characteristics of an immigrant community that is underrepresented in the literature, especially regarding its entrepreneurship; it underscores the special role that family and kin play in supporting their entrepreneurship; and it makes visible the impact that Ethiopians and Eritreans have had in some areas of Washington D.C.     

Tackling the Big Questions in Social Impact Bond Research through Comparative Approaches

Abstract

This special issue of theJournal of Comparative Policy Analysis brings together four cross-disciplinary articles representing the first concerted attempt to combine comparative approaches to extend theoretical and empirical understandings of Social Impact Bonds (SIBs). SIBs are investment-backed payment-by-results projects and have been subject to vigorous academic debate on their appropriateness and efficacy since the first SIB launched in 2010. This introduction to the special issue outlines the state of the academic literature on SIBs, identifying gaps and suggesting five big questions that do not yet have satisfactory answers: (1) What are the administrative or political problems to which SIBs respond? (2) Where and why do SIBs emerge in particular contexts? (3) What is the role of SIBs in the evidence-based policy movement? (4) Is delivering an intervention through a SIB more effective than other means and are associated costs justifiable? (5) Do SIBs catalyse wider organizational, system, or institutional changes? This introduction then summarizes the articles included in this special issue, discusses how they respond to these big questions, and suggests that further comparative research might best address remaining gaps in the literature.