How do human societies provide for the wellbeing of their members? How far can we organise the ways in which we care for and about each other? And who should take responsibility for providing the support we all need? These are some of the fundamental questions addressed by social policy today.
In this short introduction, suitable for students at any level, Hartley Dean explains the extraordinary scope and importance of social policy. He explores its foundations and contemporary significance; the principal issues it addresses and their diverse economic, political and sociological dimensions, and concludes by looking at the fundamental challenges facing social policy in a dramatically changing world.
Taking an innovative approach to social policy as the study of human wellbeing, Hartley Dean examines the ways in which governments and peoples throughout the world attend to, promote, neglect or even undermine the things that make life worth living. These include essential services, such as healthcare and education; the means of livelihood, such as jobs and money; and vital but sometimes intangible things, such as physical and emotional security. Some of these are organised by governments and official bodies. Others are provided by businesses, social groups, community organizations, neighbours and families. Trying to understand all these elements, which together constitute human wellbeing, is the stuff of social policy.
Hardback
Status
Available
Edition
First
Edition
ISBN
9780745634340
ISBN10
0745634346
Publication Dates ROW:
Dec 2005
Publication Dates US:
Dec 2005
Publication Dates Aus & NZ:
Feb 2006
Pages
176
pages
Paperback
Status
Available
Edition
First
Edition
ISBN
9780745634357
ISBN10
0745634354
Publication Dates ROW:
Dec 2005
Publication Dates US:
Dec 2005
Publication Dates Aus & NZ:
Feb 2006
Pages
176
pages
* Exam copies only available to lecturers for whom the book may be suitable as a course text.
Please note: Sales representation and distribution for Polity titles is provided by John Wiley and Sons Ltd.
`Hartley Dean's short introduction breathes new life into the study of social policy. Lively and entertaining, the book demonstrates the importance of social policy in tackling the big issues which affect our lives today: essential concerns, such as health, money and relationships; and pressing matters, such as poverty, the environment and crime. It provides a welcome reminder of the possibilities social policy offers for improving human wellbeing in the twenty-first century and should excite and enthuse all students approaching the subject for the first time.'
Polly Toynbee
`In this engaging and articulate book Dean has managed to capture in print the passion which has drawn him to the study of social policy. In a wide-ranging and informative account he explains what social policy is and why it is so important, and in so doing he provides inspiration for new generations of students and scholars to follow his example.'
Professor Pete Alcock, University of Birmingham
List of Figures and Tables
List of Boxes
Preface
Acknowledgements
1. What is Social Policy?
Hey, big spender!
Butterflies vs. Magpies
Who cares?
A good life
Summary
2. Where did it come from?
From barbarianism to civilisation?
The making of capitalism
The taming of capitalism
Welfare and ideology
Summary
3. Why on Earth does it matter?
The threat of globalisation?
Welfare regimes
Ecology and human welfare
Global Social Policy
Summary
4. What does human wellbeing entail?
Health and education
Income maintenance and employment
Housing and the environment
The 'personal' social services
Summary
5. Who gets what?
Sharing public goods
Where's the money?
Principles of distribution
How does it all pan out?
Summary
6. Who's in control?
The problem of power
Street-level organisation and local governance
The nation state and the policy process
Regional governance
Summary
7. What's the trouble with human society?
Diversity and difference
Class and identity
Inequality and exclusion.
Social change and the life course
Summary
8. Can Social Policy solve social problems?
The (de-)construction of problems
The righting of wrongs
Blaming the victim?
Crime and anti-social behaviour
Summary
9. How are the times a-changing?
The crisis of welfare
The 'new' Social Policy
Welfare pluralism and new managerialism
Post-modernity and 'risk society'
Summary
10. Where is Social Policy going?
Welfare without the state?
An anti-capitalist agenda
A Third Way consensus?
A politics of needs interpretation
Summary
References
Index
Hartley Dean is senior Lecturer in Social Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
