Reforming Welfare Bureaucracies: The Seebohm Report Outcome

In: Policy studies journal: an international journal of public policy, Band 9, Heft 8, S. 1250-1261

Abstract

An analysis of several critical unresolved issues facing social services departments (SSDs) that were established in England & Wales following the publication of the important 1968 Seebohm Report. Three main issues are discussed: (1) the boundaries of welfare bureaucracies; (2) the impact of qualitative organizational change; & (3) the dilemma of social conscience administration. SSDs were set up within an era dominated by the "social conscience" policy -- an optimistic belief that the central problems of welfare have been solved, & that change is cumulative & in the direction of greater generosity & wider purpose. However, an alternative analysis of SSDs leads to the concept of social breakdown, a state resulting in institutionalization. This is distinguished from another category of needs, social discomfort, which embraces problems of isolation & loneliness. Questions are raised as to the appropriateness of governmental intervention in "discomfort" problems, & the failure of government to intervene in all the categories of breakdown. The establishment of the new SSDs, which replace smaller & less complex agencies, is analysed as a qualitative organizational change. In particular, the phenomena of "missing" levels of work & lack of administrative capacity are discussed. Examples of the conceptual challenge to current administrative beliefs are given, & an outline of a theory of levels of response to social need is provided, with illustrations. Modified HA.