The wide range of developments in social policy has necessitated dividing this commentary into two parts. The first part will examine discrimination law developments; the second part, published inthe next issue, will look at general employment law developments.
AbstractThis article explores the way aspects of our approach to social policy in the UK have changed over the last 40 years – one academic lifetime and also, coincidentally, the lifetime of this journal – and the significance of six particular changes. More social problems have come to be seen as having a supra‐national dimension: the scale and ramifications of problems are much better appreciated; the accepted territory of social policy has greatly widened; the state has lost people's confidence; we have come to see organizational and management issues as much more important; and the health of the economy has come to be regarded as a greater priority than the development of systems of social welfare.
AbstractThe article deals with the connection between Judaism on the one hand and social policy and the development of social services on the other. The article deals with those aspects of Judaism that are specifically related to the foundations of social policy: the nature of interpersonal relationships as well as the relationship between society as an all‐encompassing framework and the individual who is a part of that framework.
The paper attempts the difficult task of identifying and exploring key resource factors which may influence social policy in the next millennium. It begins by critically examining the impact of demographic trends upon finance and demand for welfare in Europe. The possible impact of this is then examined in relation to the role of the family as a primary welfare resource and upon the supply of professional services. The implications of diminishing environmental resources are then examined and green social policy proposals are briefly outlined. However, the paper argues that the key resource is public goodwill and support for a range of social policy interventions. "The public" has been regarded as homogeneous in many surveys, but this paper argues that trends in middle‐class welfare support and welfare activity pose concerns for the future of welfare provision.
SummaryThe first part of this paper establishes the outlines of social policy in the course of the nineteenth century using Great Britain, Germany and France as examples, with particular emphasis on the differences arising from the varying political cultures of these countries. In the second part the paper attempts to establish comparisons for a generalized framework, also covering developments into the twentieth century. 'Social policy' in this instance means all state measures to safeguard the physical and social existence of employed workers on the basis of a criterion of fairness which is derived from their citizenship, it is political in other words. Safety ar work is as much a part of this as protection during illness, old age or unemployment. This study as a whole sets out to achieve some standardizations which will be useful in the analysis of the history of social policy and may also be helpful in the discussion of current socio-political problems.
Social Policy responses to AIDS are much in accord with prevailing practice in other areas, the constructs used are typical of crime and disorder rather than illness and treatment. This article analyses the implications of this particularly as it relates to policy on prevention. It questions the value of using analytic frameworks evolved in identifying moral panics and suggest that homophibic and racist social policy responses to AIDS link with a prevailing construct of dangerousness. This argument is related to the impact of AIDS and responses to it on the distinction between the public and private world. Finally AIDS policy is located within an analysis of public expenditure and a consistent emphasis on a presentation of generosity hiding a pratice of parsimony is identified.