Suchergebnisse

In Money In Their Own Name, Wendy McKeen examines the relationship between gender and social policy in Canada from the 1970s to the 1990s. She provides a detailed historical account of the shaping of feminist politics within the field of federal child benefits programs in Canada, and explores the critical issue of why feminists' vision of the 'social individual' failed to flourish. Canadian social policy, as in most western welfare states, has established women's access to social benefits on the basis of their status as wives or mothers, not individuals in their own right. In her analysis, McKeen underscores this persistent familialism that has been written and rewritten into Canadian social policy thereby denying women's autonomy as independent claims-makers on the state. She further demonstrates the lack of contest by the women's movement toward this dependent status, and the consequent erasure of women from social policy. McKeen effectively weaves together sociological theory with substantive examples from political discourse. She uncovers overlooked aspects of Canadian social policy politics and subsequently extends our understanding of politics and political change. At the same time, by synthesizing the concepts of discourse, agency, and policy community, she offers a new analytical tool for approaching the shaping of political interests.

This article analyzes the politics surrounding the 1970s/early 1980s introduction of work-incentive measures for "welfare mothers" in Ontario. It uses governance and assemblage theory to analyze the substance and dynamics of the debates in this area as they involved state officials, social policy and social welfare advocates, and welfare mother activists. Using a wide array of archival documents and media accounts, the article uncovers the discursive and other kinds of practices that government officials used in seeking to contain the debate and foreclose more radical possibilities, as well as the role that progressive groups sometimes played in reinforcing official expertise. The article concludes that the work incentives for welfare mothers measures were not just benign policy but mechanisms that screened out the political and, ultimately, further disempowered and marginalized welfare mothers. Such programs operate to this day to reinforce a worldview that ignores structural oppression and inequality.

Cet article analyse la politique entourant l'introduction des mesures d'incitation au travail pour les «mères aidantes» en Ontario dans les années 1970 et au début des années 1980. Il utilise la théorie de la gouvernance et de l'assemblage pour analyser la substance et la dynamique des débats dans ce domaine, car ils impliquaient des représentants de l'État, des défenseurs de la politique sociale et de la protection sociale et des mères activistes. À l'aide d'un large éventail de documents d'archives et de comptes rendus des médias, l'article révèle les pratiques discursives et autres que les fonctionnaires ont utilisées pour contenir le débat et exclure des possibilités plus radicales, ainsi que le rôle que les groupes progressistes ont parfois joué dans le renforcement de la compétence officielle. L'article conclut que les mesures d'incitation au travail pour les mères aidantes n'étaient pas seulement des politiques bénignes mais des mécanismes qui filtraient le politique et, en fin de compte, rendaient les mères aidantes encore plus démunies et marginalisées. De tels programmes fonctionnent à ce jour pour renforcer une vision du monde qui ignore l'oppression structurelle et l'inégalité.

This paper examines the struggle in Canada over ideas about social policy. It takes the view that debates held at the meso level of the policy community are important sites for exploring how dominant ideas about social problems and social policy are shaped. This paper examines one specific debate (the late 1990s debate on the national children's agenda) to explore how the mainstream conceptual ground has shifted. It argues that progressive constructions of the issues and solutions have been increasingly undermined, as an outcome of both the narrow 'child development' focus of the debates and the success new actors have had in gaining credibility as voices in the social policy community. The result has been a shift in how dominant social policy actors think about social policy, with the shift gravitating towards a simplistic, individualized, casework model. This new diminished understanding has had implications for narrowing the scope of political debate about social policy in Canada and encouraging the development of policies that fail to address the root problems.

Impact on women of the principle of individual entitlement regarding social benefits advanced in EC policy directives. Some focus on the feminist movement.