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This article introduces this themed issue which challenges government policies and discourses using evidence from the UK 2012 Poverty and Social Exclusion Study. Policies and discourses prioritising the role of individual deficiencies and highlighting the structural problems of the welfare state in poverty causation are nothing new. However, they re-emerged vigorously in the UK following the 2007–8 global financial crisis and ensuing economic recession. The articles forming this themed issue seek to challenge in different ways this prevailing discourse. This introductory article draws upon Bacchi's 'what is the problem represented to be' ('WPR') approach to examine the ways in which poverty was problematised by the Conservative–Liberal Democrat Coalition government (2010–15). It argues that this problematisation silenced structural processes associated with the government's commitment to neo-liberalism, resulting in devastating, socially harmful consequences.

Poverty and inequality appear to be intractable features of rich industrialised nations. It is a great paradox that despite rising prosperity in most advanced industrialised countries over the last two or three decades, poverty and inequality have remained stubbornly high and have even increased in the majority of rich countries (OECD, 2008, 2011). The United Kingdom and Japan are no exceptions to these trends. Despite having markedly different historical trajectories, there is evidence that the two societies are converging on the issue of these pressing social problems.

Cover -- Half Title -- Dedication -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- List of tables -- List of figures and CHAIDS -- List of contributors -- Foreword -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Chapter 1 Measuring poverty: Breadline Britain in the 1990s -- Chapter 2 The poverty line: methodology and international comparisons -- Chapter 3 The public's perception of necessities and poverty -- Chapter 4 Poverty and gender -- Chapter 5 Poverty and crime -- Chapter 6 Poverty and health -- Chapter 7 Poverty and mental health -- Chapter 8 Poverty, debt and benefits -- Chapter 9 Poverty and local public services -- Chapter 10 Adapting the consensual definition of poverty -- Chapter 11 Conclusions and Summary -- Bibliography -- Appendix I: Technical appendix -- Appendix II: Annotated questionnaire -- Appendix III: Additional tables

While the notion of social harm has long interested critical criminologists it is now being explored as an alternative field of study, which provides more accurate analyses of the vicissitudes of life. However, important aspects of this notion remain undeveloped, in particular the definition of social harm, the question of responsibility and the methodologies for studying harm. This book, the first to theorise and define the social harm concept beyond criminology, seeks to address these omissions and questions why some capitalist societies appear to be more harmful than others. In doing so it provides a platform for future debates, in this series and beyond. It will be a valuable resource for academics and researchers across criminology, sociology, social policy, socio-legal studies and geography

This challenging book brings together contributions from leading poverty analysts on inequalities in income, wealth, standard of living, employment, education, housing, crime and health. It charts the extent of the growth in inequalities and offers a coherent critique of the New Labour government's policies aimed at those tackling this crisis

Drawing on nationally representative surveys, this paper describes the contemporary relationship between gender and poverty in Britain and changes between 1999 and 2012. Poverty rates between men and women have converged: women today are only marginally poorer than men. Our analysis reveals that female lone parents' poverty rates remain exceptionally high, the situation of older women has markedly improved, and there is an emerging poor group of solo-living men. We therefore argue that gendered analysis of poverty needs to consider the circumstances of men as well as women, and that some of the standard feminisation of poverty arguments require revision.

Establishing what constitutes 'need' has been a long-standing tradition in empirical investigations of poverty. In their pioneering Poor Britain study, Joanna Mack and Stewart Lansley (1985) developed the 'consensual' or 'socially perceived deprivation' approach. This sought the views of ordinary people (as opposed to academics or professional experts) in determining the necessities of life. Their approach subsequently provided the basis for further UK poverty surveys, as well as studies in other counties in Europe, Australasia, Africa and Asia. Despite this international proliferation, comparative analyses examining public perceptions of need across different societies and cultures remain sparse. This article presents findings from the first Japanese–UK comparative study based on nationally representative surveys informed by Mack and Lansley's approach. It compares the necessities of life in the two societies, examining differences as well as common socially perceived needs, and explores two possible explanations accounting for the variations found. In doing this, the article seeks to contribute to international debates on public attitudes towards the necessities of life.

Utilising a political economy perspective in examining the UK's counter-terrorist strategy since September 2001, we argue that there are observable economic and political interests influencing the development and implementation of policy. Specifically, there are significant electoral gains to be made and also lucrative contracts to be won in the new security environment. These interests have culminated in the UK being both an 'importer' of policy from supranational and regional organisations, and other nation states – most notably from the US – and an 'exporter' of policy as a result of having achieved a certain level of kudos with respect to the Northern Ireland conflict.

Over the last 30 or so years the problem of violence against women and how states should respond to it, in its myriad of forms, has become increasingly prevalent in academic and policy debates at both the national and international level. An active international women's movement, spanning Europe, the United States and many parts of the Southern hemisphere, including in particular Latin America and South Asia, has facilitated this growing awareness of gendered violence as a social problem requiring intervention. In a separate, but ultimately related, development there has been a growing global concern with extending human rights protection to women as a distinct group with specific concerns and needs. As a consequence of these twin developments, the tendency for gendered violence to be seen as an essentially private affair requiring limited state interfe-rence has slowly, but increasingly, been superseded by the recognition that the state has been failing victims.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and address important gaps in criminology regarding the extent and nature of female criminality. A neglected area of academic interest is investigated, namely, offences relating to television licence evasion. The focus is on the growth, over the 1980s and 1990s, in the disproportionate number of women entering the criminal justice system for possessing a television without a licence. Thus, by 1994, 57% of all female criminal convictions related to television licence evasion. A number of factors are reviewed, however, the combination of the growth in poverty over the 1980s and 1990s, women's domestic routines, and the long‐term increase in female‐headed households seem to be the most plausible. Various solutions aimed at easing the licence fee burden on poor households are discussed.

The views of social workers in Chile are rarely heard and considered in the policy debates. This article addresses this lacuna by examining discourses of social exclusion and underlying assumptions held by social workers with responsibility for implementing social policy interventions in Chile. It draws upon the findings of a study involving interviews with senior social workers from two large non-governmental organisations (NGOs) tackling social exclusion. We found that individual-based narratives and neoliberal rationality are dominant in the implementation of Chilean social policy. At the same time, anti-hegemonic strategies pursued by some social workers were also identified. Such an approach is highly relevant in the Chilean context, in which power imbalances remain almost untouched since the return of democratic regimes in the 1990s. The study findings pose diverse challenges to Chilean social policy and social work professional training. The necessity of promoting transformative imaginations that favour collective practices of resistance is identified to counteract, through a critical discourse, the neoliberal rationale, its rhetoric and practices affecting excluded people's lives.