The Inspection House and Neglected Dynamics of Governance: The Case of Domestic Visits in Family Intervention Projects

Abstract

There has been an expansion in the provision of family intervention projects in Britain. These projects, in which housing providers are centrally implicated, aim to provide a form of coercive support to households subject to, or at risk of, legal sanctions. In both core accommodation and outreach models of these projects, the dwelling is a key site, and the inspection of domesticity a primary technique, of governance. This article argues that policy narratives and some academic critiques of these projects are heavily influenced by understandings of governmentality as a disciplinary power based upon Bentham's and Foucault's works on the panopticon. The article uses indicative findings from recent research to illustrate that such conceptualisations neglect the centrality of the social worlds, social class and habitus that embed non-clinical sites and modes of governance and influence the interactions between project workers and individuals subject to project interventions.