History Of Social Policy Research Articles

Towards a new history of social policies: a genealogy rooted in Soviet socialism

Resumo: Este artigo visa problematizar as leituras quanto à gênese das políticas sociais que focam apenas as experiências anglo-europeias, secundarizando as contribuições dos modelos de proteção social fora do capitalismo ocidental. Por meio de historiografia, exploramos as influências diretas e indiretas do socialismo soviético no direito e nos esquemas de proteção social do Ocidente. Concluímos que o socialismo soviético teve um papel decisivo no surgimento e na expansão das políticas sociais pelo mundo.

Remembering Herbert Gutman's Work, Culture, and Society Fifty Years On

Remembering Herbert Gutman's <i>Work, Culture, and Society</i> Fifty Years On

On the Universal Access to the Primary School Education in the Orenburg Region at the Beginning of the 20th Century (Based on the Materials of the Turgay Region)

For the first time in historiography the article analyzes the experience of universal access to elementary school education for children from 8 to 11 years old in the Turgay region of the Orenburg governorship on the basis of records of the Turgay regional school inspector, the trustee of the Orenburg school district, the Turgay regional government, found in the Russian State Historical Archive. The purpose of this article is to reconstruct this process, its results and regional characteristics. It was determined that the reform was carried out in line with all-Russian trends. At the same time, a number of peculiarities of the region were taken into account: its multi-ethnicity and multi-confessional character, high rates of peasant migration, and lack of local self-government bodies. Therefore, the construction and maintenance of primary schools in Turgay region was carried out at the expense of the state. The author concludes that the administration of the Orenburg school district failed to implement the idea of universal primary school education. The reason was insufficient funding for school construction, the dispersed settlement of peasant settlers in the region, the mismatch rate of peasant migration to the pace of school construction, etc. At the same time the reform had a positive value, as it provided the integration of the regional education system into the imperial educational space. The article is intended for specialists in the history of social policy of the Russian Empire.

The National Women’s Alliance in interwar Yugoslavia: between feminist reform and institutional social politics

ABSTRACT This article explores the history of the International Council of Women (ICW) affiliate, the National Women’s Alliance (NWA) in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes/Yugoslavia during the interwar period, by placing it in the broader history of humanitarianism, philanthropy and social work. In particular, it addresses the question how the NWA contributed to the interwar Yugoslav state from the perspective of social work, which is defined here as reform designed to remedy social inequalities and as collective action to develop the state’s duty of care towards those who cannot provide for themselves. By examining some aspects of the relationship between women’s charitable and feminist associations on the one hand, and the (emerging welfare) state on the other, this article seeks to open new questions regarding forms of cooperation between the NWA and the Yugoslav state, and thus shed light on the history of social policy and social work in interwar Yugoslavia.

Translating social policy ideas: The Beveridge report, transnational diffusion, andpost‐warwelfare state development in Canada, Denmark, and France

AbstractIn the history of social policy in advanced industrial societies, the 1942 Beveridge Report stands as one of the most influential government‐sponsored reports ever published. In this article, we explore how the principles and the policy proposals formulated in the report diffused to other countries and how domestic actors adapted them to their local context through policy translation processes. The social policy ideas that Beveridge put forward in his 1942 report influenced post‐war policy debates in ways that varied greatly from country to country. To illustrate this claim, we analyse the reception and policy impact of this report over time in three different welfare states: Canada, Denmark, and France. This comparison shows how Beveridge's ideas influenced policy debates in different countries through translation processes that adapted these ideas to each country's institutional and political context.

Talking Tax to Social Policy Historians

When it comes to the links between taxation and social policy, the growth of the welfare state, funded by income tax, is the obvious starting point. But in Give and Take, Tillotson goes far beyond the obvious. In her hands, the tax system has complex “welfare effects.” Looking through the tax lens, Tillotson gives us fresh perspectives on the origins, politics, and consequences of social welfare programs, as well as the negotiation of social citizenship rights and obligations. In this essay, I also suggest Give and Take points us towards a relatively unexplored set of questions about the history of social policy in twentieth-century Canada, namely how the tax system and especially tax expenditures have been used to achieve social policy objectives.

History of the social policy in the United Kingdom

In the XVII century Great Britain became the first country in the world with a full-scale system of social support, which was regulated at the state level. The “Old Poor Law” of 1601 and the “New Poor Law” of 1834 are well-studied in both foreign and Russian science, but the solutions that preceded them are less known. The aim of this study is to describe the development of social policy in Great Britain up to 1834, when the system of assistance to people in need was redesigned according to the liberal logic of minimal interference of the state. The article is based on comparative and historic approach and analysis of legal documents. It demonstrates the evolution of institutions and practices of social support in Great Britain. In this country social policy grew from church and private charity and developed at local level under centrally defined rules. Consistent presentation of social policy history in Great Britain is valuable for studies of charity, local self-government and social policy.

Compassion: A Global History of Social Policy

Compassion: A Global History of Social Policy

History of social policy in the USA

History of social policy in the USA

Alvin Finkel, &lt;em&gt;Compassion: A Global History of Social Policy&lt;/em&gt;

Alvin Finkel, &lt;em&gt;Compassion: A Global History of Social Policy&lt;/em&gt;

Territórios urbanos saudáveis: itinerários, vicissitudes e dialogias

The present work is based on the reflection around some aspects, considered important, for the understanding of the notion of Healthy Urban Territories. Inserted in the epistemological context of a science committed to social transformation, the reflection here is part of an investigation - whose presuppositions coined in the scope of Collective Health - are placed in interaction with concepts outlined by other disciplines, and is organized under the research methodology the broader community of research and the shared production of knowledge. The emergence of the notion in question can be related to the combination of some significant processes in the history of social policies: the important Healthy Cities movement, initiated in Canada in the 1980s; of the expanded health project conceived by the Sanitary Movement from the second half of the 1970s, and partly consolidated with the SUS; and the currents of political theory - in some cases experienced - of processes of political-financial-operational decentralization of the management of public resources. It is important to highlight that the locus of the research that subsidizes this work takes place in the set of favelas of Manguinhos (for many, Manguinhos Complex), located in the northern region of the city of Rio de Janeiro, characterized as a territory vulnerable in its social, environmental dimensions , political and economic. In this way, the itinerary will highlight concepts of Healthy Urban Areas, highlighting the vicissitudes of Manguinhos as to the limits and possibilities of its experimentation, highlighting the subjects living in the territory in question.

El análisis de la pobreza y la campaña contra la mendicidad en la Ciudad de México, 1929-1931

En este artículo, se exploran las clasificaciones, los estigmas, los valores y las normas que definieron la tipología de la pobreza urbana y que articularon la política social hacia los mendigos en la Ciudad de México, entre 1929 y 1931. La historia de las políticas sociales ha centrado su atención, sobre todo, en los destinatarios de la seguridad social (trabajadores, madres-hijos, huérfanos), y son escasas las referencias respecto de los pobres desvalidos, que fueron merecedores de las políticas de protección social en la posrevolución. Con base en los documentos y publicaciones respecto de estudio de la mendicidad, que elaboraron Eyler Simpson y Ramón Beteta por disposición de la Beneficencia Pública, planteo la manera en que se fue diferenciando la asistencia social destinada hacia los considerados desvalidos, de la seguridad social, que debía otorgarse por derecho a los trabajadores.

Сто лет трансформаций социальной политики в России

Ирина Андреевна Григорьева – д. с. н., профессор, СПбГУ, руководитель проекта РНФ, НИУ ИТМО, Санкт-Петербург, Россия. Электронная почта: soc28@yandex.ru&#x0D; DOI: 10.17323/727-0634-2017-15-4-497-514&#x0D; Невозможно однозначно толковать такой глобальный социально-исторический процесс, как трансформацию социальной политики за последние сто лет, в том числе учесть все аспекты влияния на нее революции 1917 г. Несмотря на уникальность многих решений, а также взаимовлияние и взаимозависимость социальной политики и социалистической революции, провозглашение СССР в качестве передовой страны социальной политики не вполне оправдано. Задача этой статьи – реконструировать некоторые из форм взаимозависимости между индивидами и обществом в советской и постсоветской социальной политике. В тео­ретическом реконструировании необходимо учесть противоречия между целостностью общества и его дифференциацией – делением на социальные группы и регионы, часто имеющие противоречивые интересы. При этом осознанию различий интересов препятствует сохраняющаяся идеология «уравниловки», хотя реальная политика, как в советское время, так и теперь, имеет селективный характер. Кроме того, история вековой социальной политики в России и на Западе подвержена постоянному переосмыслению. С одной стороны, часто принимаются политические решения по снижению роли государства в социальной поддержке. С другой – подчеркивается его приоритет. Анализ исходит из перспективы, предполагающей не только важное значение структурных факторов общественных отношений, но и принципиальную роль людей в социальных трансформациях как субъектов собственной жизни. Историю социальной политики предлагается описать через взаимовлияние двух политических подходов – селективного и универсального. Это значит, что социальная политика может быть адресована либо определенным группам населения (трудящимся, пожилым, детям), либо населению в целом. Но какие именно решения являются при этом либеральными, а какие – социал-демократическими, какое их сочетание оптимально в конкретный момент истории, остается объектом споров.

The ‘Social Investment Perspective’ in Social Policy: A Longue Durée Perspective

AbstractThe ‘social investment perspective’ (OECD, : 14) arguably represents the very latest justification for social policy to guide the development of the economy and society in the 21st century. As yet, its history remains largely unexplored. This article aims to place it in a wider framework by exploring theoretical considerations over a longer timescale, drawing on early observations of founding social theorists on social investment including R. H. Tawney, some of the thinking of T. H. Marshall as well as the radical political economies of welfare in the 1970s and 1980s. The article links emerging ideas about ‘social investment’ to earlier ‘productivist’ traditions within social policy which informed the development of Western industrial welfare states; and shows how the productivist focus had been lost by the 1980s and 1990s with a consequent narrowing of focus to the redistributive role of the tax and transfer system. A longue durée perspective brings into sharp focus the ‘rediscovery’ of the potential of ‘social investment’ social policy in the closing years of the 20th century, as welfare states began to adapt to the new social and economic conditions of the post‐industrial era. Our aim is not to present a systematic history of social policy and economic thought. It is rather exploratory, seeking to show from some of the key thinkers and movements in the British tradition important contextual elements for understanding ‘social investment’ that appear to have been lost in social policy debates over recent decades.

‘I’m not really sure but I hope it’s better’: early thoughts of parents and carers in a regional trial site for the Australian National Disability Insurance Scheme

The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) is one of the most significant initiatives in Australian social policy history. Its complexity has been compounded by a fast-paced introduction and ongoing refinement throughout the initial trial phase. Parents and carers of very young disabled children face particular challenges accessing and navigating NDIS systems. This article presents findings from a mixed-method pilot study examining the perspectives of parents and carers of disabled children in one NDIS trial site – the Hunter Region of New South Wales. The research highlights a number of policy assumptions potentially impacting on NDIS take up for young disabled children and their families in regional contexts. Based on research findings a number of policy suggestions and improvements for disabled children and their families entering the NDIS and other individualised funding schemes are outlined.

The Social Policy Context of the Norma Parker Addresses

Little is currently known about the social policy history and activism of the Australian Association of Social Workers. This paper addresses that gap in knowledge by examining the social policy context and Australian Association of Social Workers policy activism identified in 20 Norma Parker Addresses from 1969 to 2012. A number of key themes are identified including a concern that social workers take a structural or social justice approach to policy debates, a belief that social workers should be more prominent in policy activism, challenges or barriers to social work activism, and a growing engagement with Indigenous issues. Further research on the detail and history of Australian Association of Social Workers policy activism beyond this exploratory study is recommended.

Church, school and locality: Revisiting the historiography of “state” and “religious” educational infrastructures in England and Wales, 1780–1870

The historiographical tradition which developed within the history of education from the 1970s regarded religious organisations as distractions from the “real” task of developing state-funded universal compulsory education. Despite more positive evaluations of voluntary agencies within the history of social policy, since the 1980s, the schools affiliated to the national co-ordinating religious societies are still regarded as potential agents of social control, inadequate in numerical terms, with poor standards, dull curricula and brutal discipline. This article seeks to redress the balance of this historiography by means of a case-study of part of the London hinterland. It will show how voluntary schools attached to national and international “modern” co-ordinating bodies might provide sufficient school places, a curriculum which was structured, with results evaluated positively by inspectors, and could operate systems of rewards rather than corporal punishment. Comparisons with the period after school boards were founded indicates that attendance rates stayed about the same, that the curriculum initially narrowed in one area, and that corporal punishment increased. While these factors were due partly to population increase, the evidence nevertheless demonstrates how voluntary schools could provide adequately, even well, for local populations, and that rate-aided school provision might have negative consequences.

Confusion and divergence: Origins and meanings of the term ‘welfare state’ in Germany and Britain, 1840–1940

It is often stated that there is no standard definition of a ‘welfare state’. A survey of the standard textbooks supports this claim. It is also often the case that academic works on welfare state and social policy history earmark lines or even pages to discussing the origins of the term welfare state. However, these brief accounts are often wrong in the details and are missing important aspects. In our article we offer the first detailed study of the origin of the term ‘welfare state’ tracing it back to the mid-19th century Germany and following its diverse and changing definitions in the German and British context until the 1940s. The study adds decades to the conventional understanding of this history and offers a more nuanced understanding of the different definitions attributed to the term before its political breakthrough in the late 1940s. Projecting this post-war understanding backwards in time – what the literature generally does – is too simple and anachronistic. Both in Germany and Britain the dominating understandings differ from our present day understanding of the ‘welfare state’ as a social security system.

Poor laws and schooling in Stockholm

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to utilize illustrative examples from the industrialisation period in Sweden to analyse the interlace between poor legislation and school legislation.Design/methodology/approachIt deals with how state regulation and societal transformations intervened in the lives of poor children and their parents. In particular, this article examines how collaboration between schools and poor relief resulted in normative judgements about their social inclusion and exclusion.FindingsOverall, the article illuminates a new era in the history of social policy, an epoch when old assumptions were abandoned and fresh links were forged between industrialisation, national economics, education, gender relations, and social welfare. These changes are clarified not only by reference to nineteenth century sources but also to national and international research, and ideas about capital and gender relations associated with, among others, Hannah Arendt and Pierre Bourdieu.Originality/valueThe study illustrates how and why the official public spirit affects children and why understanding of this relationship needs to be broadened as well as deepened.

Book Reviews

Robert A. Margo of Boston University and NBER reviews “The Changing Body: Health, Nutrition, and Human Development in the Western World since 1700” by Roderick Floud, Robert W. Fogel, Bernard Harris and Sok Chul Hong. The EconLit abstract of the reviewed work begins: Presents an introduction to the field of anthropomorphic history and surveys the causes and consequences of changes in health and mortality, diet, and the disease environment in Europe and the United States since 1700. Discusses our changing bodies -- three hundred years of technophysio evolution; investigating the interaction of biological, demographic, and economic variables from fragmentary data; the analysis of long-term trends in nutritional status, mortality, and economic growth; technophysio evolution and human health in England and Wales since 1700; height, health, and mortality in continental Europe, 1700-2100; and the American experience of technophysio evolution. Floud is Provost of Gresham College, London. Fogel is a professor of economics and Charles R. Walgreen Distinguished Service Professor of American Institutions in the Booth School of Business and Director of the Center for Population Economics at the University of Chicago. Harris is Professor of the History of Social Policy at the University of Southampton. Hong is Assistant Professor of Economics at Sogang University. Index.