Richard Titmuss Research Articles

Eugenics, Social Medicine and the Career of Richard Titmuss in Britain 1935-50

The pursuit of health by a society or social group requires a position to be adopted on two central issues. One issue concerns the relative importance of nature and nurture, while the second, related question has to do with whether it is the individual or the environment that is seen as the appropriate focus of health-promoting activities. While the philosophy of eugenics expresses one extreme of this continuum nature and the importance of the individual that of social medicine as articulated in the postwar period in Britain marks the other, in stressing the importance to health of social and environmental factors. For most of the first half of the twentieth century, the terminology of eugenics, the first 'scientific'2 understanding of individual conduct and development, dominated the public discourse about health in Britain and other countries. During the years leading up to and out of the Second World War, the public debate about health in Britain focussed on the spectre of a fading population. The debate highlighted population quality as well as quantity, shaping the problem into the ideological format of 'differential fertility', defined by D. V. Glass, leading investigator of population issues, as one of the primary aims of the new discipline of demography.3 The concept of differential fertility drew attention to the fact that socially advantaged groups tended to have fewer children than disadvantaged ones. But, somewhat paradoxically, out of this concern with differential fertility and mortality emerged the new phenomenon of social medicine. Whilst the public health movement had earlier focussed attention on people's living conditions as a source of important health constraints, social medicine, by providing 'a medicine of the social',4 added to this by directing attention to facets of individuals' 'lifestyles' as affecting health and use of health services. In tracing the birth of social medicine from a parentage dominated

The Imperiled Gift Relationship

The Imperiled Gift Relationship In his classic 1970 work, The Gift Relationship, Richard Titmuss compared systems of blood donation in United States (at that time, a commercialized, individualistic system) and United Kingdom (a voluntary, socialized system). Titmuss argued that commercial systems were economically and administratively inefficient and wasteful, expensive, and dangerous, and that they encouraged nonaltruistic conduct. The persuasiveness of arguments of Titmuss and others were influential in eventual replacement of market system in U.S. with one based on voluntarism, and gift relationship has been a paradigm in ethical discourse ever since. Now, a serie of editorials and letters in British Medical Journal about National Blood Transfusion Service in U.K. have expressed concern that the concept of 'gift relationship' of voluntary donor and needs of patients have been lost. A leading article (BMJ September 12, 1987) by John Cash, National Medical Director of Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service, is striking for its critique of U.K. system on grounds similar to those Titmuss once advanced against U.S. system. Cash is interested in what went wrong with a transfusion service that for decades was regarded as preeminent in world. He contends that structure of system encourages regional autonomy rather than collaboration, creating situations in which there have been of blood in one locale, while in another region less than ten miles away, blood collection programs have been diminished because of excess supply. Chronic and occasionally shortages of both blood and blood products are frequent occurrences in current system, as are inappropriate supervision and unnecessary exposure of patients to iatrogenic hazards and waste of precious, often irreplaceable, and costly resources. The management of current system is both and dangerous and invokes serious moral questions which could have a deleterious impact on voluntary blood donor programme. Many practitioners appear to agree with Cash's critique. Calling blood transfusion service seriously ailing, one commentator encourages the development of a more efficient transfusion service to organize blood collection and equitable distribution. Others have supported charge that current practices are wasteful of a scarce resource (BMJ October 3, 1987, 850-51). …

British Politics and Social Policy during the Second World War

This article sets out to examine the relationship between party politics and social reform in the Second World War. The issue of government policy towards reform was raised initially by Richard Titmuss, who argued in his official history of social policy that the experience of total war and the arrival of Churchill's coalition in 1940 led to a fundamentally new attitude on welfare issues. The exposure of widespread social deprivation, Titmuss claimed, made central government fully conscious for the first time of the need for reconstruction; the reforms subsequently proposed or enacted by the coalition were therefore an important prelude to the introduction of a ‘welfare state’ by the post-war Labour administration. These claims have not been borne out by more recent studies of individual wartime policies, but as a general guide to social reform in the period the ideas of Richard Titmuss have never been entirely displaced. In fact the significance of wartime policy, and its close relationship with post-war reform, has been reaffirmed in the most comprehensive study of British politics during the war – Paul Addison's The road to 1945. For Addison, the influence of Labour ministers in the coalition made the government the most radical since Asquith's Liberal administration in the Edwardian period. The war, he notes, clearly placed on the agenda the major items of the post-war welfare state: social security for all, a national health service, full employment policies, improved education and housing, and a new system, of family allowances.

Social Policy and the Discipline of Social Administration

The last ten years have seen a spate of books analysing social policy in terms of ideologies or models of welfare. These models, which combine an explanatory or scientific and a normative or value component, offer the discipline of social administration a terrain or base of its own from which it can legitimately explore a range of normative and scientific issues. It is suggested that the central task of social policy analysis, at the highest level of generality of the discipline, is to tease out the relevant normative and factual propositions or assumptions underlying these models and subject them to close scrutiny. In this the discipline would largely be following, but also extending somewhat, the agenda for social administration outlined by Richard Titmuss in 1968.

Morality and the market in blood.

ABSTRACT The late Richard Titmuss made a persuasive case against allowing the sale of human blood in his book, The Gift Relationship. His arguments have been developed further by Peter Singer in recent articles. While the issues of quantity and quality of blood under market and non‐market systems have received much attention, the moral and political aspects of the Titmuss‐Singer case have gone relatively unexamined. First, I question their claim that a donation‐only system promotes greater freedom, which rests on a confusion of liberty and opportunity. Next, I consider reasons for doubting their view that altruism is fostered significantly more under the non‐market approach. Finally, I survey recent developments in the quantity‐quality debate and possible implications of the blood controversy for national health care.

Morality and the Market in Blood

ABSTRACT The late Richard Titmuss made a persuasive case against allowing the sale of human blood in his book, The Gift Relationship. His arguments have been developed further by Peter Singer in recent articles. While the issues of quantity and quality of blood under market and non-market systems have received much attention, the moral and political aspects of the Titmuss-Singer case have gone relatively unexamined. First, I question their claim that a donation-only system promotes greater freedom, which rests on a confusion of liberty and opportunity. Next, I consider reasons for doubting their view that altruism is fostered significantly more under the non-market approach. Finally, I survey recent developments in the quantity-quality debate and possible implications of the blood controversy for national health care.

Social policy and political paradigms

The Idea of Welfare. By BOBERT PINKERRichard Titmuss: Welfare and Society. By D.A. REISMANThe Law of Longer Life. By c. NORTHCOTE PARKINSON and HERMAN LE COMPTE. Troy, Alabama

Altruism and economic behavior: II--private charity and public policy.

The relative advantages of private charitable organizations as against government agencies in achieving efficient redistribution of income and supply of services are examined. Central to this discussion is the elasticity of private giving to tax concessions and the proportion of donor dollars being absorbed in overhead. Recent estimates of these magnitudes are summarized. Of parallel concern is to what extent can reliance on altruism by sellers of goods and services serve as a substitute for government regulations to enforce standards, prices or product disclosures. Finally, the ways in which government can use and encourage private charitable impulse to maximize social welfare are examined; of particular interest here is the literature surrounding Richard Titmuss' work on blood donorship which raises the issue of whether or not extension of markets reduces, rather than extends, individual choice. The growing technological complexities of society, it is concluded, render the altruistic virtues of trust and consideration increasingly valuable-if increasingly rare.

Book Reviews: School Life and Work Life: A Study of Transition in the Inner City, Doing Sociological Research, the Perceptual World of the Child, Children's Drawings, the First Relationship: Infant and Mother, What is a Child, Newspaper History from the Seventeenth Century to the Present Day, Marx's Capital and Capitalism Today, Vol. 2, Women and Schooling, Contemporary Europe: Social Structures

Book Reviews: School Life and Work Life: A Study of Transition in the Inner City, Doing Sociological Research, the Perceptual World of the Child, Children's Drawings, the First Relationship: Infant and Mother, What is a Child, Newspaper History from the Seventeenth Century to the Present Day, <i>Marx's</i> Capital <i>and Capitalism Today, Vol.</i> 2, Women and Schooling, Contemporary Europe: Social Structures

Book Reviews

Journal Article Book Reviews Get access RICHARD TITMUSS: WELFARE AND SOCIETY, D. A. Reisman, Heinemann. Paperback £2.50. EQUALITY AND SOCIAL POLICY, A. Weale. Routledge and Kegan Paul. Paperback £2.50. T. A. O'Brien T. A. O'Brien Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Community Development Journal, Volume 14, Issue 2, April 1979, Pages 158–160, https://doi.org/10.1093/cdj/14.2.158-a Published: 01 April 1979

Equality and Social Policy: Some Comments

Previous articleNext article No AccessDebate with AuthorsEquality and Social Policy: Some CommentsHasseltine Byrd TaylorHasseltine Byrd Taylor Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Social Service Review Volume 52, Number 2Jun., 1978 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/643625 Views: 1Total views on this site Copyright 1978 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Gifts, exchanges and the political economy of health care. Part I: should blood be bought and sold?

Should blood be bought and sold is in crude terms the question asked and answered by Richard Titmuss in his recent book The Gift Relationship. Dr Raymond Plant, a lecturer in philosophy at Manchester University, analyses Titmuss' arguments in a paper which we are printing in two parts. Titmuss has taken the provision of blood as his example of the gift relationship--and by extension that of health care generally. Dr Plant considers in turn each of Titmuss' arguments that blood should not be a marketable commodity, the moral objections to which seem to be the erosion of freedom and of truth telling, the separation of society through the cash nexus, and its converse that the provision of health care is a means for the integration of society. Dr Plant also examines the views of other commentators on the Titmuss' theory of the value of a 'free' blood transfusion service and other medical care as a means of integration in society, and ends with his promise that in the second part of his paper he will examine Titmuss' principles not in terms of the market but rather as related to the principle of social justice.

Richard Titmuss and Social Welfare

Social Policy & AdministrationVolume 10, Issue 3 p. 147-166 Richard Titmuss and Social Welfare Paul Wilding, Paul Wilding Department of Social Administration, University College, CardiffSearch for more papers by this author Paul Wilding, Paul Wilding Department of Social Administration, University College, CardiffSearch for more papers by this author First published: September 1976 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9515.1976.tb00634.xCitations: 3AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume10, Issue3September 1976Pages 147-166 RelatedInformation

Social Work's Developmental and Change Functions: Their Roots in Practice

Social work can progress to the functions of social development and system change by fulfilling its system-maintenance function. System maintenance sustains social stability and cohesion through meeting needs of people in accordance with prevailing social values and institutions. Developmental functions aid in the orderly growth and change of established political, economic, or social institutions. System change challenges significant values and elements in the social structure, including distribution of wealth and power. These functions are overlapping in reality but are sequential in their full development. Under a residual welfare policy, using the models developed by Richard Titmuss, social work will not rise beyond the system maintenance level, while the institutional redistributive model allows more scope for social work in all of its functions.

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article:Parliamentary Scrutiny of Government Bills. By J. A. G. Griffith.Power and Authority in British Universities. By Graeme C. Moodie and Rowland Eustace.Independence and Deterrence, Britain and Atomic Energy, 1945–1952. By Margaret Gowing.Pollution, Social Interest and the law. By Neil Gunnincham.Chile'S Road to Socialism. By Salvador Allende.Chile'S Marxist Experiment. By Robert Moss.Revolution and Counter‐Revolution in Chile. By Michael Raptis (translated by John Simmonds).Modern Turkey. By Geoffrey Lewis.Edwardian Radicalism, 1900–1914: Some Aspects of British Radicalism. Edited by A. J. A. Morris.The Social Problem in the Philosophy of Rousseau. By John Charvet.Rousseau: Stoic and Romantic. By Kennedy F. Roche.Greedy Institutions. By Lewis A. Coser.The Conservative Nation. By Andrew Gamble.Traditionalism, Conservatism and British Political Culture. By Bob Jessop.Social Policy. By Richard Titmuss. Edited by Brian Abel‐Smith and Kay Titmuss.Uncertain Passage: China'S Transition to the Post‐Mao Era. By A. Doak Barnett.The Collected Works of Walter Bagehot. The Political Works. Volumes V (449 pp.), VI (407 pp.), VII (455 pp.) and VIII (455 pp.). Edited by Norman St. John‐Stevas.Democratic Theory and Local Government. By Dilys M. Hill.THE Evangelistic Bureacrat. By Jon Gower Davies.The House of Commons: Services and Facilities. Edited by Michael Rush and Malcolm Shaw.British Cabinet Ministers: the Roles of Politicians in Executive Office. By Bruce Headey.

Income Distribution and Social Change Revisited

ABSTRACTEleven years after the publication of Richard Titmuss's essay on Income Distribution and Social Change, the official statisticians are still drawing optimistic conclusions about the tendency of income inequality to decline in Britain. This article re-examines some of the critical questions raised by Titmuss concerning the accuracy and interpretation of the official statistics. It considers the definition of income, the implications of capital gains, fringe benefits and the benefits from owner-occupation, the role of life-cycle factors, and the measurement of inequality. It concludes with an assessment of the impact of Titmuss's study on the quality of statistical information and on attitudes and beliefs.

Transfused Blood, Serum Hepatitis, and the Coase Theorem

Previous articleNext article No AccessTransfused Blood, Serum Hepatitis, and the Coase TheoremReuben A. KesselReuben A. Kessel Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Law and Economics Volume 17, Number 2Oct., 1974 Sponsored by The University of Chicago Booth School of Business and The University of Chicago Law School Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/466793 Views: 4Total views on this site Citations: 26Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1974 The University of Chicago Law SchoolPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Diana W. Thomas, Michael D. Thomas Regulation, competition, and the social control of business, Public Choice 107 (Aug 2022).https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-022-00989-zAbel François, Olivier Gergaud Is civic duty the solution to the paradox of voting?, Public Choice 180, no.3-43-4 (Jan 2019): 257–283.https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-018-00635-7Jeremy Frank Shearmur The Gift Relationship Revisited, HEC Forum 27, no.44 (Oct 2014): 301–317.https://doi.org/10.1007/s10730-014-9252-6Julian J. Koplin From blood donation to kidney sales: the gift relationship and transplant commercialism, Monash Bioethics Review 33, no.2-32-3 (Oct 2015): 102–122.https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-015-0035-xJoan Costa-Font, Mireia Jofre-Bonet, Steven T. Yen Not All Incentives Wash Out the Warm Glow: The Case of Blood Donation Revisited, Kyklos 66, no.44 (Oct 2013): 529–551.https://doi.org/10.1111/kykl.12034Emanuel D. Thorne Chapter 20 The Economics of organ transplantation, (Jan 2006): 1335–1370.https://doi.org/10.1016/S1574-0714(06)02020-3Cento Veljanovski The Economics of Law, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2006).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.935952 Philippe Fontaine Blood, Politics, and Social Science: Richard Titmuss and the Institute of Economic Affairs, 1957–1973 Fontaine, Isis 93, no.33 (Jul 2015): 401–434.https://doi.org/10.1086/374061Emanuel D. Thorne The Common Property Nature of Market-inalienability, (Jan 2000): 47–77.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-62745-5_2Robert B. Ekelund, Robert D. Tollison On neoinstitutional theory and preclassical economies: mercantilism revisited, The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought 4, no.33 (Jul 2006): 375–399.https://doi.org/10.1080/10427719700000058Hartwig von Schubert Donated blood—Gift or commodity?, Social Science & Medicine 39, no.22 (Jul 1994): 201–206.https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(94)90328-XAudrey B. Davidson, Robert B. Ekelund America's Alternative to Marshall: Property, Competition, and Capitalism in Hadley's Economics of 1896, Journal of the History of Economic Thought 16, no.11 (Jun 2009): 1–26.https://doi.org/10.1017/S1053837200001395STEPHEN J. SPURR The Shortage of Transplantable Organs: An Analysis and a Proposal, Law & Policy 15, no.44 (Oct 1993): 355–395.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9930.1993.tb00113.xWarren Greenberg, Deborah Kamin Property rights and payment to patients for cell lines derived from human tissues: An economic analysis, Social Science & Medicine 36, no.88 (Apr 1993): 1071–1076.https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(93)90125-NHamish Stewart Rationality and the market for human blood, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 19, no.22 (Oct 1992): 125–143.https://doi.org/10.1016/0167-2681(92)90087-RKEITH N. HYLTON The Law and Economics of Organ Procurement, Law & Policy 12, no.33 (Jul 1990): 197–224.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9930.1990.tb00047.xRussell D. Roberts, Michael J. Wolkoff Improving the Quality and Quantity of Whole Blood Supply: Limits to Voluntary Arrangements, Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law 13, no.11 (Feb 1988): 167–178.https://doi.org/10.1215/03616878-13-1-167Susan Rose-Ackerman Efficiency, Equity and Inalienability, (Jan 1986): 11–37.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-4442-8_2Howard S. Schwartz Bioethical and Legal Considerations in Increasing the Supply of Transplantable Organs: From UAGA to “Baby Fae”, American Journal of Law & Medicine 10, no.44 (Feb 2021): 397–437.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0098858800009369CATHY BUCHANAN, ELIZABETH W. PRIOR Bureaucrats and Babies: Government Regulation of the Supply of Genetic Material*, Economic Record 60, no.33 (Sep 1984): 222–230.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4932.1984.tb00857.xPhilip Jacobs, Ronald P. Wilder Pricing behavior of non-profit agencies, Journal of Health Economics 3, no.11 (Apr 1984): 49–61.https://doi.org/10.1016/0167-6296(84)90025-0Richard J. Arneson Commerce and Selfishness, Canadian Journal of Philosophy Supplementary Volume 8 (Jan 2020): 211–232.https://doi.org/10.1080/00455091.1982.10715830Marvin Brams Transplantable Human Organs: Should Their Sale Be Authorized by State Statutes?, American Journal of Law & Medicine 3, no.22 (Feb 2021): 183–195.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0098858800005359 The High Cost of Cheap Blood, New England Journal of Medicine 294, no.1212 (Mar 1976): 675–675.https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJM197603182941226Richard A. Epstein Medical Malpractice: The Case for Contract, American Bar Foundation Research Journal 1, no.11 (Nov 2018): 87–149.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-4469.1976.tb00953.xJulia D. Mahoney Should we adopt a market strategy to organ donation?, (): 65–88.https://doi.org/10.1016/S1479-3709(01)80007-8

"Commitment to Welfare" by Richard Titmuss (Book Review)

"Commitment to Welfare" by Richard Titmuss (Book Review)

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article: Canada: A Modern History. By J. B. Brebner. Planning for Progress: The Administration of Economic Planning in the Philippines. Edited by R. S. Milne. b Modern Organization Theory, A Symposium of the Foundation for Research on Human Behavior. Edited by Mason Haire. Systems Analysis for Business Management, Canadian Economic Policy. By Brewis, T. N. et al. Social Policies and Population Growth in Mauritius. By Richard Titmuss and Brian Abel Smith. Labour in Canadian Agriculture. By George V. Haythorne. Cambridge.