Key Themes in Social Policy by Patricia Kennedy

Author:Patricia Kennedy [Kennedy, Patricia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Public Policy, Social Services & Welfare, Social Science, Political Science, Social Work, Sociology, General
ISBN: 9781135071370
Google: dJOFRt9yQ6oC
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-03-05T10:31:05+00:00

Measuring how welfare is distributed is complex. Hills (2008: 141–147) presents a conceptual framework to work towards this. He writes of the counterfactual: ‘to answer the question, “how are welfare services distributed?”, you have to add, “compared to what?”’. Next, he refers to incidence – ‘who really benefits from a service?’ – and valuation: ‘to look at the combined effects of different services, their values have to be added up in some way, most conveniently by putting a money value on them’. He highlights the importance of assessing distribution between which groups, distribution of what, and time and data collection problems.

Korpi differentiates between marginal and institutional social policy, arguing that:

in the long run, an institutional social policy will decrease inequality more than a marginal type of policy because it tends to have redistributive and political consequences which differ from the marginal type. In areas where universal programmes exist, an institutional social policy decreases inequality by making it possible for the lower socio-economic strata to enjoy roughly the same services as other groups.

(Korpi, 1993: 374)

Further reading

Fraser, N. (1995) ‘From Redistribution to Recognition? Dilemmas of Justice in a “Post-socialist” Age’, New Left Review, 212: 68–92.

Hills, J. (2008) ‘The Distribution of Welfare’, in Alcock, P., May, M. and Rowlingson, K. (eds.), The Student’s Companion to Social Policy, 3rd edn. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 139–148.

Lowi, T.A. (1972) ‘Four Systems of Policy, Politics and Choice’, Public Administration Review, 32: 298–310.

RESILIENCE

Related entries: Capabilities; Environmentalism; Functionings; Sustainable development

Resilience means bouncing back, having the ability to cope, recover and move on. It is a skill, talent or attribute that people carry in varying quantities. It is associated with overcoming adversity, surviving and, for some people, coming out of a crisis situation stronger and more resourceful.

Walsh (2003: 1) defines resilience as ‘The ability to withstand and rebound from disruptive life challenges’. She refers to Luthar, Cicchetti and Becker’s observation that ‘It involves dynamic processes, fostering positive adaptation within the context of specific adversity’ (ibid.). Walsh contrasts those who get stuck in a victim position with those who bounce back, as resilient. She suggests that ‘Resilience involves key processes over time that foster the ability to “struggle well” surmount obstacles and go on to live and love fully’ (ibid.). Referring to the work of Luthar and Zigler (1991) who emphasized personal traits possessed by the ‘rugged individual’, Walsh suggests that this view has changed over time to incorporate family and wider socio-economic influences.

Dyer and McGuinness (1996) suggest that, historically, resilience was used to describe a pliant or elastic quality of a substance or organ. Reviewing several sources, they highlight the importance of bouncing back, rebounding, adaptability and buoyancy. They define resilience as ‘a global term describing a process whereby people bounce back from adversity and go on with their lives’ (Dyer and McGuinness, 1996: 226). ‘It is a dynamic process highly influenced by protective factors’, which they describe as specific competencies ‘that are necessary for the process of resilience to occur’ (Dyer and McGuinness, 1996: 277). They indicate that ‘competencies are simply the healthy skills and abilities that the individual can access’.

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