Organizational Structure and Innovation in U.K. Voluntary Social Welfare Organizations: Applying the Aston Measures

This paper discusses the methodological issues involved in assessing the impact of organizational structure upon the innovative capacity of voluntary organizations. It reports the use of a specific methodological tool—the Aston measures—as an approach to these issues. In addition to the empirical findings reported, this paper argues for these measures as a useful addition to the methodological tool kit of voluntary sector researchers.     

Involvement of the voluntary sector in the diploma of Social Work Curriculum: A regional study

This paper explores the involvement of voluntary organisations in three Diploma of Social Work programmes in the North East of England. It focuses on their involvement in management, and curriculum planning and delivery. Issues of power and representation are fundamental to this involvement and consequently to this paper. The paper looks in detail at the approach to involving voluntary organisations in one programme, and compares the process and results of this approach with those of the other two programmes in the region studied. Throughout, the paper incorporates two perspectives: that of the programmes and that of the voluntary organisations. This paper concludes with suggested methods for involving voluntary organisations more closely in the management and curriculum development of DipSW programmes and demonstrates this with particular reference to the Black voluntary sector.     

An examination of student and provider perceptions of voluntary sector social work placements in Northern Ireland

Practice based learning in Northern Ireland is a core element of social work education and comprising 50% of the degree programme for undergraduate and postgraduate students. This article presents evidence about the perceptions of practice learning from voluntary sector/non-government organisation (NGO) placement providers and final year social work students on social work degree programmes in Northern Ireland in 2011. It draws on data from 121 respondents from189 final year students and focus group interviews with voluntary sector providers offering 16% (85) of the total placements available to students. The agencies who participated in the research study provide a total of 55 PLOs to social work students, and are therefore fairly representative in terms of voluntary sector (NGO) provision. The article locates these data in the context of practice learning pedagogy and the changes introduced by the Regional Strategy for Practice Learning Provision in Northern Ireland 2010–2015. Several themes emerged including; induction, support and guidance, practice educator/student relationship, professional identity and confidence in risk assessment and decision-making. Social work educators, placement providers and employers must be cognisant of newly qualified social workers’ needs in terms of consolidating knowledge within the formative stages of their professional development.     

The place of the natural parents in a foster care programme

The provision of social welfare services by the voluntary sector is largely dependent on government funding. This paper highlights some of the inadequacies of this funding procedure particularly as it affects the quality and conditions of work in the voluntary sector.

There is a place for the employment of an experienced professional as consultant to voluntary agencies for the provision of support and supervision of less experienced workers. Funding for the voluntary sector should provide for this.     

British Statutory Sector Partnerships with the Voluntary Sector

Abstract

The boundaries of the welfare state in Britain have shifted considerably since the early 1980s. In the context of a desire to see an expanded mixed economyof welfare, the voluntary and community sectors have been expected to take on, in partnership with the statutory sector, a more active role in the delivery of a range of welfare services. Governmental speeches and policy initiatives in the UK have reasoned that the voluntary sector is cost-effective, offers “added value” to users and statutory sector purchasers, provides high quality services, is adaptable to changing needs and promotes greater user involvement. This article takes a critical look at some of the claims that are often made for service-providing voluntary organizations in the field of community (social) care.     

Organized Environmentalists: Democracy as a Key Value?

This article, taking as its point of departure that voluntary organizations are of crucial importance in a democracy, views the transformation of the Norwegian voluntary sector through the lenses of what happens within the environmental field. Seeing changes within this field as prototypical for the transformation of the voluntary sector more generally, we start with the organizational level and contrast old versus new environmental organizations. The aim is to ascertain to what extent the newly built organizations are leaving the historically important democratic organizational model. Second, we compare attitudes toward democracy of members of the democratically and nondemocratically built organizations: attitudes both toward democracy within a voluntary organization (internal) and democracy in society (external). Furthermore, we compare these findings with what we find for the population at large. The last section analyzes demographic characteristics of organized environmentalists to see whether a new type of elite, more distanced from the population at large, is emerging in the new and nondemocratically built organizations. The study finds that new organizations are definitely breaking with the democratic organizational model. The support for democracy (internal and external) is comprehensive but not always overwhelming, and there is a tendency in the direction of congruence between organizational structure and individual attitudes. That is, members of democratically built organizations especially value internal but also to some extent external democracy more than members of nondemocratically built organizations. However, even if formal democratic structure and democracy as an absolute and generalized value seems to be under pressure, it does not follow that a new type of elitism is emerging.     

Conceptualizing the Third Sector in Ireland,North and South

While there is a long established and deeply embedded tradition of voluntary action and nonprofit organizing in Ireland, there has been very limited debate on a philosophy of voluntary action or on the place of the third sector in a modern democratic state. It is against this background that practitioners and academics are beginning to articulate their individual understandings of the role of the third sector in Irish society. This paper presents a framework developed from three questions to consider the place of the third sector in a modern democratic state. The questions are: What are the roles of the third sector in a society? What relationships exist between the third and other sectors? How are third sector organizations resourced within that societal context? Answering these questions contributes to a conceptualization of the third sector in Ireland, North and South.

     

The strategic challenges of cooperation and competition in British Voluntary Organizations: Toward the next century

The interrelationships between public, private, and voluntary sectors in Britain have witnessed increasing levels of change in recent years. This article argues that there have recently been identifiable trends within the voluntary sector, namely, increased levels of competition between sectors, increased competition between voluntary organizations, and increased pressures toward professionalization in voluntary sector management and organization. Predominantly competitive strategies and modes of professionalization have often been borrowed uncritically from commercial “best practice” by voluntary organizations. Thompson's (1967) typology of strategies is used as a basis for proposing cooperation as an alternative to competition in the British voluntary sector.     

Making Sense of Organizational Change: Voices of Older Volunteers

The role of voluntary and community sector organizations in the delivery of public services is increasing and these changes bring new responsibilities and benefits to organizations that have the capacity to participate. There are concerns within the sector about the implications for citizenship and participation. The sector is highly dependent on volunteers yet little is known about how organizational change in response to new relationships with the statutory sector impact upon the commitment and well-being of people who volunteer. This paper addresses that gap in knowledge for older volunteers. Drawing upon collaborative research with a voluntary organization in the north of England, the authors explore the meanings and aspirations of volunteering for older people, and explain how and why changes associated with closer engagement with public service delivery and less grant dependency can be disempowering for them.

The role of voluntary social welfare organisations in Norway: a democratic alternative to a bureaucratic welfare state?

Taking as a point of departure the postulated political-ideological and fiscal ‘crisis of the welfare state’, this article emphasises recent changes in the relationship between the four sectors of welfare providers: the informal sector of the family or community; the for-profit sector — where social goods are offered by profit-seeking institutions; the formalised sector of voluntary organisations; and the public sector of statutory bodies. Discussion is concentrated on the changing relationship between the voluntary and public sectors. Are voluntary organisations able to cope with new and extensive welfare problems within a more decentralised welfare state? Do they express the values, and do they possess the resources that both governmental agencies and the organisations themselves take for granted?     

Patterns in Household Giving: Evidence From U.K. Data

The Family Expenditure Survey provides a long time series of household-level data on U.K. charitable giving, which previously has not been exploited. Data analyzed for the period 1978–93 reveal a long-term decline in the proportion of households giving to charity, which persists once we control for changes in other characteristics that affect giving, such as income and wealth. The biggest declines in the number of givers are among younger and poorer households. We also draw out generation-specific trends in a way that is crucial to thinking about future trends in funding for the voluntary sector.     

Setting the agenda: social inclusion,children and young people

This paper was prepared collectively by participants of the third seminar in a series with the title Challenging ‘Social Inclusion’: Perspectives for and from Children and Young People. Three 3‐day seminars took place at the Universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow and Stirling in 2002–3 attended by academics, professionals from voluntary sector children's agencies, young people, representatives from central government and postgraduate students. Funding was provided by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Children's Society.     

Service Delivery and Civic Engagement: Disability Organizations in Northern Ireland

In the United Kingdom, the New Labour administration that came to power in 1997 has promoted two models of partnership between the state and the voluntary sector. The civic engagement model is based on the renewed interest among governments in the potential of voluntary organizations to contribute to the civic engagement of citizens. In the service delivery model, voluntary organizations are recruited to the task of delivering core social services. Drawing on data from disability-related voluntary organizations in Northern Ireland, this paper illustrates the impact of the service delivery partnership model on the development of voluntary action in the welfare field, and the relative paucity of resources allocated to participatory voluntary action and civic engagement. The consequent impact on the development of partnerships between the state and the voluntary sector is discussed.     

Voluntary organisations and the welfare state: the case of Norway

Taking as the point of departure the political-ideological and fiscal ‘crises of the welfare state’, this article emphasises recent changes in the relationship between voluntary organisations and the public sector in Norway, changes that open up new space for the voluntary sector both ideologically and as a service producer. We question whether voluntary organisations are able to cope with new and extensive welfare problems within the more decentralised welfare state. Do they express the values, and do they possess the resources that both governmental agencies and the organisations themselves take for granted? As part of that discussion, the article questions the dominant view within the literature, namely that Scandinavia has a very weak voluntary sector. We argue that ‘state-friendly’ Norway has a rather strong voluntary sector, that this sector is of a specific type, and that both of these factors have important theoretical implications not only for Scandinavia, but for an overall understanding of the voluntary sector.     

The voluntary sector in ‘the information society’: a study in division and uncertainty

At a time of rapid social, political and economic change in Britain, voluntary and community groups are being encouraged to assume a more prominent role in general welfare provision. Accordingly, their need to know has never been more acute. Yet the information environment of the voluntary sector is also in a state of flux and transition. Profound changes in the institutional world of information provision hold significant implications for the way voluntary and community groups seek and disseminate information. In this paper these structural changes are outlined and the findings presented of an extensive investigation into information needs and usage in the voluntary sector.     

Critical success factors for merger in the UK voluntary sector

This paper reports on research into mergers in the voluntary sector in the UK from 1988 to 1993. It compares empirically derived critical success factors with success factors derived from previous work on mergers in both the voluntary and private sectors. The study concludes that merger can be an extremely effective strategy for voluntary organisations. For it to be so, it has to be undertaken willingly, with a shared vision between the partners of what the merger will achieve. Cultural differences need to be recognised and handled within a trusting context in which mutual respect is backed by an equitable process. Finally; sensitive handling of individuals caught up in the merger process is essential—but something which the voluntary sector ought to be well capable of doing.     

The state and voluntary social work in Sweden

If Sweden has been considered at all within the voluntary research tradition, it is mainly in terms of providing a state-dominated contrast to countries where the sector is said to flourish. This article questions this rather one-sided picture of Sweden, which seems to rest on weak empirical grounds, especially if the voluntary sector as a whole is analysed. The main focus of the article is, however, on social services. It is shown that, from a historical perspective, co-operation between the state and the voluntary sector seems to be a distinctive feature of Sweden, even during periods of government take-over of voluntary activities. Today the relations between the voluntary sector and the state appear to be changing to a situation in which associations are taking part in the production of welfare services to a larger extent than heretofore.     

The Voluntary–Community Sector and Political Development in Northern Ireland,Since 1972

This paper traces the development of the voluntary and community sector in Northern Ireland from the early 1970s onwards. Particular attention is given to the expansion of the voluntary and community sector in the 1970s, community action in conflict with government in the 1980s, and new funding--from the European Union and other international sources--for development work since the mid-1990s. More recent trends discussed include the rapprochement of the voluntary and community sector with government, which has seen a growth in formal partnerships and networking, as well as the impact of the 1998 Belfast Agreement.     

The British are not coming!: UK higher education and the nonprofit sector

The rationale for the growth of nonprofit management education in the United States has recently been charted by O'Neill (2005). Ten years previously, the United States and the United Kingdom were at similar levels of development. By 2006 the parallel lines had been broken. Why has nonprofit management education expanded in the United States while provision of graduate education for the voluntary sector in the United Kingdom has stood still? This article explores the factors that have prevented parallel growth in education provision. It argues that the university as an institution, both in terms of its nature and its power structures, is one of those factors. It presents the story of the closing of the world's first voluntary sector course at the London School of Economics and concludes with reflection on the likely future of voluntary sector management education provision in the United Kingdom.     

Going beyond a tale of two sectors: a reflective career planning toolkit for social work students

ABSTRACT

This paper seeks to make the case that social work students would benefit from thinking beyond the binary of statutory sector vs voluntary sector when thinking about their future career. It argues instead that they should think in terms of their own philosophical worldview, their own preferences in terms of the mechanics of day-to-day practice, and the reasons for those preferences. Drawing on reflection literature, Johns’ Model of Reflection (2017) and an element of Motivational Interviewing, and informed by a value pluralist perspective, the paper sets out a reflective process for social work students to use. The process supports students firstly to explore their own core values and worldview, then to consider their feelings about more practical aspects of the social work role, and finally to find the connections and possible dissonances between the two. It is hoped that the article and the reflective process here advanced can contribute to students being able to plan for their professional futures in a way that does not depend principally on having to choose between statutory or voluntary sector practice, but on a much wider array of factors and values.