The emergence of the modern life cycle in Britain∗

Robert Erikson and John H. Goldthorpe, The Constant Flux: A Study of Class Mobility in Industrial Societies (1992), xvi + 429 (Clarendon Press, Oxford, £48.00).     

COVID-19 and care homes in England: What happened and why?

In the context of very high mortality and infection rates, this article examines the policy response to COVID-19 in care homes for older people in the UK, with particular focus on England in the first 10 weeks of the pandemic. The timing and content of the policy response as well as different possible explanations for what happened are considered. Undertaking a forensic analysis of policy in regard to the overall plan, monitoring and protection as well as funding and resources, the first part lays bare the slow, late and inadequate response to the risk and reality of COVID-19 in care homes as against that in the National Health Service (NHS). A two-pronged, multidimensional explanation is offered: structural, sectoral specificities; political and socio-cultural factors. Amongst the relevant structural factors are the institutionalised separation from the health system, the complex system of provision and policy for adult social care, widespread market dependence. There is also the fact that logistical difficulties were exacerbated by years of austerity and resource cutting and a weak regulatory tradition of the care home sector. The effects of a series of political and cultural factors are also highlighted. As well as little mobilisation of the sector and low public commitment to and knowledge of social care, there is a pattern of Conservative government trying to divest the state of responsibilities in social care. This would support an interpretation in terms of policy avoidance as well as a possible political calculation by government that its policies towards the care sector and care homes would be less important and politically damaging than those for the NHS.     

Working Group on Ethical Considerations in Science and Scholarship∗

Persons can be subject to involuntary treatment for mental illness or substance abuse in a variety of circumstances. The ability of such persons to give a valid informed consent for research often has been called into question, because the coercive nature of the treatment is thought to impair the voluntariness of their decision making. A careful consideration of the nature of coercion from a “moralized”; perspective focuses attention on two elements that determine the acceptability of consent: the fairness of the proposal to which consent is sought, and the moral baseline from which the proposal is made. Even when coercion is not present, disproportionate rewards offered for participation in research can impair the voluntariness of consent, as can the unintended effects of the social structure of the system in which the research is taking place. When coercion, defined as a moralized concept, is not present, however, and other conditions do not substantially impair voluntariness, consent to research legitimately may be sought from involuntarily treated populations.     

Just like a ‘modern’ wife? Concubines on the public stage in early Republican China

Whilst scholars have highlighted a variety of women who became active in the public arena in early Republican China (1912–28), little attention has been given to concubines. Beyond reformers’ social and legal efforts to abolish the custom of concubinage, we know little about the public activities of concubines and social reactions to them. This article investigates how, under the influence of the Western practice of wives accompanying their official husbands for formal functions, Chinese officials were obliged to bring their wives out of domestic seclusion to appear with them in public. Many wives, however, did not feel comfortable doing so. Consequently, a unique opportunity opened up for the concubines of Chinese officials to play the role of a ‘modern’ wife on various social and diplomatic occasions both domestic and abroad, which brought an unprecedented degree of visibility and respectability to a category of women of traditionally low-status origin. Nevertheless, these women suffered and endured discrimination and stigmatization for a variety of reasons. Their public presence was full of tensions and contradictions, which reveal the social reality of a China caught between the legacies of custom and tradition and new ideals of gender and nation inspired by Western definitions of modernity.     

Feeling safe in school∗

This paper advances the hypothesis that for a child to feel safe and to learn at school certain psychological conditions must be met. These conditions are described using concepts derived from psychoanalytic research and include; a background of SAFETY and a feeling of WELL BEING derived from a healthy ego with perceptual skills appropriate to the task, a HOLDING environment of adults who can respond appropriately to the child's developmental needs, an environment that provides CONTAINMENT and helps children process negativity in relationships, processes that help children regulate affect, value relationships, and leam to mentalise, in a SECURE ATTACHMENT experience, and finally, supports that encourage children to function as responsible members of a community organized as an OPEN SOCIAL SYSTEM.