Concepts of Risk in Relation to Organizational Structure and Functioning within the Personal Social Services and Probation

The main argument of this paper is that personal social services, including probation, at both a policy and practice level are increasingly focused on issues of risk. We postulate that risk assessment, risk management, the monitoring of risk and risk-taking itself are rapidly becoming the dominant raison d'être of such agencies, thus supplanting ideologies of meeting need or welfare provision. In turn they have become key to priority setting and rationing, the basis for organizational rationales and structures, the central focus for professional activity and accountability, and measuring quality. Thus an analysis of risk as an organizing principle offers fundamental insights into the rapidly changing nature and organization of statutory social work and probation. There is very little literature that focuses on risk across the spectrum of services. Risk analysis, as such, is most developed in the criminal justice and child protection fields. However, the mental health literature, being centrally preoccupied with notions of dangerousness, is quickly adopting risk terminology. Apart from work on elder abuse, literature on child welfare and community care has been framed in terms of need, issues of risk only coming to the fore around potential admission to residential care. We contend that as issues of rationing and accountability become more dominant, so do concerns with risk. Thus we predict the extension of notions of risk as central organizing principles throughout the social services and probation.     

Violence to Probation Staff: Patterns and Managerial Responses

This article examines the impact of violence perpetrated against probation officers. It presents empirical evidence based upon work carried out under the ESRC Violence Research Programme. It is argued that the managerial response to violence has been largely defensive and piecemeal. Professional responses to violence are context‐bound, while risk assessment is largely confined to the potential harm to the general public posed by offenders. The article concludes by arguing that more attention needs to be given to the evaluation of management responses to violence including appropriate training, and the greater organizational support for safety at work.     

社会性别意识下的农村流动妇女就业排斥研究

本文主要从社会性别意识的角度,结合目前农村女性外来务工者所受到的就业排斥现象,呈现对农村妇女就业进行排斥的主流性别意识,以及它如何使农村妇女对其进行内化而形成了自身的性别意识。重新审视现有的就业制度与主流性别意识之间的关系,关注农村流动妇女自身性别意识,有利于减轻并进一步消除农村流动妇女受到的就业排斥。     

Probation and Social Work

The paper considers the representation of probation themes inthe British Journal of Social Work (BJSW) since the early 1990s,and reviews developments in probation policy and practice sincethen, with a focus on the relationship between probation practiceand social work. It argues that emerging research evidence supportsthe view that effective probation practice is likely to be informedby values and skills that are recognizably within the traditionof social work, and concludes that despite pressures to abandonsocial work as a basis for probation practice, it is not obviouswhat the alternative could be.     

Probation and Social Justice

Correspondence to: David Smith, Department of Applied Social Science, Lancaster University, Bailrigg, Lancaster LA1 4YL, UK. E-mail: d.b.smith{at}lancaster.ac.uk or Maurice Vanstone, Centre for Criminal Justice and Criminology, University of Wales Swansea, Singleton Park, Swansea SA2 8PP, Wales, UK. E-mail: m.vanstone{at}swansea.ac.uk Summary The paper considers the past and potential contribution to socialjustice of the probation service in England and Wales, withinthe context of the service's complex origins and tradition,in which humanitarian and disciplinary concerns have long co-existed.The paper explores the service's connections with processesof categorization and governance of the dangerous, and its alignmentwith the ‘psy’ disciplines in developing its claimsto professional expertise. The implications of the recent reassertionof the centrality of psychological understandings of offendingand its prevention, in the form of cognitive-behavioural programmes,are discussed, and the circumstances in which the movement for‘effective practice’ can and cannot contribute tosocial justice are discussed. The paper then explains the groundsfor believing that a concern with social justice entails a commitmentto crime prevention at a level beyond that of direct work withknown offenders, and explores the potential of restorative justiceas a means of achieving a reintegrative and participatory approachto community safety. The paper concludes with a discussion ofthe service's successes and failures in anti-discriminatorypractice, and the feasibility of a social justice agenda inthe current policy context.     

Towards "the Field of Corrections": Modernizing the Probation Service in the Late 1990s

The Probation Service in England and Wales has been caught up in the New Labour government's broader programme of "modernization". In a document more radical than anything produced under the previous Conservative government, New Labour has proposed that the Service be brought under centralized control, that its name be changed to reflect its new primary purpose of public protection, and that it be brought into closer structural alignment with the Prison Service. This paper discerns in the case made for centralization and the need for closer ties with prisons an authoritarian impulse which is deeply at odds with the Service's own local traditions, and questions whether the undoubtedly necessary process of modernization must take the form being proposed by the government.     

Social Exclusion, Inequality and Social Work

This paper sets out the environment of inequality in which social work and the poor have recently operated. It explores pragmatic and idealist arguments concerning whether or not the poor need social work. Finally, policy solutions developed in consultation with social service users and carers are suggested in relation to poverty and social exclusion. Social exclusion can be linked to relative poverty as exclusion from economic and social norms. However, there is a wider brief in our own government’s publications and those of Europe, of examining how people are excluded from actions and policies of agencies who are there to support them. This paper will retain the concepts of poverty as lack of material income, and inequality as the gap between the rich and the poor, while being aware of the policy implications for social service users and carers of the more comprehensive process of being shut out partially or fully from social, economic, political and cultural systems. The debates around social work, social exclusion and inequality that follow establish: that some of the poor do need social work; that the poverty of social service users is related to policies that have restructured welfare in Britain; that the reason for individuals approaching or being referred to social services are complex but are likely to include financial deprivation as a key contributory factor; that if the poor do need social work, advocacy is essential rather than social work being seen as concerned only with social control—taking children into care, mentally ill people into hospitals, and advising the DSS on the suitability of claimants for benefits. Finally, the discussion turns to new policy agendas on social exclusion instigated by the Labour government. What positive difference can such policies make for social service users, their carers and social workers?.     

Work Satisfaction in Probation and Social Work

Correspondence to Professor Martin Davies, University of East Anglia, Norwich, NR4 7TJ. Summary The design and preliminary development of a research instrumentintended to provide comparable measures of work satisfactionwithin different social work settings is described. The resultsof administering it to two separate samples of social workersand probation officers are presented. It appears that probation officers feel themselves more highlyregarded by members of the general public and are less likelyto say they are badly paid; they enjoy more job autonomy; rathermore social workers tend to feel alienated at work, but mostbelieve that they have better chances of career advancementthan is the case in the probation service. There are broad similarities between the two work settings sofar as work with clients and attitudes towards colleagues areconcerned; it is argued that the emergence of these similaritiesis methodologically reassuring because it suggests the stabilityof the data overall, and therefore increases the likelihoodthat the findings regarding agency differences are a valid reflectionof social reality in each setting.     

Restructuring of Full‐time Workers: A Case of Transitional Dislocation or Social Exclusion in Canada? Lessons from the 1990s

The decade of the 1990s witnessed an unprecedented erosion of the postwar welfare state, with massive restructuring of the labour market away from full‐time, sustaining employment. This article examines the experiences of restructured Canadian full‐time workers who lost a job because of a company shutdown, relocation, or non‐seasonal business slowdown. Using data from Statistics Canada's Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics for the period 1993–2001, we present longitudinal data examining labour market outcomes at 6, 12, 18 and 24 months following the initial job loss. Outcome data allow us to examine the extent to which job displacement in the 1990s resulted in transitional dislocation followed by stable full‐time employment, or whether new pathways to social exclusion and marginalization were created. Given that only half of workers who lost their full‐time jobs during this period were in stable and full‐time employment two years later, we find support for the latter. The article further identifies policy alternatives that could lessen the social costs of neo‐liberal labour market restructuring in Canada and beyond.     

Understanding Social Inclusion and Its Meaning for Australia

This paper considers the various meanings of ‘social inclusion’ from both sociological and policy viewpoints. It shows how the perspective has been translated into particular policies and approaches to governance. After drawing some lessons from the policy experiences of other countries, it weighs the appropriateness of a ‘social inclusion agenda’ for Australia, a country with a particular history of social exclusion – of prisoners, indigenous people, and immigrants from around the world – and a special emphasis on dignity, respect and equal treatment.     

Poverty, Social Exclusion and Social Policy in the Czech Republic

This article analyses the pattern of poverty and social exclusion in the Czech Republic and the impact of social policy on this pattern. The analysis is mostly based on data from the Czech Survey on Social Conditions of Households (2001; 27,000 respondents); Eurostat data provide a benchmark for making international comparisons. The poverty rate in the Czech Republic is among the lowest in Europe. On the other hand, material deprivation, as well as concentration of poverty within specific population groups, is high, with the unemployed facing the highest risk of poverty. Social policy measures in effect reinforce this pattern: while the benefit system is highly redistributive and effectively eliminates income poverty among households of employed persons and among pensioners, incomes of persons outside paid employment are protected less effectively. Labour market policy measures are insufficient in scope and inadequate in targeting groups which are facing the highest risk of labour market exclusion and poverty. We argue that although this practice is effective at present, it is not sustainable in the long term.     

Social Exclusion and Poverty: Translating Social Capital into Accessible Resources

This article investigates the dynamic multi‐dimensional processes through which the poor become excluded from social participation. Drawing on social capital literature, it traces how bridging and bonding capital do not always translate into expected levels of social participation. It does so by detailing research findings from low income focus groups undertaken in Dunedin, New Zealand. These describe the experiences of group members in attempting to manage connections around employment, their own broader social participation or the participation of their children. In each case, the study highlights the difficulties of translation they experienced: in particular, translating available bridging or bonding capital into useful social, cultural or economic resources which could mitigate their social exclusion or enable fuller social participation.     

Housing and the Social Exclusion Agenda in England

In the period immediately following its election in 1997 the current Labour government in the UK declared a commitment to ‘combating social exclusion’ to be at the core of the domestic policy agenda. The interpretation of the term ‘social exclusion’ has been the source of extensive debate. This paper focuses on one aspect of the current debate, exploring the relationship between housing and social exclusion, both in theory and in contemporary central government policy in England. I argue that theoretical imprecision is a very real issue, not least because it allows policy makers to refer to rather vague causal mechanisms or social processes to justify actions and interventions. I identify some of the areas that require further exploration and theoretical development if we are to have a rigorous understanding of the concept of social exclusion and its link to housing. Most fundamentally, I suggest that the question of whether the concept of ‘social exclusion’ contributes anything valuable to our ability to understand social disadvantage needs to be addressed directly.     

Tough Love: Social Work, Social Exclusion and the Third Way

Summary This article argues that New Labour's priorities for socialinclusion through employment, and for strenthening civil society,have relegated public-sector social work to a limited role inassessing and managing risks. However, as failures in the government'stop-down, regulatory approach emerge, there will be new opportunitiesfor a broader-based version of the profession to contributeto a more progressive programme.     

制度排斥、社会距离与农民工社会融入——基于广东省东莞市的分析

本文利用一项广东省东莞市流动人口调查数据分析发现,有广东省户籍、有子女在东莞工作或上学、来东莞市时间长、对工作及住房条件满意度高者,社会融入状况较好;当前相对严格的户籍准入制度仍然是农民工社会融入的最主要体制性障碍;长期的制度排斥产生了不良的心理后果,较为普遍的自信心缺失也阻碍了农民工社会融入.     

Redefining the 'Rural Question': The New 'Politics of the Rural' and Social Policy

Politics in the countryside has undergone a significant shift in emphasis in recent decades, which may be characterized as a transition from ‘rural politics’ to ‘a politics of the rural’. Whereas ‘rural politics’ refers broadly to politics located in rural space, or relating to ‘rural issues’, the ‘politics of the rural’ is defined by the centrality of the meaning and regulation of rurality itself as the primary focus of conflict and debate. However, far from marginalizing social issues – as early work on the new rural conflicts by Mormont implied – the paper argues that the new politics of the rural has liberated rural social policy from the shadow of agricultural policy, providing a new language and context through which rural social issues can be placed on the political agenda. Three examples of this are discussed, drawing on illustrations from Britain, Australia, New Zealand and North America – conflicts over the rationalization of public and commercial services in rural communities; campaigns around the closure of rural schools and their symbolic place at the heart of rural communities; and issues of difference and discrimination in the countryside, including responses to travellers and asylum‐seekers.     

Social Exclusion in Britain 1991—1995

The purpose of this paper is to offer a working definition of social exclusion and to operationalize it in such a way that an initial empirical analysis of social exclusion in Britain today can be undertaken. After a brief review of conceptions of social exclusion and some of the key controversies, we operationalize one definition based on the notion of participation in five types of activity—consumption, savings, production, political and social. Using the British Household Panel Survey, indicators for participation on these dimensions are developed and analysed both cross-sectionally and longitudinally for the period 1991–5. We find strong associations between an individual's participation (or lack of it) on the five different dimensions, and on each dimension over time. However, there is no distinct group of socially excluded individuals: few are excluded on all dimensions in any one year and even fewer experience multiple exclusion for the whole period. The results support the view that treating different dimensions of exclusion separately is preferable to thinking about social exclusion in terms of one homogeneous group.     

The Emergence of a Community-based Social Assistance Programme in Urban China

To many people, the problem of poverty in China was confined mainly to the rural areas, and the situation of urban poverty was regarded as insignificant. Yet in fact, market-orientated economic reforms have created an urban underclass, made up of poorly paid state workers, the unemployed, and migrants from the countryside. In attempting to respond to the mounting needs of the urban poor, the Chinese government has introduced a means-tested social assistance programme in the cities since the mid-1990s. This paper describes the basic philosophy, structure and operation of this programme, and provides a general assessment of its functions and shortcomings.     

Framing the Other: Criminality, Social Exclusion and Social Engineering in Developing Singapore

This paper examines the issue of criminality as it is expressed in social policy in Singapore. This small South-east Asian country is characterized by great social and ethnic diversity, high rates of economic growth, but low crime rates. The relationship between these is pursued by examining the authoritarian political system and the social policies that have arisen from this to socialize and discipline the ethnically disparate and class-divided population. A brief survey of the social structure of Singapore, the role of colonialism in shaping the legal system, the legal measures introduced during the pre-independent anti-colonial and anti-communist struggles and the adoption of many of these by the new government of independent Singapore as weapons of social control introduces the paper. This is followed by an examination of the single-minded pursuit of developmentalism and security in the post-independent period and of the emergence of crime in political discourse as the paradigm of social disorder and self-exclusion from the developmental state, and the relationship of these to the dominant political problem of the management of ethnicity and social differences expressed as concern with classification, a commitment to socio-biology and the constant attempts to define a field of "Asian values" based on a local reading of Confucianism as the basis of social cohesion. The essay concludes with a discussion of the relationship between Singaporean images of social order and the pursuit of a distinctive form of positivist modernism and the question of whether a "Singapore model" is applicable elsewhere in the world.