The moral hazard of conditionality: Restoring the integrity of social security law

This article examines the extent to which the Australian and UK social security systems meet their legal obligations to provide basic relief to citizens in need. Conditionality and “mutual obligation” are at the core of both the UK and Australian social security systems and are based on the concept of moral hazard, the goal being to ensure that claimants do not consider living on benefits to be preferable to engaging in paid work. Yet, we argue that the element of “mutuality” is missing in both systems; welfare claimants are subject to myriad conditions and obligations, whilst the state operates free of any legal responsibility to provide even basic relief to those in need, to prevent or alleviate extreme poverty and destitution. We outline the extent to which Australian and UK social security laws require governments to relieve destitution, examining both domestic and human rights law. We conclude that legal protections are weak and that both systems fail to meet the basic conditions of humanity toward their citizens. On this basis, we argue that such failings demonstrate a lack of integrity which undermines the standing of both the UK and Australia to invoke a claim of moral hazard to defend claimant conditionality.     

Coercion and justice: a critical analysis of compulsory intervention towards adult substance abusers in Scandinavian social law

Compulsory interventions towards adult substance abusers have a long tradition in the Scandinavian countries. Attitudes towards such controversial measures have changed during the last decades, and currently all three countries (Denmark, Norway and Sweden) emphasise individual autonomy and integrity as the basic principle in social law. In this article justifications of compulsory interventions are analysed on the basis of three general principles of justice: the liberal Principle of Autonomy, the Principle of Care and the utilitarian Harm Principle. A critical approach towards the weighting of these principles is applied in the discussion of the legal foundation of compulsory measures in the Norwegian, Swedish and Danish social laws.     

论道德回报

道德回报是道德的内在本质要求，是公正作为最基本、最重要的社会美德的充分彰显和具体体现，它使有序的社会伦理生活成为可能，同时也是道德自身“利益”实现的必要条件。道德回报之道德既是现实性道德与理想性道德的统一，也是道德义务与道德权利的统一。道德回报之回报包括“对道德的内在回报”和“对道德主体的外在回报”两个方面。道德回报机制的建立有赖于政府的道德化，并主要通过对行政人员的“赏善罚恶”实现政府对公平正义与和谐稳定的社会秩序的供给。     

Defender, spokesperson, therapist: representing the true interest of the client in therapeutic law

The aim of this article is to analyse the role of the legal representative in therapeutic law, specifically in Swedish administrative court hearings relating to compulsory care. Data are collected from three types of cases where a health or social welfare authority argues that it is necessary to apply coercion to a citizen: the Care of Young Persons (Special Provisions) Act, the Care of Alcohol and Drug Abusers (Special Provisions) Act and the Compulsory Psychiatric Care Act. The data consist of audio-recordings from 39 hearings, supplemented by 28 interviews with participants in these hearings, and court documents. Three primary roles of the legal representatives are identified: defender, spokesperson and therapist. We show how the primary role of the attorney becomes that of the spokesperson, but also that the role of the therapist takes precedence over that of the defender.     

FALSE PRINCIPLES OF WELFARE REFORM

Welfare reform both in Australia and throughout the OECD invokes various moral principles. These are articulated in arguments about ‘consent’, on both a micro‐ and macro‐level, and the ‘mutual obligation’ that ostensibly arises from consent. There are also frankly ‘paternalistic’ arguments, whether weak or strong, to the effect that forcing people into work is good for them. A critical assessment demonstrates that none of these arguments can justify the kind of welfare reform which is currently mooted. The real aim of such reform seems instead to be simply that of ‘clearing the welfare rolls ’. This has worrying ethical consequences.     

Who is supported? Social security for families with children between family law and social security regulations in Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom

Individual and collective welfare lies at the heart of deliberations about contemporary welfare states. It is not always recognized that social security provisions interact closely with systems for the support of families and for labour market participation. This paper focuses on the interaction of institutional arrangements providing social security for families with children. The analytic framework incorporates family and marital law and social security provisions. Three European welfare states, Belgium Germany and the United Kingdom — with divergent systems of family support — are compared in detail. Among the questions to be posed are: How do these societies organize their support and family-related activities? And what are the rights for individual women, men and children? Among the indicators to be considered are whether the basis for entitlement to social security is individualized or based on a collective unit such as the couple or the household; the extent to which access relates to marriage status or the legitimacy of the children; and the employment-related or universal nature of benefit. The different family models underlying institutions are analysed.     

The Social Security Act: Just Another Act or a Blueprint for Social Justice?

This paper takes the opportunity of the Social Security Review to reflect on the meaning of social security reform. It argues that traditional conceptions of the welfare state are unduly narrow and atomistic, concentrating on vesting individuals with social security rights similar to private law notions of contract or properly, and the securing of those rights from depredations by the state. In contrast it contends that social security properly rests on a notion of social rights to participation in society. This is a positive, reciprocal relationship between citizen and state in which both sides have rights and obligations in furthering participation in core social, economic and community activities. The article assays a preliminary statement of ‘social rights’ and considers how new legislation might better harmonize with it.     

国家与祖国:涂尔干论政治社会的两个面向

1905年国家与教会分离法案确定了国家的世俗性质,保障个人的良知自由。不过,法案也内含潜在的危机：良知自由与世俗国家之间的紧张。一方面,共和体制为良知自由转化为个人政治权利提供了合法途径,进而挑战国家权威。另一方面,个人与共和国之间的感情越来越疏远。涂尔干判断,危机根植于法国的政治传统,特别是“1789年原则”。不同于契约论和教权主义,涂尔干提出国家与祖国是政治社会的两个面向,个人主义和爱国主义是对应的两种伦理,符合有机团结与机械团结的特征。人格崇拜是国家和个人所共享的,国家是社会的大脑,拥有相对的独立性和权威性。祖国是现存的最大的实体,爱国主义是集体意识,人们不能为了理念上的无形的祖国,而与同胞为敌。     

Modernizing social security: Changing responsibilities and individual choice

Social security needs to be reformed to make it sustainable. We argue that it is necessary to consider not only system characteristics (such as the level and duration of benefits, insured population), but also the division of responsibilities. Social security is not solely a state matter; firms, trade unions, industrial sectors and the individual play a role as well. As social risks are to some extent endogenous, insurance ought to be taken care of at the level at which the risk can be most directly influenced in order to improve efficiency. This may partly take place within the public system, for example through risk rating. Alternatives would include shifting from collective to more individual arrangements, prominent examples being multipillar systems and savings accounts. Multipillar systems mainly imply a new division of responsibilities, taking the endogeneity of social risks and the implications of modern life cycles into account. At the same time they offer more individual choice. Savings accounts reduce moral hazard without affecting individual choice. Either way, in reforming social security a balance needs to be found between competing goals or principles: between equity and efficiency, between solidarity and freedom of choice, between the risks of moral hazard and adverse selection. This choice is difficult because social security is not only about "security". It is an important part of the way we organize our society and embodies many of society's values.     

Nonlinear social welfare functions

It is argued that Bayesian decision theory is a solution of an important philosophical problem, viz. the problem of how to define rational behavior under risk and uncertainty. The author has shown in earlier papers that if we take the Bayesian rationality postulates seriously, and take an individualistic point of view about social welfare, then our social welfare function must be a linear function of individual utilities: indeed, it must be their arithmetic mean. The present paper criticizes Diamond's and Sen's contention that one of the Bayesian postulates (viz. the sure-thing principle) does not apply to social decisions, even though it may apply to individual decisions. It also criticizes Sen's proposal of making social welfare a nonlinear function of individual utilities. The social welfare function proposed by the author depends on interpersonal utility comparisons. The use of such comparisons is defended. It is also argued that anybody who feels that the utilitarian (i.e., linear) form of the social welfare function is not egalitarian enough, should reject the author's individualism axiom, instead of trying to reject the Bayesian rationality axioms. However, this would be equivalent to giving egalitarian considerations a priority in many cases over humanitarian considerations. Finally, the paper discusses the reasons why even full agreement on the mathematical form of the social welfare function would not give rise to a Utopian state of moral consensus: moral controversies arising from disagreements about what predictions to make about future empirical facts would still remain.     

Ethics and Animal Consciousness: How Rubber the Ethical Ruler?

The treatment of nonhuman animals has been marked by extremes of beneficence and cruelty. The ethical guidelines explicitly or informally underlying how we regard other species have been marked by inconsistency and an elastic ethics. One of the major controversies involved in nonhuman animal rights and welfare discussions involves the level of their awareness or consciousness of ill treatment. The varying ways in which this issue has been conceptualized, studied, and applied to the lives of other species throughout history are reviewed, and the difficulties of setting thresholds for differential ethical and moral concern for various taxa are discussed. A more holistic and ecological moral vision for valuing other animals is proposed.     

The Middle‐class in the German Welfare State: Beneficial Involvement at Stake?

The working‐class is typically regarded as the driving force of welfare state development. Yet, some argue that the middle‐classes' beneficial involvement in the welfare state is crucial for its financial sustainability and popular legitimacy. Against this backdrop, we investigate how recent welfare state reforms in Germany which affect the status of the middle‐class are viewed and discussed by this group. Germany is a particularly interesting case because its welfare state is seen to be centred on the desires of the middle‐class, especially through its focus on status maintenance and horizontal redistribution over the life‐course. However, the move from status maintenance to minimum income support in unemployment provision and the strengthening of private old age provision challenge this assumption. Thus, we ask how the German middle‐class views the emerging abandonment of the principle of status maintenance and the shift from collective to individual responsibility. Based on qualitative material from focus groups, we find that individual responsibility is generally supported, but that the state is still assigned responsibility for providing basic levels of social security. Furthermore, for those groups seen as less capable of acting individually responsible (e.g. the poor or long‐term unemployed) the ‘inducement’ of – or assistance for – individually responsible behaviour by the state is demanded. Overall, while the principle of ‘individual responsibility’ seems to find some resonance among the middle‐class members interviewed, they still try to balance individual and collective responsibility.     

未完成的“自然社会”:现代社会的人性基础与规范构成

对于《自然社会》关注的现代社会的规范性秩序问题,自然状态、自然法与建国契约是三个主要环节。对该书的批评也集中在这三个方面：自然状态与人性论,自然状态的道德性质,以及政治社会与规范秩序的奠基关系。自然状态学说通过自爱与社会性建立的自然社会性是理解现代社会道德关系的出发点。在考虑现代社会丰富和充实这一道德关系的努力之前,应当先理解人是如何成为一个孤独的陌生人的。从这一自爱的社会性出发,《自然社会》将霍布斯笔下的自然状态理解为道德空间乃至法权状态,但并不同意这一空间是具有内在道德尺度或客观道德科学基础的规范性秩序。作为现代国家规范性基础的道德尺度是与政治社会同步奠立的。     

Human rights,cultural practices,and state policies: Implications for global social work practice and policy

Effective practice in a global world requires knowledge and understanding of diverse cultures. Most social workers around the world are committed to values and policies that enhance the well‐being of especially vulnerable populations and that protect their human rights. However, not all cultural practices or policies place the same value on human rights and the protection of vulnerable populations, a situation that may result in conflicts for social workers, who have an ethical obligation to advocate for human rights as well as to be sensitive to their clients' cultural contexts. Based on multidisciplinary research and contemporary examples of gender discrimination, forced marriages, child labor, and female genital mutilation, this article proposes resolutions to this conflict. It concludes by suggesting practices and policies that might help social workers to strike an effective balance between cultural diversity and the promotion of human rights. Key Practitioner Message: ● Social workers are best placed to understand individuals and communities within their various cultural contexts; ● Social work practice and policy should be sensitive to cultural practices that may undermine human rights and the well‐being of vulnerable populations; ● Guided by professional values and ethics, social workers can assume the roles of educator and advocate in enhancing the rights of individuals.     

The future of adult safeguarding in Australia

Significant reforms to Australia's adult safeguarding laws and practices are in the process of occurring in the context of increasingly market‐oriented social care provision and rising human rights consciousness. Recent safeguarding developments have included federal regulatory reforms concerning disability and aged care service provision, together with significant reform activity stemming from a national inquiry into elder abuse. Despite this national activity, adult safeguarding continues largely to be an arena of state and territory responsibility. This article examines recent reform developments and asks how safeguarding laws and practices can be reformed to take account of increased federal involvement in social care regulation and the more market‐oriented ways in which social care is being provided. The article argues that while state and territory safeguarding laws and practices are unlikely to become uniform, 10 principles ought to guide continued adult safeguarding reform. These principles seek to balance respect for the autonomy of individuals with society's obligation to support those in need.     

本土社会工作实务的伦理困境与伦理抉择——基于上海青少年社会工作实践的质性研究

社会工作在实践过程中面临的最大困境是人与文化互动过程所形成的多元可能,这种多元可能往往使实务工作者在提供专业服务过程中遭遇价值抉择的两难。本研究运用质性研究的方法,以上海青少年社会工作者的实践为研究对象,着力探讨当下本土社会工作伦理实践中的困境及抉择。研究发现,本土社会工作常见的伦理困境包括:保密与否、案主自决、利益冲突、专业界限、公平分配、价值冲突、同事关系。而社工在进行伦理抉择时,遵循三大基本原则:案主生命优先原则,法律规定、机构规范优于个人价值,人际关系取向。此外,研究以"人在情境中"的概念为框架基础,提出个体因素(即社工个体对伦理抉择的影响)、问题因素(即伦理困境本身对伦理抉择的影响)、情境因素(即外部环境对伦理抉择的影响)这个三维分析架构来系统分析社会工作伦理抉择中的影响因素及其过程。最后,研究建议要建构本土的社会工作伦理体系,即建构本土导向的社会工作伦理原则、建立操作取向的社会工作伦理机制。     

Fairness, Equality and Legitimacy: A Qualitative Comparative Study of Germany and the UK

The pressures of globalization and shifts towards post‐industrialism are producing policies that increasingly emphasize the common themes of activation and of individual responsibility for outcomes. Such approaches suggest normative principles of equality of opportunity rather than of outcome, and of individual rather than collective responsibility for the outcomes achieved. Does this imply a shift towards a common normative framework for European welfare states, with implications for future policy developments? This article reports a recent qualitative study examining ideas about fairness and social provision in the very different regimes of Germany and the UK. The analysis shows that while respondents in both countries value equality of opportunity as a normative principle, those in Germany are much more likely to argue that an equal opportunity approach requires government to guarantee equal access to basic services. They are also more likely to express concerns about market freedoms which allow those who can afford it better access to health care and education. Real differences in welfare values remain, loosely following differences of regime type, despite the greater emphasis on activation and individual responsibility across European welfare states.     

A National Governance Perspective on the Transformation of Rural Property Rights: The Chinese Experience*

Property rights have multiple attributes, and these are correlated with national governance. In the West, property rights have the economic function of maximizing efficiency and the political function of rights protection, but in China, they also have a strong social character. With the modernization of national governance, these functions interact with and transform each other. When the state’s ability to supply public goods is relatively weak, property rights take on more of a social character, meeting public demand for welfare at the grassroots level. When the state is better able to provide public goods, the social function of property rights lessens as their economic function grows. The social character of property rights was the institutional foundation for China, as a huge agrarian state, to realize “governance through inaction,” and at the same time was the secret key that could break the code to the millennial continuity of Chinese agrarian civilization. Reforms including the collectivization of rural property rights after 1949, the “separation of two rights” (to collective ownership and household contracted land, with a focus on the latter), and the “separation of three rights,” (to collective ownership, household contracts and revitalized land management). These changes constitute a process in which the economic function of property rights has been growing while their social character has lessened under conditions of national governance modernization.     

Has the Nordic Welfare Model Been Transformed?

The Nordic welfare model is undergoing a fundamental transformation. Using Denmark we show how a universal welfare state model is gradually being transformed into an emergent multi‐tiered welfare state. Whereas the Danish pension system's having become multi‐tiered in the 1990s, with private schemes – collective and individual – supplementing public schemes is well documented, scant attention has focused on more recent developments in other areas of the welfare state. This article shows how the multi‐tiered welfare state spread in the 2000s to policies for families, the unemployed and the sick. Although Denmark still offers universal coverage in core welfare state areas, the increased use of occupational and fiscal welfare as well as changes in public schemes has gradually transformed the nation into a multi‐tiered welfare state that is more dualistic and individualistic, with participation in the labour market becoming still more important for entitlement to benefits. These profound changes have taken place in such a way that although core characteristics are still in place, new structures and understandings of the welfare state are also developing. Thus classical typologies need revision, so that they include more focus on this combination of universality and institutional attachment to the labour market. Moreover, measures of what welfare comprises should include not only public but also private elements.     

社会网研究的架构:以组织理论与管理研究为例

本文认为社会网研究存在于七大领域之中。根据各研究领域,本文以组织与管理研究为例说明每一领域要研究的内容,并阐述了社会网结构与社会关系如何在集体行动与个体行动之间搭起一座桥,而其间的自组织现象更使得集体行动绝非个体行动的线性加总,而有着复杂现象的特性——不同的自组织会产生分歧的行动结果,相同的个体行动可能在不同的结构中产生完全相反的集体行动。解开此非线性行为之谜,正是未来社会网研究要继续努力的重要方向。