FAMILY THERAPY RESEARCH AND THE “NEW EPISTEMOLOGY”*

Epistemological critiques of the theory and practice of family therapy recently have also been brought to bear on mainstream strategies and methods of research in family therapy. In this paper, it is argued that standard research methods are the only ethically responsible means presently available by which we can assess the efficacy of family therapy. It is also argued that standard research models have already provided data of practical relevance to clinicians, patients and public policy makers and should not be abandoned in haste. Finally, it is argued that there are insufficient grounds for divorce between the “new epistemology” and standard research, since commonplace research designs and methods are far more compatible with systemic thinking than some observers have suggested.     

Integration versus segregation: the experiences of a group of disabled students moving from mainstream school into special needs further education

Although the latest education policy for disabled students is one of inclusion, some students are moving out of mainstream schools into specialist colleges for their further education. This research uses a combination of group and individual interviews to explore why this move away from mainstream education is made. Results show that these students' moved into specialist education because of the inadequate physical accessibility of their mainstream colleges, the quality of disability services available to them and their previous experiences whilst in mainstream school. These students were able to identify both strengths and weaknesses within mainstream and special education for disabled students, and believed that educational placement should therefore be a matter of choice depending on the physical, academic and emotional needs of the individual. It would appear, however, that for the students participating in this research, their local mainstream colleges were unable to cater for their needs, indicating that their decision to move into a special needs college was not based on a real choice. Mainstream colleges are challenged to create a truly inclusive environment so that disabled students are offered a real choice.     

Out-of-school-hours learning in the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, out-of-school-hours learning (OSHL) is incorporated into education policy. This is the story of how demonstration projects, political lobbying, and funding combined with training, youth work, and schools to make such innovation mainstream "across the pond."     

The language of newcomers: developments in Dutch citizenship education

A new citizenship policy in the Netherlands is intended to provide ethnic minority newcomers with self‐management competencies for their daily lives, further education and employment. The advocates of the compulsory language training that is the main ingredient of this policy argue that it will foster newcomers' chances of getting jobs, accessing education and being incorporated into the mainstream of Dutch society. According to the Scientific Council for Government Policy, no country in Europe has gone as far as the Netherlands in terms of its citizenship policy. In this paper, we evaluate the backgrounds and the consequences of this policy, and we take a critical look at the attempt to present command of the Dutch language as the main road to integration for ethnic minority newcomers.     

The Bologna process in European and post-Soviet higher education: institutional legacies and policy adoption

This paper addresses the puzzle of the unlikeliness of the implementation of elements of the Bologna Process agenda in Europe and post-Soviet higher education systems. Following mainstream policy science theories, the policy initiative would be qualified as “prone to failure”, but surprisingly many governments took up the challenge to develop regulations and guidelines and to change the structures of their higher education systems. Looking at the adoption of Bologna process elements in various countries – east and west – I will be able to point at factors that contribute to explaining why and to what extent countries engaged with the process and hence to contribute to the literature on Europeanisation and policy adoption.     

Ecological citizenship and sustainable consumption: Examining local organic food networks

Sustainable consumption is gaining in currency as a new environmental policy objective. This paper presents new research findings from a mixed-method empirical study of a local organic food network to interrogate the theories of both sustainable consumption and ecological citizenship. It describes a mainstream policy model of sustainable consumption, and contrasts this with an alternative model derived from green or ‘new economics’ theories. Then the role of localised, organic food networks is discussed to locate them within the alternative model. It then tests the hypothesis that ecological citizenship is a driving force for ‘alternative’ sustainable consumption, via expression through consumer behaviour such as purchasing local organic food. The empirical study found that both the organisation and their consumers were expressing ecological citizenship values in their activities in a number of clearly identifiable ways, and that the initiative was actively promoting the growth of ecological citizenship, as well as providing a meaningful social context for its expression. Furthermore, the initiative was able to overcome the structural limitations of mainstream sustainable consumption practices. Thus, the initiative was found to be a valuable tool for practising alternative sustainable consumption. The paper concludes with a discussion of how ecological citizenship may be a powerful motivating force for sustainable consumption behaviour, and the policy and research implications of this.     

THE NEW MEDIA AND OUR POLITICAL COMMUNICATION DISCONTENTS: DEMOCRATIZING CYBERSPACE

This article argues that the new interactive media have a 'vulnerable potential' to enhance public communications and enrich democracy, which can be realized only through appropriate policy support and imaginative institution building. After outlining the main shortcomings of the prevailing political communication system, certain elements of redemptive potential, inherent in distinctive features of the Internet, are identified. The policy implications of this analysis are then drawn for the public-service obligations of mainstream media, to ensure open access to new media platforms, and to create a 'civic commons' in cyberspace.     

Praise Is Not Enough

This article argues there is a need for a more encompassing understanding of the relationships between domestic violence and all forms of marginalisation in the Australian context. Specific attention will be given to the invisibility of class and poverty in contemporary discourse about domestic violence in the mainstream population. That there continues to be a higher prevalence of domestic violence, and more severe physical injury sustained as a result of domestic violence among population groups living with poverty, exposes the partiality of mainstream knowledges informing Australian domestic violence policy and practice. This article proposes prevention efforts must accommodate how class and the effects of poverty interlock with other aspects of social identity to shape the experience of domestic violence for people both victimised by, and perpetrating violence.     

Policymaking from a Gender+ Equality Perspective

ABSTRACT

This article discusses policymaking from a gender+ equality perspective. It connects the knowledge from various subfields ranging from development planning, to feminist policy studies, to works on gender mainstreaming. By connecting different but convergent feminist subdisciplines, it draws a picture of the field of gender+ and policymaking. Central in this analysis are the questioning of gender+ bias in the policy process and the development of strategies to mainstream gender into policymaking. By delineating the boundaries of research on gender and policymaking, the article addresses existing challenges and reflects on gaps and promising terrains of study that could further develop and establish the field of feminist policy studies.     

Supporting pupils with special health needs in mainstream schools: policy and practice

Education policy favouring ‘inclusion’, together with medical advances, mean that a growing number of pupils in mainstream schools may have health‐related support needs in respect of a chronic illness or physical disability. Data from an empirical research study investigating these needs and carried out between 1996 and 1998 are used to reflect on the position of this group of pupils within policy guidance on special educational needs (SEN) and medical needs. Evidence of confusion and ambiguity, both in the guidance and its interpretation, suggests that the needs of this group remain somewhat hidden. More recent developments in special needs policy guidance are discussed in terms of the prospect for strengthening support for this group of pupils. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

“Welfare Mother” Activism,Mainstream Feminism,and the Cunning of History in Ontario’s 1970s Welfare Debate

ABSTRACT

This article examines the voice of mobilized welfare mothers and the mainstream women’s movement in the welfare debate of the 1970s in Ontario. A question debated was whether welfare mothers had a right to “stay home” while receiving welfare. The article shows that a radical strain of welfare mother activists at this time demanded recognition of women’s unpaid work. While mainstream women’s groups were generally sympathetic to welfare mothers, their overriding focus on employability as the solution to their poverty served to derail the radical possibilities of welfare mother politics and solidify a policy agenda that undermined the deserving status of welfare mothers.     

Curriculum Access for Pupils with Disabilities: an Irish experience

For young people with physical disabilities in Ireland, gaining access to a school represents only the first tentative step on the way to full participation in the curriculum alongside their peers. While government policy explicitly favours the inclusion of young people with disabilities within mainstream education there is little evidence of planning at a systemic level to facilitate this process. This small scale, qualitative study attempts to ascertain the reality of inclusion within mainstream settings for young people with physical disabilities. The results indicate that the young people often experienced exclusion from full curricular access. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to developing inclusive structures that facilitate curricular access for young people with disabilities within Irish post-primary schools.     

Jamaican Children with Special Needs: concerns, realities and possibilities

Official documentation on Jamaican children with special needs attending mainstream schools is limited. Consequently, the extent to which 'education for all' is a reality cannot be assessed. The absence of a national special education policy adds to the concern. To ascertain the presence and status of children with special needs attending mainstream secondary schools, individual interviews were conducted with guidance counsellors from 24 secondary schools and 102 children attending those schools. Information was also obtained from the national census data-base. There was evidence that children with a variety of special needs were present in these schools. Concerns of both students and teachers including inappropriate teaching methods and large classes were highlighted, and suggestions for improvement made. The researchers made recommendations including the better utilisation of existing services.     

Finding the bicultural balance: immigrant Latino mothers raising "American" adolescents

This article discusses the cross-cultural issues that confront immigrant Latino parents living and raising adolescents in the United States. Emphasis is placed on the need for social work practitioners, who, as they aid a family's integration into mainstream society, will listen to the parents' concerns and incorporate their past experiences and traditional culture into the assessment and treatment processes. Implications for practice, programs, and policy are also discussed.     

The contribution of behavioral economics to tax reform in the United Kingdom

This paper examines the contribution of behavioral economics to tax reform by examining two major reforms in the United Kingdom which may be seen as natural experiments – the reform of local taxation and the introduction of value added tax. The case for both was based strongly on mainstream economic analysis but one was a failure and the other a success. The introduction of the local community charge, or ‘poll tax’ as it became known, was such a failure that not only did it have to be repealed but it was also a factor in the downfall of Mrs. Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister. The introduction of value added tax took more account of behavioral factors and was successful. The paper concludes that a wider approach based on behavioral as well as mainstream economics may have considerable advantages in developing tax policy.     

Framing home-care policy: A case study of reforms in a Canadian jurisdiction

Much of the literature on home-care services reform—an issue in the spotlight of policy debate across many ‘aging’ industrialized countries—has focused on the organizational, financial and clinical aspects of service provision. Less attention, however, has been paid to how particular issues and reform alternatives gain momentum in a given context; in particular to how a selective range of policy initiatives reach government's agenda and get incorporated into mainstream policy-making. This article seeks to advance our understanding of home-care policy by considering the influence of ideational factors on reform undertakings. More specifically, while concentrating on home-care policies in the province of Quebec, Canada, it examines how the organized perspectives and differing concerns of various stakeholders—i.e. their policy frames—appear to have shaped the form and content of policy. It is argued that framing provides a cogent and insightful means of understanding policy change and stasis in this area, most notably why managed competition or an all-out privatization of service delivery, as seen in other jurisdictions, has not been advocated by government in Québec.     

Applying the social model in practice: some lessons from countryside recreation

This paper draws on the researcher's experiences as a countryside access advisor in exploring some of the ways that social model ideas can influence the development of organizational policy and practice in mainstream settings. It argues that, in seeking to influence the development of more inclusive policies and practices, disability studies needs to look for new ways of engaging with diverse audiences of practitioners who are used to operating within an individual model of disability, and who may therefore see no immediate organizational advantages to adopting social model principles in their work. This evolutionary process demands in particular that we work constantly towards finding new, more accessible, ways of explaining social model ideas to mainstream audiences. Thus, in a social climate that continues to tolerate disabled people's oppression, disability studies has a key role to play in demonstrating to theorists, policy-makers and practitioners why and how social model ideas can support the move towards inclusion.     

Integration of students with disabilities into regular schools: policy in use

In the state of Victoria, Australia, the right of all children to be educated in a regular school has been Ministerial policy since 1984. However, the issue of integration of students with disabilities into mainstream schools is problematical because of the ways that practitioners interpret this policy. This paper summarises research on the attitudes of 194 primary and secondary school teachers to integration and discusses how these are impacting on the implementation process. It is argued that it is difficult to develop policies which define 'what will be' without careful consideration of 'what is' in terms of history, beliefs and attitudes. The researchers found that ideas arising from the practices of 'special' education are being imposed on the integration process, limiting teachers' visions of educational opportunity for all.     

Should “open innovation” change innovation policy thinking in catching-up economies? Considerations for policy analyses

This paper provides a review of the current state of academic and policy-level debates on “open innovation” by elaborating on the relevance of the concept of open innovation for innovation policy-making in catching-up economies. The paper shows that paradoxes and contradictions exist between the “mainstream” innovation discourse and the development challenges of the catching-up countries that have lead to “de-contextualization” of the innovation policy discourse. The paper argues that applying the concept of open innovation in its ideal-type form to the catching-up context is likely to reinforce these de-contextualization tendencies. This problem can be remedied by more conscious attention to the basic contradictions and paradoxes, which requires a more comprehensive and systemic analytical focus on innovation and technological development at the levels of firm, industry and policy.     

Gendering the inequality debate

In the past 30 years, economic inequality has increased to unprecedented levels, and is generating widespread public concern among orthodox, as well as leftist and feminist, thinkers. This article explores the gender dimensions of growing economic inequality, summarises key arguments from feminist economics which expose the inadequacy of current mainstream economic analysis on which ‘development’ is based, and argues for a ‘gender and equality’ approach to economic and social policy in both the global North and South.