Consumption and poverty in the homes of the English poor,c. 1670–1834

The consumer behaviour of the poor in the long eighteenth century has attracted more historical attention in recent years. Yet, we have little understanding of whether regional factors affected consumption or how the poor’s ownership of household goods was influenced by level of poverty and the life-cycle. By focusing on Kent and drawing comparisons to other counties, this article argues that the material lives of the poor were improving by the late eighteenth century, but finds that there were distinct regional differences as the poor acquired more and better goods in London and the Home Counties than in relatively remote areas. Moreover, by using pauper inventories and labourers’ probate inventories, the research finds that the poor were not a homogeneous group with similar levels of material wealth, but should be considered in terms of different subgroups which often led very different material lives to one another due to life-cycle-related problems including sickness and old age. Labourers’ probate inventories are found to represent a minority of the poor who were materially richer than most, whilst pauper inventories appear to represent a more typical subgroup of the poor that struggled to make do and owned most types of goods in smaller numbers.     

Neither ‘family’ nor ‘corporate’ farming: Australian tomato growers as farm family entrepreneurs

For the past two decades there has been much debate about the future of family farming. The basic question on which this debate has turned is whether current pressures on family farm systems should be understood as symptomatic of a terminal condition, in which farmers are replaced progressively by corporate ownership; or whether family farms will persist as a social formation, albeit increasingly subsumed by off-farm interests. Using evidence from the Australian processing tomato sector, this article documents the changing social and economic formation of ‘family farming’. We argue that in this industry, the appropriate way to describe farmers is through the deployment of that a new category of farming; farm family entrepreneurs. This phrase is coined to describe the situation where family units remain at the social and economic heart of farm ownership and operation, but in the context where they relate to their land-based assets through legal and financial structures characteristic of the wider economy. As this article explores, this formation seems to represent an accommodating modus operandi for farm units within neo-liberal agricultural governance. Nevertheless, however, this duality of family-based structures and capitalist entrepreneurialism inevitably provokes a series of tensions, whose resolution requires a variety of organizational strategies to be put in place.     

Police Attendance at Child Protection Conferences: A Reappraisal

SUMMARY. We now have over 16 years experience of child protection arrangements that include the attendance of police officers at child protection conferences. This article attempts to review that experience and critically assess the police role at conferences in the light of the Department of Health's Working Together, Particular attention is paid to the nature of information made available by the police to child protection conferences.     

Colonialization and community: Implications for first nations development

First Nations' communities have been a major focus for the longhistory of colonial action in Canada. The results have beendisastrous for Native cultural, identity and pride. Four majorcommunity institutions – political, economic, religiousand educational and the family – have been devastated.This has robbed Aboriginal Nations of their identity and theirsense that they have the ability effectively to manage theirenvironments and has contributed significantly to their disadvantagedposition within Canada. If community development is to be utilized in First Nationscommunities, four objectives must be addressed: (1) strengtheningcommunity traditions and culture; (2) development of culturallyappropriate community-based organizations; (3) reflection onthe importance of land for local communities; (4) the forgingof links between local and national issues.     

Feminist collectives or private owners: both used media to advance lesbian goals

From the 1970s in Australia, feminist collectives published lesbian magazines that challenged gay male thinking, the women’s movement, and mainstream society. From the late 1980s such publishing ventures were increasingly undertaken by privately-owned publishing businesses. Responding to change around them, the political project for these private media ventures shifted from radical restructuring of society to promotion of lesbian community. Their publishers developed synergies with this developing community that expanded advertising revenues and distribution, and assisted the growth of both community and the publications. This led to greater readership reach and a range of relationships with mainstream businesses that further built community and made lesbians more visible.     

Not either/or but both/and: An Academic/field partnership in practice

Abstract

The relationship between academia and the field and between theory and practice is often characterised in both the literature and the everyday practice of social work as either one or the other. In this paper, the author argues for a constructive integration of both/and rather than either/or. The paper reports on a constructive organisational partnership between academia and a field of practice that supports a both/and view.     

Using a Person-Centered Approach to Examine the Impact of Homelessness on School Absences

Brought on by increasing levels of economic vulnerability, homelessness is a pressing issue for our schools. Homeless students often miss an inordinate amount of school days and are thought to fall at the farthest end of a “continuum of poverty.” Theoretically they have worse outcomes than their peers, though the past 20 years of literature have found inconsistencies in these comparisons. Thus the literature suggests analysis to compare types of students based on outcomes rather than demographic categorizations, a person-centered approach. Using this approach, a comparison of the number of absences for homeless students and their housed peers is made through quantile analysis. Using school administrative data collected over one school year for an entire school district we found that homeless students as an aggregate do not miss significantly more days of school than their poorest peers. However, we found homelessness and poverty dramatically increase the number of absences for children who are in the higher percentiles of absences meaning homelessness has a greater impact on those who miss more days of school in general compared to regular attendees. Findings from this study indicate that homelessness may exacerbate problems rather than cause them. Implications for practice are discussed and directions for future study are proposed.     

The Management of Workplace Conflict: Contrasting Pathways in the HRM Literature

This paper reviews the human resource management literature on the management of workplace conflict. It suggests that workplace conflict is commonly viewed in the literature as a symptom of management failure: the notion that conflict may be intrinsic to the nature of work because employees and managers have hard‐to‐reconcile competing interests is given short‐shrift. At the same time, the paper identifies important differences in the literature, which the authors call ‘pathways’, about the best methods to manage problems at the workplace. It is argued that four contrasting pathways can be detected in the literature with regard to how organizations approach workplace conflict management practices. Each pathway is examined fully and their respective strengths and weaknesses are assessed.