Distributive Justice and Social Policy: Some Reflections on Rawls and Income Distribution

This paper adapts the Rawlsian idea of decision making behind the veil of ignorance in the realm of income transfer systems. As rational decision makers, we would plan a society where the incidence of poverty is low, differences in the level of living between life cycles are small, income differences between the rich and poor are modest, income mobility from poverty to non-poverty is high, and where the living standard of the poor is decent. The results show that income mobility is not greater in those countries which have wide income differences, nor is the situation of the poor any better in countries with huge income disparities than in other countries. Cross-national comparisons indicate that high poverty rates are not associated with more rapid income mobility and higher standards for the poor.     

Impact of support networks for breastfeeding: A multicentre study

Background

The rates of breastfeeding worldwide are slowly improving since 1996. Europe is still trailing behind the global breastfeeding incidence and prevalence rates. Thus, breastfeeding promotion, protection, prolongation and support have become an important challenge as breastfeeding sharply decreases in the first six months of life.

Professional discretion and length of work experience: what findings from focus groups with care managers in elder care suggest

ABSTRACT

Research has explored how care managers in elder care – who often function as ‘street-level bureaucrats’ – regard professional discretion. The way in which length of work experience affects care managers’ use of professional discretion remains, however, unexplored. This article present findings from 12 focus groups with 60 care managers. By bringing attention to how care managers experience the needs assessment process, this article sheds light on how these ‘street-level bureaucrats’ struggle when they try to balance their clients’ needs against institutional frameworks and local guidelines. Length of work experience seems to play a role in how care managers claim to use professional discretion. Experienced care managers describe how they deviate from the guidelines at times in order to create an increased scope of action in their decision-making process. Those with less time in the profession describe greater difficulties in this respect. Findings suggest that research should explore if length of work experience plays a role in the actual way in which care managers assess needs and make decisions. As such, they contribute to our understanding of how needs assessment processes are navigated by professionals while also pointing towards the nature of professional discretion in gerontological social work.     

EU post-accession Polish migrants trajectories and their settlement practices in Scotland

The presence and the apparent permanence of post-accession EU migrants in the UK is of significant interest to both academics and politicians. Studies have debated whether migration from new accession countries to the UK mark a new type of migration often described as ‘liquid’ and ‘open ended’, or whether these migrants will settle in the new destination countries. Based on a qualitative study of Poles who have lived in Scotland for at least six years, we observed four typologies of what we call migrants’ settling practices: (1) stayers, (2) over-stayers, (3) circular and transnational migrants and (4) economic migrants. The findings from this study demonstrate that Polish migrants do not have fixed ideas about the duration of their migration (in terms of a sense of permanence) but instead focus on diverse links, anchors or attachments in Scotland and Poland in describing their settling practices. Thus, the main contribution the article makes is to present an in-depth understanding of what settlement means from the perspective of migrants themselves. This paper concludes by providing a short comment on implications of the outcome of the Referendum on EU membership ‘Brexit’ in June 2016 on Polish migrants settling practices.     

Making social policy work for economic development: the Nordic experience

The Nordic welfare states offer some lessons in a development context. A main achievement has been sustainable poverty reduction. Another important lesson is that, while democratization often leads to greater pressures for social policy expansion, social policy can also contribute to democratization. The Nordic countries further demonstrate that is possible to unify social protection with a competitive and growth-oriented economy. In a number of policy areas, particularly in relation to social services and labor market policy, the Nordic countries have also become leading modernizers. The women-friendly dual-earner model not only combats poverty among families with children, but also enables women to participate in the labor market. The future sustainability of the Nordic model of social policy hinges on the number of taxpayers that can be mobilized. In order to be successful in this, governments need to take a combined, or holistic, approach, and consider both micro motives and macro considerations.     

Body Structure Perception in Infancy

Structural cues, such as the relative size and arrangement of parts, are key aspects of adults' representation of human bodies, and they are used to derive significant social information such as age, sex, and attractiveness. Prior studies have not clearly addressed young infants' sensitivity to these body characteristics. In the current experiments, 3.5‐month‐olds exhibited a preference between images of intact bodies versus those with parts in wrong locations. Infants also discriminated between intact bodies and those with distorted part proportions. In both cases, infants discriminated when images were presented upright but not when they were inverted. These results indicate that infants are sensitive to the arrangement and size of human body parts at least by 3.5 months of age. Thus, contrary to some prior reports, body representation early in life is developed enough to include structural information.     

Social Policymaking and Its Institutional Basis: Transition of The Chinese Social Security System

This article discusses Chinese social policy development in response to the growth of the market economy. It provides a general overview of the system's evolution in three stages: (1) the pre‐reform period when a system of enterprise welfare was in operation; (2) a period of system transition; (3) the stage when state welfare began to take shape. These developmental trends are interpreted on the basis of three types of institutional relations: the State‐enterprise relation, the enterprise‐ (or employer‐) employee relation, and the individual/worker‐State relation. Moreover, the discussion deals with policy perceptions at each stage of the developmental process. Based on these analyses, it illustrates the transformation of the Chinese social security system in a broad socioeconomic and political context, where China struggled to establish a modern, market‐based enterprise system. The paper thus expounds issues of socialism, market forces and the power of organized labour.     

Impasses of Divorce: Neither Together Nor Apart

This paper looks at one type of intervention that has made it possible to help separating couples, given to irrationality and engaged in protracting disputes over their children, become more rational parents, capable of using mediation as a method of dispute resolution. The central theoretical formulation in this intervention is the divorce transition impasse. The process involved in overcoming the impasse combines a therapeutic and counselling effort with the mediation. One counsellor/mediator coordinates both phases of the process, by first assessing the impasse and then shifting the factors that created it and moving on to negotiation and implementation of the agreement made. A case seen by the author is presented to illustrate the phases of intervention and the strategies used in each phase. The possibility is raised that this type of intervention offered by specialised counsellor/mediators might prove to the Family Court's advantage in dealing with potentially complex cases, such as access enforcement cases and some ex-nuptial children disputes.     

CEO and Chairperson characteristics and firm performance

This paper focuses on the relationship between Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairperson characteristics and firm performance. Specifically, the study examines the association between the characteristics of the CEO and the Chairperson of the board and firm performance. Using a sample of S&P 500 firms, the evidence found suggests that demographic and experience-related characteristics may be associated with the market valuation and financial performance of the firm. In particular, the reported results indicate a positive relationship between the presence of female CEOs or Chairs and firm performance, thus suggesting that gender-based differences may affect the CEO’s/Chairperson’s success. Moreover, the findings concerning the age of the CEO or Chair are mixed, while their experience and quality appear positively related to firm performance. Interestingly, a CEO or Chairperson holding multiple board seats is negatively associated with firm performance, whereas CEO duality has a positive relationship with Tobin’s Q and the return on assets (ROA) of the firm.