Two Children’s social care under New Labour
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Mary Langan
Abstract
This chapter suggests that Labour’s approach to social care has been through a substantial discontinuity. It explains that this chapter’s overview of policy in social care leads through the events that shaped Labour policy, focusing on how young people has been regarded as being in ‘danger’, and how sex offenders have come to be feared, and to question parenting. It describes and explores the role of Sure Start and Family Intervention Projects in relation to Labour’s larger policy goals. It then goes on to describe the role of ‘positive psychology’ in the greater therapeutic content of Labour’s policy and how, despite negative evaluations, Labour have pressed on with the approach to trying to intervene in children’s lives, transforming the relationship between the family and the state as a result.
Abstract
This chapter suggests that Labour’s approach to social care has been through a substantial discontinuity. It explains that this chapter’s overview of policy in social care leads through the events that shaped Labour policy, focusing on how young people has been regarded as being in ‘danger’, and how sex offenders have come to be feared, and to question parenting. It describes and explores the role of Sure Start and Family Intervention Projects in relation to Labour’s larger policy goals. It then goes on to describe the role of ‘positive psychology’ in the greater therapeutic content of Labour’s policy and how, despite negative evaluations, Labour have pressed on with the approach to trying to intervene in children’s lives, transforming the relationship between the family and the state as a result.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Contents iii
- List of tables and figures v
- List on contributors vii
- Introduction 1
-
Current developments
- Education policy and policy making, 1997–2009 13
- Children’s social care under New Labour 31
- Health policy under New Labour: not what it seems? 51
- Towards a social democratic pension system? Assessing the significance of the 2007 and 2008 Pensions Acts1 71
- Minimum income standards and household budgets 97
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Current issues and debates
- Re-connecting with ‘what unemployment means’: employability, the experience of unemployment and priorities for policy in an era of crisis 121
- Facing the ‘dark side’ of deregulation? The politics of two-tier labour markets in Germany and Japan after the global financial crisis 149
- ‘Flexibility’, xenophobia and exploitation: modern slavery in the UK 173
- Mi Familia Progresa: change and continuity in Guatemala’s social policy 199
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Service user involvement
- Service users and social policy: developing different discussions, challenging dominant discourses 227
- Participation and social justice 253
- Involving disabled children and young people in research and consultations: issues, challenges and opportunities 275
- Responding to unhappy childhoods in the UK: enhancing young people’s ‘well-being’ through participatory action research 291
- Service users as peer research interviewers: why bother? 317
- Index 337
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter i
- Contents iii
- List of tables and figures v
- List on contributors vii
- Introduction 1
-
Current developments
- Education policy and policy making, 1997–2009 13
- Children’s social care under New Labour 31
- Health policy under New Labour: not what it seems? 51
- Towards a social democratic pension system? Assessing the significance of the 2007 and 2008 Pensions Acts1 71
- Minimum income standards and household budgets 97
-
Current issues and debates
- Re-connecting with ‘what unemployment means’: employability, the experience of unemployment and priorities for policy in an era of crisis 121
- Facing the ‘dark side’ of deregulation? The politics of two-tier labour markets in Germany and Japan after the global financial crisis 149
- ‘Flexibility’, xenophobia and exploitation: modern slavery in the UK 173
- Mi Familia Progresa: change and continuity in Guatemala’s social policy 199
-
Service user involvement
- Service users and social policy: developing different discussions, challenging dominant discourses 227
- Participation and social justice 253
- Involving disabled children and young people in research and consultations: issues, challenges and opportunities 275
- Responding to unhappy childhoods in the UK: enhancing young people’s ‘well-being’ through participatory action research 291
- Service users as peer research interviewers: why bother? 317
- Index 337
