Ten Service users and social policy: developing different discussions, challenging dominant discourses
-
Peter Beresford
Abstract
This chapter argues that the tensions inherent in the competing value systems around participation and involvement mean that there are risks for service users and their movements attached to participating in the state’s and service system’s user involvement agenda, an agenda which, through its origins in managerialist/consumerist approaches to social policy, is part of the pursuit of the marketisation of state welfare. It draws on examples from the experiences of two UK service user movements — the disabled people’s movement and the survivors movement and identifies two key risks. It concludes by arguing for increased reflexivity on the part of service users and their movements around participation and involvement, as well as greater recognition, ideally in partnership with service users and their organisations, within academic social policy of the importance of the issue.
Abstract
This chapter argues that the tensions inherent in the competing value systems around participation and involvement mean that there are risks for service users and their movements attached to participating in the state’s and service system’s user involvement agenda, an agenda which, through its origins in managerialist/consumerist approaches to social policy, is part of the pursuit of the marketisation of state welfare. It draws on examples from the experiences of two UK service user movements — the disabled people’s movement and the survivors movement and identifies two key risks. It concludes by arguing for increased reflexivity on the part of service users and their movements around participation and involvement, as well as greater recognition, ideally in partnership with service users and their organisations, within academic social policy of the importance of the issue.
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
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
