Elaine Batty
Biographic Data
| ID | 4238844 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Elaine Batty |
| GIVEN NAMES | Elaine |
| FAMILY NAME | Batty |
| SIGNATURE | BATTY E |
| AFFILIATIONS | Sheffield Hallam University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7524-3515 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 63 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2012 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Relational approaches to employability
As policymakers consider how best to respond to increased labour market volatility in post-Covid-19 economies, there is concern that vulnerable groups such as lone parents may be left behind, and consensus that we need to develop more responsive and person-centred approaches to employability. Drawing on Cottam’s (2011, 2018) work on ‘relational welfare’, and the principles of the capabilities approach that underly it, this article discusses the e…
Empowering Lone Parents to Progress towards Employability
Policymakers in liberal welfare states like the UK have prioritised extending the reach of compulsory activation to target vulnerable jobseeker groups, such as lone parents. However, such interventions - especially when combined with intensified welfare conditionality - appear to have had limited positive effects on lone parents' employability, while often negatively impacting wellbeing. This article argues that the problem is a disconnect betwee…
Collaborative innovation and activation in urban labour markets
Policymakers in the UK, having long supported centralised and marketised models of governance and delivery in the field of labour market activation, have recently begun to acknowledge the benefits of more localised, collaborative approaches to organising public services. Evidence from other European welfare states suggests that the case in favour of localised innovation may be particularly compelling in urban labour markets, where there can be po…
"I have a panic attack when I pick up the phone"
In this paper we provide a short briefing on recently completed qualitative research into experiences of energy advice amongst so-called hard to reach energy users. Our sample of 26 respondents comprised of highly vulnerable and marginalised consumers, many of whom led chaotic lives but who agreed to share their experiences of seeking help with energy problems (e.g. affordability; cold homes; ineffective heating etc.) with the research team throu…
Collaborative Innovation in Labor Market Inclusion
This article deploys the concept of “collaborative innovation” to discuss key stakeholders’ and service users' experiences of innovative labor market inclusion services. We draw on work by Sørensen and Torfing (2011, 2016, 2017) to frame collaborative innovation as a distinctive approach to the coproduction of services that respond to user needs, and highlight the importance of governance and leadership practices that foster mutual learning and b…
Sorry to say goodbye
The emotional dilemmas and challenges facing researchers within the research process are beginning to be documented within the literature, and academic interest in them is in ascendency. This paper adds to this growing discourse by taking a reflective journey through 19 years of research practice. It presents an honest and revealing manuscript highlighting in particular, the researcher's emotional dilemmas experienced when disengaging from partic…
Co‐production and social innovation in street‐level employability services
The United Kingdom, as an exemplar liberal welfare state, has been characterized as in the vanguard of “work‐first” activation – deploying high levels of compulsion and standardized employability services that seek to move people from welfare to work as quickly as possible. However, despite the extension of welfare conditionality to excluded groups such as lone parents, government‐led, work‐first employability programmes have often proved ineffec…
Street-level practice and the co-production of third sector-led employability services
Policymakers have promised a personalised approach to improving the employability of disadvantaged groups. The evidence suggests that contracted-out activation programmes in the UK and some other welfare states have instead sometimes delivered a standardised ‘work-first’ model. An alternative approach is exemplified in local employability services targeting lone parents in Scotland, led by third sector–public sector partnerships. Our research on …
Gamers or victims of the system? Welfare reform, cynical manipulation and vulnerability
New mechanisms of conditionality enacted through current reforms of the UK welfare system are framed within contested narratives about the characteristics, rationalities and conduct of welfare users. In the problem figuration of welfare reform the orientations and conduct of welfare recipients have been conceptualised and depicted across a spectrum ranging from cynical manipulators gaming the system and subverting the original ethos of the welfar…
Intensive Family Intervention and the Problem Figuration of ‘Troubled Families’
This article examines how intensive family interventions in England since 1997, including the Coalition government's Troubled Families programme, are situated in a contemporary problem figuration of ‘anti-social’ or ‘troubled’ families that frames and justifies the utilisation of different models of intensive family intervention. The article explores how techniques of classification and estimation, combined with the controversial use of ‘research…
Learning and Soft Outcomes
Over the last decade there has been a clear focus on tackling disadvantage and transforming lives. A plethora of programmes such as Family Intervention Projects, Think Families Pathfinders and Intensive Intervention Projects have focussed on families meeting centrally determined quantifiable outcomes and have used this as a factor to judge the success or otherwise of intervention programmes. However, little attention, or indeed value, has been gi…
Family Futures Childhood and Poverty in Urban Neighbourhoods
Family Futures Childhood and Poverty in Urban Neighbourhoods." Housing Studies, 28(1), pp. 159–160
Addressing Educational Disadvantage in Deprived Communities
The New Deal for Communities (NDC) Programme is one of the most intensive area-based initiatives (ABIs) launched in England. Between 1998 and 2010, 39 NDC Partnerships were charged with improving conditions in relation to six outcomes within deprived neighbourhoods, each accommodating around 9800 people. This paper outlines the approaches taken by NDCs to improve educational outcomes. Change is explored within three themes: change within NDC area…
Conceptualising the Contexts, Mechanisms and Outcomes of Intensive Family Intervention Projects
Intensive family intervention projects have become an increasingly prominent mechanism within anti-social behaviour and social policy programmes in the UK and are supported, in principle, by the new coalition government. They have also been the subject of considerable academic controversy within the evaluative and critical literature. This article attempts to inform continuing debates about the purpose and effects of these projects by conceptuali…
Street-level practice and the co-production of third sector-led employability services
Policymakers have promised a personalised approach to improving the employability of disadvantaged groups. The evidence suggests that contracted-out activation programmes in the UK and some other welfare states have instead sometimes delivered a standardised ‘work-first’ model. An alternative approach is exemplified in local employability services targeting lone parents in Scotland, led by third sector–public sector partnerships. Our research on …
Conceptualising the Contexts, Mechanisms and Outcomes of Intensive Family Intervention Projects
Intensive family intervention projects have become an increasingly prominent mechanism within anti-social behaviour and social policy programmes in the UK and are supported, in principle, by the new coalition government. They have also been the subject of considerable academic controversy within the evaluative and critical literature. This article attempts to inform continuing debates about the purpose and effects of these projects by conceptuali…
Co‐production and social innovation in street‐level employability services
The United Kingdom, as an exemplar liberal welfare state, has been characterized as in the vanguard of “work‐first” activation – deploying high levels of compulsion and standardized employability services that seek to move people from welfare to work as quickly as possible. However, despite the extension of welfare conditionality to excluded groups such as lone parents, government‐led, work‐first employability programmes have often proved ineffec…
Intensive Family Intervention and the Problem Figuration of ‘Troubled Families’
This article examines how intensive family interventions in England since 1997, including the Coalition government's Troubled Families programme, are situated in a contemporary problem figuration of ‘anti-social’ or ‘troubled’ families that frames and justifies the utilisation of different models of intensive family intervention. The article explores how techniques of classification and estimation, combined with the controversial use of ‘research…
Sorry to say goodbye
The emotional dilemmas and challenges facing researchers within the research process are beginning to be documented within the literature, and academic interest in them is in ascendency. This paper adds to this growing discourse by taking a reflective journey through 19 years of research practice. It presents an honest and revealing manuscript highlighting in particular, the researcher's emotional dilemmas experienced when disengaging from partic…
Gamers or victims of the system? Welfare reform, cynical manipulation and vulnerability
New mechanisms of conditionality enacted through current reforms of the UK welfare system are framed within contested narratives about the characteristics, rationalities and conduct of welfare users. In the problem figuration of welfare reform the orientations and conduct of welfare recipients have been conceptualised and depicted across a spectrum ranging from cynical manipulators gaming the system and subverting the original ethos of the welfar…
Empowering Lone Parents to Progress towards Employability
Policymakers in liberal welfare states like the UK have prioritised extending the reach of compulsory activation to target vulnerable jobseeker groups, such as lone parents. However, such interventions - especially when combined with intensified welfare conditionality - appear to have had limited positive effects on lone parents' employability, while often negatively impacting wellbeing. This article argues that the problem is a disconnect betwee…
Learning and Soft Outcomes
Over the last decade there has been a clear focus on tackling disadvantage and transforming lives. A plethora of programmes such as Family Intervention Projects, Think Families Pathfinders and Intensive Intervention Projects have focussed on families meeting centrally determined quantifiable outcomes and have used this as a factor to judge the success or otherwise of intervention programmes. However, little attention, or indeed value, has been gi…
Addressing Educational Disadvantage in Deprived Communities
The New Deal for Communities (NDC) Programme is one of the most intensive area-based initiatives (ABIs) launched in England. Between 1998 and 2010, 39 NDC Partnerships were charged with improving conditions in relation to six outcomes within deprived neighbourhoods, each accommodating around 9800 people. This paper outlines the approaches taken by NDCs to improve educational outcomes. Change is explored within three themes: change within NDC area…
Conceptualising the Contexts, Mechanisms and Outcomes of Intensive Family Intervention Projects
Intensive family intervention projects have become an increasingly prominent mechanism within anti-social behaviour and social policy programmes in the UK and are supported, in principle, by the new coalition government. They have also been the subject of considerable academic controversy within the evaluative and critical literature. This article attempts to inform continuing debates about the purpose and effects of these projects by conceptuali…
Learning and Soft Outcomes
Over the last decade there has been a clear focus on tackling disadvantage and transforming lives. A plethora of programmes such as Family Intervention Projects, Think Families Pathfinders and Intensive Intervention Projects have focussed on families meeting centrally determined quantifiable outcomes and have used this as a factor to judge the success or otherwise of intervention programmes. However, little attention, or indeed value, has been gi…
Family Futures Childhood and Poverty in Urban Neighbourhoods
Family Futures Childhood and Poverty in Urban Neighbourhoods." Housing Studies, 28(1), pp. 159–160
Addressing Educational Disadvantage in Deprived Communities
The New Deal for Communities (NDC) Programme is one of the most intensive area-based initiatives (ABIs) launched in England. Between 1998 and 2010, 39 NDC Partnerships were charged with improving conditions in relation to six outcomes within deprived neighbourhoods, each accommodating around 9800 people. This paper outlines the approaches taken by NDCs to improve educational outcomes. Change is explored within three themes: change within NDC area…
Intensive Family Intervention and the Problem Figuration of ‘Troubled Families’
This article examines how intensive family interventions in England since 1997, including the Coalition government's Troubled Families programme, are situated in a contemporary problem figuration of ‘anti-social’ or ‘troubled’ families that frames and justifies the utilisation of different models of intensive family intervention. The article explores how techniques of classification and estimation, combined with the controversial use of ‘research…
Gamers or victims of the system? Welfare reform, cynical manipulation and vulnerability
New mechanisms of conditionality enacted through current reforms of the UK welfare system are framed within contested narratives about the characteristics, rationalities and conduct of welfare users. In the problem figuration of welfare reform the orientations and conduct of welfare recipients have been conceptualised and depicted across a spectrum ranging from cynical manipulators gaming the system and subverting the original ethos of the welfar…
Co‐production and social innovation in street‐level employability services
The United Kingdom, as an exemplar liberal welfare state, has been characterized as in the vanguard of “work‐first” activation – deploying high levels of compulsion and standardized employability services that seek to move people from welfare to work as quickly as possible. However, despite the extension of welfare conditionality to excluded groups such as lone parents, government‐led, work‐first employability programmes have often proved ineffec…
Street-level practice and the co-production of third sector-led employability services
Policymakers have promised a personalised approach to improving the employability of disadvantaged groups. The evidence suggests that contracted-out activation programmes in the UK and some other welfare states have instead sometimes delivered a standardised ‘work-first’ model. An alternative approach is exemplified in local employability services targeting lone parents in Scotland, led by third sector–public sector partnerships. Our research on …
"I have a panic attack when I pick up the phone"
In this paper we provide a short briefing on recently completed qualitative research into experiences of energy advice amongst so-called hard to reach energy users. Our sample of 26 respondents comprised of highly vulnerable and marginalised consumers, many of whom led chaotic lives but who agreed to share their experiences of seeking help with energy problems (e.g. affordability; cold homes; ineffective heating etc.) with the research team throu…
Collaborative Innovation in Labor Market Inclusion
This article deploys the concept of “collaborative innovation” to discuss key stakeholders’ and service users' experiences of innovative labor market inclusion services. We draw on work by Sørensen and Torfing (2011, 2016, 2017) to frame collaborative innovation as a distinctive approach to the coproduction of services that respond to user needs, and highlight the importance of governance and leadership practices that foster mutual learning and b…
Sorry to say goodbye
The emotional dilemmas and challenges facing researchers within the research process are beginning to be documented within the literature, and academic interest in them is in ascendency. This paper adds to this growing discourse by taking a reflective journey through 19 years of research practice. It presents an honest and revealing manuscript highlighting in particular, the researcher's emotional dilemmas experienced when disengaging from partic…
Collaborative innovation and activation in urban labour markets
Policymakers in the UK, having long supported centralised and marketised models of governance and delivery in the field of labour market activation, have recently begun to acknowledge the benefits of more localised, collaborative approaches to organising public services. Evidence from other European welfare states suggests that the case in favour of localised innovation may be particularly compelling in urban labour markets, where there can be po…
Empowering Lone Parents to Progress towards Employability
Policymakers in liberal welfare states like the UK have prioritised extending the reach of compulsory activation to target vulnerable jobseeker groups, such as lone parents. However, such interventions - especially when combined with intensified welfare conditionality - appear to have had limited positive effects on lone parents' employability, while often negatively impacting wellbeing. This article argues that the problem is a disconnect betwee…
Relational approaches to employability
As policymakers consider how best to respond to increased labour market volatility in post-Covid-19 economies, there is concern that vulnerable groups such as lone parents may be left behind, and consensus that we need to develop more responsive and person-centred approaches to employability. Drawing on Cottam’s (2011, 2018) work on ‘relational welfare’, and the principles of the capabilities approach that underly it, this article discusses the e…
Political science (11 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Public relations (7 works) · Business (6 works) · Corporate governance (5 works) · Economic growth (5 works) · Economics (5 works) · Healthcare innovation and challenges (5 works) · Psychology (5 works) · Social Policy and Reform Studies (5 works)