The end of social work

Neoliberalizing social policy implementation

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12985149
AutoresF Schram (0000-0002-3158-9941, Bryn Mawr College, autor correspondente), Basha Silverman (Bryn Mawr College)
Ano2012
Volume6
Fascículo2
Páginas128-145
Data de publicação2012-07-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoCritical Policy Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1946-0171 • E-ISSN: 1946-018X
EditoraTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/19460171.2012.689734
OpenAlexW2123170546
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas51
Referências citadas27

Over the last few decades, the human services have been transformed, not just in the United States, but also in other countries where pressure grows to emulate the United States in a globalizing world. Neoliberal organizational reforms, like devolution, privatization and performance management, have been joined with paternalist policy tools, like sanctions, or financial penalties for noncompliant clients, to create a flexible but disciplinary approach to managing the populations being served. Neoliberal paternalism represents a society-wide movement to marketize the operations of social service organizations more generally, so that they inculcate in clients a market compliant orientation aimed at making them less dependent on the shrinking human services and more willing to accept the positions allotted to them on the bottom of the socio-economic order. This analysis compares welfare-to-work in Florida and drug treatment in Delaware. We find numerous parallels, including most especially: (1) deskilling in staffing patterns associated with relying on former clients as caseworkers; (2) marketizing of administrative operations stemming from the institution of neoliberal organizational reforms; and (3) disciplining of clients via paternalist policy tools. By examining two very different states and two very different areas of service provision, we suggest the broad impact of neoliberal paternalism in transforming the human services today

Deskilling · Devolution (biology · Human services · Neoliberalism (international relations · Paternalism · Political economy · Political science · Public relations · Social policy · Social Welfare · Sociology · Welfare · Welfare reform · Work (physics · Homelessness and Social Issues · Law · Public Administration · Social Policy and Reform Studies · Social Work Education and Practice · Social Work