Social Policy, Social Administration and the Social Construction of Welfare

Bibliographic Data

ID2325415
AuthorsAlan Walker (0000-0002-7576-3948, University of Sheffield)
Year1981
Volume15
Issue2
Pages225-250
Publication date1981-05-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0385 • E-ISSN: 1469-8684
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/003803858101500205
OpenAlexW1995698098
LanguageEN
Citations received13
References cited2

Teaching and research in social administration have been dominated by the study of the public social services. Some of the limitations of this approach have been exposed by the perpetuation and growth of inequality in welfare state societies. Existing conceptions of social policy do not provide an adequate framework for the study of the social production and exploitation of inequality. The tendency to equate social policy with the institutionalized welfare state has reinforced the insular tendencies in British social administration, overemphasized the importance of government in the distribution of resources and fostered a false image of the benevolent state as the embodiment of welfare principles. Alternative definitions of social policy are needed to ensure that the analysis of welfare is more comprehensive than that carried out so far within the framework of social administration. It is argued that the essential aspect of social policies are their distributional implications or outcomes. Social policies may be made implicitly or explicitly, by a wide range of social institutions and groups, including the state. The task of social policy analysis is to evaluate the distributional impact of existing policies and proposals and the rationales underlying them. In such analyses attention will be focussed less on the problems of individuals or clients, than on the behaviour of organizations, professions and classes in order to balance descriptions of the institutional framework through which the welfare state is administered with analysis of the social production and maintenance of inequality. Unless social policy teaching and research adapts its tools and methods to take account of these social factors it is likely to become increasingly detached from the real world of social welfare

Administration (probate law) · Economic growth · Economics · Government (linguistics) · Inequality · Market economy · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Public economics · Public policy · Resource mobilization · Social change · Social inequality · Social movement · Social order · Social policy · Social Welfare · Sociology · Welfare · Welfare state · Healthcare innovation and challenges · Law · Social Policy and Reform Studies · Social Work Education and Practice

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