No abstract available. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Durban-Westville, 2002.

Between 1900 and 1930, social scientists attempted to refashion social ethics by conducting extensive social research. Some of them collaborated with Herbert Hoover before and after he became president. In the 1920s, they accepted positions on Herbert Hoover's various commissions. The work they did on these commissions made them a forum for manifesting their interest in modernizing social ethics. At one and the same time, they were in a position to define both social ethics and the purpose of the social sciences. Throughout this dissertation, I explore the cases of three social scientists involved with Hoover's commissions: the economist Wesley Clair Mitchell, the political scientist Charles Edward Merriam, and the industrial researcher and social worker Mary van Kleeck. Wesley Clair Mitchell addressed issues of American consumption and economic behaviour. Charles Edward Merriam analyzed the political behaviour of American citizens. Mary van Kleeck surveyed labour relations between American workers and employers. In this dissertation, I have employed methods developed by intellectual historians, focussing on the published and unpublished papers that these social experts and Herbert Hoover himself produced. This collaboration between Hoover and some of the most prominent social scientists of the day explains the ambitious project they undertook, that of adjusting social ethics to the modern living conditions they had discovered while carrying out their social research. In so doing, they sought to adapt the traditional code of conduct of most Americans to the new circumstances that prevailed in the first decades of the twentieth century.

Considerable research has been done on conceptions of poverty and on the welfare state; however, there is little research into the relationship between the two the ways in which poverty discourses shape welfare states and how transitions in welfare states influence poverty discourses. Using Critical Discourse Analysis, I explore the underlying construction of poverty in Albertas income-support policy as it has developed within an active social policy framework. In the government documents analyzed, poverty is constructed as an objective and neutral assessment of unmet basic needs and is effectively removed from political debate. Also constructed as a lack of labour-market attachment, the poverty discourse that does exist is subsumed within the market discourse. The thesis argues that we need to expand our conceptions of poverty to improve our poverty alleviation strategies, to revitalize the place of social policy in Alberta, and to enrich the way in which we live together. / Family Ecology and Practice

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

In the last three decades regulation as a public policy instrument has developed from a tool to manage markets to a means for government to offer protection or impose boundaries in areas associated with social and moral issues. Social regulatory mechanisms are broad, and have as their justification the public interest. It is one response by governments to the development of reproductive technologies. (For complete abstract open document)

The nature of debates about managerialism and social justice tend to be adversarial. The purpose of this study is to explore the nature of the relationship between managerialism and social justice. The thesis examines the nature of this relationship in the development of a community-networking project, a pilot website for young people in a high need community. The community-networking project was established through a novel contractual arrangement between government and a local community organisation. In this study social values comprise the analytical lens used to map out this relationship. Kekes??? (1993) approach to ethical pluralism is used to explore the nature of relations between ideas about managerialism and social justice in the process of implementing policy. The study is contextualised in a minor policy proposal of the former federal Liberal Coalition government and associated with a 1998-99 Budget proposal concerned with improving access to and the coordination of family-related information and services including information relating to mental health, child care, youth and aged care (see Black et al. 2002: 10). The policy initiative was established to test a range of assumptions about strong communities. There are two facets to the field study. The first facet explores the process of the implementation of the policy initiative through the different perspectives of three key informants, and the second facet explores the views of end-users of the service to determine whether or not young people were empowered, in the sense of being able to access knowledge about their own lives in terms that have meaning for them. The tone of the study is influenced by my own direct involvement as ???an insider???. Despite the explicit intentions that were supported by research and policy, pragmatic constraints limited the extent to which community organisations were empowered to act outside the demands of government organisations and in this instance, managerialism did act against social justice. However, this did not appear to prevent the end-users of the service that was established from achieving a sense of empowerment.

The goal of this research is to provide a clearer understanding of the non-shelter impacts of housing, and in particular of the possible processes by which aspects of housing may impact on aspects of schooling. The intention is not to prove a causal relationship, rather to shed light on mechanisms. To that end the approach taken is qualitative, involving in-depth semi-structured interviews with a sample of public housing tenants and a smaller group of educators. This thesis begins with an examination of previous research around this topic. This review identifies past studies that highlight the possible negative effects of transience as a contributor to isolation; the role that neighbourhood may play in encouraging or discouraging the valuing of schooling; a possible link between crowding and punitive parenting practices; and the impact that high housing costs can have on stress levels and therefore health. This thesis details research that builds on this earlier body of work. Given findings from earlier studies (in particular the importance of neighbourhood effects identified in some United States� studies), a sampling framework was developed to ensure a reasonable number of households who had experienced a change in neighbourhood as well as housing conditions. As well, an interview schedule was developed to provide a framework to ensure that possible pathways between housing and schooling identified in earlier research would be explored in these interviews. Public tenants were chosen as the population group from which to draw the interview sample, as this group have undergone a significant housing change (when they moved into public housing), and their income levels increase the chances of them having lived in poor quality housing in the past. A small number of interviews with educators were also conducted. Schools were chosen randomly from outer suburbs where poor quality housing and transience were expected to impact on school populations. As well an inner-city school in a gentrifying suburb was also selected for interview. These interviews identified four main themes � transience, housing amenity, neighbourhood and cost. Transience may be a significant problem for children who are already struggling in the school system, especially those who are receiving school based remediation. For these children, moving house may interrupt important remediation work at school, and may result in children falling further and further behind their peers. Also, transience may contribute to family stress levels which may impact on health and happiness, thereby reducing motivation and levels of school attendance. Housing amenity can impact on health, as a result of injuries related to poorly maintained or designed housing, from stress associated with noise and broken sleep, and from insect born illnesses due to the absence of insect screens. Possibly the most significant housing amenity related health impact seems to be due to the link between asthma, and dust and mildew. Neighbourhood seems to have the potential to be a significant positive and negative force in people�s lives. Supportive neighbours can make single parenting much less stressful, for example by helping with child-care, increasing the sense of safety, and reducing isolation. Hostile neighbours, on the other hand, can create levels of stress that may force adults and children indoors to avoid conflict. High housing costs can cause significant stress for families. For those who are already suffering from stress this additional pressure may contribute to stress related ill-health. As well, these families may not be able to afford to eat properly, and may not be able to afford to pay for extra-curricula activities such as school outings, dance classes etc. Poor diet may contribute to increased incidents of illness, and extra days missed from school. These insights suggest some changed approaches to the design and delivery of housing assistance in Australia, so as to maximise the non-shelter benefits of such interventions.