In today's information society, to make a real and lasting impact on human welfare takes applications of information technology aimed at enhancing access to all. HUSITA7-The 7th International Conference of Human Services Information Technology Applications: Digital Inclusion-Building a Digital Inclusive Society presents diverse viewpoints from around the globe, examining the latest applications of digital technology for social work education and practice. These conference presentations from respected international authorities discuss the application of ICT (information and communication technology) in various facets of human service to achieve the goal of a digital inclusive society where all have access to education and informational resources. HUSITA7-The 7th International Conference of Human Services Information Technology Applications examines the development and use of information technology in professional training, including the strengths and limitations of e-learning in social work curriculums along with the rationale behind a learning object approach. Research includes findings from educators in Canada describing the development and implementation of e-learning in social work programs and the qualitative study of technological content in an MSW curriculum. Various types of Web-based learning approaches are explored with an eye toward providing more effective teaching strategies. Various technological advances and approaches toward individual empowerment are described to facilitate greater societal inclusiveness. The book is well referenced and includes several helpful tables and figures. Topics in HUSITA7-The 7th International Conference of Human Services Information Technology Applications include: the learning object approach of e-learning for social work education challenges implementing e-learning in social work education a research study of the relationship between technology content in social work education and technology use in social work practice international partnerships in Web-based teaching effective integration of emotion into the content of Web-based learning the use of indigenous knowledge in content the use of Web CT for effective address of issues such as quality of teaching and communication bringing about social inclusion through effective digital government how technological advances impact assistive technology research on the Internet self-efficacy in older person's learning of ICT a communication tool for the speech impaired improving social work service effectiveness through knowledge management (KM) the "SenSui" disability information resource in Japan HUSITA7-The 7th International Conference of Human Services Information Technology Applications is enlightening reading for librarians, social educators, social work students, researchers interested in ICT, and human service professionals.

In recent times, educational reformers have proposed ways of using education to reduce inequality, overcome discriminatory values and attitudes, and alleviate social problems. An increasing number of language theorists and practitioners contends that in order to reduce inequality it is essential to address the personal, cultural, and political implications of language teaching. Awareness of these factors activate the need to gain deeper insight into the personal and professional nuances of teachers' lives. The gap between sociolinguistic theory and educational practice points to the fact that linguists and educationists themselves carry the prejudices of particular social, ideological, cultural and geographical backgrounds. Who teaches what to whom, why and how affects curricular decisions which can thus become fraught with political allegiances; in this way the non-neutrality of language pedagogy is confirmed. Drawing from a suite of data sources the book explores the following questions: Do teachers' autobiographical experiences shape their professional identities? Does subscription to counter-hegemonic ideologies impact teachers' personal and professional positionality and authority? What contributions can feminist theorising make to language teaching in socially diverse classrooms? Through an exploration of these questions, the book gestures towards an imperative to re-think educative and pedagogic relationships and the politics of difference and dialogue in demographically diverse classrooms that subscribe to social redress agendas.

Prescriptions for rural development abound, but 'what is frequently lacking is not so much ideas or techniques as the will and the commitment' to improve conditions. The author describes how, in the complex case of Ethiopia, man can be held responsible for famine -and suggests how he can act to prevent it. This book sets out to demonstrate that the subsistence production system, with the disincentives of oppression and exploitation which keeps peasants and their families permanently at barely subsistence level without any means of averting or coping with the consequences of crop failure, is the system that creates famine in time of peace. A subsistence production system impoverishes peasants and pastoralists as well as the physical environment. It is this fact that occasionally disturbs the delicate balance between the activities and expectations of the peasants and the pastoralists, on one hand, and the process of the physical environment, on the other. When this delicate balance is disturbed famine does not occur automatically, but instead takes several months to mature into a mass killer. The author urges positive and rational action - for example, the accumulation of data, programmes of research and development, and reform, especially of taxation, can create the conditions necessary for improvement. 'The world of under development is a world of faith as opposed to critical reason...The pain of thinking can replace the pain of famine.'

This thoroughly researched volume surveys the nature and extent of 'informal' work in Asia, which is a powerful and under-studied force in the region. After over half a century of development, even in the fast growing economies of Asia, the formal sector, and industrial jobs have grown rather slowly, and most non-agricultural employment growth has occurred in the informal economy. At the same time as this, there has been a feminization of informal workers and growth in subcontracted homework. Drawing on detailed case studies carried out in five Asian countries - two low income (India and Pakistan) and three middle income (Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines) - where subcontracted production, usually by women and children working out of home, is now widespread, this insightful book acknowledges that home-based work is the source of income diversification for poor families, but is also the source of exploitation of vulnerable workers and child labour as firms attempt to contain costs. This wide-ranging and accessible survey, edited by key specialists in this field, along with an impressive team of contributors, examines the social protection needs of these workers arguing convincingly for public action to promote such work and protect these workers as a possible new labour intensive growth strategy in developing countries.

This is a sharp analysis of the unique Nordic welfare system with urgent lessons for governments and societies across the globe. Welfare programs and institutions tend to be analyzed as instrumental arrangements, overlooking the fact that welfare programs are essentially expressions of moral conceptions and values. This book recognises this distinction and offers analyses, perspectives and interpretations of the normative foundation of the 'Nordic welfare state model'. These authors examine the main normative principles in this model, exploring their origins and the relationship between them. Paying particular attention to the principles of 'universalism', 'public responsibility for welfare', and 'work for all', they consider their significance for current welfare policy and question whether external economic and ideological pressures are threatening these principles. The book is divided into three clear parts: *Part I considers the historical trajectories behind the Nordic welfare model *Part II looks more specifically on normative tensions and dilemmas in current welfare policies with a focus on women friendly welfare, attitudes to basic income and alcohol and drug misuse *Part III focuses on the possible change in the normative foundation of the Nordic welfare states This book will be essential reading for researchers and students of the welfare state and also to those in the fields of social policy, comparative politics and political economy.

Written in consultation with a range of experts, clinicians and practitioners as well as adoptive children, families and birth relatives, this book gives helpful guidance on making evidence-based assessments and planning successful adoption support. Key features include: a discussion of the main themes of adoption and pointers for practice in relation to the Assessment Framework a guide to the use of evidence-based approaches to assessment, including the tools commissioned by the Department of Health and the Department for Education a model for analysis and planning, and planning support and interventions an investigation of the source, range and value of support services and interventions that can promote the wellbeing of adopted children, their adoptive families and birth relatives. Packed with practical advice, case examples and models of good practice, this book is invaluable for social workers and managers involved with the adoption process and the well-being of children and families. It is also essential reading for social work students learning about working with children and families.

In this timely and unique work, Calum Paton assesses the political economy and politics of current health policy in order to explain the underlying causes of problems in the National Health Service. Debates from political theory, political economy and public administration are used to examine health policy made and implemented by New Labour since their election victory in 1997. The author argues that the fundamental nature of health policy is dependent upon the prevailing regime in political economy and also that 'policy overload', contradictions and confusion have rendered the task of coherent implementation very difficult. Although there is implicit comparison, the primary focus is England within the UK (post-devolution), and the book provides a detailed examination of contemporary health policy. Written by an established scholar in the field, it will particularly interest academics, post-graduate students and professionals in health policy, social policy and politics.

NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF 2022 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES The first book to tell the full story of race and health in America today, showing the toll racism takes on individuals and the health of the nation. In the US, Black people have poorer health outcomes than white people at every stage of their lives: Black babies are more than twice as likely as white babies to die at birth or in the first year of life; Blacks in every age-group under sixty-five have significantly higher death rates than whites. Racial disparities in healthcare are impossible to ignore, and yet they have never been fully investigated until now. In Under the Skin, Linda Villarosa reveals the elements in the American healthcare system and society that cause Black people to 'live sicker and die quicker'. Today's medical texts and instruments still carry slavery-era assumptions that Black bodies are fundamentally different from white bodies. Study after study of medical settings show worse treatment and outcomes for Black patients. Black people live in dirtier, more polluted communities due to environmental racism. And, most powerfully, Villarosa describes how coping with the daily scourge of racism ages Black people prematurely, a phenomenon called weathering. Anchored by human stories and offering incontrovertible proof, Under the Skin is dramatic, tragic, and necessary reading. 'A searing indictment of a broken health system in the age of American decline.' New Statesman 'Villarosa's empathic and sharp-sighted journalism is as astute as it is groundbreaking, as brilliant as it is timely. Let the conversations begin!' Jacqueline Woodson, New York Times bestselling author of Red at the Bone

Newly available in paperback, this original and informative volume outlines a new, well-designed reflective teaching and learning model that can be used with single- or multi-disciplinary groups of students and professionals. It offers an overview of the origins of the different theories of reflection and explains how different levels of reflection can be understood and incorporated into everyday teaching and training. Outlining specific teaching and learning techniques to be used in training situations, it also includes examples of how these techniques have been successfully used with groups of professionals from health and social care areas. This edition features a substantive new preface, bringing the book up to date with recent developments in the field. It is a well-researched guide to both the theory and the practice of reflection, and it also offers those who teach and train professionals a clearly delineated reflective model for use in the classroom or professional training environment.

At a time of growing pressure on health and social care services, this book draws together contributions which highlight contemporary challenges for their management. Providing a range of contributions that draw on a Critical Management Studies perspective the book raises macro-level concerns with theory, demographics and economics on the one hand, as well as micro-level challenges of leadership, voice and engagement on the other. Rather than being an attempt to define the 'wickedness' of problems in this field, this book provides new insights designed to be of interest and value to researchers, students and managers. Contributions from international researchers explore four main topics: identifying contemporary challenges in health and social care; managing, leading and following; listening to silent voices in delivering change; and new methodologies for understanding care challenges. The concerns discussed in this volume are 'wicked' in so far as they are persistent, pernicious and beyond the curative abilities of any single organisation or profession. Such problems require collaboration but also new approaches to listening to those who suffer their effects. This book demonstrates such listening through its engagement with policy makers, leaders, followers, professions, patients, forgotten groups and silenced voices. Moreover, it considers how future research might be transformed so as to shine a more inclusive light on 'wicked' problems and their amelioration. This is a timely and engaging book that challenges you - the reader - to think again about how we should look at, engage with and support all those involved in health and social care.

Social protection serves as an important development tool, helping to alleviate deprivation, reduce social risks, raise household income and develop human capital. This book brings together an interdisciplinary team of international experts to analyse social protection systems and welfare regimes across contemporary Latin America. The book starts with a section tracking the expansion of social assistance and social insurance in Latin America through the state-led development era, the neoliberal era and the pink-tide. The second section explores the role played by local and external actors modelling social policy in the region. The third and final section addresses a variety of contemporary debates and challenges around social protection and welfare in the region, such as gender roles and the empowerment of CCT beneficiaries, and welfare provision for rural outsiders. The book touches on key topics such as conditional cash transfer programmes, trade union inclusionary strategies, transnational social policy, state-led versus market-led welfare provision, explanatory factors in the emerging dualism of social protection institutions, social citizenship rights as a consequence of changing social policy architecture and different poverty reduction strategies. This interdisciplinary volume will be of interest to economists, political scientists, sociologists, anthropologists and historians working on social protection in Latin America, or interested in welfare systems in the global south.

Precariousness and the Performances of Welfare brings together an international group of artists, activists and scholars to explore precarity in the contexts of applied and socially engaged theatre. The policy of austerity pursued by governments across the global North following the financial crisis of 2008 has renewed interest in issues of poverty, economic inequality and social justice. Emerging from European contexts of activism and scholarship, 'precarity' has become a shorthand term for the permanently insecure conditions of life under neoliberal capitalism and its associated stripping back of social welfare protections. This collection explores a range of theatre practice, including activist theatres, theatre and health projects, the community work of regional theatres, arts-led social care initiatives, people's theatres and youth arts programmes. Comprising full-length chapters and shorter pieces, the collection offers new perspectives on social theatre projects as creative occasions of occupation that generate a sense of security in a precarious world. This book was originally published as a special issue of RiDE: The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance.

This volume offers empirically based insights and findings on the question of how human service organizations are reacting to the increasing need for greater impact, effectiveness, and performance. As demand for increased impact outstrips our knowledge of how best to achieve these goals, the book's contributors discuss the innovative strategies being used to ensure that multiplex goals are being met and the degree to which client and staff concerns are being sacrificed for the organizational bottom line. Taken together, these discussions demonstrate that specific management strategies and collaboration based on trust and consideration of mission may help improve the quality of some services; however, many of the pressures which organizations and managers experience are resulting in lower staff morale, compromised missions, and inefficiencies. This book will be of interest to those researching human service agencies, as well as those with a broader concern for how organizations react to doing more with less. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Human Service Organizations journal.

Russian domestic politics has long been both labyrinthine and pragmatic, at once both inordinately complex and breathtakingly dynamic. The same can be said of Russia's foreign policy, in particular in relations with former Soviet republics. Any study of Russian foreign policy comes back to the intriguing question of why Russia, long perceived as an inveterate imperial power, would refuse to take back a handsome portion of its former empire - a portion that offers a bridge to Europe and an advantageous geostrategic position. Despite formal declarations, Russia has made little progress in achieving union with its ex-Soviet neighbour, Belarus. Linking Russia's foreign policy to its domestic politics, Alex Danilovich clarifies this paradox and explains why specific attempts to reunify Russia and Belarus failed, contrary to the desires of significant forces on both sides and to certain theory-based expectations.

How do people find themselves homeless? Why are the needs of homeless people almost totally neglected in Russian society? Which lines do they cross to become complete outsiders? This is the first book to explore the experience of homeless people in Russia both in the late Soviet period and during post-socialist transition. It concentrates on the homeless, or roofless people, living on the streets or in other places unfit for normal human habitation: cellars and lofts of apartment blocks; at train stations and airports; or in rubbish dumps or underground hot water pipes. Using in-depth interviews, the author documents their routes into homelessness; the strategies they adopt in using the city space for survival and building social bonds; and the barriers which block their escape from the streets. Interviews with people who became homeless in the 1970s-1980s are contrasted with accounts of those whose homelessness started after the end of the Soviet regime. The author places these narratives within the framework of theoretical perspectives on social-spatial exclusion, interaction between space and social identity and the regimes of settlement and social control. case of social-territorial displacement, and to set out its causes and its individual consequences within the larger social and political context. She suggests that by using the concept of displacement, particularly in a historical perspective, it is possible to better understand the ways in which social systems produce marginality and homelessness.

This volume seeks to contribute to an interdisci-plinary, comparative, and historical study of Western welfare states. It attempts to link their historical dynamics and contemporary problems in an international perspective. Building on collaboration between European-and American-based research groups, the editors have coordinated contributions by economists, political scientists, sociologists, and historians. The developments they analyze cover a time span from the initiation of modern national social policies at the end of the nineteenth century to the present. The experiences of all the presently existing Western European systems except Spain and Por-tugal are systematically encompassed, with com-parisons developed selectively with the experi-ences of the United States and Canada. The devel-opment of the social security systems, of public expenditures!and taxation, of public education and educational opportunities, and of income inequal-ity are described, compared, and analyzed for varying groupings of the Western European and North American nations. This volume addresses itself mainly to two audi-ences. The first includes all students of policy problems of the welfare states who seek to gain a comparative perspective and historical under-standing. A second group may be more interested in the theory and empirical analysis of long-term societal developments. In this context, the growth of the welfare states ranges as a major departure, along with the development of national states and capitalist economies. The welfare state is interpreted as a general phenomenon of modernization, as a product of the increasing differentiation and the growing size of societies on the one hand, and of processes of social and political mobilization on the other. It is an important element of the structural convergence of modern societies - by its mere weight in all countries - and at the same time a source of divergence by the variations within its institutional structure.

Get a balanced, comprehensive analysis of the effects from 1996 welfare reform The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 was aimed at repairing the welfare system of the United States. The Impact of Welfare Reform: Balancing Safety Nets and Behavior Modification comprehensively examines how this bill transformed the system and affected not only clients but also the organizations that implemented the reform. This text moves beyond traditional analyses of welfare reform to reveal a full range of viewpoints and issues while avoiding mere political rhetoric. Leading authorities present knowledgeable perspectives on the clients and their problems, the implementing organizations, the struggles to comply with the requirements, and the issues that remain unresolved. The Impact of Welfare Reform presents revealing interviews with clients, organizational employees, and caseworkers. In-depth discussion topics include the value of emotional well-being on job status, the effects that the new time limit requirements have on clients, ways to facilitate the welfare-to-work transition for women with mental health issues, changes in the work environment of service-providing organizations, and the client's own experiences within and outside of the system. Qualitative and quantitative methods of study are used to effectively evaluate welfare reform while providing a direction for further research in the future. The text is extensively referenced and uses tables, charts, and figures to clearly illustrate data. This book will bring you up to date on: the impact of alcohol, drugs, and psychological well-being on successfully finding employment the impact of welfare reform on children and adolescents innovations by state welfare offices community and alternative interventions that help those on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) to comply with work requirements and time limits the perceptions of caseworkers who implement TANF and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) The Impact of Welfare Reform is enlightening reading for social workers, educators, graduate students, and public policy professionals.

This open access book examines how civil society organizations in Poland, Russia, and Sweden (re)act to transformations of opportunities and limitations in access to various forms of resources. The volume's contributions discuss the constraints associated with different types of resources as well as organizations' capacities to generate resources-or compensate for their lack-as they negotiate and contest barriers. The resourcefulness of civil society is revealed to be rooted in a variety of capabilities: converting resources, eliciting organizational change, and metamorphosing in response to organizational and environmental development.

A common belief is that the European welfare states are in a position of crisis or heading towards one with the process of globalization removing any hopes of eventual worldwide welfare. This book challenges this assumption arguing that a proper understanding of the future role of the welfare state requires a broader social perspective that encompasses the interaction of economic, political and social processes. The Future of the Welfare State provides an interdisciplinary analysis of the practical and theoretical challenges which the welfare state (and progress towards world welfare) can and must meet in the future.

Get a balanced, comprehensive analysis of the effects from 1996 welfare reform The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 was aimed at repairing the welfare system of the United States. The Impact of Welfare Reform: Balancing Safety Nets and Behavior Modification comprehensively examines how this bill transformed the system and affected not only clients but also the organizations that implemented the reform. This text moves beyond traditional analyses of welfare reform to reveal a full range of viewpoints and issues while avoiding mere political rhetoric. Leading authorities present knowledgeable perspectives on the clients and their problems, the implementing organizations, the struggles to comply with the requirements, and the issues that remain unresolved. The Impact of Welfare Reform presents revealing interviews with clients, organizational employees, and caseworkers. In-depth discussion topics include the value of emotional well-being on job status, the effects that the new time limit requirements have on clients, ways to facilitate the welfare-to-work transition for women with mental health issues, changes in the work environment of service-providing organizations, and the client's own experiences within and outside of the system. Qualitative and quantitative methods of study are used to effectively evaluate welfare reform while providing a direction for further research in the future. The text is extensively referenced and uses tables, charts, and figures to clearly illustrate data. This book will bring you up to date on: the impact of alcohol, drugs, and psychological well-being on successfully finding employment the impact of welfare reform on children and adolescents innovations by state welfare offices community and alternative interventions that help those on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) to comply with work requirements and time limits the perceptions of caseworkers who implement TANF and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) The Impact of Welfare Reform is enlightening reading for social workers, educators, graduate students, and public policy professionals.

First published in 1910, this volume is a dispassionate analysis of the changes in and the various aspects of official policy towards pauperism from the 'Revolution of 1834' to the Majority and Minority Reports of 1909. In their preface to this volume the Webbs wrote: "What obscured the history was the manner in which masses of heterogeneous facts were heaped together. To read, one after another, these complicated Orders and lengthy Reports, each dealing with all kinds of paupers and various methods of relief, was but to accumulate confusion. They resembled a heap of geological conglomerates which could not be assayed until they had been broken up in such a way as to sort the different materials into separate homogeneous parcels". This book succeeds in presenting a masterly survey of this sector of the British social services on the eve of the foundation of the Welfare State, and completes the corpus of the Webbs on the Poor Law.

This collection presents creative strategies and programs designed to address needs of families in the context of rural communities. Even before the most recent worldwide economic crisis, many rural families in the United States struggled to meet basic needs. As needs in rural communities have expanded, services have shrunk. This book identifies rural families' needs, including social supports during pregnancy, identification of adolescent risk behaviours, child safety, and basic services such as food and health care, using techniques such as Geographic Information Systems and needs and asset assessments. Strategies to address those needs include program development, the use of technology, and community partnerships. The book reminds readers of the sense of independence and self-reliance found in many rural communities and the theme of diversity within rural communities runs throughout the book. The chapters are organized by identification of the needs of rural families, addressing disparities in rural areas, practice in rural communities, and human service organizations and professionals. Through research, practice, and creative works, the book contributes to a greater understanding of ways that service providers can advance their work with rural families and broaden their perspectives about realities experienced by families living in rural communities. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Family Social Work.

In this book Max Koch develops a theoretical model to understand the restructuring of labour markets and social structures of advanced capitalist countries on the basis of the 'regulation approach'. This approach is then applied to comparative analysis of the national trajectories of the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden. Against the background of the classical sociological theories of Marx and Weber, he examines whether there are general links between inclusion, exclusion and capitalism. This is followed by an outline of key concepts of the regulation approach and a discussion of the transition from Fordism to Post-Fordism which leads to empirically verifiable hypotheses about long-term trends in labour markets and social structures in Western Europe. These hypotheses serve as the theoretical basis for the subsequent country studies that are founded on an evaluation of international labour statistics.

The crisis of internally displaced persons (IDPs) was first confronted in the 1980s, and the problems of those suffering from this type of forced migration has grown continually since then. This volume traces the normative, legal, institutional, and political responses to the challenges of assisting and protecting IDPs. Drawing on official and confidential documents as well as interviews with leading personalities, "Internal Displacement" provides an unparalleled analysis of this important issue and includes: An exploration of the phenomenon of internal displacement and of policy research about it A review of efforts to increase awareness about the plight of IDPs and the development of a legal framework to protect them A 'behind-the-scenes' look at the creation and evolution of the mandate of the Representative of the Secretary-General on IDPs A variety of case studies illustrating the difficulties in overcoming the operational shortcomings within the UN system A foreword by former UN high commissioner for refugees, Sadako Ogata. "Internal Displacement "is written by two outstanding scholars and will appeal to students, scholars, and practitioners with interests in war and peace, forced migration, human rights and global governance.

The statistics are pretty grim - young people face an ever increasing tide of poverty, alcohol and drug abuse, violence, suicide, and family dysfunction. Society's response has been slow. Too many young people do not receive consistent, positive, and realistic validation of themselves from those adults on whom they depend." Nurturing Future Generations" goes beyond the stilted rhetoric on the problems of youth and the dilemma for society by outlining specific treatment intervention and prevention strategies that address the full spectrum of dysfunctional behavior. It introduces structured intervention strategies for school and community collaboration, with an emphasis on remediation and treatment. Educators and helping professionals will find counseling strategies and psychoeducational techniques that focus on primary prevention. These primary prevention strategies are supported by an understanding of critical social, emotional, and cognitive skills. The new edition provides an increased focus on the positive aspects of youth development, with less emphasis placed on the dysfunctional side of youth behavior. The book addresses emerging research on resiliency and includes increased coverage of best practices for use with troubled youth. A new chapter on LGBT youth issues has been added, and the existing chapters have been substantially revised and updated. The author has reorganized sections within each chapter, adding to the readability and flow of the book, making it more useful as both a professional reference and supplemental text.