Research
You will find a complete range of our monographs, muti-authored and edited works including peer-reviewed, original scholarly research across the social sciences and aligned disciplines. We publish long and short form research and you can browse the complete Bristol University Press and Policy Press archive.
Policy Press also publishes policy reviews and polemic work which aim to challenge policy and practice in certain fields. These books have a practitioner in mind and are practical, accessible in style, as well as being academically sound and referenced.
Books: Research
Following the highly respected first volume, this book continues to provide a holistic view of Julio Boltvinik’s vast and important work on poverty conceptualisation and measurement. While the previous book introduced the author’s widely adopted Integrated Poverty Measurement Method (IPMM), this new volume outlines his Marxian approach to poverty and human flourishing, focusing on what he conceptualises as human poverty.
Bringing together 20 years of research, this interdisciplinary book provides an alternative to Sen’s Capability approach and details its internal consistency, solid foundations and promising perspectives for applicability.
Available Open Access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
During the cost-of-living crisis, schools and nurseries have had to step beyond their educational purpose to offer free food to families through food banks. This book explores how these food banks operate, why families use them and how they affect children’s participation and wellbeing. Drawing on case studies of 12 primary schools and early years settings across England, it examines the impact on family wellbeing, home-school relationships and staff.
The authors argue that the situation will remain unsustainable if this welfare work continues to be unfunded and unrecognised, raising a significant question of who should and who can be responsible for alleviating child poverty.
The rich and the poor in the UK are subject to radically different legislative approaches. While the behaviours of the poor are relentlessly scrutinised, those of the rich are ignored or enabled.
In this book, Sarah Kerr suggests that we live in a state of ‘wealtherty’, characterised by the hyper-concentration of wealth and a stark distinction between the rich and the rest. Drawing on evidence from the 1500s onwards, she reveals a long history of government scrutiny of the poor and ignorance of the rich. She contests contemporary policy and practice which disregards the enduring role of the rich in the production of poverty and poverty in the production of the rich.
In pursuit of social and economic justice, this radical book challenges policy makers and researchers to stop talking about poverty and to start addressing the problems caused by wealtherty.
Available Open Access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
Experts from across the globe review leading social policy scholarship in this new volume in the Social Policy Review series.
Specialists explore local and multi-level trends in social policy including government responses to the cost-of-living crisis in the UK and decentralisation in primary health care in Thailand. They also review policy responses to working age risks in England, Italy and Australia, as well as policy developments and transformations such as social protection in Japan and Australia and immigration resettlement schemes in the UK.
Published in association with the Social Policy Association, the latest book in this respected series will be essential reading for students and academics in social policy, social welfare and related disciplines.
In dealing with individual problems and difficulties, critical social work (CSW) is an emancipatory practice which seeks to address social injustice. In this book the author draws on almost 40 years’ experience as a social worker to consider CSW in core areas of practice with children and families.
Fully updated to cover the impact of austerity, Brexit, the COVID-19 pandemic and cost of living crisis, this accessible textbook is essential reading for students, educators and practitioners of child and family social work. It features:
• clearly signposted ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ sections;
• over 10 case studies including those drawn from the author’s experience;
• end of chapter ‘Key points’ summaries;
• further reading suggestions.
With expanded coverage of race and intersectionality, contextual safeguarding and critical child protection, the book champions the development of resilient social workers working towards a more just and equal world.
This book offers a holistic view of Julio Boltvinik’s vast and important work on poverty conceptualisation and measurement. While well known to Spanish-speaking audiences, this volume brings these works together to offer access for English-speaking audiences for the first time.
The book provides the foundations, application and empirical examples of Boltvinik’s Integrated Poverty Measurement Method, which could potentially transform poverty narratives globally as it has done in Mexico.
Deeply critical of available poverty approaches, it provides a challenging and radically new way of conceiving and measuring poverty, offering the only multidimensional poverty measurement method which includes time-poverty and allows all Aggregate Poverty Measures to be fully calculated.
Recent welfare reforms, based on austerity narratives and a gender-neutral rationale, have failed to recognise the ways in which women and men experience the different demands and rewards of paid employment and unpaid care.
This book draws on a wealth of qualitative longitudinal evidence to cast light on women’s lived experiences of welfare and work. Giving voice to social security recipients, this book uncovers the hidden gendered bias of conditional welfare reforms to challenge dominant political discourses, policy design and practice norms.
It combines and develops three interdisciplinary perspectives – feminist analysis, lived experience and street-level bureaucracy – to offer a new understanding of British welfare reform policies and practice.
ePDF and ePUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND license.
The perpetuation of poverty across generations damages lives. It weakens social cohesion and the economy and undermines environmental sustainability. This book examines why poverty is carried on from one generation to the next and what needs to be done to eradicate it.
This book draws on a wide variety of sources and academic disciplines (social sciences, economics, law, community development, neuroscience and developmental psychology) along with the lived experience of people in poverty. Challenging the myths and prejudices about poverty that hinder progress, it calls for a comprehensive approach based on ensuring real equality of opportunity for all. It stresses the need to intervene early to combat child poverty and break the vicious cycles that perpetuate poverty and disadvantage.
EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
In the latest edition of Social Policy Review, experts review the leading social policy scholarship from the past year.
The book addresses current issues and critical debates within the field, with a particular focus on intergenerational research. Contributors also explore key social policy and research developments across a wide range of themes, including the impact of COVID-19 on eldercare and homelessness, research into faith-based organisations, local social services in Italy and social policies for autistic adults in England and Wales.
Published in association with the Social Policy Association, this comprehensive volume will be essential reading for students and academics in social policy, social welfare and related disciplines.
EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
Whilst the COVID-19 pandemic affected all parts of the country, it did not do so equally. Northern England was hit the hardest, exposing more than ever the extent of regional inequalities in health and wealth.
Using original data analysis from a wide range of sources, this book demonstrates how COVID-19 has impacted the country unequally in terms of mortality, mental health and the economy.
The book provides a striking empirical overview of the impact of the pandemic on regional inequalities and explores why the North fared worse.
It sets out what needs to be learnt from the pandemic to prevent regional inequality growing and to reduce inequalities in health and wealth in the future.
