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

You are looking at 1 - 10 of 12 items for :

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Scottish Police Reform, Localism, and Epistocracy
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Making a unique contribution to the scholarship on democratic policing, this book adapts the concept of epistocracy to explore the role of knowledge and expertise in police governance and accountability.

A rigorous empirical analysis of the Scottish police governance arrangements following reform in 2013 is complemented with examples from other liberal democracies, situating the Scottish context in wider debates on democratic policing, localism, and the operational independence doctrine. The book provides a framework for knowledge-based working practices, showing how principles of democratic policing, such as equity and responsiveness, may be achieved in practice.

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Context, Practices and Challenges

Neighbourhood policing has been called the ‘cornerstone of British policing’ but changing demand, pressures on funding and the cyclical nature of political support mean that this approach is under considerable pressure.

Locating neighbourhood policing in its social and political context, the book investigates whether this UK model - intended to build confidence and legitimacy - has been successful. Exploring effective policing strategies and the importance of funding and philosophical support, it concludes with an assessment of the model’s future and the challenges that it needs to overcome.

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What Every Practitioner Should Know
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This book aims to make clear the interconnections between social policy and criminal justice practice, bringing together key social policy concepts within a framework for reducing reoffending rates. The book focuses on the key social policy issues of employment, health and mental health, low income and poverty, housing and family. It shows how understanding and treating these as issues interconnected to criminal justice outcomes can and does lead to improvements in criminal justice practice.

This book enables students and criminal justice practitioners to understand how a social policy focus can better inform practice with those involved in the criminal justice system. It features:

  • A 10 point summary of key points for learning;

  • Chapter heading questions to support independent learning;

  • Tables and graphs to illustrate the text.

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This collection offers a comprehensive review of the origins, scale and breadth of the privatisation and marketisation revolution across the criminal justice system.

Leading academics and researchers assess the consequences of market-driven criminal justice in a wide range of contexts, from prison and probation to policing, migrant detention, rehabilitation and community programmes. Using economic, sociological and criminological perspectives, illuminated by accessible case studies, they consider the shifting roles and interactions of the public, private and voluntary sectors.

As privatisation, outsourcing and the impact of market cultures spread further across the system, the authors look ahead to future developments and signpost the way to reform in a ‘post-market’ criminal justice sphere.

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Policy, politics and practice in the UK

Modern slavery, in the form of labour exploitation, domestic servitude, sexual trafficking, child labour and cannabis farming, is still growing in the UK and industrialised countries, despite the introduction of laws to try to stem it.

This hugely topical book, by a team of high-profile activists and expert writers, is the first to critically assess the legislation, using evidence from across the field, and to offer strategies for improvement in policy and practice. It argues that, contrary to its claims to be ‘world-leading’, the Modern Slavery Act is inconsistent, inadequate and punitive; and that the UK government, through its labour market and immigration policies, is actually creating the conditions for slavery to be promoted.

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Assessing the impact of reform
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Originally introduced as a form of social welfare with near-universal eligibility, legal aid in the UK is now framed as a benefit external to the legal system and understood in primarily economic terms. This book is the first to evaluate the recent reforms of UK legal aid from a social policy perspective and assess their impact on family law courts and advocacy.

Written by experts in the field, it focuses on the rise in people representing their own legal case and argues that the reforms effectively ‘delawyerise’ disputes, producing a more inquisitorial justice system and impacting the litigants, court system, staff and process.

Arguing for a more holistic concept of the reforms, the book will be of relevance to students, academics, policy-makers, judges, campaigners and social workers, not just in England and Wales, but in other jurisdictions instituting cuts to their legal aid budgets, such as Australia, Scotland, France, and the Netherlands.

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Reflections on challenging times for advice agencies
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Available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence.

In a world dominated by austerity politics and policies, Advising in austerity provides a lively and thought-provoking account of the conditions, consequences and challenges of advice work in the UK, presenting a rare and rich view of the world of advice giving. Based on original research it examines how advisors negotiate the private troubles of those who come to Citizens Advice Bureaux (CAB) and construct ways forward. Exploring how advisors are trained, the strong contributor team reflect on the challenges facing Citizens Advice Bureaux in the future, where austerity will ensure that the need for advice services increase, while funding for such services declines.

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Events of 2015

The human rights records of more than 90 countries and territories is put into perspective in Human Rights Watch’s signature yearly report. This volume highlights the armed conflict in Syria, international drug reform, drones and electronic mass surveillance, and also features photo essays of child marriage in South Sudan, the cost of the Sochi Winter Olympics in Russia, and religious fighting in Central African Republic.

Reflecting extensive investigative work undertaken in 2015 by Human Rights Watch staff, in close partnership with domestic human rights activists, the annual World Report 2016 is an invaluable resource for journalists, researchers, students, diplomats, and citizens, and is a must-read for anyone interested in the fight to protect human rights in every corner of the globe.

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Events of 2014

CUSTOMERS IN NORTH AMERICA: COPIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM WWW.SEVENSTORIES.COM

The 25th annual World Report summarizes human rights conditions in more than ninety countries and territories worldwide, reflecting extensive investigative work undertaken in 2014 by Human Rights Watch staff in close partnership with domestic rights activists. The World Report 2015 focuses in particular on the roles--positive or negative--played in each country by key domestic and international figures. Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth’s introduction addresses the tumultuous events of the past year, and describes inattention to human rights as an aggravating factor in the rise of brutal non-state actors such as ISIS and Boko Haram. Other essays focus on the strangulation of civil society by both repressive and so-called democratic countries; the need to keep surveillance on the human rights agenda; the alarming rise of explosive weapons in populated areas; and human rights abuses linked to mega-sporting events.

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New perspectives on the ‘not-so-big society’

Drawing on a wide array of policy domains and events, this book provides an innovative account of social control and behaviourism within welfare systems and social policies, and the implications for disadvantaged groups.

This accessible collection reviews the controls, assumptions and persuasions applied to individuals and households and explores broader themes, including how ‘new behaviourism’ was consolidated during the New Labour and Cameron periods.

Social policy and social control offers timely engagements with key issues for researchers and policy makers, and is relevant for students in social policy, sociology, socio-legal studies, social work and social care, disability studies, human geography, politics and public policy, and gender, family and life course studies.

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