Why is it so difficult to turn girls’ success at school into success in the labour market? How does detailed evidence about women’s engagement with local labour markets affect the ‘preference theory’ debate? Why is part-time employment such a popular but economically damaging choice for women? What barriers still limit women’s horizons and narrow their aspirations?
Using a new and original approach, this illuminating book explores women’s employment at the start of the 21st century, in particular identifying aspects of women’s labour market situation which remain poorly understood and challenging much ‘received wisdom’ about women and work. The contributors examine pervasive myths about women in employment which have influenced policy and explore a number of theoretical puzzles and problems which persist despite attempts to tackle them.
“Policy for a change” will be essential reading for professionals, employers and trade unions working in human resources, regeneration, equalities and diversity, anti-poverty, skills and training, as well as for researchers, teachers and students in sociology, social and public policy, labour market economics, urban studies and management.
Poverty rates vary dramatically across the UK’s ethnic groups - an issue of concern both for poverty-reduction policies and for social justice. This book provides a comprehensive account of these variations and explores the reasons why they occur.
Drawing on a wealth of research conducted since 1991, and with a particular focus on the most recent evidence, the report reviews what we know about poverty and ethnicity and provides a detailed and considered insight into the factors contributing to the differing rates of poverty. In addition to outlining the policy implications of existing research, the author also reflects on the limitations to our knowledge and understanding of the issues, which serves as a useful framework for a future research agenda.
The book is valuable both as a comprehensive assessment of the topic and as an up-to-date and searchable resource on relevant research writings. It is essential reading for all those wishing to know more about ethnic differences in poverty experience and the contributing factors. It provides a sophisticated reading of the literature for students and researchers and a policy-informed take on the research for policy-makers.
As debates around ethnic identity and inequality gain both political and media interest, this important book is the first to offer in-depth analysis from the last three UK population censuses focusing on the dynamics of ethnic identity and inequalities in contemporary Britain. While providing a comprehensive overview, it also clarifies concepts associated with greater ethnic diversity, increased segregation, exclusive growth of minority groups through immigration and a national identity crisis.
The contributions, all from experts in the field based at or affiliated to the Centre on Dynamics of Ethnicity, highlight persistent inequalities in access to housing, employment, education and good health faced by some ethnic groups. The book will be a valuable resource for policy makers and researchers in national and local government, community groups, academics, students, and will act as an authoritative text to cite in reports, dissertations and funding applications.
An emerging consensus sees British pension policy as unravelling. Yet the gender impact of expanding private pension provision and relying increasingly on means-testing has been largely overlooked.
This book examines key issues such as: how pension choices over the lifecourse are structured by gender, class and ethnicity; the impact of changing patterns of partnership and parenthood on pension building; the distributional impact of privatising pensions; questions about individualisation of rights, survivor benefits, a citizen’s pension and means-testing; the EU dimension - comparing alternative strategies for improving gender equity.
The book is essential reading for teachers, researchers and students in social gerontology, sociology, social policy and women’s studies; practitioners in social work and welfare rights; policy makers concerned with income in later life; and all those who wish to improve their understanding of pensions issues.
“Beyond the Workfare State” explores equality, discrimination and human rights in relation to employability and ‘welfare-to-work’ policies. It draws extensively on new research from the SEQUAL Project, undertaken for the European Social Fund, which investigated seven dimensions of discrimination in a labour market that is theoretically ‘open to all’.
The book provides an overall analysis of policy shifts and presents a wide and distinctive range of illustrative studies that give voice to a variety of potentially marginalised groups. Chapters deal with obstacles to labour-market access around each of the following themes: gender and class; disability; race and ethnicity; geographical exclusion; sexual orientation; the problems of old and young people; and refugees.
The authors draw attention to localised examples of promising practice, but also connect these to a broader ‘human rights’ agenda, linking them to changing legislative and governance frameworks. Its scope covers the whole of Great Britain and it shows how devolution in Scotland and Wales, and at the regional level in England, is creating new possibilities for mainstreaming good practice in this key area.
The book will be of great interest to academics and students in social policy and related fields. It will also be valuable for professionals, policy makers and practitioners in the regeneration, community development and anti-discrimination fields, particularly in the UK but also in Europe and beyond.
This book focuses on the changing terrain of ethnic disadvantage in Britain, drawing on up-to-date sources. It goes further than texts that merely describe ethnic inequalities to explore and explain their dynamic nature. It suggests that the increasing diversity of experience among different ethnic groups is a key to understanding continuing and emerging tensions and conflicts.
Explaining ethnic differences: provides up to date data and analysis of ethnic diversity and changing patterns of disadvantage in Britain;
· covers key areas of social life, including demographic trends, education, employment, housing, health, gender, and policing and community disorder;
· is written by leading experts in the field;
· addresses issues of urgent public importance in the context of recent community disorder and the resurgence of the far right.
· The book is essential reading for policy makers in central and local government; academics, postgraduate students and advanced undergraduates in the social sciences; social work, health, education and housing professionals; and criminal justice personnel.
This volume and its companion, The New Dynamics of Ageing Volume 1, provide comprehensive multi-disciplinary overviews of the very latest research on ageing. Together they report the outcomes of the most concerted investigation ever undertaken into both the influence shaping the changing nature of ageing and its consequences for individuals and society.
This book concentrates on four major themes: autonomy and independence in later life, biology and ageing, food and nutrition and representation of old age. Each chapter provides a state of the art topic summary as well as reporting the essential research findings from New Dynamics of Ageing research projects. There is a strong emphasis on the practical implications of ageing and how evidence-based policies, practices and new products can produce individual and societal benefits.
The relationship between gender and welfare states is of key importance in understanding welfare states and gender equality and inequality. Western welfare states of the post-war era were built on assumptions about gender difference: they treated men as breadwinners and women as carers. Now governments are committed in principle to gender equality. But how far have they come from male breadwinner assumptions to gender equality assumptions? How much do gender differences continue in UK social policy and social practice?
The book analyses the male breadwinner model in terms of power, employment, care, time and income, providing a framework for chapters which ask about policies and practices for gender equality in each of these. This new approach to analysis of gender equality in social welfare contextualises national policies and debates within comparative theoretical analysis and data, making the volume interesting to a wide audience.
To understand contemporary ageing it is necessary to recognise its diversity. Drawing on an extraordinary range of theory, original research and empirical sources, this book assesses the stereotyped conceptions of ageing, and offers a critical and updated perspective.
The book explores the diversity of individual pathways of ageing, the sources of identifications, migration and otherness, and the tension between social structures and personal agency; considers multidisciplinary and international perspectives as an important means of understanding the diversity of ageing, and the need for change in established notions and policies; addresses key issues such as global ageing, migration, transnational community and citizenship; incorporates theories and findings from psychology and sociology, anthropology and demography, social policy and health sciences.
'Ageing and diversity' is aimed at academics, students and practitioners in the fields of sociology, social psychology, health, and welfare. It will also be of interest to all those who want to challenge stereotypes about ageing.
There is no shortage of political and moral commentary on family life. Frequently the underlying theme of these commentaries is the decline of contemporary family commitment, particularly when older people’s family experiences are the focus.
“Family Practices in Later Life” challenges many common stereotypes about the nature of family involvement as people age. The book explores diversity and change in the family relationships older people maintain, looking at how family relationships are constructed and organised in later life. It recognises that the emerging patterns are a consequence of the choices and decisions negotiated within family networks, emphasising older people’s agency in the construction of their family practices. In exploring such themes as long-term marriage, sibling ties in later life and grandparenthood, the book highlights the continued significance of family connection and solidarity in later life, while recognizing that family relationships are inevitably modified over time as people’s social and material circumstances alter.
“Family Practices in Later Life” will be of interest to students, researchers and academics in the fields of social policy, family studies and social gerontology. It provides a valuable contribution to the developing field of critical social gerontology as well as to an understanding of family process.
