The ongoing social crises and moral conflicts evident in global social policy debates are addressed in this timely volume.
Leading interdisciplinary scholars focus on the ‘social’ of social policy, which is increasingly conceived in a globalised form, as new international agreements and global goals engender social struggles. They tackle pressing ‘social questions’, many of which have been exacerbated by COVID-19, including growing inequality, changing world population, ageing societies, migration and intersectional disadvantage.
This ground-breaking volume critically engages with contested conceptions of the social which are increasingly deployed by international institutions and policy makers. Focusing on social sustainability, social cohesion, social justice, social wellbeing and social progress this text is even more crucial as policy makers look to accelerate socially sustainable solutions to the world’s biggest challenges.
Introduction This final chapter draws lessons from across the volume, for thinking through the conceptual ‘lynchpin’ of the ‘social’ and the seismic shifts in social policy over time and space. Here we return to the different conceptualizations of ‘the social’ and ‘the social question’ posed in the different chapters, reflecting further on the ‘social’ in social policy and the struggle for social sustainability in the 21st century. Emerging global social policy frameworks, and proposed pathways and alternatives for accelerating global social progress, are
relating to ‘social sustainability’ and the relevance of collective worker representation prior to the adoption of Agenda 2030 and the SDGs. It goes on to consider the shift in perspective from 2015 onwards. The chapter then examines the ILO approach to the intersection between sustainability and labour objectives, noting a long-standing reluctance to engage with trade-related issues and recent resistance from the employers’ group to concrete protections of freedom of association. What may seem more promising are a number of developments which have taken place in 2019
Part 3 THE CHALLENGES FOR A SOCIALLY SUSTAINABLE LONDON
general, varied and unclear definitions are commonplace in research on sustainability ( Langergaard and Dupret, 2020 ). Moreover, Schoyen and Hvinden (2017: 317) argue that ‘the dominating conceptions of “welfare state sustainability” are rather narrow’, because they only consider/exclusively focus upon social outcomes and financial considerations. In this volume, concerns regarding care work are transversing climate and environmental, economic, and social sustainability; and welfare state sustainability is seen as an overarching concept. We agree with Fraser (2014
areas of concern in terms of gender equality and elements of social sustainability in a situation of care crisis. When care is talked about in politics today, it is typically seen as a financial burden (expenditure) or as a social investment, where investments in early childhood education and care are a way of investing in human capital and the conditions for successful lifelong learning in the competition between nations ( OECD, 2001 ; EU Commission, 2011 ). In contrast – and as already mentioned – this book theorises care as a precondition for human life and
In this insightful collection, academic experts consider the impact of neoliberal policies and ideology on the status of care work in Nordic countries. With new research perspectives and empirical analyses, it assesses challenges for care work including technologies, management and policy-making.
Arguing that there is a care crisis even in the supposedly feminist Nordic ‘nirvana’, this book explores understandings of the care crisis, the serious consequences for gender equality and the hitherto neglected effects on the long-term sustainability of the Nordic welfare states.
This astute take on the Nordic welfare model provides insights into what the Nordic experience can tell us about wider international issues in care.
The field of early childhood education and care (ECEC) is characterised by great diversity in status and organisation in different countries. Care for children is commonly heavily dependent on unpaid and non-formal care work by mothers and relatives, or poorly paid nursing and child-minding, for instance by migrant workers (Acker, 1990; Bäck-Wiklund, 2004). Consequently, a common strategy for the valorisation of care work pursued by feminist policy-makers and researchers, in the Nordic countries in particular, is that of professionalisation or ‘professional projects’ (Witz, 1990; Williams, 1996; Dahl, 2010). In Denmark, this political strategy has been advocated not only by the labour unions of the (social, educational and health) care workers and by their educational institutions. The possibilities and advantages of professionalisation have also been taken up and promoted as part of policy discourses and regulatory reforms around the ‘modernisation’ of public services as a means to enhance the quality of care, and the legitimacy of public service and reproduction on a broader scale (Wrede et al, 2008; Dahl, 2010). Seen from this point of view, professionalisation is not a controversial strategy.
Taking a closer look at the underlying interests and explicit reasons for professionalisation, there is however less consensus among the advocating agents. In fact, discussions of professionalisation expose controversies not only about the aims, but also the means of professionalisation. Following Witz (1990), this chapter argues that the potential of professionalisation as a strategy rests on the validation of the substance of the professional practice at its core: on the one side, the basic understandings and recognition of the services rendered; on the other side, the status of professional knowledge, qualifications and necessary judgements, values and ethics needed to act with professionalism to secure the quality of the tasks and services provided.
For several decades now, elder care services have been characterised by recurring crises in Finland. In 2006, a political scandal erupted when allegations became public of insufficient staff ratios in Koukkuniemi, the largest unit of institutional care for older adults in the Nordic countries at the time (Yle, 2006). In 2019, a scandal broke when the National Supervisory Authority for Welfare and Health (Valvira) ordered the closure of several care homes owned by private care companies due to severe neglect in the quality of care, and announced that they were investigating several complaints regarding deficiencies in elder care (Valvira, 2019). Valvira’s lawyer described the situation in the first care home as an ‘acute crisis’, which is why it was closed down immediately (Tiessalo, 2019). The situation was described as a ‘care crisis’ by the media, expert commentators and opposition politicians as well as the Regional State Administrative Agencies (AVI, 2020).
Care crisis is understood here as referring to a situation in elder care that has reached a critical phase in relation to the quality of care, also involving public concerns over the quality and conditions of care work. While a crisis is commonly understood as a temporary disruption, for many people in the world, such as older adults in poor health, a crisis can become a lasting, endemic condition. Nevertheless, when a crisis has been identified by central actors in the field, action needs to be taken.
In Finland, a common line of action is routinely suggested as a solution to the crisis of elder care: improvements in the management of care.
Over the last few decades, nurses have had to do the necessary, and sometimes life-saving, care work at hospitals under genuinely changing political and organisational conditions. Following the regimes of New Public Management (NPM), new managerial discourses have been set up in Scandinavia, as well as in many other OECD countries, which have placed ever-increasing pressure on health-care workers (Malmmose, 2009; Centeno and Cohen, 2012). Managerial regimes have been implemented, partly to encourage efficiency through standardisation of care, but also to ensure commitment to the marketisation discourse and make ‘health care services’ more consumer-oriented and open, to meet the consumer’s ‘right to choose’ between different service providers. The arrival of these new regimes and discourses have been followed by policy instructions to take up a more service-minded approach, displayed through the slogan, ‘We are here for you’, advertising the Regional Health Service on the website (Region Sjælland, 2016). This is part of a policy regime, aiming to address the needs of patients-as-customers and announcing the political and organisational concern, not only for consumer choices, but also for their safety – as a first priority. While it could in fact be seen as a commitment to address citizens’ and patients’ needs, we will discuss a different and more complex reality. The focus of this chapter is on the consequences of the current transformations of these governing regimes – here based on the recorded experiences of newly educated nurses from different medical wards in Region Zealand, Denmark.
The work of nurses has, since the beginning of the 21st century, been deeply influenced by international discourses of safety programmes; especially as outlined in the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) conceptualisation of ‘patient safety friendly hospitals’ (WHO, 2016).
