Government is currently committed to radical reform of the welfare system underpinning social citizenship in Britain. Welfare rights and responsibilities is a response to this, focusing on welfare reform and citizenship. Specifically it explores three issues central to citizenship's social element: provision, membership and the link between welfare rights and responsibilities(conditionality). Part 1 discusses competing philosophical, political and academic perspectives on citizenship and welfare. Part 2 then moves discussions about social citizenship away from the purely theoretical level, allowing the practical concerns of citizens (particularly those at the sharp end of public provision) to become an integral part of current debates concerning citizenship and welfare. The author gives voice to the 'ordinary' citizens who actually make use of welfare services. The book offers an accessible overview of contemporary debates about the contested concepts of citizenship and welfare, linking them to recent developments and discussions about the new welfare settlement and values that underpin it. It combines relevant debates within political philosophy, social policy and sociology that relate to social citizenship with recent policy developments. Welfare rights and responsibilities allows the presently marginalised voices of welfare service users to become a valued element in contemporary debates about the extent of social citizenship and the reform of the welfare state. It is therefore important reading for students and teachers of social policy, sociology and politics. It will further appeal to a wider audience of policy makers and professional social workers with an interest in welfare reform/service users accounts.

This book makes an original contribution to current debates around welfare reform through a qualitative investigation of the opinions and experiences of welfare users. Competing philosophical, political and academic perspectives on citizenship and welfare are also analysed and discussed, making this book important reading for students and teachers.

Britain's New Labour government claims to support the cause of human rights. At the same time, it claims that we can have no rights without responsibility and that dependency on the state is irresponsible. The ethics of welfare offers a critique of this paradox and discusses the ethical conundrum it implies for the future of social welfare.

This volume is a comprehensive collection of critical essays on The Taming of the Shrew, and includes extensive discussions of the play's various printed versions and its theatrical productions. Aspinall has included only those essays that offer the most influential and controversial arguments surrounding the play. The issues discussed include gender, authority, female autonomy and unruliness, courtship and marriage, language and speech, and performance and theatricality.

The critical role of food in contemporary policy, in the UK, Europe and internationally, is explored in a comprehensive and readable account of current issues, including food rights, patenting, safety, aid, choice and poverty. This landmark collection explores the critical role of food in contemporary national and international policy. The contributors represent different professional and academic perspectives. The contributions challenge state, institutional and agency structures and responses to food as a social policy issue. Most of the contributors write from an empirical research base.

Welfare Rights and Social Policy provides an introduction to social policy through a discussion of welfare rights, which are explored in historical, comparative and critical context. At a time when the cause of human rights is high on the global political agendathe authorasks why the status of welfare rights as an element of human rights remains ambiguous. Rights to social security, employment, housing, education, health and social care are critical to human well-being. Yet they are invariably subordinate to the civil and political rights of citizenship, they are often fragile and difficult to enforce, and because of their conditional nature they may be implicated in the social control of individual behaviour.

The impetus for this book is the shift in welfare policy in Western Europe from state responsibilities to individual and community responsibilities. The book examines the ways in which policies associated with advanced liberalism and New Public Management can be identified as influencing professional practices to promote personalisation, participation, empowerment, recovery and resilience. In examining the concept of ‘responsibilisation’ from the point of view of both the ‘responsibilised client and welfare worker’, the book breaks from the traditional literature to demonstrate how responsibilities are negotiated during multi-professional care planning meetings, home visits, staff meetings, focus groups and interviews with different stakeholders. The settings examined in the book can be described as on the ‘margins of welfare’ - mental health, substance abuse, homelessness services and probation work, where the rights and responsibilities of clients and workers are uncertain and constantly under review. Each chapter approaches the management of responsibilities from a particular angle by combining responsibilisation theory and discourse analysis to examine everyday encounters. Taken together, the chapters paint a comprehensive picture of the responsibilisation practices at the margins of welfare services and provide an extensive discussion of the implications for policy and practice. Drawing upon both the governmentality literature and everyday encounters, the book provides a broad approach to a key topic. It will therefore be a valuable resource for social policy, public administration, social work and human service researchers and students, and social and health care professionals.