Vendor: Õ¬Äе¼º½
Type: Paperback
Price: 45.00

The provision of social services in Australia has changed dramatically in recent decades. Governments have expanded social provision without expanding the public sector by directly subsidising private provision, by contracting private agencies, both non-profit and for-profit, to deliver services, and through a number of other subsidies and vouchers.

Private actors receive public funds to deliver social services to citizens, raising a range of important questions about financial and democratic accountability: 'who benefits', 'who suffers' and 'who decides'. This book explores these developments through rich case studies of a diverse set of social policy domains. The case studies demonstrate a range of effects of marketisation, including the impact on the experience of consumer engagement with social service systems, on the distribution of social advantage and disadvantage, and on the democratic steering of social policy.

Vendor: Õ¬Äе¼º½
Type: Paperback
Price: 39.95

Care for Australia's children and elderly is provided in a mixed economy, in which for-profit providers are playing an increasingly important role alongside more traditional government and non-government organisations. Does the growth of for-profit provision affect the quality of services or of jobs in paid care? Does it change the political dynamics of the social care sector in contemporary welfare states? How might service users, their families, and organisations work together to sustain and improve the quality of care services? What theories and evidence help us to understand the process and consequences of the shift toward for-profit provision of social care? In nine chapters by leading researchers, this book explores these and other questions, to inform policy and practice in this key field of social policy.

Vendor: Õ¬Äе¼º½
Type: Paperback
Price: 34.95

How can change be promoted and sustained in disadvantaged communities and for children in communities? How can professionals be supported to bring about positive change in communities? How can collaborative research and evaluation make a difference? The chapters in this book, emanating from the Communities and Change Conference at the University of Õ¬Äе¼º½ in 2007, explore these questions, demonstrating the challenging and constructive connections between education and social work, between universities and community organisations, and between research and practice.