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Articles 1 - 25 of 25
Full-Text Articles in Social Work
Policy Mandated Collaboration, Jan Ivery
Policy Mandated Collaboration, Jan Ivery
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
This exploratory study examined the collaborative strategy used by Tri Cities Partnership (TCP) to facilitate the collaborative process required by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to receive Continuum of Care funding. The study examined partner perceptions of TCP's leadership, organizational structure, benefits and drawbacks of participation, and relationships with partners. A follow-up survey and key informant interviews explored themes related to organizational affiliation with TCP, benefits and drawbacks of participation, relationships with partners, challenges impacting the ability of TCP to facilitate collaboration and strategies for involving key stakeholders. The study also identified factors that motivate …
Rethinking Social Work's Role In Public Assistance, Julie Cooper Altman, Gertrude Schaffner Goldberg
Rethinking Social Work's Role In Public Assistance, Julie Cooper Altman, Gertrude Schaffner Goldberg
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
This article presents an argument for revisiting social work's relationship to public assistance in the wake of 10 years of welfare reform. Three case studies drawn from a mixed-method study of the quality of life of former TANF recipients illustrate the range, depth and complexity of the needs of persons while they are on the welfare rolls, transitioning off and living without cash relief. The article briefly traces the history of social work's commitment to and provision of social services for this population and argues that it may be time to revisit the profession's role in public assistance. In light …
Review Of Why Welfare States Persist: The Importance Of Public Opinion In Democracies. Clem Brooks And Jeff Manza. Reviewed By Allan Brawley., Allan Brawley
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Book review of Clem Brooks and Jeff Manza, Why Welfare States Persist: The Importance of Public Opinion in Democracies. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2007. $45.00 hardcover, $18.00 papercover.
Review Of The Lost Promise Of Civil Rights. Risa L. Goluboff. Reviewed By Wilma Peebles-Wilkins., Wilma Peebles-Wilkins
Review Of The Lost Promise Of Civil Rights. Risa L. Goluboff. Reviewed By Wilma Peebles-Wilkins., Wilma Peebles-Wilkins
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Book review of Risa L. Goluboff, The Lost Promise of Civil Rights. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007. $35.00 hardcover.
Review Of Citizen Lobbyists: Local Efforts To Influence Public Policy. Brian Adams. Reviewed By Michael Woodford., Michael Woodford
Review Of Citizen Lobbyists: Local Efforts To Influence Public Policy. Brian Adams. Reviewed By Michael Woodford., Michael Woodford
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Book review of Brian Adams, Citizen Lobbyists: Local Efforts to Influence Public Policy. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2007. $71.50 hardcover, $25.95 papercover.
The Untold Story Of Welfare Fraud, Richelle S. Swan, Linda L. Shaw, Sharon Cullity, Joni Halpern, Juliana Humphrey, Wendy M. Limbert, Mary Roche
The Untold Story Of Welfare Fraud, Richelle S. Swan, Linda L. Shaw, Sharon Cullity, Joni Halpern, Juliana Humphrey, Wendy M. Limbert, Mary Roche
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
The experiences of women who have been charged with welfare fraud in the years following the passage of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act cast a shadow over the claim that welfare reform has been an unequivocal success. This article addresses this under-explored issue by considering the face of welfare fraud in San Diego, California after the change to federal welfare law. After a brief discussion of the socio-historical context of welfare fraud prosecution and a summary of the scholarly findings related to welfare fraud post-PRWORA, the aiticle details a new "poverty knowledge" about welfare fraud drawn …
Long-Term Tanf Participants And Barriers To Employment: A Qualitative Study In Maine, Sandra S. Butler, Janine Corbett, Crystal Bond, Chris Hastedt
Long-Term Tanf Participants And Barriers To Employment: A Qualitative Study In Maine, Sandra S. Butler, Janine Corbett, Crystal Bond, Chris Hastedt
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Although welfare rolls have declined dramatically since the passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) in 1996, many of those parents still receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) face multiple barriers to employment. In response to a proposed state bill increasing work requirements and imposing stricter time limits, the authors conducted focus groups and interviews in order to learn about the experiences of long-term recipients of TANF in Maine. Domestic violence, children's disabilities, and health issues for the mother emerged as key obstacles to meeting TANF work requirements for the 28 women participating in the …
Welfare And Family Economic Security: Toward A Place-Based Poverty Knowledge, Deborah A. Harris, Domenico Parisi
Welfare And Family Economic Security: Toward A Place-Based Poverty Knowledge, Deborah A. Harris, Domenico Parisi
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 is viewed by many as a resounding success. Its success, however, is predicated primarily on caseload reduction rather than improvement of family well-being. In addition, provisions in the act ignore the importance of place in shaping one's life chances. Using Alice O'Connor's influential book, Poverty Knowledge, as a framework, we discuss findings from a qualitative study that examines how low-income families plan for a life without welfare in places with different opportunities and structural constraints. We find that returns to TANF are common among welfare leavers and that place …
Dropped From The Rolls: Mexican Immigrants, Race, And Rights In The Era Of Welfare Reform, Alejandra Marchevsky, Jeanne Theoharis
Dropped From The Rolls: Mexican Immigrants, Race, And Rights In The Era Of Welfare Reform, Alejandra Marchevsky, Jeanne Theoharis
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Welfare reform transferred considerable discretion over eligibility standards and benefits to individual caseworkers, contributing to a highly diffuse, yet system-wide, practice of discrimination against nonwhite and foreign-born families within the new TANF program. Based on a two-year ethnographic study of welfare reform's impact on Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles County, this article documents a pattern of heightened anti-immigrant sentiment and disentitlement within L.A. County's welfare system following the passage of PRWORA. The vast majority of eligible immigrant families in our study lost some or all of their cash and food stamp benefits, and were systematically denied access to the work …
Tracking The Transition From Welfare To Work, Cynthia Needles Fletcher, Mary Winter, An-Ti Shih
Tracking The Transition From Welfare To Work, Cynthia Needles Fletcher, Mary Winter, An-Ti Shih
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
One of the primary goals of the 1996 federal welfare reform legislation was to reduce dependency on cash transfers and to promote self-sufficiency through employment in the paid labor force. This paper draws upon a qualitative study of 18 Iowa welfare recipients and tracks changes that occur over a three-year, post-reform period. Thick descriptions highlight the internal family dynamics of the choices made over time. The purposes of the study are twofold:first, to document changes in family composition, employment, housing, and program participation, and second, to report how recipients experience such changes. Findings reveal that the 11 families who left …
Lost In Appalachia: The Unexpected Impact Of Welfare Reform On Older Women In Rural Communities, Debra A. Henderson, Ann R. Tickamyer
Lost In Appalachia: The Unexpected Impact Of Welfare Reform On Older Women In Rural Communities, Debra A. Henderson, Ann R. Tickamyer
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
A primary goal of welfare reform was to overcome welfare dependency through the promotion of work and the setting of lifetime limits. While atf irst blush thisg oal may have appearedr easonablef or young recipients, it does not address the needs of older recipients, particularly women. Based on in-depth interviews with welfare recipients in four impoverished rural Appalachian counties over a four year time span (1999-2001; 2004), this paper evaluates the experiences of older women as they confront the changes brought on by welfare reform legislation. Findings suggest that impoverished older women in isolated rural communities experience multiple crises as …
"It's All One Big Circle": Welfare Discourse And The Everyday Lives Of Urban Adolescents, Staci T. Lowe
"It's All One Big Circle": Welfare Discourse And The Everyday Lives Of Urban Adolescents, Staci T. Lowe
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Welfare reform succeeded, in part, because of discourse that characterized the poverty problem as one of long-term dependency and personal irresponsibility. Adolescent pregnancy was targeted as both cause and manifestation of a welfare crisis. This study examined how welfare reform was perceived and experienced by lowincome, urban adolescents. Findings from interviews revealed that adolescents agreed with many of the basic tenets of welfare reform, largely because they had appropriated much of the discourse prevalent in wider society. However, their complex life stories contained a powerful subtext concerning structural determinants of poverty that ran counter to prevailing notions of "personal responsibility."
Potential Impact Of Eitc Adjustments On Financial Self-Sufficiency Among Low-Income Families: A Simulation Model, Younghee Lim, Catherine Lemieux
Potential Impact Of Eitc Adjustments On Financial Self-Sufficiency Among Low-Income Families: A Simulation Model, Younghee Lim, Catherine Lemieux
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Policies that help low-income mothers find and keep employment as a means of obtaining self-sufficiency have been a focal point of the welfare reform debate in the past decade. In the midst of this dialogue, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) has gained popularity as one of the core work support programs for America's low- and moderately low-income families with children. This study compares the estimated effects of EITC when its value deteriorated in the late 1990s with that of a simulated EITC for which the real value kept pace with the actual cost of living on welfare caseload reductions. …
Transforming Caregiving: African American Custodial Grandmothers And The Child Welfare System, S. Yvette Murphy, Andrea G. Hunter, Deborah J. Johnson
Transforming Caregiving: African American Custodial Grandmothers And The Child Welfare System, S. Yvette Murphy, Andrea G. Hunter, Deborah J. Johnson
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Growing numbers of African American grandmothers are raising grandchildren under the auspices of the child welfare system; however, little is known about the manner in which child welfare policies and practices impact custodial grandparenting. Based on focus groups with African American grandmothers who are raising grandchildren as formal kinship caregivers, this study explored the ways in which the new formalized relationship between the child welfare system and African American custodial grandmothers is transforming the meanings and practices related to intergenerational caregiving in African American families. Drawing on cultural and historical traditions, grandmothers forge a transformative partnership with child welfare that …
Documentary Photography In American Social Welfare History: 1897-1943, Peter Szto
Documentary Photography In American Social Welfare History: 1897-1943, Peter Szto
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
This is a study of documentary photography in American social welfare history. The study examines the emergence of photography as a tool of social policy, and in particular, key practitioners who shaped the perception of American social welfare. Within the social welfare literature, this topic is largely unexamined yet invaluable to an understanding of American social welfare. Photography performed a highly instrumental role by providing visual evidence as an innovative way of seeing and analyzing social problems. This image-based approach to social welfare analysis influenced how society viewed itself and the social environment. The goal of this study is to …
When Does Public Opinion Matter?, Jennifer L. Christian
When Does Public Opinion Matter?, Jennifer L. Christian
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
The landmark 1996 reform to Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) provides an opportunity to study processes of welfare reform in the United States. A potential factor behind the transformation of AFDC is public opinion, possibly in the form of changes in attitudes among politically relevant groups. This study will evaluate this thesis, focusing on attitudinal changes between partisan identifiers. Most data suggest the American public may have been critical of welfare programs prior to the 1996 reform. However, the extent of these criticisms generally varies depending on who is asked, how questions are worded and the type of …
Political Economy, Moral Economy And The Medicare Modernization Act Of 2003, Judie Svihula
Political Economy, Moral Economy And The Medicare Modernization Act Of 2003, Judie Svihula
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Through the lens of political and moral economy, I examined the dominant values and actors in the legislative process of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003. In my content analysis of federal hearings, I found that witnesses from government agencies, Congress and think tanks had almost equal presence at the hearings. Witnesses who were invited by Congress to testify at the hearings expressed twice as much support for private interests than for the general Medicare population or low-income beneficiaries. Few expressed concern for the uninsured population. Witnesses offered almost four times as many expressions of support for market rationalism than …
Social Welfare Policy And Public Assistance For Low-Income Substance Abusers: The Impact Of 1996 Welfare Reform Legislation On The Economic Security Of Former Supplemental Security Income Drug Addiction And Alcoholism Beneficiaries, Sean R. Hogan, George J. Unick, Richard Speiglman, Jean C. Norris
Social Welfare Policy And Public Assistance For Low-Income Substance Abusers: The Impact Of 1996 Welfare Reform Legislation On The Economic Security Of Former Supplemental Security Income Drug Addiction And Alcoholism Beneficiaries, Sean R. Hogan, George J. Unick, Richard Speiglman, Jean C. Norris
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Prior to January 1, 1997, individuals with drug- or alcohol-related disabilities could qualify for federal public assistance through the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. During the welfare reforms of the Clinton administration, this policy was changed, resulting in lost income and health care benefits for many lowincome substance abusers. This paper examines the historical underpinnings to the elimination of drug addiction and alcoholism (DA&A) as qualifjing impairments for SSI disability payments. Following this, empirical evidence is presented on the effect this policy change had on the subsequent economic security of former SSI DA&A beneficiaries. Findings indicate that study participants who …
The Illusion Of Change, The Politics Of Illusion: Evolution Of The Family Support Act Of 1988, Luisa S. Deprez
The Illusion Of Change, The Politics Of Illusion: Evolution Of The Family Support Act Of 1988, Luisa S. Deprez
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
The enactment of the Family Support Act was the outcome of a six-year legislative and administrative review of, and debate about, welfare policy and programs. Heralded as the opportunity of the century, it did little, however, to alter existing policy. This article examines the evolution of the Family Support Act within the United States Congress, spotlighting two important time periods leading up to its enactment: 1981 to 1985 and 1986 to 1988. Original documentsfroin the files of the late Senator Moynihan, legislative sponsor of the Family Support Act, as well as a comprehensive investigation of Congressional records of hearings and …
Social Security Privatization: An Ideologically Structured Movement, Judie Svihula, Carroll L. Estes
Social Security Privatization: An Ideologically Structured Movement, Judie Svihula, Carroll L. Estes
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
We document the cumulative change in expressions of support for Social Security's social insurance ideals to privatization,from the late 1970s through 2007. Social Security's basic structure and principles generally were supported by the United States government and in amendments to the original Act of 1935. However, in the 1980s market arguments began to proliferate in government alongside pension privatization projects by international governmental organizations and conservative think tanks. Although in 1983 Commission members concluded "the Social Security system is sound in principle.. and... structure," four members wrote a supplemental statement that emphasized market rationalism. By 1994 dissension in Congress was …
A Decent Home For Every Family? Housing Policy Initiatives Since The 1980s, Sondra J. Fogel, Marc T. Smith, Anne R. Williamson
A Decent Home For Every Family? Housing Policy Initiatives Since The 1980s, Sondra J. Fogel, Marc T. Smith, Anne R. Williamson
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
A fundamental economic and social principle embedded in the American psyche remains the value of shelter. However, housing policy is the result of a complex exchange among economic, political, and social agendas competing for attention within the multiple levels of local, state, and federal governments. This article intends to capture what we consider afea of the significant initiatives since 1980 that reflect these tensions and comprise our current housing policies and directions. Furthermore, we suggest additional housing issues that may need to be addressed by the next presidential administration.
History Of Contemporary Social Policy: Introduction, Richard K. Caputo
History Of Contemporary Social Policy: Introduction, Richard K. Caputo
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
As the contributions to this special issue of ]SSW attest, much can be said about the nature of social welfare policies and programs over the past quarter century. Some changes are allegedly beneficial, some not, in regard to the welfare of the nation in general and to economically needy people in particular. The welfare program in the form of cash assistance primarily to lowincome mothers and their children as we had understood and implemented it since 1935 ended. Work effort became the sine qua non of cash assistance for all low-income families. Further, the very notion of the welfare state …
Leveling The Playing Field: Epitomizing Devolution Through Faith-Based Organizations, Robert J. Wineburg, Brian L. Coleman, Stephanie C. Boddie, Ram A. Cnaan
Leveling The Playing Field: Epitomizing Devolution Through Faith-Based Organizations, Robert J. Wineburg, Brian L. Coleman, Stephanie C. Boddie, Ram A. Cnaan
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
The original New-Federalism agenda that emerged with the Reagan administration weakened federal programs and transferred power to states and localities. While Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush's years were characterized by block grants and dismantling public assistance, the Clinton years will be remembered for the dismantling of AFDC. Recruiting faith-based organizations to provide social services epitomized the second Bush presidency. In this article, we demonstrate how the seeds for recruiting faith-based groups were planted before and during the Reagan years, and how two waves of devolution chipped away at our national commitment to welfare. These first two waves provided …
Does Belief Matter? Social Psychological Characteristics And The Likelihood Of Welfare Use And Exit, Michele Lee Kozimor-King
Does Belief Matter? Social Psychological Characteristics And The Likelihood Of Welfare Use And Exit, Michele Lee Kozimor-King
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
Numerous studies have reemerged examining social psychological variables as predictors of individual differences in the human experience. Still, current research focusing on the effects of self-beliefs on welfare use and exit is limited. This study examines the effects of social psychological variables on the likelihood of welfare use and five-year outcomes of wonen using data from the 1979 through 2000 waves of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). Binary logistic regression estimates suggest that social psychological characteristics are initially related to welfare use, but do not remain oce control variables are introduced. While social psychological predictors do not appear …
Tracing The History Of Medicare Home Health Care: The Impact Of Policy On Benefit Use, Joan K. Davitt, Sunha Choi
Tracing The History Of Medicare Home Health Care: The Impact Of Policy On Benefit Use, Joan K. Davitt, Sunha Choi
The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare
We trace key policy changes that affected use of the Medicare home health benefit from the 1980s through the prospective payment system implemented in 2000, analyzing the impact on three measures of home care use: expenditures, users and visits. We demonstrate the impact of policies generated in the legislative, the judicial, and the executive branches of government and the gaming behavior of home health agencies in response to policy changes. Our analysis suggests that the policy itself and the implementation process are critical to understanding benefit use. The incentives in the policies and agency reactions had the potential to generate …