Rob Macmillan

ePDF and ePUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence. During the consolidation of the welfare state in the 1940s, and its reshaping in the 2010s, the boundaries between the state, voluntary action, the family and the market were called into question. This interdisciplinary book explores the impact of these ‘transformational moments’ on the role, position and contribution of voluntary action to social welfare. It considers how different narratives have been constructed, articulated and contested by public, political and voluntary sector actors, making comparisons within and across the 1940s and 2010s. With a unique analysis of recent and historical material, this important book illuminates contemporary debates about voluntary action and welfare.

This book provides a new perspective on joblessness among men. During the last twenty years vast numbers of men of working age have moved completely out of the labour market into ‘early retirement’ or ‘long-term sickness’ and to take on new roles in the household. These trends stand in stark contrast to rising labour market participation among women. Based on an unprecedented range of new research on the detached male workforce in the UK, and located within an international context, the book offers a detailed exploration of the varied financial, family and health circumstances ‘detached men’ are living in. It also challenges conventional assumptions about the boundaries between unemployment, sickness and retirement and the true health of the labour market. Work to Welfare represents an important contribution to debates about the labour market and benefit systems and will be of interest to readers and practitioners in social policy, economics and geography.

Despite the growing significance of the voluntary sector in political planning, and despite increased research into the size, shape and structure of this sector, we still know little about its everyday dynamics. Drawing on detailed case study research with eight organisations in the UK in 1999, Moving pictures fills this gap, providing an accessible and lively account of the working of voluntary sector organisations. It identifies eight key dilemmas of voluntary action and explores how these are experienced and managed within particular organisations. In addressing these issues through practitioners' voices, it highlights the human perspective on policy and practice. The report will improve understanding of how voluntary organisations are structured and evolve, and how they respond to, or resist, opportunities and constraints. Issues covered include: the infrastructure of small and medium sized voluntary organisations, and how they achieve much with little; the values and dilemmas of volunteering; the dilemmas of strategic planning; the issues and tensions associated with external agencies and partnership working. Moving pictures will appeal to practitioners and policy makers, to workers, volunteers and users, and to a wider academic and student audience endeavouring to make sense of their findings in a critically analytical way.