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So often, the ills of society are blamed on negligent parenting, leading to the development of social service policies built around the concept of early intervention. Interrogating this concept, this book explores the history of our understanding of children, family, and parenting, and its implications for society. With a particular focus on the intersection of brain science and social policy, the authors challenge our long-held consensus on early intervention. Accessibly written and highly topical, this book is a comprehensive and critical assay of our contemporary belief that so-called bad parents raise substandard future citizens unfit for the new capitalism.

Numerous books have been written about Victorian child-care pioneers, but few biographical studies have been published about more recent child-care and welfare pioneers. This book looks at the lives of six inspirational individuals who have made significant contributions to the well being of disadvantaged children over the course of the twentieth century. Each of the six discussed – Eleanor Rathbone, Marjory Allen, Clare Winnicott, John Stroud, Barbara Kahan, and Peter Townsend – has been important in establishing present systems of ch ild care and child welfare, and in stimulating debate around issues that remain high on policy and practitioner agendas today.

There are, sadly, children whose lives are severely blighted by abuse, by neglect and by separation from their parents. Ways have been devised to protect and care for them. Some have been encouragingly enlightened while others have been deeply misguided. These essays describe and explain the significant political, economic, legal and ideological factors that have shaped this history from the mid-1850s up to the present day. In this, as much emphasis has been given to accounting for the unchanging nature of certain problems, issues and assumptions as to what has changed: hence the title. However, the essays look forward as well as looking back and in doing so endeavour to discern the likely pattern of future developments in the nature and scale of the problems with which the children’s services grapple and in the policies to which they give rise. Two key questions follow. How far will such policies be informed by well-founded evidence and how far by uninformed political conviction or by the legacies of the past? And will there be the necessary skill, commitment and compassion for the lives of our most vulnerable children to be enhanced, not least by forestalling the ills that are liable to befall them?

The general well-being of British adolescents has been the topic of considerable debate in recent years, but too often this is based on myth rather than fact. Are today's young people more stressed, anxious, distressed or antisocial than they used to be? What does research evidence tell us about the adolescent experience today and how it has changed over time? And how do trends in adolescent well-being since the 1970s relate to changes in education, leisure, communities and family life in that time? This unique volume brings together the main findings from the Nuffield Foundation's Changing Adolescence Programme and explores how social change may affect young people's behaviour, mental health and transitions toward adulthood. As well as critiquing research evidence, which will be of interest to a wide academic audience, the book will inform the wider debate on this subject among policy makers and service providers, voluntary organisations and campaign groups

Health and social care professionals are constantly exhorted to work collaboratively. This book reports on research which examines inter-professional work with families in which mothers have a mental health problem and where there are also concerns about child protection. Breakdowns in inter-professional collaboration, issues of risk and relevant resources are all addressed. Mothers' views and experiences are contrasted with professional perspectives. The book reports on a survey of 500 practitioners working in health, social services and the voluntary sector, presents data from in-depth interviews with mothers with severe mental health problems, identifies weaknesses in inter-professional coordination in this area of work, and suggests a new model for work with families where mental health problems and child protection concerns co-exist.

Most slave trades were abolished during the nineteenth century, yet there remain millions of people in slavery today, amongst them approximately 210 million children in slavery, trafficked, debt bondage, and other forms of forced labour. This book, drawing on experience worldwide, focuses on child slavery and shows how children remain locked in slavery, the ways in which they are exploited, and how they can be emancipated. It examines child labour, child trafficking, and child exploitation in various countries such as Nepal, Turkey, Uganda, South and Southeast Asia, India, Central America, and the United Kingdom.

The viability, quality and sustainability of publicly supported early childhood education and care services is a lively issue in many countries, especially since the rights of the child imply equal access to provision for all young children. But equitable provision within childcare markets is highly problematic, as parents pay for what they can afford and parental income inequalities persist or widen. This book presents recent, significant research from eight nations where childcare markets are the norm. It also includes research about ‘raw’ and ‘emerging’ childcare markets operating with a minimum of government intervention, mostly in low income countries or post transition economies. Childcare markets compares these childcare marketisation and regulatory processes and the format of any public investment across the political and economic systems in which they are embedded. Contributions from economists, childcare policy specialists and educationalists address the question of what constraints need to be in place if childcare markets are to deliver an equitable service. Evidence is presented that marketisation and privatisation, including corporatisation, risk deepening, consolidating or widening inequalities of access to early childhood education and care provision and driving qualitative differences between types of provider. The book documents the varied economic and policy backdrops of current childcare market systems, examines their consequences for parents, children, providers and the systems themselves, and finally explores alternative approaches.

Little is known about the experiences of children living in families affected by severe and enduring mental illness. This book provides an in-depth study of children and young people caring for parents affected in this way. Drawing on primary research data collected from forty families, this book presents the perspectives of children (young carers), their parents and the key professionals in contact with them. The book contributes to the growing evidence base on parental mental illness and outcomes for children. It examines the experiences and needs of children caring for parents with severe mental illness, provides the perspectives of children, parents and key professionals in contact with these families, reviews existing medical, social, child protection and young carers' literatures on parental mental illness and consequences for children, provides a chronology and guide to relevant law and policy affecting young carers and parents with severe mental illness, makes concrete recommendations and suggestions for improving policy and professional practice and contributes to the growing evidence base on parental mental illness and outcomes for children and families.

Many policy and practice initiatives that aim to prevent social exclusion focus on children and young people. This book considers new approaches to understanding the complexities of prevention, and how these new understandings can inform policy and practice. Preventative initiatives such as the National Evaluation of the Children's Fund (NECF) have supported large-scale complex evaluations that have generated rich and important data about strategies for addressing social exclusion and what they can achieve. The book uses evidence from the NECF to illustrate and explore the experiences of children and families who are most marginalised. It examines the historical context of approaches to child welfare, and presents a new framework for understanding and developing preventative polices and practice within the context of social exclusion.

As internet use is extending to younger children, there is an increasing need for research focusing on the risks young users are experiencing, as well as the opportunities, and how they should cope. With expert contributions from diverse disciplines and a uniquely cross-national breadth, this timely book examines the prospect of enhanced opportunities for learning, creativity and communication set against the fear of cyberbullying, pornography and invaded privacy by both strangers and peers. Based on an impressive in-depth survey of 25,000 children carried out by the EU Kids Online network, it offers wholly new findings that extend previous research and counter both the optimistic and the pessimistic hype. It argues that, in the main, children are gaining the digital skills, coping strategies and social support they need to navigate this fast-changing terrain. But it also identifies the struggles they encounter, pinpointing those for whom harm can follow from risky online encounters. Each chapter presents new findings and analyses to inform both researchers and students in the social sciences and policymakers in government, industry or child welfare who are working to enhance children's digital experiences.