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Education is a key political issue, and is seen as a crucial factor in ensuring economic productivity and competitiveness. This book offers an analysis of the flood of government initiatives and policies that have been introduced over the past 20 years, including Beacon Schools, the Academies programme, parental choice, Foundation Schools, faith schools, and teaching standards. It looks at the politics of these policy interventions and how they have changed the face of education.

The banking collapse and ensuing global financial crisis has been the subject of much analysis and speculation. One growing certainty is that there will be an impact on the delivery of public services, and on local government and governance. This book examines and debates the challenges posed, on a local, European, and global level, by the imperative to balance a fiscal need for smaller public expenditure with a social need for strong governance and protection of the most vulnerable in UK society. Academics in the field of local governance contribute to a diverse set of analyses on the impact of the financial crisis.

Prior to the onset of the recent financial crisis, global trends of social security in industrialised societies were indicating a progressive disengagement of the State in favour of tax-financed measures similar to social assistance, which may fail to ensure a basic standard of living. In this book the author, with his life-long experience of international social security, advocates reinstating social insurance by reducing the volume of income redistribution, increasing the transparency of money flows, and improving citizen information.

This book confirms the significance of social capital as an analytical tool, while challenging the basis on which current policy is being developed. It offers a wealth of evidence on a topic which has become central to contemporary government; provides a detailed empirical investigation of the relationship between social capital, knowledge creation, and lifelong learning; relates the findings to wider policy debates; questions the dominant theoretical models of social capital; and confronts the assumption of many policy makers that the obvious solution to social problems is to ‘invest in social capital’.

There is no precedent to the 2008 economic crisis or its aftermath. The world's most important financial centres all but collapsed under its weight. And some of the world's largest financial institutes either went bust or survived only with massive government bailouts. The impact on social policy has been huge. But the impact of the crisis on national economies and on welfare systems has been far from uniform and predictable. Different economies and different welfare states have been affected at different times, in different ways and to different degrees of magnitude. Bringing together a range of expert contributions, this book argues that the crisis is better understood as a variety of crises, each mediated by its national context. Consequently, there is an array of potential trajectories for welfare systems, from those where social policy is regarded as incompatible with the post-crisis economy to those where it is considered essential to future economic growth and security.

In the UK, both Conservative and New Labour welfare strategies have been influenced by American policies. British welfare reform has continued in recent years, while American policies appear to have stagnated. What now are the lessons of British reform for America? This book presents a detailed and unique comparison of welfare policies in the two countries. Throughout the book, international experts outline, compare, and contrast the reform strategies pursued in each country, and summarise the results to date. The editors argue that recent American reforms have failed to address key problems but that British ideas could refresh the American policy agenda. Moreover, both systems would gain from increased transatlantic policy dialogue.

In the wake of the economic crash, public policy is in search of a new moral compass. This book explains why the Third Way's combination of market-friendly and abstract, value-led principles has failed, and shows what is needed for an adequate replacement as a political and moral project. It criticises the economic analysis on which the Third Way approach to policy was founded and suggests an alternative to its legalistic and managerial basis for the regulation of social relations.