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Comedy & Critique is a sociological inquiry which seeks to engage with the art-world of the stand-up comedian as well as providing an interpretation of comedic works. It demonstrates a correspondence between what is happening within stand-up comedy and what is going on in the society from which the comic material arises. The book demonstrates that stand-up comedians are engaged in a proto-sociological enterprise, a method of ‘doing’ sociology. Comedian’s material may be viewed as a comedic acting out of forms of sociological knowledge, an act which is self-driven and intra-personal. Stand-up comedians came to their proto-sociology as stand-up in Britain moved from the fringes of entertainment in working man’s clubs to Fringe theatre. Through this transition stand-up became a space where a ‘New Left’ politics of anti-racism, feminism and a queering of self and society was both lived and artfully positioned. By exploring the ‘art of stand-up’, as a modernist art-form and professionalised industry, the book argues that stand-up is the art of building and improvising social relations.

This book critically explores the funding arrangements governing contemporary community development and how they shape its theory and practice. The chapters consider the evolution of funding in community development, and how changes in policy and practice can be understood in relation to the politics of neoliberalism and contemporary efforts to build global democracy from the ‘bottom up’. Thematically, the book explores matters such as popular democracy, the shifting contours of the state–market relationship, prospects for democratising the state, the feasibility of community autonomy, the effects of managerialism, and hybrid modes of funding such as social finance. The book is positioned to stimulate critical debate on both policy and practice within the broad field of community development.

This book is a one-off history of the women’s domestic violence movement in the UK with some international and global content. It celebrates transformative women’s activism on violence against women from the 1960s on. Interviews with activists, practitioners and abuse survivors provide reflection on this inspiring movement of social change for women, shaped by a generation of pioneering activists. The book is illustrated with memories, anecdotes and memoir, and with poems celebrating women’s activism. It also reflects on the movement challenging rape and sexual violence. It presents an analysis of the radical early politics of the domestic violence refuges and Women’s Aid in terms of the empowerment of women, collective working and attempting to break down differences between women providing and using services. This particular history is almost lost from view and the book aims to recall and celebrate it. Further, it details the challenges of the Black women’s movement and the development of specialist services for Black, minority ethnic and refugee (BMER) women. Legal, strategy and policy developments are outlined. Also covered are cutbacks, the difficulties of seeking funding within competitive commissioning frameworks and attacks on the sector in recent years, disproportionately experienced by BMER projects. The discussions include attention to harmful practices like ‘honour’-based violence, FGM and forced marriage. The book also discusses international activism on domestic violence, the relevance of shelters/refuges across the world and trans-national women’s partnerships. It outlines the development of feminist research on violence against women. Projects, campaigns and key activists are honoured throughout.

This book argues that mental health social work needs to be located within the wider political and social policy landscape. Wider societal attitudes to mental illness are examined followed by a discussion of the development of community care. The author argues that these historical perspectives provide an insight into the roots of the current crisis in mental health services. The book goes on to analyse a range of contemporary issues and challenges in mental health social work. It argues that social inequality and policies of austerity have increased levels of mental distress. It calls for a rediscovery of core social work values and a rejection of bureaucratic managerialism.

This is the first book in the series Rethinking Community Development and it sets the tone for the series as a whole by probing some fundamental challenges and dilemmas for community development today. As contributors address the book title, Politics, Power and Community Development, they raise issues of international relevance but which are, nonetheless, specific in their focus. In its three sections and 13 chapters, contributors explore how diverse political and power configurations shape and are shaped by community development processes. There are critical reflections on policy and practice in Taiwan, Australia, India, South Africa, Burundi, Germany, the USA, Ireland, Malawi, Ecuadorian and Peruvian Amazonia and the UK. While all authors direct their chapters explicitly towards community development, in some cases their contributions are informed by a particular policy interest or political question. These include: the commons and alternative economies; global governance and the (post) Washington Consensus; disability arts and the affirmation model; challenges to diversity and egalitarian policies; environmental justice in the context of oil exploration; gender equality and the successes and limitations of India’s Panchayat system; service delivery protests and democratic deficits; and the remaking of place in the name of cultural specificity and economic competitiveness. A recurring issue across the book is the dominance of neoliberalism internationally, and the extent to which practitioners, activists and programmes can challenge, critique, engage with or resist its influence.

Using international perspectives and case studies, this book discusses the relationships between community development and populism in the context of today's widespread crisis of democracy. It investigates the development, meanings and manifestations of contemporary forms of populism and explores the synergies and contradictions between the values and practices of populism and community development. The book examines the ways that the ascendancy of right-wing populist politics is influencing the landscapes within which community development is located, and it offers new insights on how the field can understand and respond to the challenges of populism.

Protest camps are a common and recurring feature of social movements around the world. From Tahrir to Taksim, acts of occupying squares, parks and streets together, have made protest camps into a key site of democratic politics in the 21^st century. Since the Arab Uprisings and Occupy movement of 2011 brought protest camps to global attention, more and more protest camps have occurred in hundreds of cities and dozens of countries around the world. People camping out in protest captures the public imagination, making media headlines and often triggering violent police responses. Across the world political leaders and security chiefs are concerned about the prospect of protest camps emerging, while everyday people are pegging their hopes and dreams on this form of coming together, in public, to voice their dissent. This book provides an in depth analysis of this new form of protest. With seventeen case studies from all around the world, it provides the most comprehensive study of protest camps to date.

This book offers theoretical and practical insights in the responsiveness of social policies. It includes a comparative analysis of recent developments in social assistance, sheltered work and labour market policies in the Netherlands and relates this to developments in other European countries. It shows how policy-makers and politicians deal with multiple challenges, interests and perspectives on social policies. It not only makes readers aware of societal transformations that are in need of responses, but also offers lessons to analyse and respond to these transformations. These lessons are placed in an international and European perspective. Modern welfare states are confronted with a wide variety of social and economic developments, including individualization, secularization, globalization and changing preferences and ideologies of citizens. This book closely analyses the consequences of these changes for social policies. It shows how policy-makers continuously are trying to incorporate social transformations into the existing welfare state institutions, while they are obstructed by the path-dependent development of welfare state institutions and their persistence. The book identifies three different ‘logics’ that might trigger change in social policies: (1) the institutional logic of the policy regime, (2) the logic of the (socio-economical and cultural) policy context and (3) the logic of public preferences. Sometimes these logics converge, but more often they diverge, placing policy-makers for the almost impossible task to adapt social policies to the conflicting demands of its context.

Bringing together international case studies, this book offers theoretical and empirical insights into the interaction between social work and social policy. Moving beyond existing studies on policy practice, the book employs the policy cycle as a core analytical frame and focuses on the influence of social work(ers) in the problem definition, agenda setting, policy formulation and implementation of social policy. Twenty-three contributors offer examples of policy making from seven different countries and demonstrate how social work practitioners can become political actors, while also encouraging policy makers to become aware of the potential of social work for the social policy-making process.

This edited collection provides a comprehensive overview of the third (or voluntary) sector role in the delivery of public services in the UK. It covers social enterprise, capacity building, volunteering and social value; as well as the sector’s role in specific fields including employment, health and social care, housing and criminal justice. It is the first book to review developments over the New Labour and Coalition period which saw a sustained expansion of the scale and scope of third sector delivery. In this period, the sector was required to respond to new policy challenges such as personalisation, market-based mechanisms of funding allocation and regulation, and an increased focus on rewarding outcomes (payment by results). Drawing on research at the ESRC-funded Third Sector Research Centre, University of Birmingham, the book also makes an analytical contribution in charting historical shifts in state, third sector, and market relationships, with a focus on the controversies associated with such shifts.

Face-to-Face: The Persistent Power of Cities In a Post-Pandemic Era, is about the way that people and firms are adapting to the world of always-on and everywhere digital access, and what that means for cities and regions. Twenty years after The Death of Distance—and in the midst of a pandemic that has led some to question the future of cities—many people still think that we are on track for ‘business anywhere’. The book shows why that's not the case, and provides a structure for thinking about the next twenty years of social and economic upheaval. It shows how the changing fortunes of cities are tied to the ongoing importance of face-to-face contact to our most valuable industries, and thus why the ‘human touch’ will continue to be crucial in the cities of tomorrow. Drawing on interviews with artists and advertisers, bankers and bakers, software devs and property developers, across some forty interviews we home in on what people actually do and why. ‘Contact’, in all its forms, is shown to still matter hugely to companies and individuals, even in a world with high-quality video conferencing and free online calling. And when the pandemic hit, a further digital survey explored interviewees’ experiences of an ‘e-only’ world, gaining ‘front-line’ insights into the short- and long-terms. The book seeks to provide guidance for city leaders, businesses, policymakers and students of urban and regional planning on how to think about 21^st Century urban change.