Changing Politics of Canadian Social Policy - Softcover

Rice, James J.; Prince, Michael J.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 080208074X ISBN 13: 9780802080745

Publisher: University of Toronto Press, 2000

Synopsis

No one is content with the state of health and social programs in Canada today. The Right thinks that there is too much government involvement, and the Left thinks there is not enough. In Changing Politics of Canadian Social Policy James Rice and Michael Prince track the history of the welfare state from its establishment in the 1940s, through its development in the mid 1970s, to the period of deficit crisis and restraint that followed in the late 1970s and 1980s. Taking a historical perspective, the authors grapple with the politics of social policy in the 1990s. Globalization and the concomitant corporate mobility affect government's ability to regulate the distribution of wealth, while the increasing diversity of the population puts increasingly complex demands on an already overstressed system. Yet in the face of these constraints, the system still endures and is far from irrelevant. Some social programs have been dismantled, but the government has organized and maintained others. Greater democratization of welfare programs and social policy agencies could make the system thrive again. Changing Politics provides the much-needed groundwork for students and policy makers while also proposing real solutions for the future.

About this title

About the Author

Michael J. Prince is Lansdowne Professor of Social Policy in the Faculty of Human and Social Development at the University of Victoria. James J. Rice is an emeritus professor in the School of Social Work at McMaster University.

From the Inside Flap

'Changing Politics represents a serious advance in the state-of-the-art research in the field. I know of no other study that approaches its methodological and analytical reach, in considering not only various scholarly approaches to understanding the field, but also the impact of these approaches.'

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Toronto Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 080208074X
• ISBN 13: 9780802080745
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304