Social Policy: Definition, Concept, Source, Model & Assumptions
Social Policy
The Oxford dictionary defined SP as ‘settled course of action followed and adopted by the government or a political party’.
The word policy refers to the particular course of action followed because it happens to be useful for the time being whereas social refers to anything that got to do with the society and its betterment.
SP can be defined as a series of public policies designed to promote social development, undertaken by a variety of actors through a range of instruments. Social policy has both intrinsic and instrumental value; intrinsic in terms of creating equality of opportunity, and instrumental in terms of strengthening the legitimacy of public institutions and social integration.
According to Levin (1997): SP refers to the practice of social intervention aimed at securing social change to promote the welfare and wellbeing of citizens.
Social Work Dictionary (1991): SP as the activities and principles of society that guide the way it intervenes in and regulates relationships between individuals, groups, communities, and social institutions….. SP includes plans and programs in education, health care, crime and corrections, economic security, and social welfare made by governments, voluntary organizations, and the people in general.
While summarizing the whole discussion, it can be said that social policy is a deliberate action on the part of individuals, collectivities and governments, undertaken to organize services, opportunities and social action so as to affect the life styles of people and initiate a process to prevent, postpone, initiate and manage change.
Thus SP is * A subject as well as an area of practice * An instrument (used by the govt to regulate and supplement the existing instt and structure) * Plays distributional and redistributive role * Transfer of resources from one section to the other within the society * It concern with the weaker and vulnerable section of the society, welfare in nature * Co-exist
The Oxford dictionary defined SP as ‘settled course of action followed and adopted by the government or a political party’.
The word policy refers to the particular course of action followed because it happens to be useful for the time being whereas social refers to anything that got to do with the society and its betterment.
SP can be defined as a series of public policies designed to promote social development, undertaken by a variety of actors through a range of instruments. Social policy has both intrinsic and instrumental value; intrinsic in terms of creating equality of opportunity, and instrumental in terms of strengthening the legitimacy of public institutions and social integration.
According to Levin (1997): SP refers to the practice of social intervention aimed at securing social change to promote the welfare and wellbeing of citizens.
Social Work Dictionary (1991): SP as the activities and principles of society that guide the way it intervenes in and regulates relationships between individuals, groups, communities, and social institutions….. SP includes plans and programs in education, health care, crime and corrections, economic security, and social welfare made by governments, voluntary organizations, and the people in general.
While summarizing the whole discussion, it can be said that social policy is a deliberate action on the part of individuals, collectivities and governments, undertaken to organize services, opportunities and social action so as to affect the life styles of people and initiate a process to prevent, postpone, initiate and manage change.
Thus SP is * A subject as well as an area of practice * An instrument (used by the govt to regulate and supplement the existing instt and structure) * Plays distributional and redistributive role * Transfer of resources from one section to the other within the society * It concern with the weaker and vulnerable section of the society, welfare in nature * Co-exist