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Social Welfare and Political Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

W. Hardy Wickwar
W. Hardy Wickwar
Affiliation:
United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration
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Extract

During the past generation, social welfare has risen to a position of almost prime importance in the work of government. “Social services” have rivalled “defense services” as objects of public expenditure. “Social security” has complemented “national security” as an objective of public policy. Graduate schools of social work have taken their place alongside law schools, schools of education, and military and naval academies as important training-places for public service. It is perhaps time that we now inquire in what ways political science has been, or may yet be, affected by so phenomenal a change. If, as we are often assured, atomic fission means a revolution in our political thinking, the large-scale pursuit of social welfare might at least be expected to call for an equally vast, even though more gradual, evolution in our attitudes.

As an organized body of professed political scientists, how have we reacted to this change? We have, by and large, welcomed the extension of governmental activity. As teachers, we have helped habituate a new generation to such expressions as “the service state,” “positive government,” and “the new belief in the common man.” As scholars, we have followed with interest and approval the successive steps by which jurists have brought these activities within the framework of the written constitution of a federal state. As theorists, we have given to personal insecurity an honored place in the new psychopathological chapter in our evolving political philosophy. As citizens, we have played our part in planning and administering social welfare policies.

Type
Instruction and Research
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 40 , Issue 3 , June 1946 , pp. 563 - 571
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1946

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References

1 Note, however, that in the United States social insurance has gone beyond the “low income group” concept of a social service, in that it covers the first $3,000 of income, and not only the earners of less than $3,000.

2 The right to family allowances and old-age pensions was proclaimed by Paine, Thomas in Rights of Man, Pt. 2 (1792).Google Scholar

3 On the discretionary nature of general poor-relief, see 41 Am. Jurisprudence (San Francisco, 1942), p. 704; Social Science Research Council Committee on Social Security, Suggestions for Research on Problems of Relief (Washington, 1939), p. 12Google Scholar; and Abbott, Edith, Public Assistance (Chicago, 1940), I, pp. 7–23.Google Scholar On administrative “fair hearings” and judicial appeals in public assistance for special categories, see Lansdale, Robert T. et al. , Administration of Old Age Assistance (Chicago, 1939), pp. 297 ffGoogle Scholar; Social Science Research Council Committee on Social Security, Topics for Research Concerning Public Assistance Programs (Washington, 1941), p. 28Google Scholar; Warren, Dorothy, “Staff Thinking on Fair Hearings,” Public Welfare, Vol. 3 (June, 1945), pp. 136 ff.Google Scholar For the discretionary administrative assimilation of categorical assistance to general poor-relief, see Linford, Alton A., “Responsibility of Children in the Massachusetts Old Age Assistance Program,” Social Service Review, Vol. 19 (June, 1945), pp. 222 ff.Google Scholar

4 Howard, Donald S., WPA and Federal Relief Policy (New York, 1943), especially Chaps. 14–16.Google Scholar

5 Perhaps because housing, regardless of whether publicly or privately owned, is in process of becoming a public utility undertaking in the interest of all classes instead of—or as well as—public housing being a social service on behalf of particular classes.

6 The inadequacy of judical remedies needs exploring state by state. The general limitations, however, are summarized in Blachly, F. F. and Oatman, M. E., Administrative Legislation and Adjudication (Washington, 1934), Chap. 9Google Scholar; and reasons why a former generation of jurists studied negative controls rather than positive services are touched upon in Freund, Ernst, Administrative Powers over Persons and Property (Chicago, 1928), p. 7 f.Google Scholar For the proportion of the American people dependent on public aid in the 1930's, see National Resources Planning Board, Security, Work, and Relief Policies (Washington, 1942), p. 100.Google Scholar

7 For the application of organizational principles and standards to social welfare management, see Stevenson, Marietta, Public Welfare Administration (Chicago, 1938).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 “Maintaining High-level Production and Employment; A Symposium” (ed. Fritz Morstein Marx), in this Review, Vol. 39 (1945), pp. 1199 ff.

9 The more so since state registration of social workers has now spread from Germany and France to California. See Bradway, John S., “Legalizing the Professional Social Worker,” in Social Service Review, Vol. 19 (1945), pp. 48 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Johnson, Arlien et al. , in a special number of The Compass, Vol. 26 (Sept., 1945).Google Scholar

10 See, e.g., McMillen, A. W., Community Organization for Social Welfare (Chicago, 1945)Google Scholar; Colcord, Joanna C., Your Community (New York, 1941)Google Scholar; and Perry, Clarence A.et al., “Neighborhood and Community Planning,” in Regional Survey of New York (1929), Vol. 7.Google Scholar

11 On the relationship between governmental and voluntary social welfare action, one might compare, for the United States and the United Kingdom, respectively, Johnson, Arlien, Public Policy and Private Charity (Chicago, 1931)Google Scholar, and Macadam, Elizabeth, The New Philanthropy (London, 1934)Google Scholar, although neither is confined to local community action.

12 Note especially International Labor Organization, International Survey of Social Services (Geneva, 2nd ed., 1935)Google Scholar, with its emphasis on nationally-financed income-security.

11 A number of excellent monographs have been written on particular aspects of social welfare administration in particular countries; but no comparative study of social welfare in general has been published in English since Henderson, C. R., Modern Methods of Charity (1904).Google Scholar Recent texts in comparative government in which some attention is given to social welfare include Marx, Fritz Morstein, “Germany,” in Anderson, William, ed., Local Government in Europe (1939)Google Scholar; Sharp, Walter R., Government of the French Republic (1938)Google Scholar; and Wickwar, W. H. “Government and the Social Pattern in Wartime Britain,” in Zink, H. and Cole, T., eds., Government in Wartime Europe and Japan (1942).Google Scholar See also Wickwar, W. H., “Welfare Map of Europe,” Social Service Review, Vol. 20 (June, 1946).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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