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eleven - Participation and social justice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 2022

Majella Kilkey
Affiliation:
University of Sheffield
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Summary

Introduction

Advocacy of participation by ‘the public’ and of service users in decision making about public policy and services has multiple origins. In the late 1980s it was claimed by sections of the Left as a radical idea that would renew the public sector in order to resist attacks from Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and others who sought to replace public services with private markets (Deakin and Wright, 1990). In contrast, for the neoliberals of the political Right, consumerist strategies were a way of limiting the power of professionals and rolling back the state. Creating active consumers was part of the strategy of market making. For New Labour in government, initiatives to involve the public and service users have reflected aspirations to improve services, create more assertive consumers, enable more accountability and to generate greater legitimacy for public service decision making (Barnes et al, 2004). For users of welfare services and for deprived and disadvantaged communities the right to have a say about services and policies is a matter of civil rights and social justice (for example, Beresford et al, 1999). From whatever perspective, changes in public service governance and service delivery that have taken place over the last 20–30 years represent a substantially different way of imagining the relationship between the state and its citizens from that which characterised the first 20–30 years of the welfare state.

One group of people who have both demanded and been invited to have their say is those who use mental health services. Colin Gell argues the importance of this:

  • a Because any business or service that does not enable this will not meet what it set out to do and could potentially lose its business. The development of Foundation Trusts could see competition increase and inappropriate trusts could be shunned by commissioners.

  • b The most successful businesses regularly ask their customers about what they want. M&S and Tesco are always asking their customers.

Most importantly it is morally right that organisations that use our money should be accountable to us, particularly those providing health and social care. Instinctively most service users know what is right for them and what is not.

Type
Chapter
Information
Social Policy Review 22
Analysis and Debate in Social Policy, 2010
, pp. 253 - 274
Publisher: Bristol University Press
Print publication year: 2010

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