Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-zzh7m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-27T02:56:35.976Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Welfare Exchange Reconsidered*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2009

Stephen Uttley
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The objective of this article is to explore aspects of the nature and process of exchange in welfare systems. The welfare exchange was the focus of much discussion in the early 1970s stemming from the writings of Titmuss, Pinker and Pruger, and this article starts with a review of that debate. In searching for a more adequate theoretical framework it argues that Gouldner's work on reciprocity, beneficence and complementarity provides that framework. A model of exchange on an interpersonal level is put forward in which welfare exchanges are viewed as lying along a continuum reflecting the notions of reciprocity and beneficence, with exchanges at each end of the continuum being represented by the two types of complementarity. Dependency, power and disequilibrium are seen as crucial factors in the exchange process, and the total pattern of exchanges is shown to be strongly influenced by the pattern of resource generation and availability within which all exchanges occur. Different types of social services are located at various points along the exchange continuum, and these are seen as reflecting differing relationships between service donors and individual service recipients. The final section of the article is concerned with discussing the influence of the interaction between ‘servers’ employed by agencies and service recipients.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , April 1980 , pp. 187 - 205
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Titmuss, R. M., Commitment to Welfare, Allen and Unwin, London, 1968.Google Scholar

2 Titmuss, R. M., The Gift Relationship, Allen and Unwin, London, 1971.Google Scholar

3 Pinker, R., Social Theory and Social Policy, Heinemann Educational Books, London, 1971.Google Scholar

4 Pruger, R., ‘Social Policy: Unilateral Transfer or Reciprocal Exchange’, Journal of Social Policy, 2:4 (1973), 289–302.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 Titmuss, , The Gift Relationship, p. 210.Google Scholar

6 Titmuss, , Commitment to Welfare, p. 22.Google Scholar

7 Titmuss, , The Gift Relationship, p. 242.Google Scholar

8 Pruger, op. cit. p. 291.

9 Ibid. pp. 292–5.

10 Pinker, op. cit. p. 139.

11 Ibid. p. 151.

12 Titmuss, , The Gift Relationship, p. 215.Google Scholar

13 Boulding, K. E., The Economy of Love and Fear, Wadsworth Publishing Company, Belmont, California, 1973.Google Scholar

14 Gouldner, A., For Sociology, Pelican, London, 1975.Google Scholar

15 See Levine, D. N., Carter, E. B. and Gorman, E. M., ‘Simmel's Influence on American Sociology, II’, American Journal of Sociology, 81:4 (1976)CrossRefGoogle Scholar 1,125.

16 The discussion of these three types of exchange is based on Chapters 7, 8 and 9 in Gouldner, op. cit. pp. 190–300.

17 It could be argued that reciprocity is not a truly universal norm; see for example Turnbull, Colin M., The Mountain People, Jonathan Cape, London, 1973.Google Scholar

18 Perhaps Gouldner could be accused of mixing the interactional and inter-structural levels of analysis here, although the idea of an intervening structure is important when one is considering the functioning of welfare agencies, as will be explored later in this article (see pp. 201–3, below).

19 Gouldner, op. cit. p. 250.

20 Ibid. p. 266.

21 He does of course retain the option of refusing to take part in the exchange.

22 Gouldner, op. cit. p. 282.

23 Power is used here as meaning the ability of one individual to influence the other in such a way as to fulfil his own objectives.

24 Tumin, M., ‘Captives, Consensus and Conflict: Implications for New Roles in Social Change’, in Stein, H. D. (ed.), Social Theory and Social Invention, Case Western Reserve University Press, Cleveland, 1968, pp. 93–112.Google Scholar

25 Blau, P. M., Exchange and Power in Social Life, John Wiley and Sons, New York, 1964.Google Scholar

26 Ibid. p. 28.

27 Gouldner, op. cit. pp. 292–6.

28 Ibid. p. 294.

29 Blau, op. cit. p. 24.

30 Ibid. p. 113.

31 The analysis is applied to public services and not services in the private sector or those of voluntary agencies.

32 Parker, J., Social Policy and Citizenship, Macmillan, London, 1975, p. 546.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

33 Watson, D., ‘Welfare Rights and Human Rights’, Journal of Social Policy, 6:1 (1977), 31–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

34 Gouldner, op. cit. p. 261.

35 See Titmuss, , Social Policy, Allen and Unwin, London, 1974, pp. 124–5.Google Scholar

36 Tumin, op. cit. p. 100.

37 Gouldner, op. cit. p. 287.

38 Jordan, B., Freedom and the Welfare State, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1976, p. 162.Google Scholar

39 Pinker, op. cit. pp. 135–75.

40 Tumin, op. cit. p. 98.

41 See Blau, op. cit. p. 24.

42 Schon, D. A.Beyond the Stable State: Public and Private Learning in a Changing Society, Pelican, London, 1973, pp. 30–57.Google Scholar

43 Robson, W. A., Welfare State and Welfare Society: Illusion and Reality, Allen and Unwin, London, 1976, p. 38.Google Scholar

44 Ibid. p. 174.

45 Blau, op. cit. p. 261.

46 Schwartz, B., ‘Waiting, Exchange and Power’, American Journal of Sociology, 79 (1974), 841–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

47 Parker, R. A., ‘Social Administration and Scarcity’, in Butterworth, E. and Holman, R. (eds), Social Welfare in Modern Britain, Fontana-Collins, London, 1975, pp. 204–12.Google Scholar

48 Wootton, A. J., ‘Sharing: Some Notes on the Organisation of Talk in a Therapeutic Community’, Sociology, II (1977), 333–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

49 Ibid. p. 334.

50 Examples of writing about the contract in social work are Reid, W. J. and Shyne, A. W., Brief and Extended Casework, Columbia University Press, New York, 1969Google Scholar; and Reid, W. J. and Epstein, L., Task Centred Casework, Columbia University Press, New York, 1972Google Scholar