Book review: A community psychology perspective (II)

✍ Scribed by David Fryer

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 71 KB
• Volume: 8
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1052-9284
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-1298(199803/04)8:2<178::aid-casp474>3.0.co;2-b

✦ Synopsis

hope for another Bartley-style examination of the lessons from this debate over the relationship between research and policy.

I would also suggest that further work needs to take account of studies in equality which go beyond income distribution to take account of the additional resources often excluded or neglected in ocial statistics, e.g. the substantial widening resulting from the concentration of more than fringe bene®ts among directors, employers and many higher-status employeesÐthe `concealed multipliers of occupational success' as Richard Titmuss drily termed them over 40 years ago (Titmuss, 1958, p. 52). They are not simply add-ons to inequality but may increase when the conventionally accepted indicators show little or no change.

Despite these questions, the importance of this book cannot be overstated: the implications of its analyses are very considerable for social policy. If the distribution of the nation's resources is more important than their absolute growth, then the current economic orthodoxy is seriously ¯awed. And the measurement of growth by quantitative rather than qualitative indicators only compounds the problem, neglecting the importance of the harder-to-measure `social capital'. The analysis provides strong support for closer attention to policies moderating the distribution of resources rather than their growth.

REFERENCES Bartley, M. (1992). Authorities and Partisans: The Debate on Unemployment and Health.