Synopses & Reviews
This is an indispensable book for anyone who wants to make sense of the bewildering recent shifts in ideology and policy towards the welfare state, and to understand the broader political implications of civil society.The Politics of Civil Society offers a wide-ranging analysis of recent shifts in the ideas andparadigms that underpin social policy. Since the 1980s the renaissance of civil society has introduced new ideas about the nature of power, citizenship and human rights, which radically challenge the dominance of the state, the power of professionals andthe welfare system itself.Frederick Powell traces the historical roots of these apparent changes and movements, demonstrates in detail their often paradoxical results and speculates about the whole future of social policy. He has produced an entirely original synthesis, as well as a major guide to social policy, that goes well beyond traditional interpretations of civil society as the voluntary and community sector.This is not just a book for the specialist reader but raises a whole range of issues of much wider interest to the social sciences. A concluding chapter on the practical and policy implications of the analysis is of special relevance to welfare practitioners and policy-makers.
Review
Frederick Powell has written an original and important book which draws civil society from the margins into the centre of political and social theorising. The Politics of Civil Society will be essential reading for anyone concerned with the strengthening of market power and the erosion of democracy in contemporary society. Professor Peadar Kirby, Co-director, Centre for International Studies, Dublin City University
Review
“A book that will be on the reading lists of political science undergraduates . . . [and] it should be read by those interested in the development and politics of the welfare state.”
Review
“Powell has spent many hours . . . reading vast amounts of academic and media print, trying to make sense of the various shifts in power and democratic forms evident in new civil society energies as diverse as the World Social Forums, Arab Spring, Occupy, and the Tea Party. For that this reader is grateful. Powells exploration enables the reader to meaningfully theorize and reflect on such recent events. The book explores a great deal of very complex theoretical debate and does so in very accessible manner. He makes good creative use of often long quotations from some of the emerging literature (Badiou, for example) and from the classics, but also draws on contemporary media (he is clearly a Guardian reader). I particularly liked his liberal use of George Orwell. The result is a lively read and a thorough investigation of the contemporary literature. . . . Powell poses big questions. He is provocative and he is not afraid to come off the fence. . . . The task of civil society is to produce the new political imaginary for the 21st century and this book is a worthy contribution to this challenge of creating a ‘social left.'”
Review
“Offers analytic tools to comprehend the economic and political context within which we live and invites us to explore the inherent complexity of civil society activities.”
Review
“This is a closely argued and fascinating book, and we are in Powell’s debt for updating his treatise.”
Synopsis
In this fully revised edition of his groundbreaking book, Fred Powell looks behind -the mirror of power- to discover the real civil society--or Big Society--that lies beneath it. Articulating three forms of civil society--radical, liberal, and conservative--he examines a complex interplay between state and community, arguing that citizens contend for power via civil society. This is both a historic pursuit dating to antiquity and a contemporary democratic struggle between competing visions of modernity, the stakes of which are no less than -real- politics themselves as experienced by everyday citizens. The second edition includes a new concluding chapter on practical and policy implications.
Synopsis
2011 shook the world politically. The Occupy Movement, Los Indignados and the Greek Aganaktismenoi (outraged) reacted to zombie capitalism in the West, while the Arab Spring challenged political tyrannies in the Maghreb-Mashreq region.Democracy became the meta-question of the moment. New communicative technologies unleashed a tidal wave of civic protest that spread across the globe, bringing new political actors on to the street. But what does this protest movement mean? Are we on the threshold of a transformation in global political consciousness? Is civil society the necessary counter-power that is democratising democracy from within? Or are we living through an apocalyptic terminal phase of civilisation? In the second, revised edition of this indispensable book, the author looks behind the mirror of power and differentiates the real from the fake in policy and politics. It offers an original and compelling history of the present and will have wide appeal to a broad cross-disciplinary audience.
Synopsis
In the second, revised edition of this indispensable book, the author looks behind 'the mirror of power' to discover the reality of civil society - or 'Big Society', as it has become known.
Synopsis
In this fully revised edition of his groundbreaking book, Fred Powell looks behind “the mirror of power” to discover the real civil society—or Big Society—that lies beneath it. Articulating three forms of civil society—radical, liberal, and conservative—he examines a complex interplay between state and community, arguing that citizens contend for power via civil society. This is both a historic pursuit dating to antiquity and a contemporary democratic struggle between competing visions of modernity, the stakes of which are no less than “real” politics themselves as experienced by everyday citizens. The second edition includes a new concluding chapter on practical and policy implications.
Synopsis
Continuing professional development has become an important and widespread practice in twenty-first-century social work. This volume traces its emergence and evolution, identifying the characteristics of continuing professional development, the barriers to undertaking it, and the way social workers view it. Drawing on an international survey of practitioners and interviews with social workers and their managers, the authors provide unique insight into the possibilities and challenges of continuing professional development for newly qualified and experienced social workers alike.
Synopsis
This book offers a wide-ranging analysis of recent shifts in ideas and paradigms that underpin social policy and provides an understanding of the broader political implications of civil society.
About the Author
Carmel Halton is director of practice and director of the Master of Social Work Programme at the University College Cork, National University of Ireland.Margaret Scanlon is a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Applied Social Studies at the University College Cork, National University of Ireland.Fred Powell is dean of social science and professor of social policy at the University College Cork, National University of Ireland.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. Doublethink: the ‘Big Society, Small Government debate
2. The renaissance of civil society
3. Modernity, civil society and civic virtue
4. Radical civil society, early social movements and the socialization of the state
5. Nietzsches revenge: totalitarian big society
6. Rights talk, new social movements and civic revolts
7. American exceptionalism, multicultural civil society and Platos noble lie
8. Global civil society: myth or reality?
References
Index