The Role of the Board of Social Responsibility in the Development and Implementation of Social Work Policy in Scotland
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The role of the Board of Social Responsibility in the development and implementation of social work policy in Scotland. A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of Stirling for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Paul William Monaghan 21 st July 2004 /4 I hereby declare that this thesis has been composed by myself. The thesis has not been accepted in any application for a degree. All the work has been done by myself. All verbatim extracts have been distinguished by quotation marks and the sources of information have been specifically acknowledged. Signed _______________ Policy analysis, however, is one activity for which there can be no fixed program, for policy analysis is synonymous with creativity, which can be stimulated by theory and sharpened by practice, which can be learned but not taught. (Wildavsky, 1979 : 3) Acknowledgements This study was supervised by Professor Cherry Rowlings, Dr. Angus Erskine and Professor 10chen Clasen, Department of Applied Social Science, University of Stirling and by Mr. Ian Baillie, C.B.E., at the Church of Scotland's Board of Social Responsibility. I am indebted to the many people who gave their time to be interviewed. I am required to record the financial support that was provided to me by the Economic and Social Research Council and wish also to record the financial assistance provided by the Church of Scotland's Board of Social Responsibility and the Inverness Royal Academy Endowments Trust. Abstract This thesis focuses on the role of the Church of Scotland's Board of Social Responsibility in the development and implementation of social work policy in Scotland. The thesis deploys a case study methodology and interpretive research methods to generate understanding of the Board of Social Responsibility and its intended purpose as a service-providing voluntary organisation. Links between the Board of Social Responsibility and significant social work policy developments are identified to determine the changing influence of both local authorities and central government upon the scope of voluntary social work service provision. The thesis identifies a process of incremental social work policy development in Scotland that has operated to encourage the contribution of service-providing voluntary organisations. The Board of Social Responsibility is identified as having operated as Scotland's largest voluntary provider of social work services throughout the period under review and to have implemented a changing pattern of social work service provision: first shifting from an innovative to a traditional model of participation, returning to an innovative model, and then, finally, shifting towards a developmental model of participation. The source of this changing pattern of participation is identified as individual agency allied. to interpretations of the organisation's faith based ethos. The significant role of the Board of Social Responsibility in the development and implementation of social work policy in Scotland is established as that of provider of a range of replicative, alternative social work services. This role is related to Scotland's wider voluntary sector to establish that views of social work policy development existing within the Board of Social Responsibility are not indicative of views existing within other voluntary organisations. The Board of Social Responsibility's particular pattern of participation is also recognised to be distinctive. Ultimately the thesis finds that the approving model of governance adopted by the Board of Social Responsibility's higher-order collectives means the Church of Scotland has not exerted a significant influence upon the policy environment that has grown to control and regulate the social work undertaken by service-providing voluntary organisations operating in Scotland between 1948 and 2000. Contents Chapter 1 Introduction 1 Chapter 2 The Board of Social Responsibility 8 Chapter 3 The post-war development of statutory social work policy and 22 services in Scotland Chapter 4 The voluntary sector in Scotland 48 Chapter 5 Methodology 87 *,,-, Chapter 6 The position of the Board of Social Responsibility as a provider 119 of social work services over time and the factors that influenced decisions about how its services were developed Chapter 7 Understanding the work of the Board of Social Responsibility in 168 terms of innovation, replication and complementarity Chapter 8 The contribution of the Board of Social Responsibility to social 189 social work policy development at the local and national levels in Scotland Chapter 9 The extent to which the activities of the Board of Social 216 Responsibility have been shaped by its religious ethos, by activity on its own initiative and by external forces Chapter 10 Discussion of findings 245 Bibliography 262 Appendices 285 Chapter 1 : Introduction 1 In 1971 Lieut. Col. the Rev. Dr. Lewis L. L. Cameron, Secretary and Director of the Committee on Social Service of the Church of Scotland, published his account of the social work carried on by the Church of Scotland 'The Challenge of Need: A History of Social Service by the Church of Scotland 1869-1969' (Cameron, 1971). In 1998 the Church of Scotland's Board of Social Responsibility decided to update this historical account as part of its millennium celebrations (Minutes of the Board of Social Responsibility, 1998-1999). This decision led Mr. Ian Baillie, C.B.E., Director of Social Work, Board of Social Responsibility, 1990-2002, to pursue the matter with Cherry Rowlings, Professor of Social Work, Department of Applied Social Science, University of Stirling, and culminated in the Board and the Department securing, in partnership, a Collaborative Award in Science and )~ " Engineering (CASE) from the Economic and Social Research Council (~SRC). The award allowed for the appointment of a doctoral level research student to undertake a research project intended to advance four specific research questions that had been developed by Prof. Rowlings and Dr. Angus Erskine, Senior Lecturer in Social Policy, University of Stirling, with input from Mr. Baillie. The research project was intended to address two objectives, namely to identify and theorise the role of the Board in a thesis suitable for presentation towards the award of a doctoral degree and to provide an account of the work of the Board of Social Responsibility for general publication (see Appendix I). In the application to the ESRC the research project was entitled 'The role of the Board of Social Responsibility in the development and implementation of policy and professional practice in the delivery of social work services in Scotland'. Under this title four research questions were specified with a view to advancing the objectives of the partner institutions. The research questions were: 1. How has the position of the Board as a provider of welfare provision changed over time and what have been the major factors behind decisions about where and for whom its services should be developed? 2 2. To what extent can the work of the Board be understood in terms of innovation, replication or complementarity, as meeting a residual demand or in partnership with the state? 3. What has been the contribution of the Board to social policy development at national and local levels and to changes in the professional practice of social workers? . 4. How far have the activities of the Board been shaped by its religious ethos, by activity on its own initiative and by external forces such as changing social and economic conditions, demographic change and latterly, the development of the social market, reform of local government and pending devolution? These specific research questions were formally approved by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 2000, at which time the Board was formally congratulated on the way it had used the millennium year to draw attention to its work (Board of Social Responsibility, 2000 : 24/3 and 24/26). However, the original project title was subsequently considered to announce unnecessarily two areas of research: the development and implementation of social work policy and the development and implementation of professional social work practice in the context of service delivery. The inclusion of the latter aspect in the title was considered to be redundant because the issue of social work policy development and implementation could not be considered without explicitly considering the issue of service delivery. Accordingly, at a very early stage, and with approval from within the Board, the project was retitled 'The role of the Board of Social Responsibility in the development and implementation of social work policy in Scotland' and question 3 was reworded as 'What has been the contribution of the Board to social work policy development at national and local levels?'. Notwithstanding the Board's desire to celebrate and recognise its work, there are more utilitarian and specific reasons why the role of the Board of Social Responsibility should be studied at an academic level. Why the Board of Social Responsibility should be studied 3 Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, major works directed towards understanding voluntary action have been qualified by statements regarding the improbability of being definitive about the precise nature or scale of voluntary action within the United Kingdom (see for example, Beveridge, 1948; Brenton, 1985; Kendall and Knapp, 1996; Kemp, 1997; Murray, 1969; Rooff, 1957; Wolfenden, 1978). The improbability