Social Exclusion, the Underclass and Welfare Koch, Max; Herkommer, Sebastian; Littlewood, Paul Published in: Social Welfare, Social Exclusion - A Life Course Frame 2007 Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): Koch, M., Herkommer, S., & Littlewood, P. (2007). Social Exclusion, the Underclass and Welfare. In L. Harrysson, & M. O'Brien (Eds.), Social Welfare, Social Exclusion - A Life Course Frame (pp. 7-32). Värpinge Ord & Text. 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LUND UNIVERSITY PO Box 117 221 00 Lund +46 46-222 00 00 Social welfare, social exclusion - A life course frame Lars Harrysson & Michael O’Brien (eds.) V O&T Social welfare, Have you ever experienced standing on the sidelines unable to participate despite wishing to? It has happened to us in various situations: in school, at sports practice, at work, or even at parties. Our experiences are normal episodes in everyday life, but imagine if they were consistent. Being sys- tematically excluded from basic opportunities, rights and services in soci- ety is a different matter. Social welfare This book is about social exclusion as it may appear at different times in life. Eleven authors have contributed with conceptual discussions, em- Social exclusion pirical studies and enlightening thoughts about social exclusionary proc- esses and the structures they evolve within and create. A life course frame We think that practitioners, researchers and students of sociology, so- cial work, social services and social policy will appreciate this book. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Sweden License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/se/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Fran- cisco, California, 94105, USA. If we’re so clever, Please refer to this volume as: Harrysson, Lars and Michael O’Brien (2007), (eds.), Social welfare, Social exclusion - A life course frame, Lund: Värpinge Ord & Text. A specified chapter is referred to as: author’s name, why ain’t we chapter title, and then the full reference. all within? Free download from http://lu-research.lub.lu.se/ and then search by title. Värpinge Ord & Text Grävarvägen 3 SE-227 30 Lund Sweden Lars Harrysson & Michael O’Brien (eds.) Social welfare Social exclusion A life course frame Lars Harrysson and Michael O’Brien (editors) This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Sweden License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/se/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Fran- cisco, California, 94105, USA. Please refer to this volume as: Harrysson, Lars and Michael O’Brien (2007), (eds.), Social welfare, Social exclusion - A life course frame, Lund: Värpinge Ord & Text. A specified chapter is referred to as: author’s name, chapter title, and then the full reference. ISBN 978-91-628-2405-1 Published in 2007 Värpinge Ord & Text Grävarvägen 3 SE-227 30 Lund Sweden Printed by Intellecta DocySys AB, Göteborg II The authors Staffan Blomberg, senior lecturer, School of Social Work, Lund Univer- sity, Sweden. Lars Harrysson, senior lecturer, School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. Sebastian Herkommer, professor em. Max Koch, associate professor, School of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Work, Queen’s University, Northern Ireland. Paul Littlewood, lecturer, Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Applied Social Sciences, Glasgow University, Scotland. Aase Mygind Madsen, senior lecturer, Den Sociale Højskole, Århus, Denmark. Michael O’Brien, associate professor, School of Social and Cultural Stud- ies, Massey University, New Zealand. Lars B. Ohlsson, senior lecturer, School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. Jonas Olofsson, associate professor, research fellow at Ministry of Em- ployment, and senior lecturer, School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. Jan Petersson, professor, School of Human Sciences, University of Kal- mar, Sweden. Erika Werner, PhD candidate, School of Social Work, Lund University, Sweden. III Preface This project started some time ago. To be fully correct a cloudy afternoon in late November in 2004 at a meeting in Lund, following a day’s teaching with social work students. It has been a process some will see as slow. However, this volume is the work of people engaged in social research, but whose contribution has been one made on top of their everyday workload. The same has been the case for the editors and it is a small victory to see the book in print. We are grateful to all those that have participated and without complaints made changes to their texts on request. Already at the start of this project it was decided that this volume should be made accessible as a book to libraries free of charge and to the public via the World wide web. Thus we have to thank our employers for keeping us employed. The printing was made possible by a research grant (which after fulfillment had some minor left overs) from several Swedish governmental institutions in Vellinge kommun. Riksförsäkringsverket and Vetenskapsrådet provided support regarding chapter six, and FAS regard- ing chapters three and seven. Finally our sincere thanks to the publisher, Värpinge Ord & Text, for letting us do this without any financial inter- ests. The volume is downloadable from http://lu-research.lub.lu.se/ and then by searching the title. This is provided by the School of Social Work at Lund University. Please read carefully the creative commons license information on the title page. It is possible to reach the editors via e-mail or mail. Please do not hesi- tate if you have questions. A summer’s day in Lund A winter’s day in Auckland 2007 Lars Harrysson Michael O’Brien Lund University School of Social & Cultural Studies School of Social Work Private Bag 102 904 P.O. Box 23 North Shore Mail Centre SE-221 00 Lund Auckland Sweden Aotearoa/New Zealand [email protected] [email protected] V Introduction 1 Lars Harrysson and Michael O’Brien ONE 7 Social exclusion, the underclass and welfare A critical analysis Paul Littlewood, Sebastian Herkommer and Max Koch TWO 33 Social and economic exclusion / inclusion A complex paradox Michael O’Brien THREE 57 Young at the margins of welfare A study of immigrant youth and labour market establishment Lars B Ohlsson FOUR 85 Vocational education and social exclusion among youth Jonas Olofsson FIVE 123 Perspectives on social exclusion and inclusion Stratification versus differentiation Aase Mygind Madsen SIX 141 Preparing for retirement - a comparative view Personal experiences of financial preparations from four nations Lars Harrysson and Erika Werner SEVEN 173 Elderly care in Sweden as part in the formulation of a social citizenship - A historical perspective on present change Staffan Blomberg and Jan Petersson Conclusion 195 Lars Harrysson and Michael O’Brien VII Introduction Lars Harrysson Michael O’Brien Choosing a title for a book is not easy. How do you reflect a very complex social process in just a few words? The question raised - ‘If we’re so clever, why ain’t we all within?’ - is a matter of our concern. What can we do? Academics and researchers tend now to be seen as a rather gloomy group - carping at the deficiencies of contemporary conceptual analysis and pessimistic about the impact of emerging social policies. We have decided, with what degree of justification time will decide, to strike a different and more optimistic note. We believe that, under the um- brella of social inclusion, intellectual and policy interests are interacting today more closely than for several decades. We also believe that social work - understood broadly to include all the public, voluntary and pri- vate agencies and groups concerned with individual and community welfare - has a significant place in this agenda. (Barry & Hallett, 1998 pp. 130-131) The quote is some ten years old, but still valid. A concern of ours is that the arenas where we may meet with other professionals and with consum- ers are still hard to bridge. The social relations among social work profes- sionals, social policy makers, social scientists etcetera are still somewhat distant. If we include service users and consumers the gap seems even more pronounced. As social scientists we have to ask ourselves where we have our comparative advantages, to use a classical economic terminology; What can we add? We have to consider how we can engage as well, and what consequences this may cause. In the final discussion of this volume these particular issues are highlighted. There are signs of change. For example, Ruth Lister (2002) points to a project in Britain where people in poverty take direct a part in the plan- ning of services affecting them. The legislation in Sweden (LSS) concerns among other things the rights for disabled persons to organise and run their own planning for subsidised service provision with some restrictions (Elmér et al.