Jeremy Bentham’s Dream

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bart Schultz
Keyword(s):  
Social Reform ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Edmund Burke ◽  
Natural Religion ◽  
Poor Laws ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Radical Critique ◽  
Sex And Sexuality ◽  
Evaluative Standard ◽  
The Right

This chapter examines Jeremy Bentham's doctrine of utilitarianism and the principle of “the greatest happiness of the greatest number.” Bentham is known for his radical critique of society, which aimed to test the usefulness of existing institutions, practices and beliefs against an objective evaluative standard, as well as his advocacy of law reform and his utilitarian justification for democracy. The chapter considers Bentham's views on subjects ranging from happiness and pleasure to social reform, “theory of fictions,” and sex and sexuality. It also discusses some of Bentham's writings, including Analysis of the Influence of Natural Religion on the Temporal Happiness of Mankind (published under the pseudonym Philip Beauchamp), Chrestomathia, Defense of Economy against the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, and An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Finally, the chapter looks at Bentham's proposals for reform of the Poor Laws and his influence on the Poor Law Amendment Act.

scholarly journals The Royal Commission on the Poor Laws, 1905–09

1977 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 137-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathleen Woodroofe
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Social Reform ◽  
Royal Commission ◽  
Poor Law ◽  
Poor Laws ◽  
Conservative Government ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Cost

Although there is some truth in the comment made by Canon Barnett, rector of St Jude's, Whitechapel, and founder of Toynbee Hall, that the issue in 1909 of the Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws “may mark the beginning of a new epoch in our social life”, the precise reasons for the appointment of the Commission on December 4th, 1905, are not yet known. The Conservative government, which made the appointment almost on the eve of its defeat, had been in power for ten years, first under the prime ministership of Lord Salisbury and then, until his resignation in December 1905, of A. J. Balfour. During that time the cost of the Poor Law had risen steadily, and yet, until the end of 1904, either through social myopia or a preoccupation with the greater drama of events abroad, the government displayed little interest in the problem of the Poor Law or, indeed, in any of the wider questions of social reform.

scholarly journals Retrospectives: Classical Family Values: Ending the Poor Laws as They Knew Them

1997 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 179-189 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Persky
Keyword(s):  
Family Values ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Inequality Of Opportunity ◽  
Poor Law ◽  
Poor Laws ◽  
Classical Liberal ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Self Reliance ◽  
Thomas Malthus ◽  
Women And Children

Poor law reform in the early 1830s provides a key example of the deep conflicts between classical liberal principles of self-reliance and the realities of dependency. Eminent economists, such as Nassau Senior and Thomas Malthus, argued that the dependency of women and children calls forth and motivates its own support from the altruism of husbands and fathers. Like modern welfare reformers, the classical economists asserted the natural necessity and sufficiency of such dependency and ignored its powerful implications for the intergenerational perpetuation of a highly illiberal inequality of opportunity.

Rights-Politics and the Politics of Rights in Neoliberal India

Social Change ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 307-321
Author(s):  
Aparna Gopalan
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Scientific Inquiry ◽  
Poverty Alleviation ◽  
Poor Laws ◽  
Rural Employment ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
The Right ◽  
Neoliberal India ◽  
Employment Guarantee

In 1991, the Indian economy, was finally proclaimed liberalised from the control of the state; the market was now to be the sole engine of growth, development and poverty alleviation. But just over a decade later, a series of rights-based legislations––rights to food, work, information, education, and forests were seen as challenging the market’s dominance over an anti-poverty agenda and heralding the birth of India’s welfare state. These rights-based legislations have animated a growing field of social scientific inquiry which assesses the genesis and career of the different pro-poor laws that have passed since 2005. This paper reviews two recent contributions to that scholarship: Rob Jenkins and James Manor’s Politics and the Right to Work and Indrajit Roy’s Politics of the Poor, both of which are concerned with the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). After contextualising the two books within an emerging legal activism and providing an in-depth discussion of their key concepts, arguments and methods, attention is paid to each author's explanation of the contradictions between India’s neoliberal economy and welfare state. In conclusion, the strengths and limitations of prevailing approaches studying India’s poverty alleviation programmes are discussed and it is suggested that a theoretical cross-fertilisation with neoliberalism studies could further reinvigorate and give shape to this promising literature.

Protecting the Desperate: The Regulation of Payday Lending

2015 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 147-176
Author(s):  
Andrew J Serpell
Keyword(s):  
Consumer Credit ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Payday Lending ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Payday Loans ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Right ◽  
Credit Contracts ◽  
The Cost

Payday loans are small-amount, short-term, unsecured, high-cost credit contracts provided by non-mainstream credit providers. Payday loans are usually taken out to help the consumer pay for essential items, such as food, rent, electricity, petrol, broken-down appliances or car registration or repairs. These consumers take out payday loans because they cannot — or believe that they cannot — obtain a loan from a mainstream credit provider such as a bank. In recent years there has been a protracted debate in Australia — and in several overseas jurisdictions — about how to regulate the industry. Recent amendments to the National Consumer Credit Protection Act 2009 (Cth) — referred to in this article as the 2013 reforms — are designed to better protect payday loan consumers. While the 2013 reforms provide substantially improved protection for payday loan consumers, further changes to the law may be warranted. This article raises several law reform issues which should be considered as part of the 2015 review into small amount credit contracts, including whether the caps on the cost of credit are set at the right level, whether the required content and presentation of the consumer warnings needs to be altered, whether more needs to be done to protect consumers who are particularly disadvantaged or vulnerable and whether a general anti-avoidance provision should be included in the credit legislation.

Conclusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew S. Seligmann
Keyword(s):  
Corporal Punishment ◽  
Social Reform ◽  
Alcohol Intake ◽  
Religious Practice ◽  
Royal Navy ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Push Forward ◽  
The Common

As this book has shown the common conception that ‘Churchill’s “radical phase” was cast to the winds’ when he was put in charge of the Navy in October 1911, although well established in the literature, is not, in fact, accurate.1 The radical President of the Board of Trade, eager to improve the lives of the poor, became the radical Home Secretary, no less enthusiastic for social reform, who then became the radical First Lord of the Admiralty, imbued with both a desire and, perhaps more importantly, a will to intervene in order to better conditions for those who served in the Royal Navy. Accordingly, he embarked upon a major programme of improvement across a wide range of different areas all of which affected the everyday life of sailors. Alcohol intake, sexual behaviour, religious practice, corporal punishment, as well as pay and equality of progression, all came under the spotlight while Churchill was First Lord. Of course, not all of the new measures were successful and not all were progressive in the modern understanding of the term, but all of them represented significant attempts to push forward a radical agenda for change....

The Global Rise of Social Cash Transfers

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lutz Leisering
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Social Security ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
Cash Transfers ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Sociological Approach ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Social Cash Transfers ◽  
The Right

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) proclaimed the equality of all human beings in dignity and rights. The right to social security, however, has been taken more seriously only since the 2000s, through calls for ‘Social security for all’ and ‘Leaving no one behind’. The book investigates a major response, social cash transfers to the poor. The idea of simply giving money to the poor had been rejected by all major development organizations until the 1990s, but since the early 2000s, social cash transfers have mushroomed in the global South and on agendas of international organizations. How come? What programmes have emerged in which countries? How inclusive are the programmes? What models have international organizations devised? Based on unique quantitative and qualitative data, the book takes stock of all identifiable cash transfers in all Southern countries and of the views of all major international organizations. The author argues that cash transfers reflect broader changes: new understandings of development, of human rights, of global risks, of the social responsibility of governments, and of universalism. Social cash transfers have turned the poor from objects of charity into rights-holders and agents of their own lives and of development. A repertoire of cash transfers has evolved that has enhanced social citizenship, but is limited by weak political commitments. The book also contributes to a general theory of social policy in development contexts, through a constructivist sociological approach that complements the dominant approaches from welfare economics and political economy and includes a theory of social assistance.

Right to Parental Care

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asha Bajpai
Keyword(s):  
Law Reform ◽  
Best Interest ◽  
Family Courts ◽  
Custody Of Children ◽  
The Family ◽  
Shared Parenting ◽  
The Right ◽  
A Minor ◽  
And Control ◽  
Physical Care

Custody refers to the physical care and control of a minor whereas guardianship is a wider term and includes rights and duties with respect to the care and control of minor’s person and property, and includes the right to make decisions relating to the minor. The present legal regime relating to guardianship and custody of children is discussed, including the Guardians and Wards Act, 1890, the Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, 1956, the personal and matrimonial laws, and relevant provisions in the Family Courts Act and Protection of Women against Domestic Violence Act, 2005. The emerging concepts of shared parenting, joint custody, and the interparental child removal or abduction of child is included. There is review and analysis of some major reported judicial decisions. A comparative survey of international laws and trends has been done. Suggestions for law reform in the best interest of the child have been given.

The Right to Education in India

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Florian Matthey-Prakash
Keyword(s):  
Private Education ◽  
The State ◽  
Legal Empowerment ◽  
Right To Education ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Potential System ◽  
Education In India ◽  
Alternative Means ◽  
Education Act ◽  
The Right

What does it mean for education to be a fundamental right, and how may children benefit from it? Surprisingly, even when the right to education was added to the Indian Constitution as Article 21A, this question received barely any attention. This book identifies justiciability (or, more broadly, enforceability) as the most important feature of Article 21A, meaning that children and their parents must be provided with means to effectively claim their right from the state. Otherwise, it would remain a ‘right’ only on paper. The book highlights how lack of access to the Indian judiciary means that the constitutional promise of justiciability is unfulfilled, particularly so because the poor, who cannot afford quality private education for their children, must be the main beneficiaries of the right. It then deals with possible alternative means the state may provide for the poor to claim the benefits under Article 21A, and identifies the grievance redress mechanism created by the Right to Education Act as a potential system of enforcement. Even though this system is found to be deficient, the book concludes with an optimistic outlook, hoping that rights advocates may, in the future, focus on improving such mechanisms for legal empowerment.

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