Fostering in a Carefare Regime

This chapter is about foster parents and their work. Recent changes in the regulation of foster care illustrate the formation and operation of a carefare regime: the transformation of state policies and services and the integration of foster parents into the “deserving” female working and caring underclass. Relying on two years of participant observations and interviews with foster parents, experts, guardians, social workers and foster parent agency personnel, I describe the highly skilled care work most foster parents provide in demanding circumstances for a practically endless number of work hours. I explain how their status has been transformed from being volunteers to being contracted employees who work in increasingly precarious circumstances for extremely low wages. I argue that sentimentalization of care work is used by policy makers to discipline foster mothers into accepting the new terms of their relationship and by foster parents too to rationalize their compliance.

Eksistensi Badan Layanan Umum Sebagai Penyelenggara Pelayanan Publik

This study aims to determine the existence of public service agencies as public service providers in Indonesia. The research method used is legal research with statutory approach approach (analytical approach) which is analyzed with qualitative analysis. The results of the research show that the Public Service Agency (BLU) as the public service provider plays an important role in providing services to the public in the form of the provision of goods and / or services. Legally BLU is not a legal entity, but BLU operates as a working unit of state ministries / agencies / local governments for the purpose of providing public services whose management is based on the authority delegated by the respective parent agency. Therefore, the financial management is not separate from the state ministries / institutions / local government as the parent institution. Keywords: Public Service Board, Public Service, State Organizer

Environmental health indicators: a review of initiatives worldwide

Purpose – The extent to which research into the design and development of environmental health indicators (EHIs) has translated into operational programmes is unclear. The purpose of this paper is to identify EHI initiatives worldwide, distil the EHIs and draw lessons from the experience. Design/methodology/approach – A systematic internet-based review was undertaken. Programmes were selected for inclusion if they: first, had the ability to monitor both the physical environment and associated health outcomes; and second, the parent agency had the ability to influence policies related to the environment and health. Findings – The small number of eligible programmes indicates EHI initiatives are not yet well established, especially in developing countries. The use of indicators was also limited by uncertainties in the exposure-response relationships that they implied, and the consequent inability to translate the indicators into a common measure of health impact. In addition, there is no information on the extent to which the indicators have been applied in decision making, nor on the policy implications of using indicators. Practical implications – More effort is needed to encourage the development and use of more balanced and informative sets of indicators, and to evaluate their use and outcomes in terms of health benefits. Originality/value – The time is right for a substantial review paper on EHIs as they are now being used by a number of organisations and to the knowledge this is the first review of operational EHI programmes worldwide.