Entrapment in Unemployment: Motivational Deficiency or Structural Constraint?

This chapter explains the processes that lead people to become vulnerable to labour market marginalisation through unemployment. It first focuses on incentives to work and suggests that unemployment is the result of a motivational deficit, which is linked to a system of welfare benefits that reduces the value that people attach to work. It then discusses social exclusion, which suggests that once people become unemployed, they are caught in a vicious circle of poverty and social isolation that in turn sharply reduce their opportunities for employment. Finally, it looks at the argument that the critical factor is related to the changing patterns of skills in advanced societies and the nature of the training provision for the updating and modification of skills.

The Puzzle of Work: Insecurity and Stress and Autonomy and Commitment

This chapter suggests that the nature of work in Britain changed dramatically during the last thirty years of the twentieth century. Sectoral shifts included a move from manufacturing towards services. There were also major shifts from the public sector to the private sector: between 1980 and 1998 the proportion of employees accounted for by private sector services rose from 26% to 44%. Part-time and temporary workers also became more common. These changes are often claimed to be associated with some more general transformations in the nature of work in Britain. One view holds that there have been improving levels of skills and training and better communication in the workplace. Another view holds that there have been increased levels of effort and stress. This chapter attempts to explain why rising skill levels, employee autonomy and commitment have been accompanied by widespread reports of increases in stress, lengthening working hours and a sense of a lack of control over one's working life.

The Puzzle of Retirement and Early Retirement

This chapter focuses on early retirement, explaining why at a time of increasing longevity, and in particular healthy and active longevity, there is a continual withdrawal from the labour force of men and women who have not yet reached the formal age of retirement. While the expectation of a healthy life has been steadily growing, between 1950 and 1995 the estimated average age in the UK of the transition from economic employment to economic inactivity by older workers fell from 67.2 to 62.7 years for men and from 63.9 to 59.7 years for women. There are three main explanations for this change. First, economists have taken the view that there exist within most national pension systems incentives to retire. Second, sociologists argued that changes within the workplace and labour market have forced employees to withdraw. Finally, there are the changing attitudes of the workers and a growing internalisation of retirement as an extended period of funded leisure and consumption.

The Puzzling Rise in Childbearing Outside Marriage

This chapter analyses the rise of incidence in childbearing outside marriage. In the last quarter of the twentieth century, the percentage of births outside marriage rose from 9% in 1975 to 40% in 2000. This chapter shows that the major factor accounting for this change is the dramatic rise of cohabitation among young people. It then analyses why there has been widespread substitution of cohabiting unions for direct marriage in Britain. The chapter concludes with a discussion on the implications for changes in family life.

What are the New Religious Movements Doing in a Secular Society?

This chapter discusses one of the major social changes that have taken place in late twentieth-century Britain — secularisation — the process whereby religion loses its social significance. In the second half of the twentieth century there was a major decline in Britain in formal church membership and attendance, although the decline in religious belief is less well established. The chapter also discusses the emergence of new religions in the secular society. They derive from a wide variety of sources: some such as the Jesus Army from the Baptist tradition of Protestant Christianity, others such as the New Jerusalem claim to represent the true Orthodox tradition; many others have a non-Christian character, the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and the Brahma Kumaris have their roots in Hinduism, while Buddhism has given rise to Soka Gakkai and Shinto to Konkokyo; and also Paganism, Wicca, Satanism and traditions deriving from science fiction. The most important point to be made about these new religious movements is that because of their diversity, any generalisation concerning them can almost certainly be shown to be untrue for one or another of their number.

The Social Origins of Depression and the Role of Meaning

This chapter discusses the role of social factors in ill health, with a particular focus on depression. Major life events increase the risk of most depressive disorders. In a longitudinal study carried out in the early 1980s of 400 mothers in Islington, 1 in 10 developed a depressive disorder within a year, and most of those had a severely threatening life event not long before. This chapter also summarises the three forms of meaning relevant for the aetiology of depression. First, the role-based meanings of severe events relate to traditional anthropological and sociological concerns. Second, the evolutionary-derived meanings show that the experience of humiliation following a severe event is critical in the development of depression. Finally, the memory-linked emotional schemas influence a person's vulnerability to events.

Explaining Ethnic Minority Disadvantage

This chapter offers a variety of explanations as to why ethnic minorities in Britain suffered ‘ethnic penalties’ or serious disadvantages in the labour market. These explanations focused on the lack of human capital on the part of the migrant workers and the prejudice and discrimination they experienced at the hands of the British society.

Is Failure Inevitable? The Recent Fate of Secondary School Reforms Intended to Alleviate Social Disadvantage

This chapter discusses school reforms that have been taking place, with the aim to produce greater equality of educational opportunity. The chapter suggests why they may have been less effective than hoped. It focuses on three areas: the effects of comprehensive reorganisation; the extent of variations in school effectiveness; and the contribution of systemic programmes on educational disadvantage.

Why Did Class Inequalities in Educational Attainment Remain Unchanged over Much of the Twentieth Century?

This chapter is concerned with changes in the level of educational attainment in Britain. It discusses and evaluates sociology's contribution to understanding class inequalities in educational attainment. It begins with empirical studies documenting the extent of class inequality in education. It then describes methodological work concerned with measuring class differentials in educational attainment. Finally, it explores possible explanations for the persistence of class inequalities.

Victims’ Rights in England and Wales at the Beginning of the Twenty-first Century

This chapter examines the way in which the victim of crime, the ‘forgotten party’ of the criminal justice system has started to regain something of the standing of an interested party with recognised rights in the justice system. A number of causal narratives are involved in this gradual process of change. First, there have been outside influences with statements and declarations of individual rights from the United Nations, North America and Europe which saw the eventual enactment of the Human Rights Act in 1998. Second, the ‘new managerialism’ of recent Conservative and Labour governments gave rise to the idea of the citizen as a customer in a market of services delivered by the state. Third, is the notion of reintegrative shaming, modelled on Maori justice in New Zealand, and intended to lead to a rapprochement in which the victim is no longer so fearful or angry and the offender better understands the impact of his actions and is reunited with the moral community rather than outlawed from it.