The concept discussed in the article has some basis in the modern social welfare programs but can be largely described as a poor policy that perpetuated inequalities among people or classes of people. In the modern society there is a tendency where by social programs are seen as “preserves of the poor” (United States, 1994). On a large scale social welfare programs are constructed to meet common needs of the population. This shift is mainly directed by a need to completely do away with the perception that special services make the poor inferior. Universal services do not subject the poor to stigmatization but serve to integrate the poverty-stricken into the society so that they also have high self-esteem and ability to feel more equal to others. The primary undertaking towards this course is the SSA of 1935.
There is a shift from provision of minimum level of resources and behaves in such a way as to create resources and environments to develop and nature human potentials. There is a general move to social and structural factors from moral and psychological defects. Nowadays, with the development of social security act, a public approach has been adopted and the government is mainly tasked to deal with the poor. Governments have no reason any more to dwell in temporary provision of immediate needs but their sole responsibility rests in long term plans that will serve to prevent future needs.
Marshall indicates that the concept of equality of citizenship is paradoxical since in development of capitalism it is a system that perpetuates inequality. According to him, measures of welfare are not of an egalitarian measure and social services cannot be primarily used as a way of removing income differences. Changes in the American state of social Evolution of the American state of social welfare from new deal, sailing through to the administration of Clinton shows the way in which social policy developments have enhanced the advantages attached to whites by a series of mechanisms. Social welfare evolved from private and public that were residual in nature. In ancient times, residual services were mainly provided under discriminatory segregation in communities.
In my opinion, social welfare policies should be geared towards addressing the unmet needs of all people and should be universal. Social institutions act as networks that discharge the essential roles. Social welfare institutions should be viewed from a larger perspective of religion, kinship and family, market place, government and mutual assistance. All these represent formalized mechanisms of resource provision to meet needs of human beings. Social welfare policies should be formulated in the direction that improves the welfare of not only an individual but rather of the nation as a whole.
References
Day, P. J. (1989). A new history of social welfare. Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice Hall.
United States (1994). Social welfare. Washington, DC: U.S. G.P.O. [Supt. of Docs.
Axinn, J., & Stern, M. J. (2008). Social welfare: A history of the American response to need. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.
