Rowntree and Townsends Theories on Poverty

Rowntree and Townsends Theories on pauperizationIntroductionSociologists disaccord over what woefulness actually is. In this es recite I aim to discuss and criticise Seebohm Rowntrees surmise from 1899 -1950 accordingly I will discuss and criticise, Peter Townsends theory. The next section will be to discuss and criticise, macintosh and Lansleys theory, and the ideas of Herbert Spencer (social Darwinism) There will then be a discussion of regressive and advanced taxation and an explanation of Marslands theory. Finally I will explain and criticise, John Wetergaard and Henrietta Reslers suggestment that there is a myth surrounding the welfargon state. This myth is that the wellbeing state is progressive and redistri al angiotensin converting enzymees from the rich to the poor. scantiness and Seebohm RowntreeIn the time of Queen Elizabeth the first it was slews duty to sponsor alleviate indigence. They did this by feeding the poor and visiting the sick and trying to ensur e that people were not destitute. After the Reformation things agitated and laws were passed to dictate the amount that was spent on the poor. In 1601 the Elizabethan Poor Law was passed and made provision for the ambit of the poor on work1 The Poor Law also utter that the poor were responsible for cargon for each other. Overseers were ap dappleed in every area to decide how much poor relief would be needed. In the amended Poor Law of 1834 overseers knew the circumstances of the poor in their are and those who were considered lazy would not get much help. These amendments to the Poor Law gave those in power a greater degree of check into over the lives of the poor.In the 1860s, Joseph Rowntree, Seebohm Rowtrees father conducted two studies into scantness.2 This led Seebohm Rowntree to later conduct his own show which was published in 1901. He made an early distinction between primary and secondary penury a distinction which sociologists still use today. Primary poverty mea nt that a family did not have plentiful money coming in to cover the basic necessities of food, shelter and clothing. Secondary poverty was where families earned enough but spent their money on things other than the basic necessities. So some spending was regarded as alright while other spending was seen as wasting money, on drink for example. He believed that issue should be change magnitude be have got then people would be well fed and healthy and would be an businesslike workforce. He raised the wages of workers at his own company and give tongue to that businesses who refused to do this should be close down as they were doing the country no favours. His second study which he carried forbidden in the mid-thirties was published as Progress and poverty in 1941. He argued in this study that the main cause of poverty was unemployment, the conclusions of his report influenced the founding of the welfare state.Although Seebohm Rowntree did a lot to further the cause of the po or and to point out the causes of poverty. His remarks about primary and secondary poverty, while still influential today, were typical of those in power. That is to interpret they carried the message that the poor were irresponsible and needed to be told how to spend the money that they had earned.Peter Townsend scantiness as a social ProblemTownsend (1979) has defined poverty in the following wayIndividuals, families and groups in the community can be said to be in poverty when they wish the resources to obtain the types of diets, embark in the activities and have the musical accompaniment conditions which are customary, or at least widely encouraged and approved, in the societies to which they belong. Townsend(197931).Townsends work ease ups it kinda clear that poverty is not just a lose of money but encompasses things other than strictly material needs. Those who are poor often live in poorer areas with badly do schools and poor housing. This often results in ill hea lth. Townsend said that there were two types of poverty, relational poverty and dictatorial poverty. Research undertaken for the Rowntree Foundation (Howarth et al,1999) found that in local function housing more than two thirds of the heads of those households were not in paid work and since 1991 there has been an increase of 40% in the number of local authority areas with above average mortality rates. Absolute poverty is not really seen in the west.In develop countries people are often denied thenecessities e.g. food and shelter which maintain existence. Giddens (2001311) argues that the idea of absolute poverty is grounded in subsistence. Anyone without sufficient food, shelter and clothing could be said to be living in absolute poverty. star of the ways in which absolute poverty is measured is by the poverty line which is based on the price of goods in a given society that humans need for survival. Those who cannot afford these goods live in poverty.Not everyone agrees with this and the idea of absolute poverty is highly contested because the use of a single monetary standard fails to take into account the differences between societies. Needs are not the same in all societies, or even in the same society, nutritional needs are different for people working in different jobs, a labourer for example may need more calories than a bank clerk. Drewnowski and Scott (1966)3 argue that absolute poverty should also include a lack of cultural needs. This is often argued over because a fixed standard on such needs is bound to fail. These people are more interest in relative poverty. telling poverty looks at peoples incomes and compares them to a national average. Relative poverty manner that people are living in poverty when their life is compared to those of the average family this is because lack of income also agency poorer housing. People who live in relative poverty usually live in deprived areas also. Since 1979 increased unemployment and a rise in bene fit payments and earnings that are index linked to prices rather than wages, has resulted in a huge rise in the number of people living in relative poverty.4 In a report inThe British Medical Journal (2000) the writer looked at absolute and relative babe poverty in developed countries where some peoples incomes were more than fifty percent lower than the average. It also said that in the league table of relative child poverty one of the four bottom places was held by the UK.An article in the Daily Telegraph (27/08/02) says that the idea of relative poverty is a problem. The article suggests that or else of using household income as the regulator it might be better if statisticians calculated the prices of basic goods and services. chthonic the present system the rich were becoming richer and the poor were paying for it in increased taxes and a lack of services. Another approach to measuring relative poverty is finished peoples perceptions of the necessities of life which is what Mack and Lansley did.Mack and LansleyThe work of Mack and Lansley (1985, 1992) listed those things that were considered to be required to modern day life if a individual was not living in poverty. They did two studies on relative poverty in the UK. Mack and Lansley carried out an opinion poll to find out what people fantasy were the necessities of modern day life. There were cardinal six things that most people considered important these things included new clothes, heating, a bath and indoor toilet. Relative poverty was thus measured by the presence or absence of the things that had been listed. Mack and Lansleys look found that the number of people living in poverty in the 1980s went up quite a bit, this poverty was defined by the lack of three or more of the basic necessities mentioned earlier. amid 1983 and 1990 when the two studies were undertaken the number of people who were living in poverty went up from 7.5 billion to 11 million and the number of those living in sev ere poverty or who were lacking more than 7 of the items that were considered essential, went up from 2.6 to 3.5 million (Mack and Lansley, 1992). Poverty is also defined by how far people can afford to participate in social activities such as school trips. In recent years this has been called social exclusion. Social exclusion does not look at poverty just in terms of a lack of material things. It looks at the wider picture and this includes wheter people are able to participate in society.There are no clear ways of measuring poverty. Absolute and relative poverty are both complicated and ways of measuring what it is to be poor, and not everyone agrees on them. Policy makers say what poverty is and then make laws for it but few of them experience what it is to be poor. A report published by the Rowntree tail end says that what the poor have to say needs to be taken into consideration in research on poverty. pickings into account the opinions of those who actually lived in poverty would provide useful information for existing organisations that might help shape policy making in the long term.5 In all this there is a touch perception that the poor are somehow to blame for the circumstances in which they find themselves. A point which Herbert Spencer authorship in the nineteenth century would have agreed with.As far as Spencer was concerned people lived in poverty as a result of dissolute living. He had no sympathy at all for the poor and regarded many of them as criminals and drunks. He believed it was unnatural to help people who lived in poverty as a result of their own behaviour and irresponsibility. If people were too lazy to work then they should not be allowed to eat. He believed that the cause of poverty could be found by an examination of the righteous character of an individual. The Poor Laws were wrong because they encouraged the poor to be lazy and to rely on psyche elses operose work to provide them with the necessities of life. This allowed moral decline to spread through the population. The result would be that both society and the economy would suffer. Late nineteenth and early twentieth century thought was severely influence by Darwins work The Origins of the Species and Spencer was no exception. He believed in Darwins idea of the survival of the fittest. golf-club could nevertheless evolve properly and morally if the honest and hard working members of society were allowed to keep the fruits of their labour. The workweek and lazy members of society should be condemned to live in poverty because that was what they deserved. Falling into poverty was a necessary evil in society because without poverty work would not exist.Although this may seem repugnant to a lot of people Spencers ideas are still rife in modern society. Peter Golding (1978) has said that media reporting of poverty in the nineteen seventies portrayed the poor as welfare scroungers living rack up the backs of others. The press portrayed people as having a comfortable existence living off social security at the expense of tax payers.The New RightThe ultraconservative Government headed by Margaret Thatcher were voted into power in 1979. Political debates of the time were concerned with a free market economy versus the welfare state. The tory presidency brought in measures to roll back the welfare state and control spending. This was done through the foot of marketing and business strategies into policy making. At the same time there was an intense process of privatization because it was thought that public ownership of companies, and the public sector worked against market forces. Introducing marketing principles into social care allowed the Governments to in theory improve services. It also enabled them to retain a greater degree of control. Giddens (2001) says thatthe momentum of Thatcherism in economic matters was well-kept by the privatising of public companies..(this)..is held to reintroduce healthy economic competitio n in place of unwieldy and idle public bureaucracies, reduce public expenditure and end political interference in managerial decisions (Giddens, 2001434).The display of market forces into social care was considered the best method of Government spending because free markets were considered to be self-importance organising (Olssen 2000).They thought this would increase productivity and improve care and be cost efficient. Government discourses, both Conservative and New Labour have revolved around the notion that the introduction of market mechanisms would result in a more equitable system benefiting all. However, Alcock (1994) says that the Conservative policies resulted in greater unemployment, a rise in the number of homeless people, and a general growth in social inequality. Marsland (1996) disagrees and says that in Britain poverty has been exaggerated.David MarslandMarsland says that the Rowntree foundation deliberately confuse poverty with inequality and that they exaggerate the amount of poverty in Britain. He says that who say poverty is increasing act out of their own self interest because the evidence is not examined impartially. He does not believe in relative poverty but says that in order to truly be poverty it has to be absolute and this is disappearing from Britain because of the increase in living standards that has come about through capitalism. He is also critical o universal welfare provision i.e. those benefits such as rearing which are available to everyone regardless of their income as he believes they create a dependency culture. Marsland (1989) believes that relying on the government to take care of the people results in an abdication of personal responsibility and welfare hand outs are just another reason for remaining unemployed.Jordan (1989) says that Marsland is wrong in what he says about universal welfare provision creating a dependency culture and that if such a culture exists it is targeted with means tested benefits that only the very poor get. Rather than poverty being the result of an over generous welfare system, Jordan says that it comes from one that is too mean.Westergaard and Resler (1976) argue that the welfare state does not make the distribution of wealthiness more equal. Poverty is not being eradicated. Any money or benefits that the working material body receive will in the end be paid back in tax by themselves. They believe that the welfare state is only when another tool of capitalism and poverty exists because of that system which prevents poor people from obtaining the resources to stop being poor. In Westergaards view the policies of the eighties and nineties and the hold that market forces had over Britain meant that even the aim of redistributing wealth through the welfare state had been abandoned. Kincaid says that it is not just a matter of rich and poor it is the concomitant that some people are very rich while some are very poor. Poverty therefore is a result of the capitalis t system. However, such theories do not really explain why some people become poor nor do they differentiate between poor working class and other members of that class. So we have plenty of theories but no real solutions.ConclusionThis essay has looked at different theories of poverty. Seebohm Rowntree in the nineteenth century who wanted to improve the lives of the poor and believed that increased wages would change things. Herbert Spencer on the other hand believed the opposite. He thought it was wrong to help the poor and believed that if people were hard working and honest then they should keep all of the money they had earned. Some people were born to be richer than others, it was the survival of the fittest. Peter Townsend distinguished between absolute and relative poverty but relative poverty is not booming to define and is still being contested. Even Macky and Llansleys work on relative poverty does not solve the problem.New Right approaches have contributed to the problem s of poverty but Marxist criticisms do not provide answers as to who the poor really are or how they became that way. Clearly this is not an easy question. Howver, if we look back at the definitions of absolute poverty then we can say that this type of poverty does not really exist in Britain today.BibliographyGiddens, A. 2001. (4th ed). Sociology. Cambridge, regulation Press.Haralambos, M and Heald, R. 1985 Sociology Themes and Perspectives. London, Bell and Hyman.Howarth,C. et al 1999 Monitoring Poverty and Social Exclusion. York, Joseph Rowntree Foundation.http//www.rte.ie/news/2003/1210/poverty.htmlMack, J. and Lansley, S. 1985. Poor Britain. London, George Allen and Unwin.Mack, J. and Lansley, S. 1992. Breadline Britain mid-nineties The Findings of the Television Series. London, London Weekend Television.Nickell, S. RES multitude paper April 2003 Poverty and Worklessness in Britain http//cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp0579.pdfONeale Roache, J. 2000. One in Six Children Live in Relative Poverty. BMJ 20003201626 ( 17 June ).The Daily Telegraph 27th August 2002Townsend, P. 1979. Poverty in the United Kingdom. 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