Connecting Policy to Practice

Traditionally, human services policy has been made by people whose own lives are unaffected by their decisions. As a consequence, that policy often fails to meet the needs of service users. In this second edition of Connecting Policy to Practice, as in the first, Wharf and McKenzie suggest that a more inclusive process will produce better results. Following a careful examination of current practices, they look at a number of alternative strategies, including shared decision-making, policy communities, community governance, and family group conference.

Table of Contents:
Aknowledgements; Preface; Introduction; 1. Policy: What Is It and Who Makes It?; What is Policy?; The Current Policy Environment: Inequality in Canada; The Effects of Globalization on Social Policy; What Can Be Done?; Who Makes Policy?; 2. Policy-Making Models and Their Connection to Practice; The Rational Model; Incrementalism; Mixed Scanning; The Value Criteria Model; The Garbage Can Model; Connecting Models to the Work of First-Line Practitioners; 3. Making Social Policy in Canada: Institutional and Political Factors; Social Policy and the Federal Government; Social Policy and the Provincial Government; Organizational Policy-Making; The Centralizing Trend in Government Policy-Making; Conclusion; 4. The Stages of the Policy-Making Process; Introduction; Stages in Developing Policy and Practice; An Integrated Model for Policy Analysis; Conclusion; 5. Implementing Policy; What the Literature Reveals about Implementation; Implementing Policy in Child Welfare: The Experiences of Two Provinces; The World of the First-Line Practioner; Centralization and Decentralization: The Variable of Distance; Improving the Implementation Process: Concluding Comments; 6. Inclusive Approaches to Policy-Making; The Case for Citizen Participation; The Case for More Inclusive Models; The Pros and Cons of Inclusive Approaches: Concluding Comments; 7. Policy-Making in Aboriginal Child and Family Services; The Policy-Making Context; Shared Decision-Making at the Federal Level; Creating a Policy Community at the Provincial Level; Community Governance and Child Welfare; Conclusion; 8. Chalk and Cheese; Marilyn Callahan; Feminist Thinking; The Women's Movement in the Current Context; What Does Feminist Thinking Offer to Policy-Making; Conclusion; 9. When Inclusive Approaches Are Not Enough; Think-Tanks; Social Movements and Policy Advocacy Groups; A Policy Debate; Whistle-Blowing; Conclusion; Towards Inclusiveness in Policy and Practice; Strategies to Influence Policy; A New Kind of Professional?; A Different Form of Inclusivity; Social Work and Social Transformation; Appendix A Questions for Reflection; Appendix B Annotated Websites and Selected Canadian Journals