IDEOLOGIES OF WELFARE

For hundreds of years the health and general wellbeing of people and their families have suffered due to the difficulties that social policy and welfare provision has been continuously faced with as a result of the persistence of poverty. This essay will explain and discuss the ideologies of the major political parties, how they have influenced the development of welfare and the effects they have had on social policies and social care provisions. It will explain how these ideologies were formed and how they are relevant in present day starting with the Elizabethan Poor Law right through to the ‘Middle way’ of the late twentieth century.