Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-cfpbc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-18T16:13:29.864Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

In Pursuit of the Underclass*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2009

John Macnicol
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The 1970s saw a wide ranging debate in Britain, initiated by Sir Keith Joseph, on the apparent existence of a ‘cycle of deprivation’. Most participants viewed this debate as having originated in the 1960s, but in fact versions of the general concept of an inter-generational ‘underclass’ have figured prominently in social debates during the past one hundred years. In particular, in the inter-war period there were several investigations of an hereditary ‘social problem group’, investigations which were crucial to a wider conservative social reformist strategy. These investigations produced inconclusive results, however, because ultimately the underclass is a statistical artefact, the existence of which can only be argued by the use of several serious methodological contradictions.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 16 , Issue 3 , July 1987 , pp. 293 - 318
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Anderson, Martin (1979), Welfare, Hoover Institute Press, Palo Alto.Google Scholar
Armstrong, Charles Wicksteed (1931), The Survival of the Unfittest, C.W. Daniel, London, 1931 edn.Google Scholar
Auletta, Ken (1981a), ‘A Reporter at Large: the Underclass, Part 1’, The New Yorker, 16 11, 1981, pp.63–181.Google Scholar
Auletta, Ken (1981b), ‘The Underclass, Part II’, The New Yorker, 23 11, 1981, pp.72–175.Google Scholar
Auletta, Ken (1981c), ‘The Underclass, Part III’, The New Yorker, 30 11, 1981, pp. 101–169.Google Scholar
Auletta, Ken (1982), The Underclass, Random House, New York.Google Scholar
Banfield, Edward C. (1970), The Unheavenly City: The Nature and Future of Our Urban Crisis, Little, Brown and Co., Boston.Google Scholar
Blacker, C.P. (ed.) (1937), A Social Problem Group?, Oxford University Press, London.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blacker, C.P. (ed.) (1952), Problem Families: Five Enquiries, Eugenics Society, London.Google Scholar
Booth, Charles (1902a), Life and Labour of the People in London, Vol. 2, Macmillan, London, 1902 edn.Google Scholar
Booth, Charles (1902b), Life and Labour of the People in London, Vol. 4, Macmillan, London, 1902 edn.Google Scholar
Brown, Muriel and Madge, Nicola (eds) (1982), Despite the Welfare State, Heinemann Educational Books, London.Google Scholar
Jones, David Caradog (ed.) (1934), The Social Survey of Merseyside, Vol. III, Hodder and Stoughton, London.Google Scholar
Jones, David Caradog (1939), ‘Heredity and Environment’, unpublished typescript, David Caradog Jones Papers, D 48/3.Google Scholar
Jones, David Caradog (1973), Power: a Gift ta Ordinary People. the Autobiography of David Caradog Jones, unpublished typescript, David Caradog Jones Papers, D 48/1.Google Scholar
Coffield, Frank, Robinson, Philip and Sarsby, Jacqui (1981), A Cycle of Deprivation? A Case Study of Four Families, Heinemann Educational Books, London.Google Scholar
Dahrendorf, Ralf (1985), letter to The Times, 3 06, 1985.Google Scholar
Donnison, David (1982), The Politics of Poverty, Martin Robertson, Oxford.Google Scholar
Dugdale, R.L. (1895 edn.), ‘The Jukes’: a Study in Crime, Pauperism, Disease and Heredity, G.P. Putnam's, New York.Google Scholar
Duncan, Greg J. and Hoffman, Saul D. (1986), ‘Welfare Dynamics and the Nature of Need’, The Cato Journal, Vol. 6, No. 1, Spring/Summer 1986, pp.31–54.Google Scholar
Eugenics Review (1963), ‘Obituary of E.J. Lidbetter’, Vol. 54, No. 4, 01, 1953, pp.191–3.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1923a), Mrs. C. Hodson to C. Burt, 16 04 1923; EUG C 52.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1923b), C. Burt to Mrs. C. Hodson, 17 April 1923; EUG C 52.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (mid 1920s), Memorandum, ‘Research Into Social Qualities and Health of a Sample of Our Population’, n.d., c. mid 1920s; EUG C 53.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1925a), Memorandum, ‘Science and Social Service’; EUG F 8.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1925b), Memorandum, ‘Proposed Series of Samples’; EUG C 210.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1927), Circular Letter, ‘Enquiry Into Causes and Continuance of Destitution (Poor Law)’, n.d., c. 1927; EUG C 210.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (early 1930s), Memorandum by L.S. Penrose, ‘The Complex Determinants of Amentia—Abstract’, n.d., c. early 1930s; EUG C 271.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1930a), Julian Huxley, ‘What Are We to Do With Our Mental Defectives?’, typescript article; EUG C 195.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1930b), A.F. Tredgold to Sir Bernard Mallett, 24 November, 1930; EUG C 337.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1931a), C.P. Blacker to the Commonwealth Fund, 24 March, 1981; EUG C 185.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1931b), C.P. Blacker to E.J. Lidbetter, 27 June, 1931; EUG C 209.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1932), Memorandum, ‘The Social Problem Group’, n.d., c. 1932; EUG D 197.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1933), C.P. Blacker to A.M. Carr-Saunders, 20 11, 1933; EUG C 209.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1935), C.P. Blacker, ‘Memorandum on the Formation of an Institute of Family Relations’, unpublished typescript; EUG C 57.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives (1944), C.P. Blacker to A.M. Carr-Saunders, 20 June, 1944; EUG C 58.Google Scholar
Eugenics Society Archives, files EUG F 1–5.Google Scholar
Harrington, Michael (1964), The Other America. Poverty in the United States, Macmillan, New York, 1964 edn.Google Scholar
Hill, Martha et al. (1985), Motivation and Economic Mobility, Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.Google Scholar
House of Commons Debates, Vol. 255, 21 07 1931, Col. 1249.Google Scholar
Jones, Kathleen (1972), A History of the Mental Health Services, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.Google Scholar
Jordan, Bill (1974), Poor Parents—Social Policy and the ‘Cycle of Deprivation’, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.Google Scholar
SirJoseph, Keith (1972), Speech to the Pre-school Playgroups Association, 29 06, 1972.Google Scholar
SirJoseph, Keith (1974), Speech at Birmingham, 19 10, 1974.Google Scholar
Kevles, Daniel J. (1985), In the Name of Eugenics, Alfred A. Knopf, New York.Google Scholar
Lewis, Oscar (1975), La Vida, Random House, New York.Google Scholar
Loney, Martin (1983), Community Against Government: the British Community Development Project, 1968–78—a Study in Government Incompetence, Heinemann Educational Books, London.Google Scholar
Lidbetter, E.J. (1933), Heredity and the Social Problem Group, Vol. 1, Edward Arnold, London.Google Scholar
Macnicol, John (1984), ‘Eugenics and the Campaign for Voluntary Sterilisation Between the Wars’, unpublished paper for Conference on the Declining Birth Rate in Europe, Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, London, September, 1984.Google Scholar
Macnicol, John (1986), ‘The Evacuation of Schoolchildren’, in Smith, Harold (ed.), War and Social Change: British Society in the Second World War, Manchester University Press, Manchester, pp. 3–31.Google Scholar
Marshall, Alfred (1890), Principles of Economics, Macmillan, London.Google Scholar
Moynihan, Daniel P. (1965), The Negro Family: the Case for National Action, Office of Policy Planning and Research, US Department of Labor.Google Scholar
Public Record Office (PRO) (1932), L.G. Brock to Sir Arthur Robinson, 16 03, 1932; MH 79/292.Google Scholar
Public Record Office (PRO) (1930), A.R. Maxwell-Hyslop to D. Buckle, 19 09, 1939; ED 10/245.Google Scholar
Ray, L.J. (1983), ‘Eugenics, Mental Deficiency and Fabian Socialism Between the Wars’, Oxford Review of Education, Vol. 9, No. 3, 1983, pp.213–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Report of the Mental Deficiency Committee (1929a), Report of the Mental Deficiency Committee, being a Joint Committee of the Board of Education and the Board of Control, Part 1—General, 1929.Google Scholar
Report of the Mental Deficiency Committee (1929b), Report of the Mental Deficiency Committee, being a Joint Committee of the Board of Education and the Board of Control, Part III—the Adult Defective, 1929.Google Scholar
Jones, Gareth Stedman (1971), Outcast London, Oxford University Press, London.Google Scholar
Stephens, Tom (ed.) (1947), Problem Familles: an Experiment in Social Rehabilitation, Pacifist Service Units, Liverpool and Manchester, 1947 edn.Google Scholar
Titmuss, Richard (1965), ‘Goals of Today's Welfare State’, in Anderson, Perry and Blackburn, Robin (eds.) Towards Socialism, Cornell University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Tonge, W.L., James, D.S. and Hillam, Susan M. (1975), Families Without Hope: a Controlled Study of 33 Problem Families, Royal College of Psychiatrists, Hedley.Google Scholar
Townsend, Peter (1974), ‘The Cycle of Deprivation—the History of a Confused Thesis’, in British Association of Social Workers, The Cycle of Deprivation: Papers Presented to a National Study Conference, Manchester University, March, 1974, B.A.S.W., Birmingham.Google Scholar
Townsend, Peter (1979), Poverty in the United Kingdom, Penguin, Harmondsworth.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Treble, James H. (1983), Urban Poverty in Britain, 1930–1914, Methuen, London, 1983 edn.Google Scholar
Wilson, William Julius (1985), ‘Cycles of Deprivation and the Underclass Debate’, Social Service Review, Vol. 59, No. 4, 12 1985, pp.541–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wofford, John G. (1969), ‘The Politics of Local Responsibility: Administration of the Community Action Program, 1964–1966’, in Sundquist, James L. (ed.), On Fighting Poverty, Basic Books Inc., New York.Google Scholar
The Women's Group on Public Welfare (1943), Our Towns: a Close-Up, Oxford University Press, London.Google Scholar
Wootton, Barbara (1959), Social Science and Social Pathology, Allen and Unwin, London.Google Scholar