The relationship between different approaches to the study of social policy making is often ambiguous. An attempt to relate subjectivist approaches to others in order to establish their applicability and relevance to policy making requires the prior clarification of these relationships in the form of a typology. This is used to illustrate ‘category mistakes’ that occur in the literature on policy making as well as to make more explicit the differences and similarities between alternative approaches. The nature of subjectivist approaches is further explored and the limitations of such approaches illustrated in respect of a particular study of policy making. The difficulty of establishing connections between subjectivist accounts of policy making in terms of actors' constructions and meanings, and the tangible outputs of the policy process, is shown as an important problem from this study. The article then turns to the usefulness of subjectivist approaches, especially in testing assertions made about the nature of the policy process by alternative approaches, and concludes with some remarks about the epistemological status of subjectivist accounts.

The article uses a distinction between topic and discipline to argue that social administration, like economics, is characterized by both, but that social administration has the special advantage, in treating the topic of social policy, of being multi-disciplinary. An account is presented of why economics is underrepresented among the disciplines of social administration, and three important contributory roles are outlined for economics to play in the development of social administration.

In both Britain and the USA a young person leaving school with few or no qualifications faces great difficulties in obtaining employment. A number of policies have been developed in both countries to help counter some of the problems to which an increasing proportion of young unemployed gives rise. This article examines some of these policies and their underlying assumptions about the causes of youth unemployment. It attempts to identify the strengths and weaknesses of programmes developed by both the training and education services and to see what relevance the more extensive youth policies in the USA may have for the problems and policies nurtured in Britain.

Singapore and Hong Kong are two of the most advanced industrial countries in east and south-east Asia. Comparisons between them have often been made, and this article takes their social security systems as a subject for examination. It begins with a brief discussion of the social, economic and political structures of Singapore and Hong Kong, identifying their similarities and differences; this is followed by a comparison of their existing social security provisions and the functions they perform in the two societies. It is found that, while Singapore and Hong Kong are now both affluent enough to provide their workers with comprehensive income protection, industrialization in the two cities has not brought a corresponding development in their social security systems. Other considerations seem to be more important than the need for such measures.

The first part of this article explores the ways in which the term ‘prevention’ is utilized in the field of the personal social services. The conclusion is reached that, unlike its legitimate use in the physical world, the term is intellectually confused when applied to social services. In Part Two it is argued that this confusion has unanticipated and damaging consequences. It leads to an unfair deal for clients, to confusion and status differentials for staff, and an increase in the social control apparatus of public agencies. It is suggested that the abandonment of ‘pseudo-prevention’ may lead to the clarification and explication of more defensible boundaries based on the analysis of problems rather than the attainment of ideal states.