Welfare and Social Policy in Britain Since 1870 : Essays in Honour of Jose Harris

This collection of twelve essays reviews the history of welfare in Britain over the past 150 years.It focuses on the ideas that have shaped the development of British social policy, and on the thinkers who have inspired and also contested the welfare state.It thereby constructs an intellectual history of British welfare since the concept first emerged at the end of the nineteenth century. The essays divide into four sections. The first considers the transition from laissez-faire to social liberalism from the 1870s, and the enduring impact of late-Victorian philosophical idealism on the development of the welfare state.It focuses on the moral philosophy of T. H. Green and his influence on key figures in the history of British social policy like William Beveridge, R.H. Tawney, and William Temple. The second section is devoted to the concept of 'planning' which was once, in the mid-twentieth century, at the heart of social policy and its implementation, but which has subsequently fallen o