The end of destitution: Evidence from British working households 1904-1937

This paper estimates and investigates the reduction, almost to elimination, of absolute poverty among working households in Britain between 1904 and 1937. To do this, it exploits two newly-digitised data sets. The paper is a statistical generalisation, to working families in the whole of Britain, of the finding that absolute poverty declined dramatically over the early part of the twentieth century in the towns studied by, among others, Bowley and Rowntree. The paper offers a number of pieces of corroborative evidence that support the estimates. It simulates a decomposition of the poverty reduction into the effects of three proximate causes. The first two causes are the decline in family size and the rise of real wages and these were of roughly equal importance for poverty reduction. The third cause is a decline in wage inequality, but this is of relatively minor importance for poverty reduction among working households. It concludes with a discussion of deeper causes.poverty, living standards, Britain, demographic change, real wage growth

The meanings of happiness in Mass Observation's Bolton

In April 1938, the social investigative organization, Mass Observation conducted an inquiry into the happiness of Bolton people. In this article we analyse the letters and questionnaire responses generated through a competition that asked, ‘What is happiness?’ We examine the extent to which these competition entrants were representative of Bolton population and conclude that they were broadly representative in terms of occupation and sex, but less so in terms of social class. We describe the factors which according to competition entrants determined individual happiness. These were remarkably stable across age groups and gender. Economic security emerged as the dominant consideration, whilst personal pleasure was represented as playing little part in generating happiness. A detailed analysis of the happiness letters and questionnaires suggests that introspective and relational factors were also important determinants of well-being. We demonstrate that these introspective factors were framed by an individual’s personal moral framework and that relational factors were under-pinned by gendered conceptions of domestic happiness

No Room to Live: Urban Overcrowding in Edwardian Britain

We study the extent of overcrowding amongst British urban working families in the early 1900s and find major regional differences. In particular, a much greater proportion of households in urban Scotland were overcrowded than in the rest of Britain and Ireland. We investigate the causes of this spatial distribution of overcrowding and find that prices, especially rents and wages are the proximate causes of the phenomenon. In large cities, ports and cities specialising in old heavy industries high rent and overcrowding are more prevalent. Within cities, but not between cities, variations in infant mortality are clearly correlated with measures of overcrowding. All the findings are consistent with a core-periphery view of urban households choosing the location and size of housing to balance the health risks of overcrowding against the risks associated with lower and less regular incomes in places where rents are lower.poverty, rent, overcrowding, Scotland, 1904, infant mortality, Bowley

The First WorldWar andWorking-Class Food Consumption in Britain

This paper reassesses the food consumption and dietary impact of the regimes of food and food price control and eventually, food rationing, that were introduced in Britain during the First World War. At the end of the War the Sumner Committee was convened to investigate the effects of these controls on the diets of working class families. With the help of some of the original returns of an earlier 1904 survey, we are able to reassess the Sumner Committee findings. We find that, although calories intakes did not fall for households headed by unskilled workers, there were substantial falls for skilled workers’ households. We also find that the price controls were particularly effective in changing the pattern of food spending. In particular, because the prices of many fruits and vegetables were allowed to rise much more than other foods, there were large falls in the intakes of nutrients most associated with these foods, to average levels well below today’s recommended intakes.First World War, Britain, food controls, food consumption, nutrition

Evaluation of the Villiers Park Scholars Programme

An evaluation of the Villiers Park Scholars Programme was carried out by Louise Gazeley, Judy Sebba, Sarah Aynsley and Angela Jacklin from the Department of Education at the University of Sussex between 2009 and 2011. The Villiers Park Scholars Programme identified young people from less advantaged backgrounds who displayed high academic potential and sought to improve their chances of gaining entry to 'centres of excellence at leading universities'. The evaluating team focused on tracking the impact of the programme on its first cohorts of scholars over a two year period. A multi-site case study approach was adopted for which data was collected in three phases for each of the 10 participating institutions. The main impact at school level related to improvements in the identification of high potential. Analysis of the quantitaive data showed Year 11 scholars in three schools performing favourably at GCSE level in relation to the top 25 per cent of their peer group. Feedback from the scholars themselves indicated that the mentoring they had received had contributed to changes in their academic and study skills that contributed to improved attainment. Staff, parents and scholars all felt that changes in the performance of identified scholars was seen in their motivation, self-esteem and confidence in particular. Greater impact was seen in relation to Year 11 scholars and those without a parent who had been to university. Staff and scholars also considered that the programme had improved scholars' knowledge of higher education. Analysis of the destinations data for Year 13 scholars revealed that around half of those for whom data was available took up places in 'leading' universities. Scholars who did not have a parent who went to university were found to be more likely to say that their involvement in the programme had changed their future plane

Unpacking ‘disadvantage’ and ‘potential’ in the context of fair access policies in England

Policy makers internationally are increasingly preoccupied with the need for education systems to be developed in ways that mitigate unfairness. What is more contestable is what might need to change. In England this emphasis has informed the development of fair access policies that aim to improve the representation of ‘disadvantaged’ young people of high ‘potential’ at high status universities. Drawing on research conducted at the inception of one fair access intervention, this paper provides original insights into a process of policy translation that requires multiple encodings and decodings of two constructs that defy ready definition, with their intersection being a particular point of difficulty. Behind the apparent objectivity of commonly used selection criteria sits a process of situated decision-making that incorporates not only the particularities of institutional context and the understandings of key actors, but also macro level pressures that reinforce the need for changes in understandings of fairness at the top

The End of Destitution

The paper presents a statistical generalisation, to working families in the whole of Britain, of Rowntree's finding that absolute poverty declined dramatically in York between 1899 and 1936. We use poverty lines devised by contemporary social investigators and two relatively newly-discovered data sets. We estimate an almost complete elimination of absolute poverty among working households for the whole of the Britain between 1904 and 1937. We offer a number of pieces of corroborative evidence that give support to our findings. We decompose the poverty reduction into the effects of two proximate causes, of roughly equal importance, the decline in family size and the rise of real wages. We conclude with some speculation about the deeper causes of the decline.poverty, living standards, Britain, demographic change, real wage growth

Deploying teaching assistants to support learning: from models to typologies

The deployment of Teaching Assistants (TAs) to support learning has been the subject of much critical debate, including the particular concern that TAs too often becomes a less skilled replacement for the teacher rather than acting as an additional source of support. Despite efforts to encapsulate the TAs contribution to learning within specific models of deployment, wide variations in practices make the role and its contribution to learning difficult to define. Drawing on data gathered in four secondary schools in England, this paper explores TA deployment practices through six typologies: The Island; The Container; The Separate Entity; The Conduit for Learning; The Partner and The Expert. Illustrated graphically, these bring key elements together in a more contextualised and dynamic way. The paper concludes that the spatial and relational dimensions of deployment warrant more nuanced treatment and that more emphasis on partnership and mutuality and rather less on difference and hierarchy might be productiv

The strong ‘weak state’ : French statebuilding and military rule in Mali

Drawing on newly collected empirical data, this article explores the complex long-term political relationship between the state and the military in Mali. It argues that post-2013 French intervention has lacked an understanding of the place of the military within state structures. This led to an approach to statebuilding premised on the false idea that Mali has historically been a weak state, with weakness defined in military terms. It challenges this understanding and provides a counterargument rooted in a historical approach. It highlights how the French focus on military strengthening post-2013 inadvertently created the conditions for the 2020 coup d’état.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Reducing inequalities in school exclusion: learning from good practice

The research reported here was commissioned by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner’s to inform the second year of their on-going School Exclusions Inquiry. The first year of the inquiry culminated in the publication of the report They Never Give Up On You which included an analysis of recent national data on recorded exclusions from school that provided stark evidence of inequality for particular groups. Concerns about the disproportionate impact of school exclusion on specific groups of young people are not new and there have previously been attempts at policy level to reduce inequalities. However, the relationship between exclusion and other educational and social processes is complex and these inequalities persist. The over-arching objective of the research was therefore to identify characteristics of good practice in addressing inequalities in school exclusions, with particular attention to the following factors: Free School Meals; gender; ethnicity; and Special Educational Needs (SEN)