Anne Digby

British welfare policy : workhouse to workfare

This study is designed to fill the gap between histories of welfare policies, which normally take the story only as far as the emergence of the welfare state in the 1940s, and discussions of social policy, which are typically concerned only with current issues and very recent changes. It thus aims to place contemporary policies in their full historical perspective from the 1830s to the 1980s. The text demonstrates the recurrence of dilemmas posed by such issues as eligibility for relief, selectivity versus universality, or the role of means testing. Similarly, it suggests that there is a long term continuity in the social inequality sustained by certain other forms of benefit, such as occupational pensions, and the incidence of tax reliefs on insurance premiums or mortgage interest. The extent to which apparently modern initiatives have been shaped by earlier policies is emphasized in the books analysis of the changing boundary between provision of public welfare and private alternatives in the form of charity, informal care or voluntary services.

Making a Medical Living: Doctors and Patients in the English Market for Medicine, 1720-1911.

Introduction Part I. The Professional Structure of Practice: 1. Medical practitioners 2. The context of practice 3. Medical encounters Part II. The Economic Dimensions of Practice: 4. The creation of surgical general practice 5. The GP and the goal of prosperity 6. Physicians Part III. Patients and Doctors: 7. Medicalisation and affluent patients 8. Office, altruism and poor patients 9. Expanding practice with women and child patients Part IV. Synthesis: Reflections.

Madness, Morality and Medicine: A Study of the York Retreat, 1796-1914.

This detailed study of the York Retreat (famous for promoting mild methods of treatment for the insane) uses for the first time the unrivalled wealth of archival material on the Retreats history and is thus able to tackle the complexities of the development of psychotherapy in the nineteenth century. Dr Digbys approach is both analytical and comparative, placing the Retreat in the context of related developments and evaluating the distinctive nature of its approach, the extent of its influence in Britain and the United States, and the degree of success of its treatment. The book details a computerized study of the patients and also examines the personal papers of a Retreat attendant, which provides rare insight into the attitudes of those who cared for the insane in Victorian England. This comprehensive account is further highlighted by a selection of original photographs from the Retreats archives.