Social policy is often constructed and implemented by people who have little experience of its impact as a service user, but there has been a growing interest in greater public, patient and service user involvement in social policy as both political activity and academic discipline.

Social Policy First Hand is the first comprehensive international social policy text from a participatory perspective and presents a new service user-led social policy that addresses the current challenges in welfare provision.

A companion volume to Peter Beresford's bestselling All our welfare, it introduces the voices of different groups of service users, starting from their lived experience. With an impressive list of contributors, this important volume fills a gap in looking at social policy using participatory and inclusive approaches and the use of experiential knowledge in its construction. It will challenge traditional state and market-led approaches to welfare.

Foreword ~ Baroness Ruth Lister

Introduction ~ Peter Beresford and Sarah Carr

Part I: Service users and social policy: an introduction

Challenging Injustice: the importance of collective ownership of social policy ~ Danny Dorling

Participation and solidarity in a changing welfare state ~ Peter Taylor-Gooby

Social policy in developing countries: A post-colonial critique and participatory inquiry ~ Sweta Rajan-Rankin

Advancing sustainability: developing participatory social policy in the context of environmental disasters ~ Margaret Alston

Social policy and disability ~ Colin Cameron

A case study of children’s participation in health policy and practice ~ Louca-Mai Brady, Felicity Hathway and Emily Roberts

Who owns co-production? ~ Sarah Carr

Part II: Critiquing and reconceiving Beveridge’s ‘five giant evils’: Key areas of British post-war social policy from a lived experience perspective

Rethinking disabled people’s rights to work and contribute ~ Jane Young

Talking policy as a patient ~ Anya de Iongh

‘We don’t deal with people we deal with bricks and mortar’: a lived experience perspective on UK health and housing policy ~ Alison Cameron

Education (ignorance) addressing inclusive education: the issues and its importance from a participatory perspective ~ Tara Flood and Navin Kikabhai

‘For work, we came here to find work’: migrant Roma employment and the labour of language ~ Colin Clark

Part III: The contribution of service user knowledges

Disability policy and lived experience: reflections from regional Australia ~ Kathy Boxall, Adam Johnson, Lawrence Mitting, Suzanne Simpson,

Stefan Zwickl, Judith Zwickl, Shae Kermit, Luke and Caroline

Renewing epistemologies: service user knowledge ~ Diana Rose

Pornography, feminist epistemology and changing public policy ~ Ruth Beresford

Making social policy internationally: a participatory research perspective ~ Nicola Yeates and Ana B. Amaya

Part IV: An inclusive life course and developmental approach to social policy

Disabled children’s lives: an inclusive life course and developmental approach to social policy ~ Mary Wickenden

Troubled Youth and Troubling Social Policy: Mental Health From a Mad Studies Perspective ~ Lucy Costa

Disability: an inclusive life course and developmental approach to social policy ~ Emmeline Burdett

Independent living from a Black Disabled Woman’s perspective ~ Michelle Daley

Food poverty and the policy context in Ireland ~ Deirdre O’Connor

Implementing race equality policies in British health and social care: a perspective from experience ~ Hári Sewell

Participatory approaches to social policy in relation to ageing ~ Sarah Lonbay

Death, dying and digital stories ~ Lisa Williams, Merryn Gott, Tess Moeke-Maxwell, Stella Black, Shuchi Kothari, Sarina Pearson, Peter James Simpson, Tessa Morgan, Marianne Grbin, Matua Rawiri Wharemate and Whaea Whio Hansen

Part V: Transforming social policy

People acting collectively can be powerful ~ Jennie Fleming

Their participation and ours: competing visions of empowerment ~ Iain Ferguson

A participatory approach to professional practice ~ Suzy Croft

Dreams of justice ~ Tina Minkowitz

Sustainable-participatory social policy ~ Marilyn Palmer

Participatory social policy in a large EU research project ~ Joe Greener and Michael Lavalette, with Rose Devereaux and members

of SUGAH

Part VI: Campaigning and change

Section One: Approaches to activism

'What Is strong, now what is wrong' An interview with Clenton Farquharson MBE

Participatory social policy and social change: exploring the role of social entrepreneurship linked to forms of social and micro enterprises in the field of social care ~ Barbara Fawcett

Public duty, whistleblowing and scandal: influences on public policy ~ Kay Sheldon

Visual: Making the case for single sex mental health wards ~ Kay Sheldon

'Informed gender practice in acute mental health': when policy makes sense ~ Nicky Lambert

#JusticeforLB: in search of truth, accountability and justice ~ George Julian and Sara Ryan

Section Two: The role of online platforms and social media

Guerilla policy: new platforms for making policy from below ~ Michael Harris

A Magna Carta for learning disabled people ~ Kaliya Franklin and Gary Bourlet

Pat’s Petition: The emerging role of social media and the internet ~ Pat Onions and others

Part VII: Breaking down barriers

Section One: Inclusion and difference in the formulation and operation of social policy

"LGBT History Month is a thing!" The story of an equal rights campaign ~ Sue Sanders

Section Two: user-led approaches to social policy

Transforming professional training and education - a gap mending approach: The PowerUs European partnership ~ Helen Casey

Grassroots tackling policy: the making of the 'Spartacus Report' ~ Sam Barnett-Cormack

Involvement for influence: developing the 4Pi Involvement Standards ~ Sarah Yiannoullou and Alison Faulkner

Part VIII: Participatory research and evaluation

From expert to service user: challenging how lived experience is demeaned ~ Michele Moore

Participatory methodologies involving marginalised perspectives ~ Charlotte Williams

Developing the evidence to challenge ‘welfare reform’: the road to ‘Cash Not Care’ ~ Mo Stewart

Service user-controlled research for evidence-based policy making ~ Alison Faulkner

Participatory citizenship, gender and human trafficking in Nepal ~ Diane Richardson, Nina Laurie, Meena Poudel, Shakti Samuha and Janet Townsend

Experiential knowledge in mental health policy and legislation: can we ever change the agenda? ~ Jasna Russo

Conclusion ~ Peter Beresford and Sarah Carr