Shorts

This practitioner-oriented text is the first to help social researchers define research projects, manage the social research process, engage with stakeholders and influence change. It will be invaluable for all those commissioning, managing and conducting social research.

This book calls for a bold forward-looking social policy that addresses continuing austerity, under-resourced organisations and a lack of social solidarity. Based on a research programme by the Webb Memorial Trust, a key theme is power which shows that the way forward is to increase people’s sense of agency in building the society that they want.

Bringing 25 years of research and teaching in the sociology of death and dying to this important book, Tony Walter engages critically with key questions around this universal fact.

Based on involved creative, qualitative work with families in India and the UK who live in different contexts, this book illuminates how environmental practices are negotiated within families, and how they relate to values, identities, and society.

In 2014 the ‘Trojan Horse’ affair, an alleged plot to ‘Islamify’ several state schools in Birmingham, caused a previously highly successful school to be vilified. Holmwood and O’Toole challenge the accepted narrative and show how it was used to justify an intrusive counter extremism agenda.

This important new book provides a framework for understanding the dynamics underpinning recent unprecedented levels of migration across, and loss of life in, the Mediterranean, casting new light on the ‘migration crisis’ and challenging politicians, policy makers and the media to rethink their understanding of why and how people move.

An examination of the early work of the innovative Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children Ethics and Law Committee. It will help anyone involved in other cohort studies to understand how ethical policies evolve.

Throughout history there has always been an ‘other’, often based on culture, race, gender or class, that has been demonised by the majority. Whitehead challenges the idea that this is an inevitable fact of life. This important book offers a resolution that benefits society as a whole rather than just the powerful few.

Custody visitors are volunteers who make unannounced visits to police custody blocks to check on the welfare of detainees. However, there is a fundamental power imbalance between the police and these visitors. This timely book offers detailed proposals for radically reforming custody visiting to make it an effective regulator of police behaviour.

Irish law only currently allows for abortion where the life of the pregnant woman is at risk. A constitutional referendum will be held in 2018 to liberalise abortion law. This book offers practical proposals for policymakers and advocates, including model legislation, making it an essential campaigning tool leading up to the referendum.