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Social welfare history has needed historical reconsideration since the growth of regional research. Pivoting on a central theme of the development of public provision for social welfare, Comparative Development in Social Welfare (originally published in 1972) investigates how elements of social policy have evolved in Great Britain and the United States from the sixteenth to twentieth century.

Professor Briggs reviews the methodology of social welfare history and argues for a wide-ranging approach based on several disciplines; E.W. Martin then traces the development of English poor law administration from the time of parish dominance to that of union responsibility. J.S. Taylor gives the first detailed evaluation of the pre-1834 workhouses to be undertaken since the Webbs and Dorothy Newman, while Mark Neuman probes into the real significance of the Speenhamland system of relief. Blanche Coll shows how early Americans coped with their poor and freely adapted English poor law; Milton Speizman records the American historians' concern for social welfare from the Civil War to World War II. Eric Midwinter links local and central administration in Victorian social provision, and Brian Abel-Smith concludes with a comparison of the medical care in America and Europe.

This book affords a unique comparative perspective of how two major industrial nations have provided for social welfare, and is essential reading for social historians, social administrators and social workers.