Needham, Catherine, Allen, Kerry, Burn, Emily , Hall, Kelly, Mangan, Catherine, Al-Janabi, Hareth, Tahir, Warda, Carr, Sarah, Glasby, Jon and McKay, Steve (2022) How do you shape a market? Explaining local state practices in adult social care. Journal of Social Policy . pp. 1-21. ISSN 0047-2794
Full content URL: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047279421000805
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Item Type: | Article |
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Item Status: | Live Archive |
Abstract
The Care Act 2014 gave English local authorities a duty to ‘shape’ social care markets and encouraged them to work co-productively with stakeholders. Grid-group cultural theory is used here to explain how local authorities have undertaken market shaping, based on a four-part typology of rules and relationships. The four types are: procurement (strong rules, weak relationships); managed market (strong rules, strong relationships); open market (weak rules, weak relationships); partnership (weak rules, strong relationships). Qualitative data from English local authorities show that they are using different types of market shaping in different parts of the care market (e.g. residential vs home care), and shifting types over time. Challenges to the sustainability of the care system (rising demand, funding cuts, workforce shortages) are pulling local authorities towards the two ‘strong rules’ approaches which run against the co-productive thrust of the Care Act. Some local authorities are experimenting with hybrids of the two ‘weak rules’ approaches but the rival cultural biases of different types mean that hybrid approaches risk antagonising providers and further unsettling an unstable market.
Keywords: | Health and social care, social care outcomes, Markets |
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Subjects: | L Social studies > L432 Welfare Policy |
Divisions: | College of Social Science > School of Social & Political Sciences |
ID Code: | 46976 |
Deposited On: | 09 Nov 2021 15:22 |
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