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National evidence shows that around 60% of patients would prefer to receive end of life care and die at home, but in 2005 in North Derbyshire only 20% of patients were supported to do so. This article discusses the tools used to improve end of life care services in the community and explores the enablers and barriers.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the consequences of experiencing social isolation in a context of dirty work. Relying on an integration of the job demands-resources model (Schaufeli and Bakker, 2004) with the social identity approach (Ashforth and Kreiner, 1999), the paper posits that perceived social isolation prevents the development of defense mechanisms that could counter the occupational stigma, and thus tends to increase perceptions of stigmatization, and to decrease perceptions of the prosocial impact of their work. Through these two perceptions, perceived social isolation indirectly affects emotional exhaustion and work engagement.

Research hypotheses are tested among a sample of 195 workers in the commercial cleaning industry who execute physically tainted tasks.

Results support the research model. Perceived prosocial impact mediates the negative relationship between perceived social isolation and work engagement, and perceived stigmatization mediates the positive relationship between perceived social isolation and emotional exhaustion.

This research contributes to the dirty work literature by empirically examining one of its implicit assumptions, namely, that social isolation prevents the development of coping strategies. It also contributes to the literature on well-being and work engagement by demonstrating how they are affected by the social context of work.

The present paper is the first to study the specific challenges of social isolation in dirty work occupations and its consequences.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the shifting roles of medical professionals as stakeholders in opioid substitution treatment (OST) policies and practices in Denmark and the UK within the past 15 years.

The paper is based on literature reviews, documentary analyses and key informant interviews with a range of stakeholders involved in OST and policy in Denmark and UK. The study is part of the EU-funded project: Addictions and Lifestyles in Contemporary Europe: Reframing Addictions Project.

Denmark and the UK are amongst those few European countries that have long traditions and elaborate systems for providing OST to heroin users. The UK has a history of dominance of medical professionals in drugs treatment, although this has been recently challenged by the recovery movement. In Denmark, a social problem approach has historically dominated the field, but a recent trend towards medicalisation can be traced. As in all kinds of policy changes, multiple factors are at play when shifts occur. We examine how both countries’ developments around drugs treatment policy and practice relate to broader societal, economic and political changes, how such divergent developments emerge and how medical professionals as stakeholders enhanced their roles as experts in the field through a variety of tactics, including the production and use of “evidence”, which became a key tool to promote specific stakeholder’s perspectives in these processes.

The paper contributes to current policy and practice debates by providing comparative analyses of drug policies and examination of stakeholder influences on policy processes.

This chapter starts with a short discussion of social work and how it interlinks educational issues with forms of support to enable people to cope with difficult situations. An example shall illustrate that a global perspective on questions of governance in social work has to consider the historical, economic, and political context in which it takes place. It will then be argued that “governance building” might be a fundamental necessity in strengthening the empowerment of people, and this means accepting the ambivalence of support and control. In this context, some distinguished authors will be identified who considered social movements as motors of governance bringing in normative aspects, which cannot be reduced to functional theory. Finally, the chapter concludes by reflecting on the role of research in defining support programs in welfare states.