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Dr Chris Grover

Senior Lecturer in Social Policy

Associated research centres and groups: Child Welfare Research Unit CWRU, Criminology, Health and Welfare Policy Analysis

Current Teaching

I currently teach the following courses:

ASSC 109 Social Divisions and Social Diversity 1

ASSC 210 Crime, Poverty and Social Security

I also make a contribution to the following courses:

ASSC 102 Crime and Social Life

ASSC 205 Criminological Thought

ASSC 271 Practising Equality for Social Work

ASSC 421 Social Divisions and Social Diversity

Research Interests

Discipline and social security; loaning social security benefits; political economy and poverty and social security; social security policy and low wages; crime, inequality and social policy.

I joined the Department of Applied Social Science as a member of staff in January 2001, although I have had connections with it since 1989 when I started to study as an undergraduate. After graduating I studied in the department for a PhD that examined the introduction of the social security benefit, Family Credit in 1988.

In 1998 I left the department to work for the pressure group, the Daycare Trust as a researcher. Having got fed up with travelling to London and the politics of the voluntary sector, I retreated north to Bradford University where I worked as a Lecturer in Social Policy and Social Work before coming back to Lancaster University.

My main current research interests are concerned with analysing contemporary and historical changes in income maintenance and labour market policy. I am interested in the ways in which such policies are shaped by concerns with groups in the population that are deemed to be 'problematic', such as lone mothers and young people, and the ways in which income maintenance and labour market policies are held to be more important because of their macro-economic benefits, rather than their social benefits. I am currently engaged in research at the National Archives which is focusing upon the introduction of Family Income Supplement in 1971 and how one of the guiding principles - that market wages should not be subsidised by the state - which had shaped social security policy making from the introduction of the Poor Law Amendment Act, was overcome by policy makers in the 1970s.

More directly related to criminology, I am interested in the press reporting of crime, particularly the reporting of sexual offences and the ways in which groups in the population (most notably black and working class men) are constructed as sex offenders.

Reflecting these research interests I teach courses called Crime, Poverty and Social Security and Crime and the Media . I also make a contribution to the core Criminology course Criminological Thought and the first year course Crime and Social Life .

Recent Publications

Grover, C. and Piggott, L. (forthcoming, 2005), 'Disabled people, the reserve army of labour and welfare reform', Disability and Society , vol. 20, no. 7.

Grover, C. (2005), "Living Wages and the 'Making Work Pay' Strategy", Critical Social Policy , vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 5-27.

Grover, C. (2005), 'The National Childcare Strategy: the social regulation of lone mothers as a gendered reserve army of labour', Capital and Class , no. 85, pp. 63-85 .

Grover, C. (2005) 'Crime and Inequality', in Peelo, M. and Soothill, K. (eds.), Questioning Crime and Criminology , Cullompton, Willan.

Grover, C. (2004), A History of Morecambe and Heysham Citizens Advice Bureau , Morecambe, Morecambe and Heysham Citizens Advice Bureau.

Grover, C. and Stewart, J. (2004) 'Care Leavers, Financial Support and the Children (Leaving Care) Act, 2000', Benefits: a journal of social security research policy and practice , vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 107-111.

Grover, C., Stewart, J. and Broadhurst, K. (2004), 'Transitions to Adulthood: some critical observations of the Children (Leaving Care) Act, 2000', Social Work and Social Sciences Review , vol. 11, no. 1, pp. 5-18

Grover, C. (2003), "'New Labour', welfare reform and the reserve army of labour", Capital and Class, no. 79.

Grover, C. and Stewart, J. (2002), The Work Connection: the role of social security in regulating British economic life, Basingstoke, Palgrave.

McCalla-Chen, D., Grover, C. and Penn, H. (2001), Local Nurseries for Local Communities, London, National Children's Bureau.

Grover, C. and Stewart, J. (2000), "Modernising welfare: 'new Labour' and social security', Social Policy and Administration, vol. 33, no. 3.

Grover, C. and Soothill, K. (1999), 'Bigamy: Neither Love nor Marriage, but a Threat to the Nation', Sociological Review, vol. 47, no. 2, pp. 332-344.

Grover, C. and Stewart, J. (1999), "'Market Workfare': Social security and competitiveness in the 1990s", Journal of Social Policy, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 73-96.

Potential Doctoral Proposals

Social security policy, particularly in the areas of in-work benefits and loaning benefits; relationships between crime and inequality; relationships between crime and social policy.

Associated Keywords: Child care, Disability and employment, Disability and welfare, Entry-level work, Family, Labour market policy, Living wages, Loaning social security, National childcare strategy, Parenting, Poor law, Regulation, Social exclusion, Social fund, Social justice, Social policy, Social policy and criminology, Social security and welfare reform, Welfare, Welfare practices, Worklessness, Youth employment/unemployment

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