SOC 6340/POEC 7340 Domestic Social Policy

Spring 2006 Tuesday 7:00 - 9:45 p.m. Classroom: GR3.606

Dr. Richard K. Scotch Office Hours: Tuesday 6-7 Office: GR3.510
Phone: 972-883-2922 Email: scotch@utdallas.edu

Domestic Social Policy addresses governmental and nongovernmental programs, policies, and
institutions dealing with individuals and families who do not function self-sufficiently within the
American market economy. Beneficiaries of such programs include children and youth, the elderly,
families headed by unemployed or under-employed parents, and people with physical and mental
disabilities. We will examine how social policy in the United States reflects the political economy,
culture, and demographic trends. The class will be run as a seminar, with an emphasis on group
discussion of assigned readings and current issues in social policy.

Course requirements include (open book essay) midterm and final examinations (30% of the total
course grade each) and a literature review paper (40% of the total course grade). The literature review
paper involves a summary and analysis of key scholarly and policy literature related to some issue in
social policy, to be chosen in consultation with the instructor. Students will be required to submit a
topic statement (on February 7) and annotated bibliography (on February 28) for their paper, both of
which must be approved by the instructor, and are expected to give a class presentation on their
papers during the final weeks of the class. Late assignments will be penalized unless prior approval is
received from the instructor. Students are responsible for following university rules for academic
honesty; violations will be referred to the Dean of Students for disciplinary proceedings.

Reading assignments include the following five books and some additional on-line readings related to
current policy debates that will announced in class.

Course Texts

Elijah Anderson, Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the
Inner City, W.W. Norton and Company, 1999
Sheldon H. Danziger and Robert H. Haveman (eds.), Understanding Poverty,
Russell Sage Foundation, 2002
Sharon Hays, Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform,
Oxford University Press, 2003
Jennifer Hochschild and Nathan Scovronick, The American Dream and the Public
Schools, Oxford University Press, 2003
William JuliusWilson, When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor.
Knopf, 1997

Course Outline (some changes may be announced in class)

January 10 Introduction to the Course; Definitions of Poverty

No assigned reading

January 17 Historical Overview of Social Policy

Reading: Danziger & Haveman, Introduction
Course Outline (continued)

January 24 Poverty Trends and Policy Responses

LIBRARY INSTRUCTION
Reading: Danziger & Haveman, chapters 1-5
Additional reading TBA

January 31 Inner City Poverty: Causes and Consequences

Reading: Wilson, all

February 7 Cash Assistance Programs

PAPER TOPIC DUE
Reading: Danziger & Haveman, chapters 6 & 7
Additional reading TBA

February 14 Welfare Reform

Reading: Hays, all

February 21 Midterm Examination

February 28 Homelessness
ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY DUE
Reading: Reading TBA

March 7 SPRING BREAK – NO CLASS MEETING

March 14 Culture, Crime, and the Inner City

Reading: Anderson, all

March 21 Health and Poverty

Reading: Danziger & Haveman, Chapter 8
Additional reading TBA

March 28 Education and Human Capital

Readings: Hochschild & Scovronick, all
Danziger & Haveman, Chapter 9

April 4 Race and Public Policy

Reading: Danziger & Haveman, Chapter 10
Additional reading TBA

April 11 Housing and Community Development

PAPER DUE
Reading: Danziger & Haveman, Chapter 12

April 18 Social Security and Medicare

Reading: TBA
April 25 FINAL EXAMINATION