PARENTS AND PRESCHOOL SERVICES: ISSUES OF PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT

Abstract

The debates on welfare provision in Britain are both familiar and well documented. (Loney, Boswell & Clarke 1984, Mishra 1984). It has been pointed out, however, by recent analysts (Barrett & Mcintosh 1982, Dale & Foster 1986) that quite different analyses of the deficiencies of the present system share common assumptions regarding the family. It will be argued here that this is particularly clear in current debates concerning parental involvement in pre school provision. Parental involvement has become a political catchphrase in the 1980's. It has been taken up by right and left, by community activists and central government. Much of the discussion, however, is underpinned by a particular view of the family. For the New Right the family is a focal point for much that is wrong in contemporary British society (Fitzgerald 1983). Parental involvement, here, is seen as a right and a duty for parents as well as a way to offset the reduction in individual responsibilities that have occurred with an invasive welfare state. The Left has also tended to view families in individualistic ways but has sought to redistribute educational opportunities through supporting parents to understand, use and make demands on overly centralised educational system e.g. Plowden 1967, Strathclyde Regional Council 1985. Parental involvement becomes a right and away to improve parents resources. The difficulties with these prescriptions, from Left and Right, is that their conceptualisation of the family ignores the realities of families and childcare, particularly in relation to women (David 1985, Wilson 1983). Thus they fail to take into account how these realities affect the way in which parents use and respond to parental involvement strategies.

Citation

Scott, G. (1990), "PARENTS AND PRESCHOOL SERVICES: ISSUES OF PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT", International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 10 No. 1, pp. 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb013082