Making A Life On Mean Welfare Av Emma (Western Sydney University) Mitchell

<P>We are often told that mean welfare is what the public wants. Whether or not that's true, this book encourages us to at least be honest about what that entails. </P><P> It explores how diverse welfare users navigate the personal and practical hurdles of Australia’s so-called social security system, where benefits are deliberately meagre and come with strings attached. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in a region of Sydney known for ethnic diversity and socio-economic disadvantage, Emma Mitchell brings her own experience of belonging to a poor family long reliant on welfare to her research. </P><P> This book shows the different cultural resources that people bring to welfare encounters with a sensitivity and subtlety that are often missing in both sympathetic and cynical accounts of life on welfare.</P>