Privatisation, Welfare Services and Welfare

Abstract

Interest in the subject of privatisation in Australia has increased markedly over recent years, although references to it have been made in the literature intermittently over a longer period. The original purpose of this bibliography was to record items dealing with the privatisation of welfare services. However, as work on collecting material for the entries proceeded, it became obvious that it is extremely difficult to separate privatisation of welfare services from the effects on welfare of the privatisation of enterprises not directly concerned with those services. Privatisation of enterprises such as the water supply and communication services, has direct or indirect effects on the well-being of the population. It introduces the question of 'community service obligations' (CSOs), or the non-commercial objectives of government business organisations, which are often lost when these organisations are privatised. This bibliography has therefore widened its scope to include works which refer to the effects on the well-being of the population of the privatisation of enterprises not directly in the welfare area.

Another issue which has affected the choice of entries has been that of what constitutes privatisation. A number of works cited here are concerned with definition and with detailing the nature of the changes which are entailed in different forms of privatisation: deregulation, the introduction of user-pays practices, asset sales etc. Among these may be included an expanded role for the voluntary or non-profit sector in the provision of community and welfare services. These entries are found under the keyword 'Forms'.