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This chapter charts the relationships between the state and the voluntary sector under the 1997–2010 Labour governments. The period inaugurated a new stage in the social welfare role of voluntary action, which has developed since the nineteenth century from leading provision, through complementarity and supplementarity with regards to state welfare programmes in the twentieth century, and into the partnership seen at the start of the twenty-first century. Charting the various initiatives and institutional innovations of these years, the chapter makes the case for a ‘strategic unity’ amongst all the key agents and agencies, who had a collective interest in maintaining and developing the third sector as a space for policy intervention and forward planning. Overall, it demonstrates the significance of adaptation and renewal within the sector, rather than decline or co-option.

The move towards achieving the information society is not without certain consequences, particularly for government taxation, regional development, and employment. Since some analysts would perceive this investigation to be looking into the ‘impact’ of the previously illustrated socio-economic and technological changes, a specific aspect of these developments is found to be unavoidable and reliant on the ‘best use’ of technological opportunity. Our examination in this chapter draws attention to the implications of the said changes for the development of skills and the growth experienced by employment. We also explore the relations between the development of information infrastructure and the development of the non-profit sector, referred to as the ‘Third Sector’, while also looking into the initiatives in developing new technology applications and how e-commerce requires changes in the tax revenues collection.

This book explores how outside actors from the suburbs and from state government have intervened during the past fifteen years to redevelop the central city in ways that bolster the region. Drawing on evidence from greater Philadelphia, it considers these interventions as a kind of de facto regionalism that brings outside money and infuence into the city to help restructure urban land and services. It also shows how these interventions exacerbate the problems of transparency and accountability facing the citizens of the city, raising the question of whether initiatives that strengthen the region necessarily help city residents. This book argues that Third-Sector organizations have played a central role in “a postmodern urban process in which the urban periphery organizes the center within the context of a globalizing capitalism.” It examines the ways that Third-Sector organizations for urban development are blurring the boundaries between the public and private sectors in American civic life.

This chapter focuses on who governs the Third-Sector organizations in greater Philadelphia and what they are trying to accomplish. Contrary to predictions that economic elites would abandon the city, the Philadelphia case shows a more complicated picture. Although an increasing share of the region's wealthy residents both live and work in the suburbs, they have not altogether turned their back on the city. Those suburbs furnish volunteers who now occupy more than half of the board seats in the Third-Sector institutions leading development projects and pursuing the transformation of public education. This chapter shows how the Third Sector has emerged as an ideal vehicle to incorporate suburban influence in the rebuilding of the city's culture and tourism infrastructure, its institutions of higher education, research, medicine, and waterfront development. It also looks at the various funding channels that support urban redevelopment in Philadelphia and discusses the reasons why Third-Sector board members volunteer time and money to support the city.

This book concludes by reiterating the central role played by Third-Sector organizations in urban redevelopment in greater Philadelphia as powerful sources of money and influence from the suburbs. It considers the politics of urban redevelopment in greater Philadelphia and shows that Third-Sector organizations compete not only for patrons but also for capital funds to support ambitious building projects. It also examines how recent mayors have tended to engage the Third Sector through transactional politics rather than comprehensive planning. It argues that mayors and other public officials can gain full benefits from the presence of community development corporations, universities, hospitals, and other nonprofit organizations in Philadelphia by treating them more as public-purpose entities than as private corporations. In addition to effective partnerships with nonprofit service providers, Philadelphia must adopt a more coordinated approach to Third-Sector institutions as developers.

This chapter examines suburban influence in city institutions that are redeveloping urban spaces and, in the process, building new centers of gravity within the city. In the past twenty years Third-Sector organizations have played key roles in downtown development. In Philadelphia they have built a convention center, a regional performing arts center, and other facilities that are transforming downtown to serve visitors. They have made massive dollar investments to advance their own institutional goals and, in the process, have reshaped land-use patterns in central cities. Philadelphia was one of the earliest cities to adopt Third-Sector vehicles for urban redevelopment. This chapter considers how the land development decisions taken by some major institutions over the past fifteen years have infuenced the city center by focusing on major development districts that have emerged in greater Philadelphia.

In chapter 1 we provide an overview of the concept of prevention within child welfare, particularly under the New Labour government (1997-2010). Coming to power in 1997, Labour placed considerable focus, and financial investment, on reducing child poverty and social exclusion, and increasing universal early intervention support and coordination between services. The role of the voluntary sector became mainstream in the provision of children’s services, with the launch of several high-profile initiatives. Focusing on the concept of ‘prevention’ within child welfare and building on these shifting understandings of childhood and the concerns for children, this chapter explores how social policy operationalised under the Labour government; from how Labour developed strategies to tackle issues surrounding children and young people who are considered disadvantaged, vulnerable or at risk and how they mobilised the voluntary sector within this response.