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Information sharing and confidentiality in social policy: regulating multi-agency working

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posted on 2009-04-16, 11:49 authored by Christine Bellamy, Perri 6, Charles Raab, Adam WarrenAdam Warren, Catherine Heeney
In recent years, there has been growing concern in the UK that local services aimed at risky or vulnerable people are ineffective, because of persistent failure to share information about their clients. Despite considerable national policy effort to encourage better information-sharing, previous research indicates that there are many cases where information is still not shared when it should be, or where it is shared when it should not be, with potentially devastating results. This article uses data from the largest empirical study of local information-sharing yet undertaken to examine four policysectors where multi-agency working has come to the fore. It shows variations in their information-sharing and confidentiality practices can be explained by neo-Durkheimian institutional theory and uses insights from this theory to argue that current policy tools, emphasising formal regulation, are unlikely to lead to consistent and acceptable outcomes, not least because of unresolved conflicts in values and aims.

History

School

  • Social Sciences

Department

  • Geography and Environment

Citation

BELLAMY, C. ... et al, 2008. Information sharing and confidentiality in social policy: regulating multi-agency working. Public Administration, 86 (3), pp. 737–759.

Publisher

Blackwell Publishing Ltd / © The authors

Version

  • AM (Accepted Manuscript)

Publication date

2008

Notes

This article was published in the journal, Public Administration [Blackwell Publishing Ltd / © The authors]. The definitive version is available at: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118519412/home

ISSN

0033-3298;1467-9299

Language

  • en

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