Intensive family intervention projects have become an increasingly prominent mechanism within anti-social behaviour and social policy programmes in the UK and are supported, in principle, by the new coalition government. They have also been the subject of considerable academic controversy within the evaluative and critical literature. This article attempts to inform continuing debates about the purpose and effects of these projects by conceptualising the contexts within which interactions between projects and families occur; classifying the component aspects of roles and support provided; and presenting a three-part typology of potential outcomes from project interventions.

Policymakers have promised a personalised approach to improving the employability of disadvantaged groups. The evidence suggests that contracted-out activation programmes in the UK and some other welfare states have instead sometimes delivered a standardised 'work-first' model. An alternative approach is exemplified in local employability services targeting lone parents in Scotland, led by third sector–public sector partnerships. Our research on these services suggests a link between programme governance (defined by flexible funding and collaborative partnership working) and effective street-level practice (where caseworkers and users co-produce services to empower parents). The article concludes by identifying lessons for the coproduction of future employability services

New mechanisms of conditionality enacted through current reforms of the UK welfare system are framed within contested narratives about the characteristics, rationalities and conduct of welfare users. In the problem figuration of welfare reform the orientations and conduct of welfare recipients have been conceptualised and depicted across a spectrum ranging from cynical manipulators gaming the system and subverting the original ethos of the welfare state to vulnerable individuals experiencing compounded disadvantage. This paper aims to strengthen the conceptualisation of cynical manipulation and vulnerability and to empirically investigate how narratives of these ideas are deployed by key stakeholders in the welfare system and the extent to which manipulation or vulnerability are present in the orientations and conduct of individuals in receipt of welfare support.

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The emotional dilemmas and challenges facing researchers within the research process are beginning to be documented within the literature, and academic interest in them is in ascendency. This paper adds to this growing discourse by taking a reflective journey through 19 years of research practice. It presents an honest and revealing manuscript highlighting in particular, the researcher’s emotional dilemmas experienced when disengaging from participants at the end of longitudinal research studies. It uses case studies to highlight some of the challenges in maintaining the participant–researcher boundaries and the emotional dilemmas this creates when trying to say goodbye. It argues that blurring the boundaries of participant–researcher relationships and establishing a trusting relationship can present emotional difficulties for researchers during and long after the closure of a research study.

This article examines how intensive family interventions in England since 1997, including the Coalition Government's Troubled Families Programme, are situated in a contemporary problem figuration of 'anti-social' or 'troubled' families that frames and justifies the utilisation of different models of intensive family intervention. The article explores how techniques of classification and estimation, combined with the controversial use of 'research' evidence in policy making are situated within a 'rational fiction' that constructs 'anti-social' families in particular ways. The article illustrates how this problem figuration has evolved during the New Labour and Coalition administrations in England, identifying their similarities and differences. It then presents findings from a study of intensive family intervention strategies and mechanisms in a large English city to illustrate how this national level discourse and policy framework relates to developing localised practice and the tensions and ambiguities that arise.

The project team are very grateful to many individuals and organisations for their invaluable support for this project. First and foremost we are indebted to those individuals who, despite their complex circumstances and often stressful daily lives, spared the time to participate in the citizens panel exercise and to recount difficult experiences to the team. We are hugely grateful for you time, your insights and your ideas about how experiences of energy advice could be improved. We are also very grateful to all those who participated in our Stakeholder Reference Group. This provided a vital sounding board throughout the project and ensured that the project remained sensitive to policy and practice. Thank you for your enthusiasm and for your many excellent ideas about how experiences for hard to reach energy users can be improved. We are also very grateful to Dan Wostenholme and Remi Bec for their support and for facilitating a lively and productive final stakeholder workshop. We also acknowledge the vital financial support provided the Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) and for the in-kind support provided to the project by Sheffield Hallam University and Citizens Advice. research will provides important insight into how we must go about engaging with this policy challengehearing the voices of to deliver authentic, practical solutions to benefit all consumers.

This article deploys the concept of "collaborative innovation" to discuss key stakeholders' and service users' experiences of innovative labor market inclusion services. We draw on work by Sørensen and Torfing (2011, 2016, 2017 to frame collaborative innovation as a distinctive approach to the coproduction of services that respond to user needs, and highlight the importance of governance and leadership practices that foster mutual learning and boundary spanning innovation. The article reports on 102 interviews with service users (in this case, unemployed lone parents) and 117 interviews with key stakeholders involved in local partnerships. We identify benefits from such collaborative approaches in terms of innovative service design and positive outcomes for service users. We conclude that policy makers should consider the potential added value of collaborative innovation in labor market inclusion. Evidence for Practice• Collaborative innovation provides a useful framework for understanding public policy stakeholders' responses to wicked problems-in this case, the need for innovative labor market inclusion programs to respond to the needs of vulnerable unemployed jobseekers. • Collaborative governance and distributive leadership practices that empower local managers and employees may be important in laying the groundwork for multi-stakeholder collaboration and service innovation in labor market inclusion. • Boundary spanning managers and "keyworkers" can be important in building trust, joining-up services, and(crucially) empowering service users. • As policy makers seek innovative solutions to high unemployment in post-COVID-19 labor markets, there is value in considering the benefits of collaborative innovation as a route to more efficient and effective services.