The Studies of Bleddyn Davies and Their Acceptance in Anglophone Geography

Abstract

Bleddyn Davies is a famous scholar in the field of social welfare and policy. Davies is also well known among geographers for developing the concept of territorial justice. This paper reviews Davies's studies in terms of their political, social, and economic backgrounds and considers which parts of his studies were accepted by geographers dealing with public service issues and the changing relations among them.
The main opportunity for Davies to propose and apply the concept of territorial justice was under the Ten-Year Health and Welfare Plans of the UK. Therefore, Davies emphasized how intergovernmental structures and operational organizations could be improved for better service supply rather than the philosophical sophistication of his concept. Davies's studies, which were conducted in the era of the welfare state, not only pointed out prevalent problems but also offered solutions by suggesting appropriate policies and institutions to deal with them.
After the late 1970s, when the welfare state reached a turning point, Davies and his colleagues in the Personal Social Services Research Unit (PSSRU) made efforts to develop an innovative care system with better outputs but lower costs than those of the then-current system. Their efforts bore fruit in the form of community care projects and the “production of welfare” approach. These outcomes greatly affected the UK's welfare policies for the elderly.
With the emergence of the geography of public services and welfare geography in the 1970s, anglophone geography began to pay attention to Davies's territorial justice concept, and several geographers such as Steven Pinch enthusiastically presented empirical studies based on that concept. Nevertheless, after the late 1970s, when critical attitudes began to dominate anglophone geography, this concept was severely criticized as a tool for reformists, and subsequent studies by Davies and the PSSRU were rarely referred to by geographers.
The developmental process of Davies's studies suggests two tasks for geographers interested in designing better public services. The first involves further examination of the necessity for and revisions in concepts such as territorial justice under various political, social, and economic conditions. The other task is to gain a deeper understanding of how geographers' proposals should be formulated so that they are relevant within policy circles and their validity is recognized.