POLICY FOR THE'DESERVING,'BUT POLITICALLY WEAK: THE 1996 WELFARE REFORM ACT AND BATTERED WOMEN

`

POLICY FOR THE ‘DESERVING,’ BUT POLITICALLY WEAK: THE 1996 WELFARE REFORM ACT

AND BATTERED WOMEN

Sharon A. Chanley University of Illinois

Nicholas 0. Alozie School of Public Affairs

at Springfield Arizona State University

ABSTRACT

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (Public Law #104-193) is perhaps the most visible national legislation since the sweeping Civil Rights laws of the 1960s. For social policy so well entrenched into the American social fabric, the rapidity with which reforms swept through the welfare system was unprecedented and confound conventional theoretical pronouncements on bureaucracy and policy change. The swiftness of reform, and the political rhetoric that surrounded the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, have prompted criticism that reformers responded more to the social construction of welfare recipients than they did to the dictates of sound public policy (Magusson and Dunham, 1996). This article discusses the ramifications of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act for battered women and concludes that battered women’s social construction as deserving of public assistance, but politically weak, precipitated welfare reform policy, targeted to battered women, that has been largely rhetorical rather than substantive.

1. Introduction

On August 22, 1996, President Clinton delivered on his campaign promise to “end welfare as we know it” (White House, 1997) when he signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (Public Law #I 04-1 93), more popularly known as the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. The reform package established by Public Law #I 04-1 93 embodies both President Reagan and Bush’s vision of scaling back the American welfare infrastructure (Abramovitz, 1996a, p. 18), subsequently unveiled as

2 Policy Studies Review 18:2 (Summer 2001)

Proposals 3 and 4 in the “Republican Contract with America” (Gillespie and Schellhas, 1994).

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (hereafter WRA) passed the House and Senate with broad bipartisan support, and was signed into law by the President amidst great fanfare. Public opinion polls continued to tally broad support for welfare reform. Yet, despite the seemingly popular appeal of welfare reform (Bloom, 1997), the WRA continues to evoke national debate (Wallis, 1999; St. George, 1999; Cohen, 1998; Edwards, 1998; Albelda and Tilly, 1997, p. 107-64). In particular, there has been anxiety that, in responding to negatively constructed public sentiment and stereotypical images of welfare beneficiaries, and the country’s enduring cultural debate on deservedness, the WRA adopted an oversimplified “individual responsibility” approach to welfare reform [see language in Sec. 408, subsection (b) on “Individual Responsibility Plans”]. This, even though the welfare clientele and the conditions that qualify them for public assistance are as diverse as the programs that aid them (McCarthy, 1999). Consequently, since the initial proposal, adoption, and enactment of the WRA, there has been persistent analysis of the implications of the Act to particular segments of the welfare-recipient community (e.g., Espenshade, Baraka, and Huber, 1997; Yates, 1997). These constituency-based analyses should ultimately provide a more complete assessment of the efficacy of the WRA for particular constituent groups.

In this article, we seek to advance this debate by discussing the main provisions of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 specifically as they pertain to battered women. This permits us to discuss states’ application of the Act’s “hardship exception” and the “Family Violence Option.” These provisions of the WRA are available for implementation at the discretion of those states committed to responding to the issue of domestic violence generally, and to battered women in particular. We conclude that while the most recent welfare debate has distinguished battered women as “deserving,” distinct from other potential welfare clients, the accompanying policies adopted to address their often unique situations have been primarily rhetorical rather than substantive. The article is divided into seven sections. Following this introduction, the next section articulates the

Chanley and Alozie: Policy for the ‘Deserving’ 3

theoretical foundation for the 1996 welfare reform policy. The third section examines welfare reform policy for battered women as a ‘deserving,’ but politically weak target population. The fourth section discusses the major aspects of the WRA which are likely to impact battered women. The fifth and sixth sections discuss the hardship exception and the Family Violence Option and states’ initial actions on both. The final section provides a summary.

II. Social Construction: The Etiology of Welfare Reform

Established in the early 1930s, the federal welfare infrastructure conformed to the theoretical expectations of the trajectory of a public bureaucracy (Yates, 1982): it grew steadily and established both an expansive clientele and political linkages (Ingram and Schneider, 1995). However, for a bureaucracy so large and social policy so well-entrenched into the nation’s social fabric, the extent and swiftness of the recent change in the welfare system defies conventional wisdom and confounds orthodox theorizing on bureaucracy and policy change (Daniels, 1997; Lindblom and Woodhouse, 1993; Kaufman, 1976). Such theorizing posits that once created, government bureaucracies assume a life of their own, evolve subsystems that sustain them, and should utilize their “alleged impenetrable iron triangle” (Kingdon, 1984, p. 36) to deflect policy change. At best, such change will be incremental (Gordon and Milakovich, 1995, p. 62-74). In truth these extractions from the literature of bureaucratic politics and policy change cannot explain the significant changes induced both in bureaucratic structure and in substantive policy by the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. One must look elsewhere for a more relevant explanation.

While it may not explain the 1996 Welfare Reform Act completely, Schneider and Ingram’s (1 993) social construction thesis appears quite consistent with the observed patterns of reform. Social construction theory contends that public problems are largely framed and debated in symbolic and normative terms (Brewster and Brown, 1994; Edelman, 1985; Lowi, 1979) that focus on specific aspects of an issue and characterizations of the target populations. Further, such constructions determine policy choice because they frame, for both the public and policymakers, the manner in which a given public policy will be viewed (Gusfield,


1996, 1981; Smith, 1996; Marcus, 1994; Nelson, 1984). For example, a particular problem, say drug addiction, might be framed as a public health or a crime issue (Best, 1995). In turn, that characterization determines whether the policies considered for drug addiction are guided by medical or criminal justice concerns.

Schneider and Ingram (1997, 1993) contend that characteristics credited to target populations at any point in time dramatically influence policy choices toward those populations. Specifically, they argue that the allocation of policy benefits and burdens depends not only on the relative social power of groups in society but also on the social construction of each group that policies are intended to affect. They offer four constructions that influence policy outcomes in degenerative policy environments as follows: (a) powerful, positively constructed groups are “advantaged,” and are seldom chosen for policies that allocate costs; (b) powerful, negatively constructed groups are “contenders,” and are targeted for policies that the public and media believe inflict burdens, but that actually have few, if any, negative effects; (c) weak but positively constructed groups are “dependents,” and attract rhetorical policies that often permit elected officials to show great concern through widespread public pronouncements, but relieve those officials of the need to actually allocate resources; and (d) weak and negatively constructed groups are “deviants,” often targeted with policies that mete out punishment (1997, p. 102-149).

At its inception, the ADC (later AFDC, Aid to Families with Dependent Children) portion of the 1935 Social Security Act drew ideas from the mother’s pension laws in the states and presupposed that mothers should be able to stay at home and care for their children (Ingram and Schneider, 1995, p. 445). The initial targets of ADC were mostly poor white families, headed by widowed mothers, with few political resources (Ingram and Schneider, 1995, p. 445; see also Berkowitz, 1991; Abramovitz, 1996b). At the beginning, ADC recipients were seen as deserving and had an overall social construction of “dependent”; that is, politically weak but positively constructed (Schneider and Ingram, 1997).

By the mid-l960s, however, profound shifts in the social construction of welfare recipients began as the proportion of blacks and other minorities, children from broken homes, and children


born out of wedlock increased (Ingram and Schneider, 1995). Public sentiment regarding the role of welfare shifted and ushered in debate on the need for reform. By the end of the 1970s welfare reform had become a bonafide subject for political campaigns. By the 1980s and 199Os, the deployment of negative stereotypes in AFDC politics had peaked (Burkhalter, 1997). The appearance of disproportionately more blacks and Hispanics on the welfare roles effectively assigned welfare a “minority face” (Waddan, 1997). In essence, the welfare debate proliferated in the shadow of the country’s racial, ethnic, and sedgender politics.

The media projected consistent images of “welfare queens cruisin’ in their government-financed Cadillacs” (Seattle Times, 1999, p. B8). Pictures of sexually promiscuous teenage mothers who supposedly refused gainful employment even when the conditions were ripe for them to attain employment and self- sufficiency were prevalent (Boston Globe, 1998). There were concerns over the “huge portions” of the national budget supposedly being siphoned away by welfare recipients at a time of huge budget deficits (Teegardin, 1995). In turn, these pictures were over-laid with the portrait of the overburdened tax payer desiring relief. This negative construction coupled, with the President’s very public pledge to ‘end welfare as we know it,’ crowded out other relevant and available information that equally could have swayed the debate on welfare reform (Seavey, 1997; Abramovitz, 1996; Sklar, 1995).

Contrary to popular stereotypes, welfare does not primarily support minority families: numerically, there have always been more white families on welfare than blacks or Hispanics (Cammisa, 1998, p. 13-14). The trend toward out-of-wedlock childbearing is a societal trend (Family Life Matters, 1998) and has no causal relationship to welfare status (Seavey, 1997; see also Piven, 1994). In fact, according to the National Center for Health Statistics (1998), the birthrate among unmarried black 15-1 7 year-olds has declined 20 percent since 1990. Further, the welfare roles are not dominated by teenage mothers: only “0.1 percent of mothers receiving AFDC are 15 or younger, and less than 4 percent are 18 or younger” (Sklar, 1995, p. 97). The negative image of welfare recipients facilitated the exploitation of these stereotypes in the welfare debate when, in reality, the typical welfare recipient has only one or


two children and is likely to be enrolled for “less than two years, if single spells are considered, and cumulatively less than four years total” (Sklar, 1995, p. 96-97). Neither was welfare spending overburdening the economy: in 1993, only 3.4 percent of the federal budget went to AFDC, food stamps, and Supplemental Security Income (Abramovitz, 1996a). By 1994, only 3 percent of the federal budget went to welfare spending (Seavey, 1997).

The WRA was directed toward what Congress framed as a national social crisis of personal irresponsibility and lack of traditional family values (Public Law 104-1 93, 9). The continuing absence of political power of welfare recipients generally, now coupled with this negative social construction, meant that they were no longer positioned as “dependents” but rather as “deviants” (Schneider and Ingram, 1997). According to Schneider and lngram such a positioning could only result in the kinds of federal welfare policies which emerged and were ultimately adopted in 1996. As predicted by their social construction model, the WRA established stringent conditions for qualification for public assistance and prescribed punitive measures for noncompliance with the new regulations.

111. Welfare Reform for the ‘Deserving,’ but Politically Weak

Substantively, the 1996 Welfare Reform Act did not engage separately different constituencies that comprise the welfare clientele, except for the particular case of battered women. The 0. J. Simpson trials in California prompted considerable press on and public awareness of domestic violence providing advocates for battered women a “policy window” (Kingdon, 1984, p. 173) through which to channel the plight of battered women into the welfare reform debate. Although addressed variously in the WRA, the handling and eventual policy outcome of welfare reform particular to battered women conformed to predictions outlined by Schneider and Ingram’s social construction model. Battered women are politically weak (largely the profile of a group with low participation rates and with no visible or nationally recognized lobby ), although they are seen as “deserving” of assistance. Given Schneider and Ingram’s thesis, battered women will be classified as “dependents,”


unlike the negatively constructed view of welfare recipients general I y .

As Schneider and lngram (1997, p. 123) have rioted, public officials want to be aligned with the interests of dependent populations. However, “their lack of political power means that directing resources toward their interests will result in few political advantages. Instead, rhetorical policies are often used since these permit elected leaders to show great concern through widespread public announcements, but relieve them of the need to allocate resources.” Schneider and lngram further observe that policies conferring any benefits to dependent populations are typically avoided by the federal government and repeatedly shifted to the states and local governments, and to the volunteer sector. Moreover, any benefits to the dependent population are passed through other agents giving the dependents little control over the application of those benefits.

Welfare reform policy for battered women followed this trajectory. First, Congress had two opportunities (in 1995 with the Wellstone Amendment and again in 1996 with the Wellstonel Murray Amendment) to make the Family Violence Option a federal mandate. In part, this would have allowed the federal government to retain jurisdiction and monitor both implementation and the flow of resources into that aspect of the WRA. Instead, Congressional concern over the plight of battered women was followed by what amounts to an abdication of federal responsibility when Congress approved the Amendment as only an option that states could implement at their discretion. Moreover, although states would receive block grants from the federal government as part of the WRA, none of those funds were ear-marked specifically for victims of domestic violence as an acknowledgment of their unique circumstances. The data regarding states’ initial actions on the Family Violence Option make it clear that the picture from the states do not reflect the degree of action which would have been required had Congress adopted the WeIIstone/Murray Amendment as a federal mandate.


IV. Battered Women And The 1996 Welfare Reform Act

A logical starting point for explicating the consequences of the WRA for battered women and their children is to elucidate how some provisions of the Act are likely to impact this group. Pollack (1996, p. 330) has argued that “policies that limit entitlement to public assistance increase dependency [on violent men], which increases domestic violence.” In 1995 Jody Raphael, Director of the Taylor Institute, warned that “proposed changes in federal and state welfare policies have the potential of increasing the dependence of uneducated young women and their children on violent men and of increasing the incidence of domestic violence and child abuse” (Raphael, 1995, p. 33). Four significant provisions of the WRA are likely to have the most drastic effects in limiting the qualification of battered women for public assistance. These include: 1 ) lifetime assistance limits, 2) work requirements, 3) child support enforcement and paternity identification efforts, and 4) limits to medical benefits (see also National Resource Center on Domestic Violence, 1996a). Each provision is discussed separately below.

Lifetime Assistance Limits

Title I, Section 103: 408(a)(7) of the WRA prohibits states from using TANF funds to support families that have received public assistance for 60 months. Moreover, the WRA allows each state discretion to reduce this five-year maximum. However, women may be victims of domestic violence at any time in their lives and for lengths of time over which they have no control. Additionally, the incidence of violence differs markedly for particular groups of women. Divorced and separated women report being battered fourteen times as often as women still living with their partners” (Davis and Kraham, 1995, p. 1146). Given this reality, Davis and Kraham (1995, p. 1 157) insist that a lifetime limit of five years “makes no sense.” It pre-supposes a level of personal life control that many battered women and their children do not possess. Moreover, the WRA presumes that once a victim escapes the direct violence (physical or emotional), the effects of what sometimes could be a lifetime of trauma disappears. In reality, the trauma of


domestic violence could linger, incapacitating the victirn on several fronts. Raphael (1996, p. 186) puts this painful dilemma more succinctly in warning that unless specialized domestic violence services are made available to victims who continue to suffer from the lingering effects of past trauma, they will be unable to sustain employment over time.

Work Requirements

A fundamental premise of the WRA appears to be that everyone can obtain and engage in gainful employment. Not surprisingly, Title I , Section 103: 402(a)(l )(A)(ii) and Section 103: 407 of the Act requires states to obligate recipients of aid to obtain employment after two years on assistance or lose their eligibility. Various participation rates in federally approved work activities are required, depending on enumerated criteria including the age of dependent children and the number of parents in the household.

A dilemma for battered women with the work provisions, besides the difficulty of the lingering effects of trauma mentioned above, is the significant degree to which those who perpetrate the violence- bo yfrie nd s , h u s ba n d s , ex- bo yfr ie n d s , a nd ex- h u s ba nd s- can and do interfere with battered women’s efforts at self- rehabilitation through work, training, and other educational activities (Ptacek, 1997). Ferraro and Johnson (1985, p. 377, 380-383) have coined the term “underground railroad for battered women” to illustrate both the complexity and the difficulty of the problem (see also Davis and Kraham, 1995). Many battered women literally try to conceal themselves by adopting new or “fake” identities to protect their anonymity, or migrate to environments with fewer support networks, all in an effort to escape their abusers. These conditions impact battered women’s efforts to seek and retain employment. Compounding the dilemma is the fact that when discovered at their place of employment, employers may view battered women as security risks and may dismiss them as a security measure to protect persons and property (Goldscheid and Coukos, 1996, p. 195).


Child Support Enforcement and Paternity

Nonpayment of child support is a key cause of child poverty in the United States (Pearson and Griswold 1997, p. 27) and this problem was discussed at length in the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. Title Ill of the Act requires states to “reduce or eliminate assistance to a family if an individual does not cooperate with child support enforcement unless they have a good cause reason not to cooperate.” Of course, part of the child support enforcement process is establishing paternity (“legal” father) of the child and potential visitation rights.

For some battered women, increased child support enforcement could increase the financial assistance they obtain from their child(ren)’s father(s). However, mandating child support enforcement can increase violence. Women interviewed as part of a focus group on welfare reform identified fear of potential loss of custody, legally or illegally (i.e., kidnaping), as one of several reasons why they are unlikely to cooperate with child support or paternity determination efforts (Hagen and Davis, 1994, p. 34). Pearson and Griswold report that an attorney who routinely represented victims of domestic violence estimated that “at least 20 percent of clients seeking an order of protection has been abused as a direct result of cooperating with child support enforcement proceedings” (Pearson and Griswold, 1997,~. 27). Indeed, violence associated with child support is becoming a national epidemic (Zorza, 1996; Erickson and Longo, 1994). In short, a problem with the child support enforcement provisions in the WRA is that in their effort to collect child support, street-level bureaucrats (Lipskey, 1980) may underestimate the threat to battered women and engender more harm than any funds that are collected in child support enforcement could justify, let alone rectify.

Medical Coverage

While states must continue to provide medical coverage to families otherwise eligible for the now defunct AFDC program as of mid- 1996, under the WRA (Title i, Section 114), new families eligible for


TANF are not automatically eligible for such coverage. Hagen and Davis (1994, p. 31) report that clients in their focus groups “repeatedly made clear that the welfare check itself was not the primary benefit they derived from the welfare systern-Medicaid was the most valued benefit.” One study found that loss of coverage (concomitant with exit from AFDC rolls) was a serious barrier to the willingness of recipients to accept and retain employment (Weinberg, 1991, p. 448).

Domestic violence is the leading cause of injuty to women and constitutes a significant percentage of women’s hospital emergency room visits (The Family Violence Prevention Fund, 1997). Moreover, children of battered women are twice as likely to be abused mostly at the hand of their fathers (Davis and Kraham, 1995, p. 1146). The negative effects of battery and abuse on women’s overall health vis-a-vis increased stress, depression, and other symptoms typical of post-traumatic stress syndrome are well documented (see Raphael, 1996, p. 187). In short, the issue of medical benefits for battered women on or contemplating moves to or from welfare assistance is a particularly important one.

Other Potentially Consequential Provisions

The discussion above was not exhaustive of all the provisions of the WRA relevant to battered women. Several others do merit mention now and warrant subsequent discussions. These are limitations of assistance for immigrant women (women who may also suffer from domestic violence linked to threats of deportation) or for those convicted of drug felonies and probation violations. This latter provision seems especially problematic given continuing research reports which suggest that battered women may be more likely to use and abuse drugs, including alcohol (see Downs, Miller, and Panek, 1993; Miller, Downs, and Gondoli, 1989; Miller, Downs, and Testa, 1993 ).

The WRA allows wide variations in state aid packages and eligibility criteria. These variations could introduce difficulty for battered women attempting to flee across state lines, especially if residency requirements become one of the state-imposed criteria. Steiner (1995) presented a pointed argument in this regard on California’s residency requirements (see also National Resource


Center on Domestic Violence, 1996b, p. 8; Pollack, 1996, p. 340). Finally, an aspect of the discussion on welfare reform has centered on the so-called “birthing to increase benefits.” States responding to political pressure may implement “family caps” which disallow additional benefits for children born to aid recipients. The absence of explicit policies on family caps in the WRA delegates the authority on this matter to the states. The fact that domestic violence often encompasses rape and incest with their attendant unintended pregnancies presents an obvious vacuum which the WRA does not address (Pollack, 1996, p. 331-32).

V. The Hardship Exception And The Family Violence Option

Two provisions of the WRA attempted to address the potential negative effects for battered women outlined in the last section. The first, enumerated in the W W itself, is known as the “hardship” exception. The second is the Wellstone/Murray Amendment, or the “Family Violence Option,” originally conceived as a federal requirement rather than as a state option.

The hardship exception allows states, at their discretion, to develop exceptions to the 60-month limitation to assistance, although total exceptions granted may not exceed 20% of the state’s TANF caseload. Hardship exceptions may be granted if the time limit would erect additional barriers to recipients’ efforts to move from welfare to work. The difficulty with the hardship exception lies in its emphasis on caseload, rather than actual need. What if the need for exceptions exceeds 20 percent of the caseload? Given the multiple facets of the possible immediate and lingering effects for battered women already mentioned, the 20 percent caseload limit may well become problematic, especially if the bulk of it is exhausted by other categories of hardship exceptions.

The Family Violence Option Amendment, originally conceived as a federal requirement, was initially introduced in 1995. That amendment would have required states to address the needs of battered women as part of their public assistance program. The amendment, known as the Wellstone/Murray Amendment, was reintroduced in 1996, again added to the Senate version as a federal mandate. However, the provision was


appended only as a state option in the final, adopted bill, H.R. 3734, the legislative reference for the WRA.

The WeIIstone/Murray Amendment to the WRA allows states, at their discretion, to adopt the Family Violence Option. This option allows states to “(a) screen applicants for domestic violence while maintaining confidentiality, (b) make referrals to counseling and support services, and (c) grant good cause waivers from certain welfare program requirements.” If they choose, states may allow good cause waivers for as long as necessary if applicant or recipient compliance with the requirements of the WRA would make it more difficult for them to escape domestic violence or if such requirements would penalize past, current, or potential victims of domestic violence. Waivers can be applied to the two-year time limit (before work is required), federal five-year time limit (capping lifetime aid), or shorter time limits implemented by the states. The waivers can also apply to the residency requirements, child support cooperation requirements, and child exclusion provisions, among others. With the hardship exception described above, all the provisions mentioned can be, but do not have to be, included in individual state welfare reform plans. How local political situations influence particular states’ reactions to these provisions will determine the eventual impact of state discretion on these factors.

VI. The Hardship Exception And The Family Violence Option: An Initial View From the States

The first comprehensive overview of initial states’ actions on the hardship exception and family violence option was conducted by the Taylor Institute (1998). The national survey was undertaken as most states were only beginning to discuss and implement these provisions in their TANF programs. To be sure, states’ actions may change over time, but variability likely will be an integral part of the implementation of this portion of the WRA, including the level to which individual states respond to battered women’s public assistance needs. Table 1 displays the distribution of states according to their action on the Family Violence Option.

According to the Taylor Institute’s report (see Table I ) , by September 1998, thirty-one (31) states had adopted the Family Violence Option, and another nine (9) states were at various stages

14 Policy Studies Review 18:2 (Summer 2001 )

Table I Initial States' Actions on the Family Violence Option

Planning to Did Not Adopt, Did Not Adopt, Adopted Adopta But Has Alternative No Alternative (N=31) (N=9) Plansb (N=10) Plans (N=2) Alaska Connecticut Alabama Indiana Arizona Florida California Idaho Colorado Kansas Delaware New Hampshire Georgia North Carolina Hawaii Oregon Iowa South Carolina Kentucky Vermont Louisiana Wisconsin Massachusetts Maryland Michigan Minnesota Montana Missouri Nebraska Nevada New Jersey New Mexico New York North Dakota Ohio Pennsylvania Puerto Rico Rhode Island Texas Utah Washington West Virginia Wyoming

Arkansas Washington,DC Illinois Maine Mississippi Oklahoma South Dakota Tennessee Virginia

NOTES: a States are at different stages of adoption, although several of the states already have provisions requiring attention to battered women on their plans.

States have not formally adopted the Family Violence Option, but they have provisions within their plans which assess domestic violence. States' plans here most often do not differ from those found in states which have adopted the Family Violence Option.


of the adoption process (e.g., waiting for rules to be filed or for authorizing legislation). Ten (1 0) states had elected not to adopt the Option formally, but instead, had incorporated domestic violence into their TANF programs. These states that did not formally adopt the Option tended to be states that already had well-established domestic violence plans prior to the enactment of the WRA. Finally, two states had neither adopted the Option, nor did they feature any alternative provisions in their TANF programs to address domestic violence.

While a focused explanation of states’ actions on the Family Violence Option is beyond our scope, it is clear from the data in Table 1 that states’ initial actions do not vary by region, although a disproportionate number of Southern states locate in the third column-not formally adopting the Option. As would be predicted by work on the ideological direction of state policies (e.g. Erikson, Wright, and Mclver, 1993; Elazar, 1984), whether or not they formally adopted the Option, each state’s actual plan is unique in its domestic violence provisions.

Although states typically utilized some form of collaborative mechanism which included stakeholders (such as state domestic violence coalitions, local domestic violence and legal services providers, welfare department personnel, and Governors’ Commissions on Domestic Violence) in developing their domestic violence plans, so far, the provisions across states on exceptions and waivers vary markedly. Data for 42 states indicate that 20 of those states have established no specific time limits on the temporary exceptions or waivers of state work requirements. Other states’ provisions vary from a 90-day to a 24-month extension. Some states have introduced flexibility by designating domestic violence counseling as temporary alternative work, or allowing the clock on time limits to stop-and-go depending on recipients’ circumstances. No waivers are granted in at least 13 states. Regarding the 60-month lifetime limit for assistance, some states have adopted provisions extending it for as long as is necessary. Others grant extensions which range from 12 to 24 months, although some states have not considered an extension of the 60- month limit at all.

Finally, administrative mechanisms and reportingherification requirements also vary across states. Although a case worker or a


local panel may approve a temporary work waiver, most states require some kind of written verification of domestic violence (e.g., a letter from a doctor or a police report). Some states accept a written affidavit from the battered woman herself as a sufficient condition for filing, although complaints have come in those states that some case workers, contrary to statute or rules, continue to insist upon documentary evidence beyond the woman’s written statement.

Given the considerable variability in local political conditions that influence the welfare debate, it should not be surprising that states’ actions vary. The important question is how this variability will impact individual recipients. The ramifications of the devolution of federal welfare policy for battered women, as one group that relies on the safety net provided by public assistance, are becoming apparent. The initial survey of states’ actions on domestic violence indicates that very little has been done substantively, leaving battered women largely to their fate as just another group of welfare recipients.

VII. Summary

We began this essay by attempting to illuminate the political and ecological foundations of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. There is continuing debate on the merits of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. All indications are that the 1996 Welfare Reform Act is not the last word on the welfare debate in the U.S. Neither will public discourse on poverty and on citizens’ entitlement to a basic level of subsistence cease. If anything, societal debate on these matters appears to be approaching new heights (St. George, 1999; Wallis, 1999; Cohen, 1998; Edwards, 1998; Magnusson and Durham, 1996). Surely, the U.S. Census projections of the demographic profile of the country assures that these matters will remain visible on the policy agenda well into the 21st century.

Regardless of one’s views on the efficacy of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, a broad feature of the Act must be noted as it has lasting implications on the execution of U.S. social policy, including policy relating to domestic violence and battered women. With the WRA, states now have considerable discretion in


developing and implementing their respective public assistance programs, ‘ending welfare as we know it.’ However, in most areas, this discretion is regulated by specific federal mandates with regard to work requirements, lifetime time limits, and child support enforcement. The Family Violence Option, on the other hand, was ultimately disposed of by the federal government by reducing it to a discretionary state option. The open debate in Congress and the disposition of the Wellstone/Murray Amendment as merely a state option, as would be predicted by Schneider and Ingram’s social construction model, indicates that federal elected officials have shown interest by acknowledging the distinct circumstances of battered women, but, in actuality, have done very little to alleviate their plight.

NOTE: A previous version of this paper was presented at the Western Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA., March, 1999. The authors wish to thank Jesse Chanley for his helpful comments on an earlier draft of this manuscript.

Endnotes

1. The House voted 328-101 to pass the bill. Republicans voted 230: Yay, 3: Nay. Democrats voted 98 to 98. In the Senate, 25 Democrats voted in favor while 21 voted against; Republicans voted 53 for and none against.

2. See Weaver, Shapiro, and Jacobs, 1995 for poll analyses.

3. Schneider and lngram (1997, p. 102) define degenerative policy contexts as “characterized by an unequal distribution of political power, constructions that separate the ‘deserving’ from the ‘undeserving,’ and an institutional culture that legitimizes strategic, manipulative, and deceptive patterns of communication and uses of political power.”

4. The fact that welfare policy for battered women is a pure public good (i.e., every battered woman benefits whether or not she directly participates in securing the good) might also make organizing a lobby problematic (Olson, 1971 ).


5. Analogous to the underground networks which many blacks took to their freedom from the South to the North during slavery.

6. See cases: Manzano (1 998) reported that a boyfriend had been jailed in pregnant woman’s death with possible motive of avoiding child support; Wilson (1998) reported that a man, prior to his wife’s death, asserted he would never pay child support; and Wilson (1997) reported that a man pled guilty to soliciting a woman’s death after being ordered to pay $10,000 a year in child support. Such violence is not limited to women. A recent widely publicized case in St. Louis, Missouri, for example, alleged that a Brian Stewart, 32, a medical worker, walked into a hospital room during visitation and injected his 1 I-month old son with the HIV virus that causes AIDS, hoping that the child would develop full-blown AIDS and die before he could ever be directed to pay child support (Salter, 1998).

7. However, it should be noted that these studies demonstrate mere correlation, not causation.

References

Abramovitz, M. (1 996a). Under Attack, Fighting Back: Women and Welfare in the United States. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Abramovitz, M. (1996b). Regulating the Lives of Women: Social Welfare Policy from Colonial Times to the Present. Boston, MA: South End Press.

Albelda, R. and Tilly, C. (1997). Glass Ceilings and Bottomless Pits: Women’s Work, Women‘s Poverty. Boston: South End Press.

Berkowitz, E.D. (1 991 ). America’s Welfare State : From Roosevelt to Reagan. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Best, J. (Ed.). (1 995). lmages of Issues: Typifying Contemporary Social Problems. New York: Aldine de Gruyter.


Bloom, D. (1997). After AFDC: Welfare to Work Choices and Challenges for States. New York: Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation.

Boston Globe. (1 998). The Reform of Welfare Cliches. Editorial. (June 11). p. A22.

Brewster, L.G. and Brown, M.E. (1994). The Public Agenda: lssues in American Politics, 3rd Edition. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

Burkhalter, S. (1997). The Poor Are Not like the Rest of Us. Presented at the 1997 Annual Meeting of the Western Political Science Association, Tucson, AZ, March.

Cammisa, A. M. (1998). From Rhetoric to Reform? Welfare Policy in American Politics. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Cohen, A. (1998). When Wall Street Runs Welfare. Time. (March 23). P. 64.

Daniels, M. R. (1 997). Terminating Public Programs: An American Political Paradox. New York: M.E. Sharpe.

Davis, M. F. and Kraham, S. J. (1995). Protecting Women’s Welfare in the Face of Violence. Fordham Urban Law Journal, 22, 1141-1 157.

Downs, R., Miller, B.R., and Panek, D.D. (1993). Differential Patterns of Partner-to-woman Violence: A comparison of samples of community, alcohol-abusing, and battered women. Journal of Family Violence,8, 2, 11 3-1 35.

Edelman, M. (1985). The Symbolic Uses of Politics. Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

Edwards, T. M. (1998). Incite to Abortion: Is That the Effect of the ‘Family Cap’ on Welfare? Time. (June 22). P. 38.


Elazar, D. (1984). American Federalism: A View from the States 3rd Edition. New York: Harper and Row.

Erickson, N.S. and A. Longo. (1994). Study Analyzes the Effect of the Clinton Welfare Reform Program on Families Dependent on Child Support. Women’s Advocate, 15(5), p. 5-8.

Erikson, R. S., G. C. Wright, and J. P. Mclver. (1993). Statehouse Democracy. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Espenshade, T. J., Baraka, J. L. and Huber, G. A. (1997). Implications of the 1996 Welfare and Immigration Reform Acts for US Immigration. Population and Development Review, 23, 4, 769- 801.

Family Life Matters. (1998). What Can We Do When She’s 14 and He’s 23? 34(Spring).

Family Violence Prevention Fund. 1997. The Health Care Response to Domestic Violence Fact Sheet. [On-line]. Available: h tt p : //www . ig c . a p c . o rg /f u n d/ h e a It h ca re/f a ct s h e e t . h t m I.

Ferraro, K. and Johnson, J. (1985). The New Underground Railroad. Studies in Symbolic Interaction, 6, 377, 380-383.

Gillespie, E. and Schellhas, B. (Eds.). (1994). Contract With America: The Bold Plan by Representative Newt Gingrich, Representative Dick Armey, and the House Republicans to Change the Nation. New York: Time Books.

Goldscheid, J. and Coukos, P. (1996). Violence Against Women Affects the Workplace: Legal Remedies for Women and Advocates. Clearinghouse Review, (Special Issue), 195-205.

Gordon, G. J. and Milakovich, M. E. (1995). Public Administration in America, 5th Ed. New York: St. Martins Press.

Gusfield, J. R. (1996). Contested Meanings. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.


Gusfield, J. R. (1981). The Culture of Public Problems. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

Hagen, J. L. and Davis, L.V. (1994). Women on Welfare Talk about Reform: Clients in focus groups discuss teen pregnancy, child support, and time limits. Public Welfare, Summer, 30-40.

Ingram, H. and Schneider, A. L. (1995). Response. American Political Science Review, 89, 2, 441-446.

Kaufman, H. (1971). The Limits of Organizational Change. University, AL: The University of Alabama Press.

Kingdon, J. W. (1 984). Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies. New York: HarperCollins.

Lindblom, C. E. and Woodhouse, E. J. (1993). The Policy-Making Process, 3rd Edition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Lipsky, M. (1 980). Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the lndividual in Public Services. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Lowi, T. J. (1979). The End of Liberalism, 2nd Edition. New York: W. W Norton and Company.

Magnusson, P. and R.S. Dunham. (1996). An End to Welfare Politics as We Know It? Business Week (August 5), p. 39.

Manzano, R. J. (1998). Woman’s Death. Los Angeles Times. (July 29). Part B, p. 1.

Boyfriend, 2 Others Jailed in Pregnant

Marcus, I. (1 994). Reframing ‘Domestic Violence’: Terrorism in the Home. In The Public Nature of Private Violence, M. A. Fineman and R. Mykitiuk, Editors. NY: Routledge.

McCarthy, P. (1 999). The Rocky Road From Welfare to Work. The New York Times (February 28), Section 14CN, p.1.


Miller, B.A., Downs, W.R. and Gondoli, D.M. (1989). Spousal Violence among Alcoholic Women as Compared to a Random Household Sample of Women. Journal of Studies in Alcohol, 50, 533-540.

Miller, B.A., Downs, W.R. and Testa, M. (1 993). Interrelationships Between Victimization Experiences and Women’s Alcohol Use. Journal of Studies on Alcohol 11, (Suppl.), 107-1 17.

National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (1998). Declines in Teenage Birth Rates, 1991- 1997. National Vital Sfatistics Reports, 47(12), pp. 20.

National Resource Center on Domestic Violence and the National Network to End Domestic Violence. (1996a). The New Welfare Law: lmplications for Battered Women -- lntroduction to the Law (Paper #I). Pennsylvania: Author.

National Resource Center on Domestic Violence and the National Network to End Domestic Violence. (1996b). The New Welfare Law: State Implementation and Use of the Family Violence Option (Paper #2). Pennsylvania: Author.

Nelson, B. J. (1984). Making and lssue of Child Abuse: Political Agenda Setting for Social Problems. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

Olson, M. (1971). The Logic of Collective Acfion. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Pearson, J. and Griswold, E. A. (1997). Child Support Policies and Domestic Violence. Public Welfare, Winter, 26-32.

Piven, F.P. (1 994). The Welfare Stereotype. The Atlanta Journal Constitution (April 13), Editorial, Section A, p. 7.

Pollack, W. (1996). Twice Victimized - Domestic Violence and Welfare ‘Reform’. Clearinghouse Review, 329-341 .


Ptacek, J. (1997). The Tactics and Strategies of Men who Batter. In Violence Between Intimate Partners. A. P. Cardarelli, Editor. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Raphael, J. (1996). Prisoners of Abuse: Policy implications of the relationship between domestic violence and welfare receipt. Clearinghouse Review, 186-1 94.

Raphael, J. (1995). Domestic violence and welfare receipt: The unexplored barrier to employment. Georgetown Journal on Fighting Poverty, Ill, 1, 29-34.

St. George, D. (1999). Aid Cuts Make it Hard for Some Going from Welfare to Work. Washington Post. (February 25). P. B05.

Salter, J. (1998, April 24). Puzzling Aids Case: Police Suspect Dad Injected Son with Tainted Blood. The Arizona Republic. [On- line]. Available: http://newslibrary.krmediastream.com.

Schneider, A. L. and Ingram, H. (1997). Policy Design For Democracy. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas.

Schneider, A. L. and Ingram, H. (1993). Social Constructions and Target Populations: Implications for Politics and Policy. American Political Science Review 87, 2, 334-347.

Seattle Times. (1 999). Welfare ReformPThe Next Step--Kids of Welfare Queen Still Here in Workfirst. Editorial. (February 7). P. B8.

Seavey, D. K. (1997). Women and Welfare: Popular Conceptions Vs. Facts. Appendix (pp. 189-199). In Glass Ceilings and Bottomless Pits. Boston, MA: South End Press.

Sklar, H. (1995). Chaos or Community: Seeking Solutions, Not Scapegoats, for Bad Economics. Boston, MA: South EInd Press.

Smith, J. M. (1996). AIDS and Society. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.


Steiner, A. (1 995). New Domestic Violence Litigation and Legislation Advance the Rights of Welfare Recipients, Immigrant Women, and Lesbians. Berkeley Women’s Law Journal, 156-1 62.

Taylor Institute. (1998). The Family Violence Option: An Early Assessment. Report Submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (September 1).

Teegardin, C. (1 995). Congress-The First Hundred Days: Welfare Stereotypes Belie True Picture of Needy-Who Benefits? The Atlanta Journal Constitution (February 7), Section A, p. 14.

Waddan, A. (1997). The Politics of Social Welfare: The Collapse of the Center and the Rise of the Right. Brookfield, VT: Edward Elgar Publishing Co.

Wallis, J. (1999). A Look at Welfare Reform. San Francisco Chronicle. (March 2). P. A19.

Weaver, R.K., Shapiro, R., and Jacobs, L.R. (1995). The Polls- trends: Welfare. Public Opinion Quarterly, 59, 606-627.

Weinberg, J. K. (1991). The Dilemma of Welfare Reform: ‘Workfare’ programs and poor women. New England Law Review, 26,415-452.

White House, Office of the Press Secretary. (1997). Press Release: Remarks by the President to the National Governors Association, The Mirage Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada. [On-line]. Ava i I a bl e : h tt p : //www . w h i t e ho u se . g ov.

Wilson, T. (1 998). Co-workers Say Dally Boasted of Perfect Crime. Los Angeles Times. (February 12). Part B, p. I.

Wilson, W. (1997). Ex-lover Guilty of Hiring ‘Hit’ on Child’s Mother. Sacramento Bee. (October 24). P. B3.


Yates, D. (1 982). Bureaucratic Democracy: The Search for Democracy and Efficiency in American Government. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Yates, T. (1997). The Aftermath of Welfare Reform: SSl childhood disability. Clearinghouse Review, 31, 7/8, 358.

Zorza, J. (1996). Protecting the Children in Custody. Clearinghouse Review (April), p.1113-27.

POLICY FOR THE'DESERVING,'BUT POLITICALLY WEAK: THE 1996 WELFARE REFORM ACT AND BATTERED WOMEN

Documents

Transcript of POLICY FOR THE'DESERVING,'BUT POLITICALLY WEAK: THE 1996 WELFARE REFORM ACT AND BATTERED WOMEN