Teenage Pregnancy and its Support System in Korea

While family structure continues to diversify in Korean society, society’s rejection of unmarried mothers continues to be a strong obstacle. However, Korean teenage mothers increasingly are deciding to raise their own children and live their daily lives in communities that hold biases and express rejection towards them. At present, the Single-Parent Family Support Act is central to the development of support policies for unmarried mothers, but as pointed out in this study, it is important to implement detailed, individualized, comprehensive, and continual assistance, not limited to those who opt for childrearing but also towards all unmarried mothers who opt for adoption. While raising one’s own child, it is important to provide long-term and continual support and support that helps the recipient foresee how she can step her way up to independence, rather than short-term and sporadic handouts.

US Social Welfare Policy: The Reagan Record and Legacy

This paper reviews the Reagan administration's attack on the US welfare system during the 1980s. The paper considers the origins, provisions and impact of Reagan's three major pieces of retrenchment legislation: the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1981, the Social Security Amendments of 1983, and the Family Support Act of 1988. It is argued that Reagan's record in retrenching welfare was limited in budgetary terms, but was successful in making welfare programmes more restrictive. Reagan's welfare legacy is assessed in terms of his attempts at restructuring social provision and shifting the welfare debate to the right. The paper concludes by asserting that Reagan's critique of, and attack on, social provision was accepted by his presidential successors, George Bush and Bill Clinton.