Expanding the boundaries of social welfare law

“Social welfare law” is suffering from a longstanding identity crisis. The field’s development in the UK is tied closely to that of this journal - its foundation in the 1970s as the “Journal of Social Welfare Law” reflected a burgeoning area of research and practice. However, many of the concerns raised at the time about the meaning, scope and future direction of “social welfare law” as an area of research, teaching and practice remain unresolved. As Martin asked, is there “really something here which deserves recognition as a distinct field of law?” In revisiting social welfare law’s problem of definition, this article does two things. First, drawing on prior work on “social welfare law”, we provide a typology of approaches to defining the field of inquiry. We argue that there are five approaches reflected in writing on social welfare law: “statutes specify”, “law for the poor”, the “dustbin”, the “case study” and “common denominator risk”. Second, we draw two reflections about how future social welfare law research can expand its boundaries. We argue for: (i) a “global” social welfare law scholarship, and (ii) analysis that accounts for non-state actors.