Faith-Based Organisations and Exclusion in European Cities

Description

At a time of heightened neoliberal globalisation and crisis, welfare state retrenchment and desecularisation of society, amid uniquely European controversies over immigration, integration and religious-based radicalism, this timely book explores the role played by faith-based organisations (FBOs), which are growing in importance in the provision of social services in the European context. Taking a multidisciplinary approach, the contributions to the volume present original research examples and a pan-European perspective to assess the role of FBOs in combating poverty and various expressions of exclusion and social distress in cities across Europe. This significant and highly topical volume should become a vital reference source for the burgeoning number of studies that are likely follow and will make essential reading for students and academics in social policy, sociology, geography, politics, urban studies and theology/ religious studies.

Justin Beaumont is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Spatial Sciences, University of Groningen in The Netherlands. He has developed new enquires on social interventions within postsecular cities, as well as faith-based organizations and social justice in urban areas. His articles appear in International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Urban Studies, Environment and Planning A, Space and Polity, Area and TESG. Paul Cloke is Professor of Human Geography at the University of Exeter, UK. Over the last decade he has been involved in research that takes a new look geographies of ethics, focusing in particular on responses to homelessness, the new politics of ethical consumption and the growing significance of faith-based or theo-ethics in contemporary society. Paul is currently engaged in research on postsecularism and faith-based interventions in a range of social and caring arenas.

"Faith-based organisations and exclusion in European cities is an anthology that is geared especially for those interested in learning about the concepts and practices of FBOs throughout Europe (and how what can be learned from them may be generalised in other regions), as well as those interested in advancing research in the field" - Journal of Poverty and Social Justice "Very accessible and well written...it will make a timely addition to libraries across Europe" Journal of Church and State "Social science can no longer ignore the power of faith and the faithful. Beaumont and Cloke's collection provides rich insight into the ways in which religion is remaking everyday life in European cities today." Jane Wills, Queen Mary, University of London