Individualist Explanations Of Homelessness

Policies has been frequently influenced by set of social attitudes and beliefs towards the homeless (Sheedy, 2015). Up until the Second World War, homeless policies were underpinned by ideas of the ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ poor and regulated people’s access to assistance (Leggatt-Cook & Chamberlain, 2015, p. 10). Understanding of homeless in contemporary Western societies exist on an ideological continuum, which shapes the way people think about the issue. For instance, individualist explanations view homelessness as the result of lifestyle choices and personal failings such as drug abuse, criminal deviancy or alcoholism. Overemphasis on Individualist explanations could lead to minimal state intervention, antagonistic responses and reaction