ABSTRACT
To link analyses of contexts with analyses of developmental change, this chapter takes as a starting point ways of describing social contexts. Two are given particular attention: one in terms of available routes/opportunities/options, the other in terms of activities/routines/practices. Each of these two approaches to contexts may be aligned with some particular descriptions of continuity or change. Each prompts also some particular proposals for forms of intervention or prevention. Considered more briefly are specifications of contexts in terms of ideologies or values, and in terms of a general quality: homogeneity/heterogeneity. The aim throughout is integrative: reducing the array of current positions by bringing together a variety of descriptions of context, in ways that use similar dimensions for the specification of descriptions of development and that suggest particular steps towards bringing about change.
