ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I examine the Scottish model of IF, called self-directed support (SDS), through the lens of Scottish exceptionalism. Drawing on original material collected through interviews and secondary sources, I argue that SDS was held to signify a distinctly Scottish direction in social care policy, emphasising human rights and participatory parity over the New Labour ideals of individual entrepreneurship and ‘choice’. Yet the values that supposedly set SDS apart from the English approach have, in many local authorities, failed to materialise in significantly different, more progressive forms of policy practice. On the contrary, as is revealed in the first-hand accounts of people in receipt of individual budgets in the city of Glasgow, SDS became inextricably bound up with the retrenchment of services at the local government level. Claims that SDS represents a ‘progressive break’ from the neoliberal state transformations occurring south of the border should therefore be viewed with a degree of scepticism. While there is no doubt a desire on the part of the SNP-led Government to distinguish and distance itself from Westminster’s neoliberalism, post-GFC austerity has placed major limitations on the scope for policy divergence in social care.
