SHARON KANE is employed as a domestic violence policy co-ordinator at Leechmore Training Centre, Sunderland, having worked as a lecturer in sociology at Middlesbrough College, Sunderland.MARK KIRBY is a teacher of sociology at City and Islington College, London. He has taught in further education and in sixth form colleges for twelve years and is the author of Stratification and Differentiation, also in the Skills-Based Sociology series.

• IntroductionWealth, Income and InequalityTheories of Equality and InequalityDefinitions and Measurements of PovertyThe Distribution of Poverty: Who are the Poor?Explanations of PovertyGlobalisation, Localities and PovertyIdeologies of Welfare and the Welfare StateContemporary Debates about Welfare ProvisionSocial Security, Housing and Social ServicesBibliographyIndex.