Indigenous Australians Essay
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Added on 2020-05-16
Indigenous Australians Essay
Added on 2020-05-16
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Running head: SOCIOLOGYSociologyName of the student:Name of the University:Author’s note
1SOCIOLOGYSocial policies are implemented with the purpose of resolving social problems in societyand providing adequate support to people living with disadvantage (Dean, 2014). There are somegroups of people in community who suffers greater disadvantage in all areas of life and theirdisadvantage is defined by social, economic and cultural determinants in society (Fisher et al.,2016). Some of the groups who are major targets of social policies include unemployed people,single parents, aged people, women, children, and those living with disability. This is becausethey experience social injustice due to inequality in the areas of employment, health, housing andother areas of life. Hence, social policies focus on eliminating gaps in social aspects of well-being and bringing positive changes in the community. This essay particularly focuses onanalyzing the position of Indigenous Australians in community and findings out ways in whichsocial policy domains in the area of income support and health care has influence the IndigenousAustralians. The paper analyzes social policies under the income support and health care domainand gives an insight into the strength and limitation of social policy domain on impacting thelives of the selected population group. Indigenous Australians are one of the distinct cultural groups in Australia who used tolive in surrounding islands of the country. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders also comprisethe group of indigenous Australians and they follow mix of both contemporary and traditionalpractices. They are also regarded as the first inhabitant of Australia as they were the first humanto settle down in the country. By the time, European settlers arrived in Australian in 1778, therewere about 3,20,000 Aborigines in the country (Shareourpride.org.au., 2018).After the Europeansettlement, indigenous Australians have to resettle in other lands. The history of forcedresettlement and the loss of land has been a contributor to disadvantages in the group. They have
2SOCIOLOGYbeen marginalized from society and they lag behind from non-indigenous Australians in theareas of employment, health, housing and education.The perception of indigenous Australians has changed over time. According to currentperception, indigenous Australians are regarded as the most disadvantaged group in Australiabecause of disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians across all parametersof quality of life. A number of socio-economic factors create disadvantages for the group andincrease risk of health and well-being. Although indigenous people continue to inhabit Australia,however they live in a separate social stratum and retain links to traditional culture and beliefs.Indigenous people do not trust social workers because they also played a role in removal ofchildren during colonization. Issues of social justice, equity and social disadvantage hampersustainable and effective relation between indigenous Australians too (Bennett 2015). Althoughmany multicultural policies and immigration policies have been implemented in Australia toencourage a culturally diverse population, however still indigenous Australians have beenrecognized as having lower level of unemployment and greater negative health complicationscompared too rest of the population (Mitrou et al. 2014). Income support policy is one of the policy domains that have focused on welfare of theindigenous groups. Income support policies are crucial for social security and alleviating burdenof unemployment and poverty for disadvantages group in society (Carson & Kerr, 2017). Lowsocioeconomic position in terms of income and occupation also has association between greaterburden of disease and mortality in countries (Arno et al., 2011). Evidence related to burden ofdisease and disparities in health status between indigenous Australians and rest of the populationpoints out to the need for immediate policy action for this group (Vos et al., 2009). A study oncardio-metabolic risk and disease in indigenous Australians also revealed that unemployed
3SOCIOLOGYindividuals are most likely to have cardiovascular disease (Brown et al. 2014). Hence, thisproves that higher income is associated with lower odds of health risk and social disadvantage inpeople and income support policies improves the economic status of people living in poverty.Income support policy can achieve its goal when income support measures are complementedwith strategies to eliminate factors contributing to social problem in indigenous group. The roleof income support policy and its impact on indigenous Australians will be analyzed in later partof essay. Apart from income support, another policy domain that is importance in the context ofwelfare of indigenous Australians includes the health policies. This is because indigenousAustralians have lower life expectancies and worse health outcome compared to non-indigenouspeople (Durey & Thompson, 2012). Life expectancy is a parameter that describes populationhealth and for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people born in 2010-2012, life expectancyhas been estimated to be 10.6 years lower compared to non-indigenous population (AustralianInstitute of Health and Welfare, 2018).Such evidence affirms the fact that health policy domainis a necessary element to assess the fate of welfare activities done in the area of health forindigenous group. Evaluation of health policies for indigenous Australian will help to determinewhether health policies have been effective in reducing health disparities or not. It may also helpto assess whether health policies promote or compromise indigenous health and well-being. To evaluate the role of income support policy domain in influencing lives of Indigenouspeople, there is a need to analyze the performance of specific income support policies that hasbeen implemented for the group. Income inequality is a significant issue in indigenous peopleand this is evident from the 2014-2015 statistics that only less than 46 % of Aboriginal andTorres Strait Islander people above 15 years are employed in Australia. In addition, more number
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