The study seeks to make two contributions. One is to participate in the development of theories and methods for the analysis of equity and efficiency in community care. The second is to yield evidence which assists policy-makers and managers to improve the effectiveness of their policies. The broad context is the évolution of the policy discourse about issues of equity and efficiency in community care of elderly people. More narrowly, the context is the implementation of the 1989 community care reforms, set out in Care in the Community: Policy Guidance (Department of Health 1990) and the government's commitment to commission research to evaluate their impact on equity and efficiency in social care. The more recent White Paper, Modernising Social Services (Department of Health 1998), is also an important element of the context. The detailed analysis in the thesis will therefore focus around two main foci: (1) the extent to which care brokered by social services departments has achieved the equity- and efficiency-related goals stated by the 1989 White Paper and developed in the 1998 White Paper; and (2) the extent to which current policies need to be adjusted in the light of understanding about how the new system produces equity and efficiency effects. 1.1 Public policy and the Holy Grail: improving efficiency in the use of public funds The Conservative administration which produced the 1989 White Paper attached a higher priority to efficiency in the use of public funds than its predecessors. However, the origins of its concerns could be traced back to the 1970s.