This article uses ethnographic and qualitative research to explore the health implications and social responses of a low-income neighborhood in Southeast England, to more than a decade of austerity policies and declining institutional and welfare support. Findings examine how cuts to public services and welfare programs alongside changes to the area’s social structure shape resident’s perceptions of health risks and threats. Residents pointed to poor levels of mental health that were exacerbated by financial insecurity, the closure of community facilities and difficulties accessing support and professional help. An increase in social disorder and sense of danger within the vicinity were attributed to changes in the area’s social composition and a reduction of policing in the neighborhood, which were an additional cause of anxiety for residents. Many people felt their neighborhood was treated inequitably with regard to law-and-order, health provision and other services designed to address health problems and risks and dangers in their social environment. This institutional vacuum generates unmet health needs facilitating informal practices and methods for managing health, such as through self-provision or using alternative, and more readily available, sources of medical advice and treatment. The demise of older forms of social control and surveillance that ran parallel with closure of the area’s communal spaces had been partly compensated by social media usage, while informal methods of policing were a growing presence in the neighborhood in reaction to rising lawlessness and the ineffectiveness of police and local authorities.

本文利用人种学和定性研究来探讨英格兰东南部低收入社区对十多年来的紧缩政策以及不断下降的制度和福利支持的健康影响和社会反应。调查结果探讨了公共服务和福利计划的削减以及该地区社会结构的变化如何影响居民对健康风险和威胁的看法。居民们指出，经济不安全、社区设施关闭以及获得支持和专业帮助的困难加剧了心理健康状况不佳的情况。该地区社会构成的变化和附近治安的减少导致了附近社会混乱和危险感的增加，这是居民焦虑的另一个原因。许多人认为，他们的社区在法律和秩序、医疗服务以及旨在解决社会环境中的健康问题和风险和危险的其他服务方面受到了不公平的对待。这种机构真空产生了未满足的健康需求，促进了健康管理的非正式实践和方法，例如通过自我提供或使用替代的、更容易获得的医疗建议和治疗来源。与该地区公共空间的关闭同时发生的旧形式的社会控制和监视的消亡已通过社交媒体的使用得到部分补偿，而非正式的治安方法在该地区越来越多，以应对日益严重的无法无天和效率低下的情况。警察和地方当局。