Decentralisation and Social Services in England

Although Great Britain is not normally credited with the achievement of having been the first nation state to implement measures characteristic of a welfare state (this honour goes to Germany and Bismarck's strategy of promoting social insurance in the 1880s) it nevertheless pioneered many models of welfare services in view of the early onset of industrialisation in that country and the subsequent social problems it created. Organisations like the Mutual Insurance and Friendly Societies, the Charity Organisation Society or the Settlement Movement characterised an early approach to welfare that is based on initiatives at the civil society level and express a sense of self-help or of self-organisation in such a way that it did not involve the state directly. The state, traditionally, dealt with matters of discipline and public order, and for this reason institutions like prisons and workhouses represented the other end of the scale of 'welfare' provisions.

Social Integration and New Realities in the Swedish Welfare Society

This article argues that there is a discrepancy between the perception of social realities held by professionals of welfare (school teachers and social workers) in Sweden and the social realities of migrants, especially migrants depending on social assistance. The views held by professionals are rooted in an old model of social integration within the framework of the nation-state. This perception contrasts with the life conditions, expressed here in the consumption practices of migrant families who, in their daily life, are linked to both local and transnational places. Consumption is an “old question” that has been linked both to poverty and immigration. The article is focusing not on consumption as such; instead on consumption as an illustration of the mismatch existing between the professionals’ view and the migrants’ description of their own consumption. The analysis is based on a qualitative study including interviews with migrant families and welfare officers in a neighbourhood in Malmoe, a city in the South of Sweden with some 300,000 inhabitants, of which 29 % are born outside Sweden.

The Concept of Developmental-Tasks and its Significance for Education and Social Work

The term "developmental-task" was introduced by Robert Havighurst in the 1950's. According to R. Harvighurst, the term refers to tasks which arise in a social context during an individual lifetime. Since the 1950's the concept of developmental-tasks has become an important theoretical approach in educational science and in theories of growth and development - but not in social work and social pedagogy. In the following article I aim to show that this approach is very important to theory and practice of social pedagogy and social work.

The Care and Shelter of Children and Adolescents in Brazil: Expressions of Social Issues

The future of Brazilian children who have the protection offered by familial bonds is threatened by social inequities that force them to seek shelter and grow up in shelters. According to the Institute of Applied Economic Research, an estimated 20,000 children and adolescents are served by institutions. The majority of these children are afro-descendent males between the ages of seven and fifteen years old. Of those researched, 87.6% have families (58.2% receive visits from their families, 22.7% are rarely visited by their families and 5.8 are legally prohibited from contacting or being by their families). The percentage of children and adolescents “without families” or with “missing families” is 11.3%. There is no information available for 2% of the children and adolescents residing in shelters. The principle factors that necessitate the placement of Brazilian children in institutions that provide care and shelter include poverty (including children forced to work, sell drugs or beg, for example); domestic violence; chemical dependence of parents or guardians; homelessness; death or parents or guardian; imprisonment of their parents; and sexual abuse committed by their parents or guardians. The issue of abandoned children and adolescents and their care and shelter in the Brazilian context expresses a perverse violation of Child and Adolescent Rights.

Social Work, Political Violence and Historical Change:

In this paper the author outlines the background to the history of the conflict in Northern Ireland which led to the current ‘Troubles’. In this discussion a range of key ideas are highlighted, including the nature of sectarianism and patterns of violence which have profoundly affected the society. The second part of the paper reviews a number of issues which face social workers when they try to deal with the effects of such violence as well as highlighting new challenges which have emerged as the society moves towards the resolution of conflict. It concludes with the argument that, wherever there is such conflict in the world, social workers need critically to understand the way in which political and social structures impinge upon their everyday practice.

Policy Contexts of Social Work in Britain: the wider implications of 'New' Labour and the 'New Legal Regime'

Several commentators have expressed disappointment with New Labour's apparent adherence to the policy frameworks of the previous Conservative administrations. The employment orientation of its welfare programmes, the contradictory nature of the social exclusion initiatives, and the continuing obsession with public sector marketisation, inspections, audits, standards and so on, have all come under critical scrutiny (c.f., Blyth 2001; Jordan 2001; Orme 2001). This paper suggests that in order to understand the socio-economic and political contexts affecting social work we need to examine the relationship between New Labour's modernisation project and its insertion within an architecture of global governance. In particular, membership of the European Union (EU), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Trade Organisation (WTO) set the parameters for domestic policy in important ways. Whilst much has been written about the economic dimensions of 'globalisation' in relation to social work rather less has been noted about the ways in which domestic policy agenda are driven by multilateral governance objectives. This policy dimension is important in trying to respond to various changes affecting social work as a professional activity. What is possible, what is encouraged, how things might be done, is tightly bounded by the policy frameworks governing practice and affected by those governing the lives of service users. It is unhelpful to see policy formulation in purely national terms as the UK is inserted into a network governance structure, a regulatory framework where decisions are made by many countries and organisations and agencies. Together, they are producing a 'new legal regime', characterised by a marked neo-liberal policy agenda. This paper aims to demonstrate the relationship of New Labour's modernisation programme to these new forms of legality by examining two main policy areas and the welfare implications they are enmeshed in. The first is privatisation, and the second is social policy in the European Union. Examining these areas allows a demonstration of how much of the New Labour programme can be understood as a local implementation of a transnational strategy, how parts of that strategy produce much of the social exclusion it purports to address, and how social welfare, and particularly social work, are noticeable by their absence within policy discourses of the strategy. The paper details how the privatisation programme is considered to be a crucial vehicle for the further development of a transnational political-economy, where capital accumulation has been redefined as 'welfare'. In this development, frameworks, codes and standards are central, and the final section of the paper examines how the modernisation strategy of the European Union depends upon social policy marked by an employment orientation and risk rationality, aimed at reconfiguring citizen identities.The strategy is governed through an 'open mode of coordination', in which codes, standards, benchmarks and so on play an important role. The paper considers the modernisation strategy and new legality within which it is embedded as dependent upon social policy as a technology of liberal governance, one demonstrating a new rationality in comparison to that governing post-Second World War welfare, and which aims to reconfigure institutional infrastructure and citizen identity.

The Impact of Western Social Workers in Romania - a Fine Line between Empowerment and Disempowerment

Ideally the social work profession promotes social change, problem solving in human relationships and the empowerment and liberation of people to enhance their well-being (IFSW 2004). The social work practice, however, often proves to be different. Social workers are always in the danger to make decisions for their clients or define problems according to their own interpretation and world view. In quite a number of cases, the consequence of such a social work practice is that the clients feel disempowered rather than empowered. This dilemma is multiplying when western social workers get involved in developing countries. The potential that intervention, with the intention to empower and liberate the people, turns into disempowerment is tremendously higher because of the differences in tradition, culture and society, on the one side and the power imbalance between the ‘West’ and the ‘Rest’ on the other side. Especially in developing countries, where the vast majority of people live in poverty, many Western social workers come with a lot of sympathy and the idea to help the poor and to change the world. An example is Romania. After the collapse of communism in 1989, Romania was an economically, politically and socially devastated country. The pictures of the orphanages shocked the western world. As a result many Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), churches and individuals were bringing humanitarian goods to Romania in order to alleviate the misery of the Romanian people and especially the children. Since then, important changes in all areas of life have occurred, mostly with foreign financial aid and support. At the political level, democratic institutions were established, a liberal market economy was launched and laws were adapted to western standards regarding the accession into the European Union and the NATO. The western world has left its marks also at the grassroots level in form of NGOs or social service agencies established through western grants and individuals. Above and beyond, the presence of western goods and investment in Romania is omnipresent. This reflects a newly-gained freedom and prosperity - Romania profits certainly from these changes. But this is only one side of the medal, as the effect of westernisation contradicts with the Romanian reality and overruns many deep-rooted traditions, thus the majority of people. Moreover, only a small percentage of the population has access to this western world. Western concepts, procedures or interpretations are often highly differing from the Romanian tradition, history and culture. Nevertheless, western ideas seem to dominate the transition in many areas of daily life in Romania. A closer look reveals that many changes take place due to pressure of western governments and are conditioned to financial support. The dialectic relationship between the need for foreign aid and the implementation becomes very obvious in Romania and often leads, despite the substantial benefits, to unpredictable and rather negative side-effects, at a political, social, cultural, ecological and/or economic level. This reality is a huge dilemma for all those involved, as there is a fine line between empowering and disempowering action. It is beyond the scope of this journal to discuss the dilemma posed by Western involvement at all levels; therefore this article focuses on the impact of Western social workers in Romania. The first part consists of a short introduction to social work in Romania, followed by the discussion about the dilemma posed by the structure of project of international social work and the organisation of private social service agencies. Thirdly the experiences of Romanian staff with Western social workers are presented and then discussed with regard to turning disempowering tendencies of Western social workers into empowerment.

Everyday Sexuality and Social Work: Locating Sexuality in Professional Practice and Education

Social work has seen increased intellectual interest in sexuality. However, little attention has been paid to the relevance of everyday sexuality for professional practice or how this might be integrated within existing social work curricula. This paper proposes that knowledge about everyday sexuality is vital to social workers as they deal with a variety of clients faced with the increasing complexities brought about by late-modernity. Additionally, it is argued that this knowledge base is congruent with the ethical and political dimensions of the profession. The PLISSIT model is presented as a possible pedagogical framework for social work education in this area.

Women in Prostitution and Social Responsibility

The aim of the paper is to show how prostitution is embedded in historically changing gender relationships regulated by the state and part of each societies understanding of sexuality. An important role to improve the situation of women in prostitution is played by engaged social work, often linked to the womens movement on a local, national and an international level in spite of differing positions on the institution of prostitution. The authors argumentation is based on qualitative and quantitative empirical findings concerning shared experiences as well as differences between women in prostitution and findings on professional possibilities and limits of supporting the women. Important dimensions of heterogeneity amongst the women are legality versus illegality, decision making possibilities respectively dependencies und choice versus force, which also are the base of different political and professional positions taken by experts.