Correlates of Social Worker Contact with Clients' Family Networks

The study examined the degree of social worker contact with the family networks of a sample of new elderly applicants (N = 122) to the social welfare services of Jerusalem. Greater contact was correlated with frail status of the client and a request for institutional care. A curvilinear relationship was found with network accessibility. These correlations disappeared, however, when degree of family initiated contact with the social worker was considered together with the other variables, through multiple classification analysis. Implication of these findings for the interweaving of formal and informal supports are considered.     

Regulation of Personal Social Services – The Israeli Experience

The current article explores the aspects of regulatory policy in the field of personal social services. In Israel, the government sets standards, and finances and oversees personal social services, while the services themselves are provided primarily by non‐governmental organizations. Based on a qualitative study we examined two questions. First, what characterizes the implementation of regulatory mechanisms in the field of personal social services in Israel? Second, how can we explain the outcomes of regulation in the personal social services in Israel? In a unique approach, we used the institutional analysis and development (IAD) framework to explore the regulatory practices implemented in community residences and hostels for people with intellectual disabilities and in after school programmes. The findings revealed that although there were implementation gaps in both cases, the IAD might improve our understanding of the nature and magnitude of these gaps. Furthermore, the insights gained may have implications for policymakers in their development of regulatory policy.     

Retired Israeli Social Workers:

A survey of retired professional Israeli social workers found gradual withdrawal from paid work and increased participation in social welfare volunteer work. Their satisfaction with retirement in general was related to their income and health status; their satisfaction with their retirement activities as a retired social worker was also related to their income and health, plus related to their work status. Further cross-cultural comparisons of retired professionals and other workers are urged.     

Retired Israeli Social Workers:

A survey of retired professional Israeli social workers found gradual withdrawal from paid work and increased participation in social welfare volunteer work. Their satisfaction with retirement in general was related to their income and health status; their satisfaction with their retirement activities as a retired social worker was also related to their income and health, plus related to their work status. Further cross-cultural comparisons of retired professionals and other workers are urged.     

The Social Worker as 'Bad Object'

Correspondence to Dr Marguerite Valentine, 56 Osbaldeston Road, London N16 7DR Summary A ‘bad object’ has been defined as an ‘objectwhom the subject hates or fears, who is experienced as malevolent.A bad object may be either an internal or an external object’(Rycroft, 1988, p. 100). This paper explores the circumstancesin which public fears and anxieties over child abuse becomeprojected into the social worker. It discusses how social workersintroject these feelings, become a ‘bad object’,and how social services departments have developed a numberof strategies which defend against feelings of blame and responsibility.The exploration is derived from my own experiences and observations,and applies Kleinian psychoanalytic theory to studies of institutionaldefences.     

The Probation Officer as Social Worker

Summary In this article the author argues for a detachment of the probationservice from the function of carrying out court orders to superviseoffenders. He suggests that changes in social work traininghave not been matched by any fundamental changes in the probationservice's relationship with the court or by any fundamentalchanges in the probation service's own organization or philosophy.The consequence is that probation officers spend a disproportionateamount of time doing tasks for which their training has notequipped them. He postulates a new relationship between theprobation service and the courts which gives the former greaterautonomy in social work decision making, and gives the lattergreater scope to administer punishments within the community.The need to move away from the utilitarian justification forwork with offenders that it reduces crime is also urged, andit is suggested that there is a need to establish, as a value,the importance of social work provisions and counselling foroffenders as a deprived group in society, irrespective of theeffect of these measures on the crime rate.     

The Social Worker, the Client and the Social Anthropologist

Summary City Centre Project has been working with drifting and homelessyoung people and we considered it important to study not justthe clients, but also the project workers. The discipline andmethods of social anthropology appeared to offer unique advantagesin this attempt However, in the course of our fieldwork, weencountered situations which led us to question the validityof using participant observation with clients, and to explorethe tensions between social workers and academic researchers.We then altered our methods for gathering data, and realizedthat our experience had important implications for researchersconsidering the use of qualitative methods in a social worksetting. This article is our first attempt to generalize fromour particular experience, and to raise questions about powerrelations among the parties to research and action.     

偏好与结构——同质婚的形成机制研究

同质婚是指夫妻双方社会人口特征比较相似的婚姻,是社会阶层固化程度的一个反映。使用2013年"社会发展与社会建设"全国抽样调查数据,考察不同社会群体选择教育同质婚、职业阶层同质婚和户口同质婚的影响因素。结果发现,位居教育层级两端的被访者更可能选择教育同质婚;位居职业阶层底端的被访者更可能选择职业阶层同质婚;受教育水平越高的被访者,越可能选择非农户口同质婚;女性比男性更倾向于选择非农户口同质婚。总体而言,婚配模式的选择既体现出了个人偏好与个人理性,同时亦受个人所处社会结构位置的约束。     

浅析我国当前的社会工作法律和社会工作者法律

在我国,社会工作和社会工作者作为名词已经为大家所熟悉,但了解它们的具体内容的人并不多,其中的主要原因是缺乏法律的明确规定。本文介绍了社会工作法律和社会工作者法律,特别是对社会工作法律和社会工作者法律的具体规定作了较为详细的介绍。本文紧密联系我国实际,充分依据法律条文,具有较强的实证主义风格。     

Stress and Pressures in Mental Health Social Work: The Worker Speaks

Two-thirds of councils with social services responsibilities(CSSRs) took part in a UK survey of mental health social workers.A one in five sample of front line workers was drawn, and 237respondents completed a questionnaire and diary about theirwork context and content, and their attitudes to their work,their employer, mental health policy and the place of mentalhealth social work in modernized mental health services. Thequestions, that called for free-text responses, were completedin detail and at length. This paper reports the results of aqualitative analysis of these responses using NVIVO software.The paper is structured around the themes emerging from theanalysis: pressure of work; staffing matters; job satisfactionand well-being; recruitment and retention issues; and beingvalued. The conclusions are that the social workers value faceto face contact with service users, and that their commitmentto service users is an important factor in staff retention.The most unsatisfactory aspects of their work context arisefrom not feeling valued by their employers and wider society,and some of the most satisfactory from the support of colleaguesand supervisors. Without attention to these factors, recruitmentand retention problems will remain an unresolved issue.     

社会管理视野中社会工作人才队伍建设的十大瓶颈

目前我国社会正处于一个空前变革时期,各种社会矛盾集中凸显,社会问题大量涌现,迫切需要建设一支高素质的社会工作人才队伍。但在我国社会工作人才队伍建设的过程中,存在着制度、价值、认同、岗位、教育、本土化、供需、管理、考评、激励等十个方面的瓶颈。如何突破瓶颈,是培养和造就一支职业化、专业化社会工作人才队伍必须解决的课题。     

The Approved Social Worker -- Reflections on Origins

Correspondence to Pauline M. Prior, Department of Social Policy and Social Work, University of York, Heslington, York YO1 5DD. Summary The aim of this paper is to examine the role of social workersunder current mental health law, in order to see if the adventof the Approved Social Worker (ASW) represents any more thanthe re-appearance of old concepts in a new guise. It is arguedthat it is impossible for the ASW to be anything more than anupdated version of the Relieving Officer of the last century,in view of the fact that the Mental Health Act 1983 does notprovide a clear mandate for an effective professional advocateon behalf of mentally ill people.     

Welfare, Society and the Social Worker

Summary This article attempts to locate some common stereotyped transactionsbetween social workers and their clients as elements in theproduction of distinctive welfare identities. By comparing thisprocess to that of a rite of passage, the client is found tobe like a ritual subject frozen in the moment of transitionbetween social categories and thereby denied a place in society.An opposition is accordingly presumed to exist between Welfareand Society. The matrix of stereotyped expectations which derivesfrom this opposition is shown often to intrude on the relationshipbetween social worker and client, constituting a pressure toresolve the tensions produced by anomaly through the impositionof a welfare identity on the client. In this respect, the specialvulnerability of marginal groups is noted and a brief discussionthen follows of the characteristic qualities of ascribed welfareidentity. Through Welfare, Society is found to displace imaginativelyits sense of entropy beyond the moral community. But the essentiallink between Welfare and Society remains and increasing socialdisorder brings the paradoxical feature of this strategy tothe fore. The preservation of the social order requires increasingconcentrations of entropy to be symbolically located in Welfareand as a result Welfare comes to take on the aspect of a threateningand subversive entity. In conclusion, it is suggested that behindthe apparent ‘crisis’ in social work lies a crisisin the management of social entropy.     

论社工在流浪儿童救助保护体系中的作用

如果把救助以“到达救助站”为界分为两个阶段,郑州模式等从后半段为建设儿童救助保护中心提供了借鉴,同时上海的“中途宿舍”等计划为前半段提供了参考。本文将以南京救助管理体系为例,讨论社工在流浪儿童救助体系不同阶段中的作用。     

高校社会工作专业学生选择机制的演变

以韦伯的理想类型方法,可将高校社工学生的选择机制概括为精英型、大众型、个人魅力型三种模式。在传统精英型选择模式到大众型选择模式进程中,自愿型选择模式因更具有人文关怀、更具人性化而成为新的发展趋势。     

The Role of the Social Worker in Long-Term Care

Abstract

Making use of a formulation by Rosalie Kane of the ingredients necessary to “a good life” for residents of homes for the aged and other long term care facilities, the role of the social worker in insuring the presence of these ingredients is discussed. Included is an analysis of the responsibilities and tasks of the social worker which must be carried and fulfilled in order that social workers make appropriate contributions to “the good life.”     

香港社会工作管窥之三:评估与问责

在香港,无论是接受政府资助的社会服务机构,还是自筹经费的社会服务机构,都必须面对评估和问责的要求.不同的是,前者主要接受资助方-政府的评估与问责,而后者更多是向社会公众交代.说到对受资助机构的评估,就必须要提到《服务表现监察制度》.它是对受资助机构进行规管、厘定及评估服务表现的重要文件,包括社会福利署与受资助机构签订的...     

Worker Participation and the Social Service Agency

Summary Is there real sharing of decision-making responsibility withinsocial service agencies? What hope is there for participationby the consumer of services if the agency worker nearest andmost relevant to him has little voice or leverage within theorganization? This paper examines the notion of worker participationwithin the context of the social services department and theprobation service, noting the imperfections of the ‘publicmandate’ behind the authority structure of these organizations.Above all it looks for continuity between the values socialservice agencies publicly represent and the values in theirday-to-day dealings with their own staff and clients. Currenttrade union proposals for worker representation at committeelevel are considered, and Dutch experience in extending theworkers' council from the industrial to the social welfare sphereis presented as one alternative model.     

Euthanasia: Israeli Social Workers' Experiences, Attitudes and Meanings

Correspondence to Dr Ronit D. Leichtentritt, Bob Shapell School of Social Work, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel. E-mail: ronitl{at}post.tau.ac.il Summary Sixteen social workers in Israel were interviewed about theirexperiences with and attitudes towards various forms of euthanasia,as well as the meanings they ascribe to them. Using phenomenologicalanalysis, seven themes were identified, emphasizing individual,interpersonal, organizational, social and therapeutic considerations,and suggesting a holistic and integrative structure of the phenomenon.The themes were arrived at by identifying distinctions and similaritiesbetween different forms of euthanasia. Two themes suggestingsimilarities were revealed: ‘diminishing the value oflife’ and ‘a call for help’. Three themeswere found to distinguish between passive euthanasia (withholdingand withdrawing life-sustaining treatment) and active forms(active euthanasia and assisted suicide): ‘legality’,‘social acceptance’ and ‘concern for the sickand dying’. The last two themes distinguished betweenwithholding treatment and assisted suicide, on the one hand,and withdrawing treatment and active euthanasia, on the other:‘the involvement of others as executor’ and ‘thepublicity of the act’. Further research and training isrequired to better inform social workers in this ethical area.Given their unique position, social workers should activelyparticipate in legal, social and therapeutic discussions concerningend-of-life decisions, for the benefit of clients, their familiesand health-care providers.     

社会工作教师专业化发展之方向:成为有效的督导

督导是社会工作服务体系中的重要角色,也是社会工作教育者专业化发展的趋势与方向。对于社会工作专任教师而言,成为督导不仅能够适应培养学生的任务要求,同时也适应于内地社会工作模式本土化的宏观需要并促进教师在社会工作专业领域内的自身发展。在此基础上,本文对如何促进社会工作教师成为有效的督导进行了尝试性的分析。