Social work as gendered issue from a generational point of view

Social work is a gendered activity in terms both of its workforce and of the students who enter this profession. In this paper we analyse the underlying dynamics of this phenomenon in the Italian context, according to the characteristics and points of view of different generations of social workers. Data from a 2008 survey of 1000 interviews and 50 in-depth informant interviews are considered. Two multinomial linear models have been included in order to analyse the perceptions of younger and older social workers with regard to social work as ‘female work’ or ‘male work’. The results show that the perception of social work as a matter of gender is stronger among younger social workers, and that the younger generations appear to be less oriented towards equal gender roles. Longer work experience contributes to explaining different gender models. The chronological age of social workers, however, seems to be a less important variable in explaining the differences between generations.     

An Integrated Approach to Managing Change

Complex systems often involve a huge number of variables whose interdependence must be taken into account. This makes the adoption of an integrated approach essential for the proper management of a wide range of aspects related to human life, from social matters to the environment. In particular, this paper takes into consideration three different experiences in which the use of an integrated approach represented the most effective response for managing the evolving realities we took into consideration. We focused on the issue of land management, with particular attention to the problem of monoculture in Brazil. Then we analyzed the attempted cooperation between the States of the Aral Sea area for efficient water management of the basin and, finally, we dealt with the matter of energy efficiency and how the production of home integrated systems could lead to a better rationalization of energy consumption in the near future.