Towards Empowering Practice of Social Work: Activation and Support of Employment as a Practice of Social Work in the Municipalities

Abstract

The aim of the study was to analyse how the development of activation and employment sup­ port services for long term unemployed and for persons with disabilities has affected social work practices in the municipalities in Finland. The data consists of interviews and training materials collected in 2003-2004 in the Helsinki region. The theoretical framework of the study relies on the conceptual discussion on empowerment, social work, and rehabilitation in Finland in the beginning of the 2000's. The social work practice descriptions and evaluations of the interviewed are compared to the good practices of activation and social work described in the literature and in the relevant research and development projects. The implications and stipulations on customer-oriented practices in the municipalities of the new workfare paradigm of social policy are being evaluated, as well. As a member of a multidisciplinary team, social worker brings comprehensiveness and larger societal views to the problems of employment and disability. Social worker's views and practices concentrate on the barriers of employment and aim at overcoming them. Assessment of the life situations of the clients, case management, counselling of long processes, and securing the rights of the clients is the core content of empowering social work practices. Empowering social work practices in the municipality social welfare services were previ­ ously coincidental. The change has been rapid and thorough in the beginning of 2000's, and it has brought new perspectives to the aims and practices of the client work, and the network of cooperation has broadened and become closer. The multisectoral cooperation in activation, em­ ployment and vocational rehabilitation services is considered to be primarily well functioning and effective. However, the encounter of varying work cultures, practices, values, and service models has brought about contradictions, as well. At the present moment there is a continuous re-organizing process of client work and work organizations in the municipalities. During the last two years numerous joint employment service centres have been established, primarily in urban areas, in co-operation with employment, social welfare, health care, and social insurance authorities. This development is changing the local service cultures from sectoral approach towards close partnership and comprehensiveness in cli­ ent work. Various stipulations and mechanisms are endangering the establishment of empowering social work practices in the municipal social welfare services. The high turnover of workers, recruit­ ment problems, case load, and introduction of new tasks and responsibilities also hamper the establishment of the new practices. The conditions of social work have become unstable.