Privatization Of Social Services Research Articles

Public social services and sustainable development: estimating opportunities in the global south

In this article, which seeks to check the supposed potential of public social services to promote sustainable and equitable well-being, we assess, on the one hand, the magnitude of unmet social needs in Brazil in terms of additional public spending on education and health, and, on the other hand, the economic, social, and environmental benefits that might accrue from meeting these needs. Estimating the size of unmet social needs reveals abysmal distances between current service provision and a set of benchmarks. The huge size of these gaps reflects the lack of priority given to these services in the various national development projects of the past. In turn, the measurement of benefits, carried out with the help of the 2019 Brazilian Input Output Tables (IOTs), and the generation of an environmental matrix based on the IOTs, reveals that investments in these areas are key opportunities for promoting sustainable development. The greater capacity for galvanizing the economy and generating formal employment, and the smaller carbon footprint of public education and health services when compared to the average for the economy, stand out. Additionally, in comparison with the private social services provision network, public services stand out in terms of average wages, collection of taxes and contributions, formal employment, income multipliers and formal employment, and greenhouse gas emissions per unit of wage.

Social Service Providers’ Perceptions of Older Adults’ Food Access During COVID-19

ABSTRACT The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated risk factors for food insecurity among older adults, while also altering how government agencies and social service organizations could serve this population given their disproportionate vulnerability to the virus. The current study sought to understand social service providers’ perspectives about how low-income community-dwelling older adults’ access to food and related resources changed during the COVID pandemic. Data were collected via in-depth interviews with 22 social service providers from Oregon-based public and private social service agencies. Responses indicated that changes to older adults’ food access during the pandemic stemmed from increases in public benefit amounts and social distancing guidelines. Participants indicated that temporary increases in SNAP allotments supported older adults’ food security. Additionally, social distancing guidelines disrupted usual ways of procuring food, such as going to grocery stores, obtaining food with the assistance of family or neighbors, receiving deliveries from social programs, and visiting congregate meal sites. Food assistance programs changed their operations to reduce in-person interaction and increase the use of technology. When investigating older adults' food access, future research should consider adults’ experiences of and barriers to SNAP receipt, social support from social networks and safety net programs, and technology access and knowledge.

The Transition towards an Independent Life of Private Social Services Beneficiaries

The Transition towards an Independent Life of Private Social Services Beneficiaries

THE INEFFECTIVE SOCIO-EDUCATIONAL POLICIES ON STREET CHILDREN PHENOMENON IN AKWA DOUALA 1

This paper study the consequences of ineffective social and educational policies on the phenomenon of Street Children in Cameroon the case of Akwa within the Douala I sub-Division. Despite the negative life entails in the street, these children have come up with strategies to enable them overcome the hazards and ugly face of the street. This guarantees their long stay away from home. My main interest is to find out to what extent social control mechanism manage the phenomenon of street children in Cameroon whereas all effort made to retrieve them only lead to their increasing numbers. Based on findings; over a period of 8 years Cameroon has a total of 170000 street children and the mechanism put in place for reintegration back to families is weak and slow. This research will contribute to the amelioration of the socio-educational policies of the state and private social services on how to manage the policies of street children in Cameroon. KEY WORDS: Street children, social policy, educational policy, Akwa

Practice research methods in social work: Processes, applications and implications for social service organisations

Abstract Although social work research is commonly rooted within social service settings, it can be difficult for social work researchers and practitioners to develop and sustain participatory studies that specifically promote knowledge sharing and service improvement involving organisational practice. One participatory approach is practice research (PR), which involves social work researchers and practitioners collaborating to define, understand and try to improve the delivery of health and social care services and organisational structures and processes. The two goals of this commentary are to introduce essential methods and approaches to PR and to identify points of connection involving PR and social service organisational studies. Our specific focus on PR in statutory, voluntary and private social service organisations reflects efforts to connect practice, theory and qualitative and quantitative research methods to develop and share organisationally-situated knowledge.

Social work during the COVID-19 pandemic. Administrative and personal response to new challenges

Abstract The crisis generated by the COVID-19 pandemic implied specific intervention measures in all areas worldwide. Social workers from the social care system and health services, along with other specialists, have played an extremely important role in providing support to vulnerable groups, in order to manage social and psychological issues that have emerged in this period. This paper presents the results of a study involving 94 social workers from Romania. The aim of the research was to identify the main changes in the activity of social workers from public and private social services during pandemic, a period characterized by restrictive measures in order to limit the transmission of the virus. The paper focuses on vulnerabilities and challenges imposed by these changes in order to continue to provide social services for those in need. Recommendations on social policies are outlined based on the lessons learned in this period. The results show that communication and the maintenance of the relationship with beneficiaries are the parts where most changes occurred. The limitation of direct contacts has led to a decrease in field activity, online work, increased workload, or changes in working schedule, and also sometimes (mainly in public institutions) increased bureaucracy. Based on the results of the study, some recommendations for policy makers are identified, taking advantage of the lessons from this period of crisis: the need for the authorities to prioritize the allocated resources and to impose stricter rules to follow, provide funding for specific resources, intensifying the collaboration between all social actors involved, developing and implementing unitary intervention models, greater interest and understanding from authorities and responsiveness to new intervention methods, maintaining the online activity where the situation allows it in order to reduce bureaucracy in public institutions.

Structural Empowerment, Burnout, and Job Satisfaction: Comparison of Public and Private Social Service Centers

ABSTRACT Based on Kanter’s model of power, this research aimed to study burnout as a mediator of the association between structural empowerment and job satisfaction in Spanish social service workers. Data from 177 workers from public centers (sample 1) and 179 workers from private centers (sample 2) were analyzed using path analysis and bootstrapping. Structural empowerment had both a direct and indirect effect, reducing burnout levels, on job satisfaction in both samples. The findings point to the importance of structural empowerment for ensuring the quality of working life of social service professionals from both public and private centers.

Job Stress and Burnout among Social Workers in the VUCA World of COVID-19 Pandemic

This paper aimed to explore the changes posed by the new COVID-19 pandemic to the field of social work and its impact on social workers in terms of job stress and burnout in Romania. Two conceptual models were used to frame the discussion: the theoretical framework of VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity) to discuss the challenges that the unprecedented context of the COVID-19 pandemic has created for social workers; and the Job Demands and Resources model (JD-R) to understand job demands perceived as stressors and burnout. Based on convergent mixed methods, the study sample consisted of 83 social workers employed in statutory and private social services in Romania, from different areas of intervention. Results showed that social workers perceived a high level of job stress related to work during the pandemic, which was associated with higher levels of burnout in the areas of personal burnout (average score 55.9) and work-related burnout (average score 52.5). Client-related burnout was lower (average score 38.4), indicating that stress was generated mainly by organisational factors and work-related factors (workload, aligning to new legislative rules and decisions, inconsistency, instability, ambiguity of managerial decisions, and lack of clarity of working procedures) and less by client-related stressors (lack of direct contact with clients, risk of contamination, managing beneficiaries’ fears, and difficulties related to technology). High job demands and limited job resources (managerial and supervisory support, financial resources, and recognition and reward) led to a high to very high level of work-related burnout for 15.7% and an upper-medium level for 44.2% of respondents. A group of 27.7% reported lower to medium levels of work-related burnout, while 14.5% had very low levels, managing to handle stress factors in a healthy manner. Study results pointed to the importance of organisational support and the development of a self-care plan that help to protect against job stress and burnout. Recommendations were made, putting forward the voice of fieldworkers and managers fostering initiatives and the application of sustainability-based measures and activities designed to deal with the challenges of the VUCA environment.

Local government purchase of social services from private entities: problems of administration and financing

Introduction. Designing a competitive mechanism for public purchase of social services including those from private providers is indispensable for assuring the high quality of provided services and the reasonable use of budget funds. However, much as this task has been seen as an important and urgent and justified in program documents, only a miserable portion of public funds is being allocated to purchase of social services from private providers.Purpose. The goal of our research is to determine the problems with the financial mechanism of purchasing social services from non-government providers that are faced by local governments in Ukraine.Methods. In the process of preparing this article, the methods of data collection and systematization, abstraction, observation, analysis, and comparison were applied.Results. Our study proves that a significant factor impeding the development of social services outsourcing is the mechanism of social services financing, in particular the practice of their valuation. Our findings revealed the following main problems with setting tariffs for social services that are publicly purchased from private providers: a tolerance for increasing costs of service providers; the inability to include income of service providers in tariff calculations; added complexity with access to the social services market for business entities under Simplified System of Taxation, Accounting and Reporting; lack of possibility to include Single Tax in the tariff, as it is only allowed to include VAT; and the application of different approaches to budgeting for social services sourced from non-governmental entities and the communal and governmental structures. It is also worth adding that the existing methodological guidelines on social services valuation are rather complicated to use. Thus, the flawed mechanism of private social service provider financing results in that only 171 out of 2 725 service providers, or 6.3% of the total, are legal entities under the private form of ownership. The mechanism of financing social services from local budgets could be improved by introducing fixed tariffs for social services with possibility of their adjustment by means of certain coefficients.Discussion. In future research, it would be feasible to focus on elaborating a detailed conceptual framework for setting social services tariffs, validating their base component and identifying additional elements, as well as defining the scope of application for such a mechanism.

Pathways to healthcare for migrants and vulnerable people inclusion: the experience of Genti di Pace

Abstract Issue Chronic and acute diseases affects migrants and vulnerable people who often face barriers in accessing health care services. Here is the description of an innovative health center (HC) developed for identifying barriers and facilitating access to health care services of hard-to-reach (HTR) people in Rome. Description of the Problem The Community of Sant'Egidio together with the “Migrant Health Unit” of ASL Roma 1 has established an innovative HC program aimed to improve health outcomes in HTR urban population. One of the main Public Health challenge is to reduce inequalities among migrants and vulnerable people through improving access to health services. Data here analysed were collected during 2019. Results 897 migrants and vulnerable people received heath care assistance. 52.4% were females, mean age 40.7±21.4 ds, 16.3% aged under 18 years and 69.6% were between 18-64 years. Countries of provenance: 56.8% Eastern Europe (Bosnia and Romania), 16.8% South America and 15.2% North Africa. 3.2% were refugees. Among 1986 health interventions 56.3% were general medical visits, 35.4% prescriptions and free drugs distribution, 4.1% children growth controls and baby milk supplies, 3.6% specialist visits and only 0.3% were sending to the Emergency Room. Lessons Improving the access to health care services of migrants is both a public health and an economic goal. The increase in chronic-degenerative diseases underlines the need to facilitate access to health services, also through collaboration networks between public and private social. This allows continuity in treatment, which has great meaning of secondary prevention, as well as rationalization of resources, reducing an improper use of the Emergency Room, which provides occasional intervention, but does not integrate into an efficient/effective therapeutic path. Key messages Promoting health care services like this can reduce barriers, improve health outcomes in migrants and increase sustainability of the NHS. Improving access to public and private social health services is important especially in presence of chronic-diseases which require continuous therapies and examinations.

The Rise of the Regulatory Constitutional Welfare State, Publicization, and Constitutional Social Rights: The Case of Israel and Britain

This study investigates the mechanisms that courts apply to expose private social service suppliers to constitutional duties. In doing so, we suggest two variants of welfare regimes: the regulatory constitutional welfare state and the regulatory constitutional neoliberal welfare state. We outline how constitutional rights, including social rights, are applied to private entities, and the tests that courts use in doing so. We then analyze the transformation of traditional jurisprudence in Israel since the 1990s, and we discuss developments in British jurisprudence, which embraces a neoliberal approach. We end with an analysis of the differences between British and Israeli jurisprudence to highlight our theoretical framework’s contribution to comparative research.

DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT OF THE SOCIAL WELFARE OFFICE AND PROBLEMS

Document management organization in any company have to be able to store information, provide reports and information to controlling institutions, such as the State Revenue Service, the State Labour Inspectorate, judicial authorities, etc. In a private social services company especially important is information about the client, the services provided to him or her and what services one’s need. It is very important to observe the requirements of the Personal Data Protection Law when storing and using information. The goal of social care office document management is to create a comprehensive, organized, voluminous information system in the company, which is able to ensure the collection, storage and use of documents in accordance with the specifics of the company's activities. The electronic document management system is designed to store and manage electronic documents. In a private social care company document management database will be developed based on the Unified Archives Information System (VVAIS). The electronic document database will ensure the automation of the document flow, the transparency of the process and enable to simplify the document flow of the entire company for the head of the social care company.

Institutional and Cultural Perspectives in Elder Care in Rural Vietnam

Traditional norms of filial piety in Asian societies, including Vietnam, emphasise care roles of children for their elderly parents. In particular, caregiving is often the responsibility of women, who are increasingly migrating and participating in the labour market, leading to an increasing withdrawal of family caregivers from caring for their parents. In collaboration with local mass organisations and stakeholders, Vietnam is enhancing institutional care and changing the balance of care towards home, community-based services and marketisation to provide alternative care options for its elderly population. The community is playing a key role in emotional support for the elderly. Taking into account the traditional Confucian-influenced family structure, the responsibility for elderly care is still a family matter. Using a dataset from a collaboration survey of 307 elderly people in 2017, the paper aims to examine and analyse roles, challenges and difficulties of family, community, private and public social services and policy in care provision to the elderly and the gaps in it, to understand the processes of the reconstruction of those formal and informal sectors in order to bear the increasing care responsibilities, and the ways they provide care to the elderly and the linkages with policies and institutional in Vietnam, using the care diamond model. The paper also raises issues of increasing left-behind elderly people in the rural areas and identifies various initiations to sustain Asian cultural values, family relationships, and continuous development of care policies and potential implications in developing a better care mode for the elderly.

The Best Possible Immigrants: International Adoption and the American Family

Rachel Rains Winslow provides an ambitious and wide-ranging analysis of the rise of international adoption from the 1940s to the 1970s. She suggests that the practice of international adoption became an accepted and enduring practice during these years because it provided an appealing solution to humanitarian crises abroad. From prospective adoptive parents seeking to avoid the low supply of children and long wait times for domestic adoptions to relief organizations and nongovernmental organizations (Ngos) trying to save needy children to Cold War policy makers seeking to portray the United States as a prosperous, welcoming, and color-blind society. Further, Winslow argues, the system of international adoption that emerged was, by design, ad hoc and adaptable so that it could continue to meet diverse and changing interests. Winslow emphasizes the centrality of voluntarism to the uneven development of international adoption practice. Private social service agencies, charities, and religious organizations observed the plight of needy children abroad and the demand for adoptable children at home, and took advantage of the lack of coherent federal-level adoption legislation to resolve both problems. Policy makers then followed volunteers' lead to legitimize what was fast becoming a popular practice by crafting laws that welcomed foreign adoptees as refugees and providing workarounds to restrictive immigration policies. Politicians described foreign children as moldable, adaptable, and the “best possible immigrants,” making international adoption an arena where public and private interests merged—though not always in ways that were best for the home country or the children.

Structuring of Integrated Support Network for the Crime Victims and Efficient Operation Plan

The service scheme for protection and support of the crime victims in the past has the public and private crime victim support centers to provide a simple economic support-oriented service, but it has been criticised that the economic support-oriented service does not satisfy diversified demands of those victims. Therefore, the local governments and private organizations that provide social services have structured an integrated support network for the crime victims in order to facilitate the recovery from damages and losses through the network system. The integrated support network for the crime victims shares mutually required services with diverse entities consisting of public and private organizations, police, hospitals, psychological counseling offices and others that provide social welfare services in local communities through entering into MOUs. This system may enhance overall utility value through expanding the use of service resources and efficient distribution within the local communities, preventing the repeated provision of services, and useful means to provide various services to crime victims. Therefore, for the successful structuring and efficient operation of the integrated support network, it is critical for all public and private social service constituents within the local communities to enthusiastically participate in while the network participating organizations to strengthen the sustained and organic cooperation. However, there are a number of issues emerged in structuring of the integrated support network for the crime victims and operation process. With respect to the scheme of policy to address these issues, there are suggestions of converting the service scheme to protect and support the crime victims, improvement of social service related legal system, enhancement of specialization for the network operator, supplementation of insufficient specialized human resources and others. In order to improve these issues, the endeavor of the government is important as well as the entire community to place effort for prompt system improvement to enable those crime victims to return to their ordinary daily affairs through restoration from losses.

Professional Perceptions of Intervention with Families in a Crisis Context

The family institution is a key aspect of the welfare regimes of southern Europe, a crisis-affected situation in which social workers play an important role. This paper analyzes the statements of social workers regarding professional intervention and the families with whom they work within the Spanish context, which involves a strong economic crisis and the reduction of public policies. A relational and qualitative study was conducted of 15 professional perceptions of cutbacks, family demands, the profiles of the user families, and the privatization of social services. In addition, proposals for improvement and challenges are analyzed. The main results involve the relationships among dwindling resources, increasing family demands and family dependence on the system, the disadvantages of privatization, excessive bureaucratization, and adverse labor conditions. The main conclusions include the inadequacy of public policies to meet the needs of at-risk families in a crisis context. About future, the research on professional decision making and professional intervention models will be studied in greater depth.

Buddhism-based charity, philanthropy, and social work: A lesson from Vietnam

Private and public social services, including social work centers, are limited to disadvantaged Vietnamese people, such as orphans and people with HIV/AIDS. Buddhism-based organizations (BBOs) have been acknowledged as an avenue to extend social services in Vietnam. This article reviews the social service system and BBOs in Vietnam using secondary data and findings from an empirical study on Buddhist charitable giving. A proposed model linking BBOs to social work centers seeks to improve the efficacy and effectiveness of service delivery.

Enacting a model of integrated care for people with complex health needs

Introduction : Improving health care through integrated care has been a goal for governments and policymakers internationally for three decades. However, it is still unclear how integrated care can be achieved in practice. This doctoral study examined how a model of integrated care evolved as an approach to caring for people with complex health needs. The case is HealthOne, a NSW government initiative, located in primary health care. Theory / Methods : Drawing on resources from actor-network theory, practice theory and integrated care literatures, this study explored how a model of integrated care was enacted in practice. The multi-sited, mobile ethnographic fieldwork extended from 2011 to 2013. Data was collected from shadowing HealthOne liaison nurses, observing meetings, semi-structured interviews and documents. The focus was on work practices associated with care of HealthOne clients carried out by a range of health and social care professionals. Results : The enactment of integrated care emerged as a relatively unstructured form of integration, understood as linkage. While embedded practices such as working in silos and protecting client confidentiality reacted uneasily to the model of care, practices including engaging clients and working with general practitioners fostered change. This enactment of integrated care was an approach to new ways of working reliant on relational practices encouraging engagement with the model of care. HealthOne liaison nurses and case conferences held together shifting relations and emerging practices. Care was individualised and attuned to the client’s immediate needs and the realities of the local context. Discussion : Policy positioned HealthOne as a new model of care that would encompass primary care and community-based services, with integrated patient-centred care provided by multidisciplinary teams. The absence of adequate structural arrangements for shared care and lack of supportive technologies were matters of concern. Practice change evolved in uneasy tension with stability, rather than as a straightforward replacement of old with new. The policy did not work in practice entirely as envisaged, however, a form of integrated care was accomplished in practice as an ongoing, fluid process of negotiation and adaptation. Conclusions : Since there were no funding incentives, formal agreements or shared care arrangements organising practice, enacting integrated care relied on creating flexible informal partnerships across professional and organisational silos with individual clinicians and services. The HealthOne approach to integrated care became cooperative care management facilitated through liaison nurses and case conferences acting as mechanisms of integration. Lessons learned : Engagement of practitioners and clients are key dependencies. Future initiatives should establish partnership agreements with private practitioners and social care services involved in integrated care. Clinical integration should be supported by systems and structures to facilitate multidisciplinary care management and care planning. Limitations : The data and findings may not be representative of all HealthOne sites, or of a different timepoint in HealthOne’s evolution. Suggestions for future research : Future studies are recommended that foreground the clients' experiences and outcomes from integrated care initiatives. Investigation of how the HealthOne model of integrated care has been embedded in practice and further evolved would produce valuable and complementary findings to this study.

Philanthropy and Plutocracy

Two texts by Andrea Fraser are reprinted as part of October's ongoing effort to publish contemporary documents of cultural activism that aims to create spaces of progressive resistance to threats of authoritarianism. Written as a speech delivered at the Museum Ludwig Cologne in 2017, Fraser's “Trusteeship in the Age of Trump,” demonstrates how the privatization of social services and the arts through philanthropy is part of a larger withdrawal of government responsibility for the welfare of its citizens. Accompanying the lecture is an open letter, drafted Andreas Fraser and Eric Golo Stone in late 2016 and signed by dozens of art world figures, demanding the resignation of now Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin from the Board of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.

Disaster preparedness of private social services: case Finland

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore the level of disaster preparedness of institutional care and sheltered housing services provided by the private sector in Finland.Design/methodology/approachA web-based questionnaire was completed by businesses producing institutional care and sheltered housing services in Finland. They answered questions on disaster preparedness, impacts of recent hazards, measures taken during the hazards and connections to disaster risk management actors and relatives of their residents during the hazards.FindingsThe study showed that only 19 percent of the private service providers had a disaster preparedness plan, and only 11 percent reported that it was a requirement agreed on with the service purchaser. The size of the unit predicted only partly the differences in the level of preparedness. The major impacts of storms were on energy supply, leading to disruptions in the daily activities of the services.Practical implicationsThe most vulnerable to disasters are people dependent on others, which include those receiving social services. Consequently, this study recommends that preparedness planning should be legally mandated requirement for all social service providers. In addition, the local governments’ service purchasers should include private services in their disaster preparedness activities.Originality/valuePrivate businesses are increasingly involved in producing social services in Finland; hence, their preparedness to face hazards and connection with disaster risk management partners is vital. This study increases knowledge of private institutional care and sheltered housing services’ disaster preparedness, which has seldom been the focus of studies.