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Power, Social Change and Children’s Social Work

Power, Social Change and Children’s Social Work. Antony Schaffarczyk Royal Holloway University of London. Contexts of Children’s Social Work. The contexts of children’s social work raises important questions about how we interpret and engage with power and social change

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Power, Social Change and Children’s Social Work

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  1. Power, Social Change and Children’s Social Work Antony Schaffarczyk Royal Holloway University of London

  2. Contexts of Children’s Social Work • The contexts of children’s social work raises important questions about how we interpret and engage with power and social change • Seems to be a significant gap between theoretical perspectives and practice contexts • Managerialism, bureaucracy and pressure on workers • Deeper problem of how we construct discourse on power and social change

  3. Power • Discourse on power doesn’tengage enough withthe need to use power in children’s social work • Social control dimensions of practices • Concern that to theorise power is to validate authoritarian practices • There is a need to discuss how workers use power when necessary, and care should be taken around closing down discussion about social control in social work

  4. Social Change • Being explicit about power encourages reflection on how children’s social workers are actually able to support people and work in emancipatory ways • Partnership, empowerment, challenging discrimination and oppression • What do we really mean by social change? Differing conceptions and meanings of social change?

  5. Contested Spaces • Root our thinking about power and social change in the contested spaces of children’s social work • Children’s social work occurs in intermediary, contested spaces – supporting families and protecting children, care and control, families and the state, challenging structural inequalities and helping people deal with individual problems • Not just about balance, but being pulled in different directions based on different ethical principles and moral and socio-political mandates

  6. Contested Spaces

  7. Space for Social Change? • How do we create space for social change in children’s social work? • In the contested position, there are immediate, varied ways of working towards social change • Language we use and the meanings that emerge from discourses • This includes thinking about the sorts of change that are held to be significant by the people experiencing social work involvement in their lives

  8. Children’s Voices • Honesty and integrity, and making people feel meaningfully included in social work processes, even when these mean going against their wishes • Children’s views may have to be overridden – doesn’t mean they should be ignored • Critique of how children’s voices can be excluded from children’s social work processes is stronger for being rooted in exploring when it it necessary for workers to act paternalistically

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