Mobile Youth Work as a community-based approach to include street children in Central and Eastern European countries

1. Mobile Youth Work as a community-based approach to include street children in Central and Eastern European countries Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

2. Professional helpof youth workers and social workersforChildren and Youth at RiskorStreet children and youth gangs in our cities and towns Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

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4. On a European political level there is since the year 2000 the Article 137 of the EU treaty against social exclusion. ”The European Council of Lisbon in March 2000 recognised that the extent of poverty and social exclusion was unacceptable. Building a more inclusive European Union was thus considered as an essential element in achieving the Union’s ten years strategic goal of sustained economic growth, more and better jobs and greater social cohesion[1]” Three year later (March 21 2003) the European Commission stated in its report to the European Council: “Exclusion imposes unjustifiable and avoidable costs on society. The Lisbon strategy’s response – a European social agenda – is to provide basic skills for all, promote employment for those who are able to work and ensure adequate social protection for those who cannot. This approach recognises the role of well-developed social protection systems in reducing poverty and promoting employment and employability, as well as the need of such systems to be modernised to ensure their long-term sustainability in the face of an ageing population.”[2] [1] EUROPA, the European Commission, Employment and Social Affairs, The social Inclusion Process, 18 June 2003. Website: www.europa.eu.int [2] quoted in Caritas Europa 2004: Poverty has faces in Europe, page 19 (report) Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

5. In this report the Commission argues strongly for a real investment in social capital i.e. people. Education as a key factor not only for children but also for adults in the sense for life-long learning plays a rightful priority. This again made clear that fighting poverty is very much relying on our systems and qualities of education and training. The worldwide legal base for children and youth in respect to education and training is written in article 28 of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child, but it is also a part of many European national constitutions or special laws for children and youth. Concerning the target groups children at risk and their families we should and can present a concept of inclusion and love. In Europe we deal with the mentioned target groups in many different ways, levels and institutions. We are concerned about children and youth – especially in eastern European countries – who are excluded from formal educational systems (schools) and who have in thousands of cases to survive on the streets as drug addicts, street children, street youth, violent gang members, skinheads, punks and as members of other subcultural groups in hundreds of European cities and towns. Most of the time they come out of poor families or they can be characterized as socially excluded within their community. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

6. Definition of Street Children • Street Children are children under 18 who, for shorter or longer periods, live in a street milieu. • They have their peer groups and contacts in the street. Officially they may have as their address their parents‘ home or an institution of social welfare. • Most significantly they have very few or no contacts with those adults, parents, school, child welfare institutions, social services, with a duty towards them. (Council of Europe 1994) Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

7. The History of Mobile Youth Work • Mobile Youth Work goes back to street work approaches in the USA of the 20ies of the last century. • Target groups for social worker were delinquent and violent acting street gangs (street children) in large cities of the US. • Today Mobile Youth Work is a highly developed professional concept of Social Work and Love for street children. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

8. 2008 we have in Europe two approaches of Mobile Youth Work First approach is: • Social area oriented or • Community-based or • Takes place in living quarters. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

9. Second approach of Mobile Youth Work is: • Focused on certain areas or places of several quarters like city centers, downtown areas, parks, railway stations, sports stadions, underground transportation, drug scences and others; • concentrated on action places of youngstern and gangs; • target group oriented like towards punks, skinheads, hooligans, drug consumers, violent gangs, sex workers, excluded ethnic youth groups, street children. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

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14. Difficult circumstances for street children • Poverty, hunger • School drop out • Unemployment • Broken home, violence in the family • Homelessness • Imprisonment • Drug addiction • Health problems (HIV, veneral desease) Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

15. 5 Basics for Mobile Youth Work • Social area analysis • Street Work, outreach work • Case Work • Group Work • Community Work Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

16. Social area analysis Goals: • Getting hard and soft data about the living situation of street children. • Development of a social work strategy on the basis of these data. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

17. Case Work basics: • Trust between youth and social worker • Voluntariness • Advocacy • Gender. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

18. Group Work • peer group learning • cliques and gangs as compensation for the weak or missing family (broken home) • advocating for group work against the global and dominating tendency to individuate counsel and therapeutic concepts. • Turning against the denunciation of juvenile cliques and groups Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

19. Community Work Community work is a professional and local policy form of social work. It creates: • social capital • supports integration • prevents exclusion. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

20. International Society for Mobile Youth Work (ISMO)www.ismo-online.de Goals of ISMO: • Local, regional, national and European discussions und developments of the concept of Mobile Youth Work. • Creation of a European Network for Mobile Youth Work. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

21. ISMO 9th International Symposium on Mobile Youth Work in Stuttgart/Germany September 15 – 18, 2008 www.ismo-online.de Link: Symposium 2008 Prof. Dr. Walther Specht

22. Vision Each neglected child, each youngster in Europe living in a precarious situation in the whole world should be able to relay on a social liable reaction of its society. A female or a male Mobile Youth Worker will step up to give him or her support in the process of (re-)integration into the surrounding community. This reaction must be based on the EU Treaty and the UN ‚Convention on the Rights of the Child‘. Prof. Dr. Walther Specht Walther Specht 22