Socialno delo, Vol. 45 (2006), Part 3-5
Selected contributions to the second Slovenian congress of social work “Traditions – Ruptures – Visions” Portorose, 21–23 September 2005
CONCEPTS & METHODS
Integral Treatment of Persons with Dementia in Homes for the Aged - 119, (Abstract)
Unique Projects of Help in a Crisis Centre for the Youth: A Model and its Applications - 135, (Abstract)
Expanding Social Networks of Aged People by Education - 143, (Abstract)
CONSIDERATIONS OF HISTORY
Priests as the First Educators of the Deaf in Slovenia and their Benefactors - 161, (Abstract)
Some Characteristics of the Development of Homes for Old People in Slovenia after WW2 - 169, (Abstract)
CHALLENGES
The Programmes of Non-governmental Sector in the Field of Mental Health - 213, (Abstract)
Conditions of Pension Retirement and the Forms of Additional Pension Insurance - 227, (Abstract)
Abstracts
Bogdan Lešnik
Editorial Notes
This (treble) issue contains selected contributions to the Second Slovenian Congress of Social Work that took place last September in Portorose. There have been two ‘selections.’ Authors themselves made the first one by deciding whether or not to submit their papers; the second one was the result of the reviewing process. However, some accepted papers will be published in subsequent issues. The non-Slovenian reader is given yet another selection. As always, the English table of contents lists only full articles (with English abstracts). It does not include those presentations at the congress that have not been developed into such texts, but have instead been accepted for publication in the format of reports.
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The distinguished colleague Gabi Čačinovič Vogrinčič has developed a methodical concept that she translates into English as ‘unique projects of help.’ Its point of departure is the co-elaboration of the plan of action towards the solution; the worker and those who seek help with a problem make it and carry it out together, on the basis of their ‘co-research’ of their preferred solutions, potentials, opportunities, resources, etc., as opposed to the mere application or enforcement of a Procrustean template of ‘problem solution.’ The author has formulated the concept in her work with families, but it makes equal sense in the work with couples, groups, and individuals (with their personal social networks). The project that emerges from such joint efforts of the participants in a given situation is indeed inevitably ‘unique.’ However, we are not certain that the term ‘unique projects of help’ adequately describes the method, which is referred to in more than one paper, so perhaps this explanation will be useful. Suggestions are welcome.
Gabi Čačinovič Vogrinčič
Social Work With Families: Development of a Doctrine
The solution of many problems confronted in social services requires the participation of users’ families. The process of help in social work with families includes a search of good outcomes by and for all partakers in the problem. The process involves both the family and its individual members. The worker’s aim is never to preserve the family at all cost but to find better conditions for its members in the family or outside, and to support them to remain together, transform, or part. Social work with the family is carried out in unique projects of cooperation, which the workers co-elaborate with each family. The paper discusses the basic tasks in the development of a doctrine of social work with families and conceptualises the work as the co-elaboration of solutions in a working relationship, and as the accomplishment of the needed changes together with the family.
Keywords: working relationship, unique projects of help, cooperation
Dr. Gabi Čačinovič Vogrinčič is an Associate Professor at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Social Work and a family therapist.
Contact: FSD, Topniška 31, 1000 Ljubljana [gabi.cacinovic@fsd.uni-lj.si]
Vida Miloševič Arnold
Integral Treatment of Persons with Dementia in Homes for the Aged
The paper presents a model of integral treatment of persons with dementia and argues for its use in homes for the aged. The author refers mainly to the contribution of social work as a profession, whose values and concepts significantly shape the fruition of the model. She presents a possible course of work with persons with dementia on the basis of the model, as well as the possible tasks and contributions of the social worker in a sheltered departments for residents with dementia.
Keywords: concepts, model, individualisation
Vida Miloševič Arnold, BSW, supervision specialist, is a veteran lecturer at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Social Work.
Contact: FSD, Topniška 31, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 1 3006233 [vida.m.arnold@fsd.uni-lj.si]
Marie-Anne Zahl
Incorporating a Spiritual Dimension in Social Work Practice
Peter Berger was a central contributor to the development of the secularisation theory in the 1950s and 1960s. The theory holds that modernisation leads to a decline of religion both in society and in the minds of individuals. However, Berger himself is now questioning, even falsifying, the secularisation theory. In social work methods textbooks we find little, if any, attention given to knowledge and skills development in this sensitive area. The paper presents Norwegian social workers’ attitudes towards religion and spirituality in social work practice based on questionnaire data. The data reveal a general reluctance. Close to 25 % of the respondents found it against the mission and ethical principles of social work to integrate religion and spirituality in social work practice. However, the great majority want to learn more and find it appropriate to include spirituality in work such as foster-care. If spirituality is an integral part of a person, and if resource orientation is prevalent when working with clients, then the areas of religion and spirituality can hardly be ignored. Some ideas of what to include in social work education are therefore presented as possible practice tools and for further discussion.
Keywords: network, religion, resources, education, secularisation, taboo
Dr. Mari-Anne Zahl is an Associate Professor at Norwegian University of Science and Technology Department of Social Work and Health Science, and the Organizing Director of the course on Social Work and Social Policies at the Inter-University Centre, Dubrovnik.
Contact: NTNU, ISH, Dragvoll, 7491 Trondheim, Norway, +47 73591926 [mari.zahl@svt.ntnu.no]
Nina Mešl, Nataša Omladič Ograjenešek
Unique Projects of Help in a Crisis Centre for the Youth: A Model and its Applications
Children and adolescents who see a solution for their distress in temporary retreat from their living environments can in the last decade seek help in crisis centres for the youth. Recovery from a traumatic event requires adequate help, which cannot be provided without additional skills. For every child or adolescent seeking help a unique project of help is developed. The process of work in a crisis centre is divided into three chronological stages, related to the course of crisis. In the initial state of acute crisis, vulnerability, confusion, and distress, a safe, peaceful environment is necessary for support and to confirm that the young person was right to seek help. During his or her stay in the centre, the work is focused on co-researching and co-creating the conditions for further action, so that all participants in the problem develop the preferred outcome together. The end of the process is marked by the solution of the crisis and possibly a plan for further work.
Keywords: retreat, transparency, cooperation
Nina Mešl, MA, is an Assistant Lecturer and Junior Researcher at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Social Work. Nataša Omladič Ograjenešek, BSocPed, is the Head of Crisis Centre for the Youth at Centre of Social Work Celje.
Contact: FSD, Topniška 31, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 1 2809267 [nina.mesl@fsd.uni-lj.si]
Sabina Jelenc Krašovec, Sonja Kump
Expanding Social Networks of Aged People by Education
Participation in educational activities helps establish and/or maintain social networks of the elderly, increases their power and decreases their social exclusion. It raises a number of social resources and stimulates four dimensions of social support: it provides companionship and emotional, instrumental and informational support. The authors find that the supply of education for the elderly has improved during the last two decades, but the participation of the elderly nevertheless diminished between 1987 and 2004. However, since research shows the reduction of the significance of the perceived obstacles that discourage the elderly from participating, more elderly people would probably take up education, had its supply been more adequate. The need for a different conception of education for the elderly is evident from the finding that even in 2004, the main motivation to enter education was the need for social relations.
Keywords: inclusion, social needs, resources
Dr. Sabina Jelenc Krašovec is a Senior Lecturer at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Arts Department for Pedagogy and Andragogy. Dr. Sonja Kump is an Associate Professor at the same Department.
Contact: FF, Aškerčeva 2, 1000 Ljubljana [sabina.jelenc@guest.arnes.si], [sonja.kump(at)guest.arnes.si]
Marina Ajduković
Women and the History of Social Work in Croatia
The role of women in the development of social work in Croatia is analysed in three periods: 1900 – 1941 (the influence of women’s organisations, women’s movements and the emancipation of women), 1941 – 1952 (the role of women in the care for the victims of war, especially children, and the impact of women on the professionalisation of social work), and 1952 – 1960 (the role of women in the foundation of the school for social workers and in the development of the profession of social work). Each period is marked by the activities of a concrete woman. Milica Bogdanović was the president of the society ‘Protectors of Girls’ (1927–1936), Diana Budisavljević organised the rescue of, and care for, several thousand children, victims of war (1941–1945), and Tatjana Marinić was one of the founders of the Zagreb school for social workers. The analysis of the role of women in the development of social work is the framework for a reflection on more general questions: Is social work of ‘female or male gender?’ How did the marginal social status of women motivate their active role in the profession of social work? Has the entry of women into the field of care for the discriminated and vulnerable groups contributed to the professional and academic promotion of women or to the marginalisation of social work as a profession? What has been the role of individual ‘strong women’ in the development of the profession?
Keywords: gender perspective, profession, education
Prof. Marina Ajduković, PhD, is the Head of the Faculty of Law Social Work Study Centre Institute of Social Work in Zagreb, and the editor of Ljetopis (Annual) published by the Social Work Study Centre.
Contact: University of Zagreb Faculty of Law Social Work Study Centre, Nazorova 51, 10000 Zagreb [marina@dpp.hr].
Bogo Jakopič, Bogdan Knavs
Priests as the First Educators of the Deaf in Slovenia and their Benefactors
In the distant past, care for the deaf was often very bad. Christianity established a more respectful attitude. In Slovenia, as in other European countries, there have been many priests, nuns and conscientious Christians who devoted themselves to the deaf. The paper discusses, amongst others, Dr. Valentin Stanič, who founded an institution for deafmute people in Gorica, Ignacij Holzapfel, the ‘material father’ of its equivalent in Ljubljana, and Alojzij Tome, who was forbidden entry into the Ljubljana institution after the war, even though he had wholly dedicated himself to the population. Many teachers have donated or bequeathed them their property. Today, priests can work with the deaf again, this time under the umbrella of Religious Centre of the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing based in Ljubljana.
Keywords: history, education, catechesis, surdopedagogy
Prof. Bogo Jakopič is a retired Slavist and surdopedagogue formerly working in the Ljubljana Institution for the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing, and a researcher of the history of surdopedagogy in Slovenia. Father Bogdan Knavs, a Franciscan, is a chaplain in the Ljubljana – Šiška parish, the coordinator of religious teaching for the deaf and hard-of-hearing in Slovenia, and the Head of Religious Centre of the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing.
Contact: Bogo Jakopič, Mivka 16, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 1 2838530. Bogdan Knavs, Černetova 20, 1000 Ljubljana [bogdan.knavs@rkc.si]
Jana Mali, Vida Miloševič Arnold
Some Characteristics of the Development of Homes for Old People in Slovenia after WW2
The authors discuss the attitude towards users in homes for old people and their employment of staff. A survey of archives and other research material show that the attitude towards users in the homes corresponds to their employment policies and to the development of social and medical professions that now prevail in them. The employment of specialised profiles begins in the 1960s; since 1980s, with the regularisation of medical care in the homes, the trend is to increasingly employ medical staff. Even though social workers introduce new activities in the homes, the medical model still predominates.
Keywords: history, attitude, employment, medical model
Jana Mali, BSW, MA, is an Assistant Lecturer and Junior Researcher at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Social Work. Vida Miloševič Arnold, BSW, Supervision Specialist, is a veteran lecturer at the same Faculty.
Contact: FSD, Topniška 31, 1000 Ljubljana. Jana Mali, +386 1 3006232 [jana.mali@fsd.uni-lj.si]. Vida Miloševič Arnold, +386 1 3006233 [vida.m.arnold@fsd.uni-lj.si]
Iain Ferguson
Another World is Possible: Radical Social Work in the 21st Century
The growth of inequality and erosion of social solidarity brought about by two decades of neo-liberal policies points to the renewed relevance of the radical social work tradition in the 21st century. The paper argues that since its origins in the 19th century, social work has possessed a ‘radical kernel,’ most evident during periods with a high level of social struggle. Central to this radical tradition is an emphasis on locating people who use social work services within a wider context of structural oppression, political and economic processes, and the meaning of events to the actors involved. The conclusion is that the emergence of new social movements in recent years in opposition to neo-liberalism and war offers fresh opportunities for social work to renew its commitment to equality and social justice.
Keywords: neo-liberalism, social movements, social justice
Dr. Iain Ferguson is a Senior Lecturer in social work at the University of Stirling, Scotland.
Contact: Department of Applied Social Science, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK, +44 1786 467710 [iain.ferguson@stir.ac.uk]
Mateja Sedmak
Ethnically Mixed Couples and Families
The history of scientific investigations of ethnic heterogamy is the history of scientific pathologisation of this type of partnership or family relations. One of its consequences is the total absence of counselling and therapeutic work with the members of ethnically mixed families. Such work can only be accomplished successfully by taking into consideration the explicit or implicit cultural assumptions that bear upon spouses or partners experiencing a crisis. According to the research conducted in the multicultural area of Istria, the most potentially problematic culturally defined elements in the life of spouses and families are gender roles and the attached expectations. The other significant cultural differences encountered by ethnically mixed partners are dissenting views on the roles within the family and the attached expectations; dissenting views on privacy and on individuals’, partners’ and the family’s needs for privacy; different degrees and modes of collectivity (socialising, hospitality, solidarity); differences in emotions and their expressions; differences in personal, motivational and performance-related orientation towards the present or the future; and differences in mentalities, ways of life and general world-view.
Keywords: counselling, pathologisation, cultural pluralism, ethnic heterogamy
Dr. Mateja Sedmak is a Scientific Associate at University of Primorska Scientific-Research Centre, and a Senior Lecturer at University of Primorska Faculty of the Humanities.
Contact: FHS, Zadružna 2, 6000 Koper, +386 5 6637700 [mateja. sedmak@zrs-kp.si].
Maca Jogan
Gender Equality and Male-centred Tradition in Slovenian Society
In post-socialist Slovenian society, there are two opposing trends of addressing gender discrimination; on the one hand, the fortification of capitalist economy is linked to the revival of the traditional androcentric order, and on the other, accession to EU obligates Slovenia to implement the strategy of equal opportunities. The implementation of equality has institutional roots in the former (socialist) social order as well. On the grounds of public opinion polls since 1990s till 2003, the author finds a change of attitude towards gender inequality in two directions. Some characteristics of the observed period indicate an increased valuation of equality (in both genders): the dominating, unequivocal refusal of the ‘single carer’ ideology; the established view that employment is the basis of women’s autonomy; the diminishing of the belief that housework fulfils women just as much as their participation in paid work; the weakening of the idea that what women desire the most are home and children; a more energetic renunciation of the idea that women should stay home, even in the case of mothers with (pre)school children; and the awareness of half of the men that they should get more involved in existentially pressing housework. On the other hand, along distinctively disproportionate burdening of men and women with urgent housekeeping and family-related tasks, it is increasingly held that the employment of women impairs the family, which may contribute to the emergence or intensification of guilt feelings in some women, since most women do not consider employment a temporary, transient undertaking. This invisible moral overburdening of women, together with a visible physical one, is precisely what helps maintain or even reinforce the sexist, male-centred tradition in Slovenian society.
Keywords: androcentrism, discrimination of women, equal opportunities, sexism, gender inequality, public opinion poll
Dr. Maca Jogan is Professor Emeritus at University of Ljubljana.
Contact: FDV, Kardeljeva pl. 5, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 1 5805302 [maca.jogan@fdv.uni-lj.si]
Simona Gerenčer
Living in the World of Silence and Darkness
Deafblind persons are people with simultaneous impairment of hearing and vision. Their double disability requires a specific mode of communication and a specific approach. In many European countries, there are national associations that offer programmes for work and rehabilitation to deafblind persons and thus make it possible for them to socialise; in Slovenia, however, almost nothing is heard about them. Their number is unknown, no literature exists, and there are no interpreters. Deafblind persons are an overlooked group of people. On the basis of demographic indicators used worldwide, it is estimated that there are between 100 and 360 such persons in Slovenia (amongst the population of 2 million). Their communication is adjusted to their remaining abilities. Because of the mistaken assumption that they are incapable to communicate or live ordinary lives, they are pushed in total social and mental isolation.
Keywords: deafblind, overlooked group, communication
Simona Gerenčer, BSW, interpreter of the Slovenian sign language, works at the Institute for Medical Protection Maribor Centre for the Prevention of Addictions; she is also the Head of the programme for deafblind people in Ljubljana Municipal Association of the Deaf.
Contact: Radmožanci 52, 9223 Dobrovnik [simonagerencer@gmail.com]
Borut Grabrijan
The Programmes of Non-governmental Sector in the Field of Mental Health
In Slovenia, deinstitutionalisation in the field of mental health began in 1991. Non-governmental organisations have been the main actors in the process. It has brought changes to the situation in which the treatment of persons with prolonged difficulties in mental health had been primarily in the hands of psychiatric hospitals and special social care institutions. Notwithstanding the involvement of medical centres, and to an extent of centres of social work, in psychosocial rehabilitation, the main load of normalising the life of discharged psychiatric patients had fallen on their families. After the initial wave of mental health programmes that started in 1991, the state has defined priorities in the ‘National Programme in the Field of Social Care until 2005.’ The author surveys the programmes that have been co-financed by the Ministry of Labour, Family and Social Affairs, particularly in the period 1996 – 2005, by their types, by the types of their co-financing, and by the geographical dimension of their expansion in Slovenia.
Keywords: social care, programmes, community care, deinstitutionalisation, non-governmental organisations
Borut Grabrijan, MA, is employed by the Ministry of Labour, Family and Social Affairs Directorate for Social Affairs.
Contact: [borut.grabrijan@gov.si].
Toni Vrana
Social Responsibility between Claim and Practice
The author first defines social responsibility in general terms, and then in more concrete terms of the international project ExSoRes, a study of social responsibility in the social field. Its findings point to the multifariousness and vagueness of the notion in that sector, and to the need to shape specific definitions. Further, he discusses the paradoxes and dilemmas of social responsibility between claims and reality and between free choice and obligation, and raises the question whether education for social responsibility is tenable. Finally, he stresses the importance of an adequate environment, in which organisations could articulate their views on their responsibility, and of personal responsibility in the accomplishment of socially responsible behaviour.
Keywords: egotism, altruism, education
Toni Vrana is a social worker and the director of the institute Spirala – Centre for the Development of Reciprocal Relationships.
Contact: Center Spirala, Tržaška 2, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 1 4269660 [info@centerspirala.org]
Romana Zajc
Conditions of Pension Retirement and the Forms of Additional Pension Insurance
Old-age pension insurance and disability insurance are two highly important civil rights concerning social security. The paper discusses the changes brought about by the Pension and Disability Insurance Act. The legal conditions to acquire the right to pension in Slovenia are compared with other European countries. The analysis of comparative samples from a public institution and a business organisation is presented, in particular with regard to the duration of work experience, the age of persons, and their intended retirement age in relation to gender. Insured persons may shorten the required duration of work experience by ‘buying off’ their study years, maternity, military service, and by the duration of their registered unemployment. The Act reduced the rights deriving from compulsory old-age pension insurance, but it introduced additional pension insurance, which is a topical issue both for individuals and for the companies that sell additional pension insurance.
Keywords: social security, social insurance, insurance market
Romana Zajc, MA, is a Fellow of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts Scientific Research Centre.
Contact: + 386 1 4706215 romana@zrc-sazu.si
Blaž Mesec
Fascination with Power
The paper criticises the definition of social work by IASSW and IASW as unspecific and inadequate. The definition does not state that social work is not only a profession but also a science of solving social problems. It does not state the genus proximum of the profession (helping professions), its specifics, or its actual objective (help to solve concrete persons’ social problems and distress). It does not specify the social changes it supports, or the problems in human relationships it helps overcome. Imposing on social work the task of emancipating people for their own good, it repeats the ideological formula of class struggle. The complexity of social work tasks is reduced to the empowerment of unspecified ‘people.’ In defining social work as the endeavour for structural social changes, it crosses the boundaries of the profession. The author sees the origin of this confusion in the relics of ‘critical social theory,’ which are based in unrealised hopes for socialism in the generation that embraced it when it had already collapsed.
Keywords: empowerment, social strengthening, theory, definition, politics, science, ethic
Dr. Blaž Mesec is an Associate Professor at University of Ljubljana Faculty of Social Work.
Contact: FSD, Topniška 31, 1000 Ljubljana, +386 01 2809265 blaz.mesec@fsd.uni-lj.si