Social Work & Society

Trapped between neoliberal social context and professional socialization: The case of Israeli social workers in the social protest of 2011 and implications for the COVID-19 pandemic

2025-12-21T12:04:22+00:00

This study examined Israeli social workers’ experiences of the social protest of summer 2011, focusing on their attitudes toward services provided to clients in poverty in the context of neoliberal social policy. These experiences were examined in regard to social workers’ perceptions toward poverty during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study was conducted using mixed methods strategy. The qualitative data were collected through in-depth interviews (n=16) that were analyzed using thematic analysis methods. Two themes emerged from the data: 1) Perception, attitude, and participation in the protest, 2) Not on the same side of the table: Relationships between social workers and clients during and after the protest. The quantitative data were collected through a structured questionnaire that was analyzed using descriptive statistics (n=157). Most of the quantitative results validated the qualitative findings, highlighting the conflict between neoliberal policies that govern social workers’ workplaces and social workers’ professional values regarding poverty and social change. In addition, they highlight social workers’ perceptions of people in poverty during the COVID-19 pandemic, which were characterized by “salvation”/“charity” rather than “welfare.” These results call for a discourse within the social services that seeks ways of enabling social workers to fight to implement professional values.

Impact of the Covid-19 on Major Cities of India: A Search

2025-12-21T12:20:59+00:00

COVID-19 had a major effect in major cities of India led to inequalities in urban areas and affected livelihood, health and economy. Around 45 % of Delhi’s street vendors and waste pickers reported high impacts on income and health; more than 37% of Mumbai’s business establishments experienced job cuts and business shutdowns. Chennai is one of the worst affected regions, the mortality rates were high, especially in the geriatric population; Kolkata felt the strain in terms of anxiety and mental health, especially the womenfolk. The urban poor in Bengaluru were worst affected, many of the new infection cases reported came from this background. COVID-19 revealed the existing weakness in the informal settlements and informal economy, which should draw the attention of policymakers to the principle of equity and inclusive urban governance and development. Measures to reduce the transmission rate were specific precautions geared toward public health campaigns, telemedicine platforms, and physical distancing. Nevertheless, these interventions are built considering the population’s socioeconomic status to indicate the need for strong public health systems and appropriate social protection throughout future shocks.

Research for better intervention: A diagnosis of loneliness in older people in times of Covid-19

2025-12-21T12:36:41+00:00

Identifying loneliness within the biopsychosocial needs of older adults is crucial for future interventions. Through a collaboration between the Municipal Social Services Centres (MSSC) Arrabal and the University of Zaragoza (Spain), an analysis of loneliness in older people has been undertaken. The objective is to explore the biopsychosocial needs and loneliness perception among elderly MSSC users, particularly following the impact of COVID-19. Methodology. This exploratory study involved 13 participants aged 65 and over, MSSC users, selected from a similar 2019 study. A semi-structured interview, designed specifically for this research, was administered using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The script for this interview serves as a tool aimed to enhance social work practice by improving the diagnosis of situations of unwanted loneliness. Findings. Six main findings emerged: 1) COVID-19 has affected daily life. 2) Participants were satisfied with continued access to medical and social services. 3) Most did not report significant health changes, though some linked new conditions to the pandemic. 4) Social interactions with family and neighbours remained frequent, either in person or by phone. 5) Loneliness perception increased, particularly among childless and non-religious individuals. 6) Threat perception was not high, but certain activities were discontinued. Conclusions. This collaboration highlighted the importance of integrating practice with research to enhance knowledge and develop new tools, ultimately improving social work interventions with older adults. Connecting universities and social services strengthens the profession and broadens understanding. Keywords: social exclusion; social work; elderly; loneliness; Covid-19.

The COVID -19 Legacy - Social protection fragilities and frontline social work practice dynamics in Zimbabwe post COVID -19 pandemic

2025-12-24T10:54:56+00:00

Zimbabwe’s socio-economic trajectory consists intractable challenges that were partly reinforced by the COVID-19 pandemic. Zimbabwe was not spared from pervasive the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic induced social protection challenges complicated by how the country was smarting from devastating 2019 Cyclone Idai effects and other natural climatic shocks. Based on a methodology of reviewing secondary literature, exploration is made of how post the 2020 COVID pandemic, social workers continue to navigate the precarity of vulnerable persons that existed even before onset of COVID-19. Examination is also made regarding robustness of Zimbabwean government’s social protection mechanisms to cushion citizens. Finally, pathways are proposed through which social workers’ methods of interventions can continue to be enhancing socio-economic functioning to militate against long term COVID-19 impacts.

Social Policy Interventions during COVID-19: EPFO's Role in Financial Resilience and Digital Transformation in India

2025-12-24T11:02:07+00:00

The COVID-19 pandemic triggered a worldwide liquidity crisis, deeply affecting both employers and employees. To address this, India's Ministry of Labour and Employment, through the Employee Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO), has launched several schemes to alleviate financial hardships. This research assesses the effectiveness of EPFO's pandemic measures and their influence on financial stability, with a focus on grievance redressal, claim processing, communication, and digital adoption. Data were gathered from 34 Administrative Managers across small, medium, and large firms. A structured online questionnaire was distributed, and tests for validity and reliability ensured the robustness of the data. Chi-square analysis examined the links between digital platforms and employer satisfaction, as well as grievance resolution and claim processing times. A factor analysis of 24 items uncovered core relationships among the variables. Results showed significant links between grievance redressal and claim settlement (χ² = 18.516, df = 9, p < 0.05), employer communication and digital platforms (χ² = 11.453, df = 4, p < 0.05), and government contributions during COVID-19 and employer satisfaction (χ² = 21.587, df = 12, p < 0.05). The study also found a link between government support to employers and employees' net salaries, with a reduction in statutory rates (χ² (16) = 36.090, p < 0.05). Furthermore, Pearson correlation analysis validated relationships involving employee sustenance (.381*, p < 0.05), employer perspectives (.625**, p < 0.01), and EPFO's digital efforts (.359*, p < 0.05). Overall, these strategic actions underscore the EPFO’s pivotal role in mitigating the pandemic’s financial impact through digital advancements and enhanced operational efficiency.

Novel coronavirus, COVID-19: Media Perspectives and Social Workers' Perceptions on Social Development and Human Rights Challenges in Malaysia

2025-12-24T11:19:44+00:00

The identification of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) as a major rapidly spreading influenza pandemic fuelled fears of a health crisis, destabilizing national socio-economic security, as well as global security. The paper aimed to explore the COVID-19 pandemic impact on the social and economic aspect in Malaysia thematically during 1 January to 31 May 2020. This article approaches the COVID- 19 pandemic in Malaysia thematically. The papers utilized secondary information from media, news coverage and government, published sources to explore the pandemic’s consequences in Malaysia. In addition, the study incorporates perspectives from eight NGO advocates and peer supporters working in health, migration, and human rights sectors to contextualize and validate the themes emerging from news coverage. Key findings indicate that media narratives and social workers’ perceptions closely align on the major socio-developmental and human rights challenges brought by COVID-19 in Malaysia. Both perspectives demonstrated, government’s staggered yet disciplined move toward a full lockdown was medically necessary, it generated significant socio-economic disruptions, exposed human rights vulnerabilities, and intensified cross-border and migrant workers issues. Also, found that a shortage of social work human resources including limited training particularly in psychological first aid, human rights advocacy, cultural and religious sensitivity, and information and communication. These limitations underscore an urgent need to strengthen and diversify social work competencies to effectively respond to future public health emergencies.

Evolving Vulnerabilities Among COVID-19 Survivors in Rural India: Lived Experiences and the Challenge of Adaptive Social Work and Policy Responses

2025-12-27T16:46:57+00:00

The COVID-19 pandemic has both exposed and deepened structural inequalities worldwide. This hermeneutic phenomenological study explored the lived experiences of COVID-19 survivors from rural Southwest India, who were impacted by the unavailability of formal social work support and inadequate welfare infrastructure. A purposive sample of twelve individuals experiencing intersecting social, economic, and gender-based vulnerabilities was selected. Thematic analysis revealed how the pandemic shaped experiences across multiple dimensions, including health, income, caregiving roles and responsibilities, institutional interactions and support, and social relationships. The findings highlight that existing frameworks for crisis response and social protection often fail to account for lived experiences stemming from the effects of dynamic vulnerability. While anchored in a specific rural Indian context, the findings contribute to broader international debates on structural vulnerability, pandemic-induced precarity, and the imperative of adaptive social work.

Effects of Covid-19 on Digitalisation of Workspace in Nigeria

2025-12-27T16:57:23+00:00

Based on the way governments and organisations responded to the COVID-19 pandemic, it appears that the world will never be the same again in terms of its impact on sovereign entities such as Nigeria. To identify how the pandemic impacted on digitalisation of the workplace, we adopted conceptual approach, utilising documented sources, interprets them empirically and presents a new dimension to the study of the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria. It is certain that immediately after the outbreak of the pandemic, an interstate travel ban was imposed in addition to a lockdown while a work at home policy was introduced. This process has not only changed the pattern of jobs in Nigeria through increased digitalisation, but has also encouraged continuous digital activities in the new normal. However, loss of jobs is a negative consequence of post-COVID-19 digitalisation process in Nigeria. Conclusively, COVID-19 is a rare example of a negative factor leading to diverse positive changes in the area of digitalisation in Nigeria.

Social and Policy Responses to Maternal Mental Health: The Experiences of Primigravida Mother’s in India During COVID-19

2025-12-27T17:05:00+00:00

This scoping review synthesises evidence on the mental health and maternity care experiences of primigravida women in India during the COVID-19 pandemic. Guided by Arksey and O’Malley’s (2005) framework and Braun and Clarke’s (2006) thematic analysis, 39 studies were reviewed to map key patterns. Seven interconnected themes emerged, with consistently reported psychological distress driven by anxiety, depression, and uncertainty. Disruptions to antenatal services and uneven access to telemedicine further limited care and heightened isolation. Community health workers played a critical supportive role, though their capacity was constrained by workload and resource shortages. Financial hardship and restricted access to welfare schemes additionally impeded care-seeking, particularly among socioeconomically disadvantaged women. Evidence on pandemic-specific maternal mental health initiatives showed mixed effectiveness and limited reach. Overall, the review indicates that COVID-19 intensified existing inequities and introduced new barriers to maternity care, underscoring the need for strengthened support systems, expanded digital access, and responsive social policies to protect maternal well-being in future crises.

Healthcare Hardship before and during COVID-19: Financial Protective Factors

2025-12-27T17:29:14+00:00

Households face significant financial hardship due to medical expenses. Using data from the 2018 and 2021 National Financial Capability Study, this research examines three healthcare hardship indicators: emergency savings, health insurance, and income. Results indicate respondents experienced an average of 0.56 (SD = 0.98) and 0.51 (SD = 0.94) hardships in 2018 and 2021, respectively. Medical debt was the strongest predictor, while emergency savings and health insurance were linked to fewer hardships. Statistically significant interactions between medical debt and these factors were observed. We discuss implications for social work in healthcare settings, particularly regarding financial support and policy.

Re-Imagining Social Work Ethics: Bordering and Resistance

2025-12-27T17:37:09+00:00

This article explores how Swedish migration reforms (2015–2018) reshaped social work with young migrants, initially defined as unaccompanied minors in policy. Based on qualitative interviews with eight professionals and four young migrants, and analysis of policy documents, the study applies critical border theory and the new sociology of childhood. These perspectives are used to explore ethical dilemmas and the evolving notion of professionalism within the context of restrictive migration policies. It finds that policy discourse shifted from portraying unaccompanied minors as vulnerable to framing them as independent or even threatening, legitimizing exclusion from housing, education, and welfare services. Social workers were expected to enforce these bordering practices but, in some cases, resisted through acts of solidarity, advocacy and the strategic use of discretion. Such resistance re-defined professionalism from bureaucratic neutrality toward engaged allyship, creating fragile spaces of belonging for excluded youth. The findings stress the political nature of social work and its ethical responsibility to challenge exclusionary policies in pursuit of justice and human rights. By re-imagining social work ethics, this study highlights the potential for social workers to advocate for vulnerable populations and challenge harmful policies through acts of solidarity and civic duty.

The relational construction of the individual and society and the necessity for a relational concept of education (Bildung)

2025-12-27T17:41:25+00:00

Since the 1980s, we have seen an increase and expansion of individualization processes. Initially, the liberation of the individual from the boundaries of normative constraints was celebrated under the catchphrase postmodernism (Lyotard, 1984, Welsch,1988). Over time, however, it would become apparent that not everyone benefitted from this development (Neckel, 2000) and that the reduction in normative constraints came at a price, namely the loss of normative orientation. When we look at societal developments of the last decade, we can see a fundamental erosion of the social in many Western cultures. The answer to this should by no means be a return to overcome constraints. But there is a necessity for an education that enables the individual to act responsibly in a (allegedly) multi-optional world. An education that acknowledges that the relationship between the individual and society is inevitably reciprocal. As a basis for this, a concept of education will be outlined below that is based on the epistemological and social-theoretical foundations of Relational Constructivism (Kraus, 2015, 2019a, b). Central to this is the theoretical concept of the individual and society as relational constructions that both enable and restrict each other.

The Tapestry of Social Care Work History: A Pointillism Approach

2025-12-27T17:48:08+00:00

This paper postulates that the understood ‘early history’ of social care work must be re-evaluated using methodology intended to deconstruct, decolonize, and delineate historical events from the current, common patriarchal influence of modern teachings. This paper disagrees with a history of social care work that too narrowly focuses on several male theorists of social care work but only a few pioneering female practitioners, resulting in a gendered bias of social care history. Previous historical methodologies have left social care work bereft of inclusivity and without a thorough investigation of the epistemological base of social care work(s) prior to professionalization. A more advanced history of social care work requires a new approach to historical documents which attempts to build or construct a more inclusive historical base of social care work. The Pointillism Approach offers a step-by-step model with which social care work historians can reanalyze and reinterpret important events in the development of social care work by evaluating not only hegemonic paradigms of care-work foundations.

Foster Family Images in Swiss Foster Care

2025-12-27T17:59:16+00:00

This paper explores the mental images of foster families held by social work professionals in Switzerland and their impact on cooperation processes within foster care. Utilizing a broad and dynamic concept of images, the study examines how these images, shaped by biographical experiences and professional socialization, influence the practices and interactions of professionals with foster families. The research, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, involved nine group discussions with 47 foster care professionals across German- and French-speaking regions of Switzerland. The findings reveal a dominant ideal image of foster families as middle-class, heterosexual couples living in rural areas, which contrasts with the more diverse real images and marginalized images of foster families. These ideal images, often utopian and normative, serve as a model for professionals but may hinder the inclusion of diverse family forms and the effective support of foster families. The study highlights the need for a differentiated discourse in foster care practice that embraces diversity and moves beyond dichotomous notions of "good" and "bad" families. The paper concludes by calling for the development of professional orientations that recognize the resources within real foster families and address the complexities of foster care relationships. This approach aims to enhance the cooperation between professionals and foster families.

Agency in transition – a qualitative longitudinal approach to processes of leaving care

2025-12-27T18:02:53+00:00

Based on the example of a single case, taken from a sample of 16 cases in the frame of a research project in Luxembourg, we will demonstrate how agency can be analysed from a relational perspective using a longitudinal case study approach. This approach sheds light on the relevance of changing social constellations in the process of young care leavers transitioning into adulthood and situates agency in relational constellations and relationships. Through this analysis, we hope to strengthen the argument for a relational professionalism (Köngeter, 2009) that recognises, understands and respects the needs, resources and perspectives of young people in relations and constellations, and the interconnectedness of these relations. We further argue for a power-sensitive perspective that questions and overcomes boundaries with the aim of broadening scopes of action and enabling spaces, both for the young care leavers themselves and the professionals supporting these young people – a perspective that also implies policy engagement (Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2023).

Imprisonment in old age: The case of Germany

2025-12-27T18:49:01+00:00

Currently, there is a lack of reliable data on the effect imprisonment can have on the delinquent’s mental state. Little is known how individuals aged over 60 psychologically and socially adapt to long-term imprisonment, as well as into the enduring effects of their transition back into society post-release. In particular, the attributions through which older prisoners navigate and endure incarceration are insufficiently theorised and underexplored within existing scholarly literature. This article takes into consideration the perspectives of those affected. To this end, an explorative study with older ex-inmates in Germany is presented. The results illustrate different assessment dimensions. Furthermore, all findings were discussed with practice experts regarding implications for age-sensitive sentencing and resocialization. The data reflects the situation in Germany and can only be transferred to other countries and penal systems to a limited extent.

The interplay between turning points and agency among young people with out-of-home care experience. A relational-narrative approach

2025-12-27T18:55:10+00:00

The concept of turning points has become central in research on young people with out-of-home care experience. Within these debates, agency plays a crucial role, particularly in understanding the conditions that enable positive change. However, previous research has often conceptualised agency primarily as an individual capacity, risking reproducing assumptions about autonomy and self-sufficiency that overlook relational interdependencies. Such framings implicitly reinforce dichotomies between what is considered normal and what is not, while obscuring the mutual influence between individuals and their social environments.

For this purpose, the paper draws on a secondary analysis of empirical data from a dissertation project in Austria, which investigated the significance of agency in the process of transitioning out of care. By linking turning points and agency, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of biographical change as a socially embedded and narratively mediated process.

The findings have implications for research, social pedagogy, and policy, underscoring the importance of spaces that allow young people to shape and sustain positive self-narratives beyond care.

Social Work Practice with Disability: Resolving the Inclusion/Exclusion Paradox

2025-12-27T18:59:23+00:00

While numerous models of disability have been proposed, the medical and social approaches still remain predominant in social work, both in analyzing the nature of disability and fashioning responses to it. Recent introduction of critical disability theory has further addressed stigma and activism but still trains its focus on deviating bodies. In this article, we propose an alternative approach to understanding disability, disjuncture theory, that can be used by progressive social workers to guide functioning and seamless inclusion in diverse environments. This conceptual model removes the bifurcation of humans into the normal “us” and the abnormal “them” by redirecting its analysis away from “who cannot do” to “what cannot be done by anyone.” Consistent with the values of social work, disjuncture thus reenvisages disability and levels of response that can jailbreak both intended and unintentional segregating and infrahumanizing meanings and actions. The theory builds on and advances the best of medical, social, and critical analyses, expanding disability beyond body, population category, or context to a universal human experience, thereby locating disability within the fabric of human diversity. We follow with a non-stigmatized creative and innovative method to reassert the role of social work as empowering and eliminating exclusion.