Social Services and Migrant/Asylum Seeker Reception: Institutional Coordination and Cooperation
Are you already subscribed?
Login to check
whether this content is already included on your personal or institutional subscription.
Abstract
In this research, the work practice of social workers was analyzed, focusing on the institutional coordination that takes place between public agencies, social services and the Third Sector regarding the reception of refugee/asylum-seeking migrants. The starting hypothesis is that the work activity of social workers is configured not only in individual terms, but also in terms of the internal organization of the structure with the outside world. The goal is to reflect on the importance of «working together», allowing us to revisit such classic categories of analysis as cooperation and individual and collective work. To do this, we used the experience gained during the training of social workers/assistants in the FAMI-ARES Actions to strengthen reception services project, sponsored by the Prefecture of Messina in collaboration with the University of Messina. Two workshops of the Ares Project were conducted in order to highlight the critical issues in the work practice of social workers in the field of reception of refugees/asylum seekers, and possible strategies to be used. What emerged from the research is that: a) work experience positively influences cooperation, and years of professional experience show a significant connection with cooperative attitudes towards other professionals; b) regarding communication, one of the major difficulties of professionals lies in the construction of a mental representation of the situation, and in the difficulty of updating this representation when new information is added
Keywords
- Social Policies
- Refugees
- Asylum Seekers
- Cooperation
- Social Workers