Today was the last day of the 3 day ENSACT conference on Social Action in Europe: Sustainable Social Development and Economic Challenges. I'm looking back on it with mixed feelings. As I didn't attend the Monday sessions and had 2 field visits on day 2 of the conference, it was only on Wednesday that I went to the conference venue to get an impression of the atmosphere and all that was going on.
I'd already heard people saying that a number of things hadn't turned out to be the way it was planned, that presenters hadn't turned up, that nearly all field visits proved to have fewer participants than anticipated etc. However, my personal impression of this morning's seminar on curriculum issues was pretty good and all 3 presenters had valuable, interesting information and expertise to share with us. One presenter gave a (critical !) overview of the recent national changes in the Social Work Bachelor programme in Denmark and argued that that there is an urgent need to reaffirm the independent integrity of the social work profession. Another presenter from Switzerland explained the new professional profile of the socio educational assistant and how it was regarded among other social work professionals. And the last speaker from Queens University Belfast shared with us his experience of an EU funded project on preparing social work students to work with victims and survivors of the "troubles", a familiar euphemism for the Northern Ireland conflict.
To round off the conference a panel discussion was scheduled, starting from concise summaries of all that had been dealt with during the previous days. What could have been a grand finale turned out to be a boring session for a diminished audience, fizzling out with just one or two people commenting after the panel had given their views.
Just as a reminder for myself, here are the conclusions / recommendations comprising the four main subject areas:
On the topic of Social Policy
* The management of the current crisis is dominated by economic theories. Growth and employment is put first. The welfare state has to adapt and distribute less resources among more people in need.
* Financial and economic crises create new challenges but also new opportunities. The concept of sustainable development offers an alternative and long term perspective for social action.
* Social transition demands adaptability and resilience from individuals and social systems. The main contribution of the social field is to develop social capital which is key in that process.
* Social professionals should take an active role in influencing social policies. This involves a global view on challenges, a critical and radical attitude, cooperation amongst each other and the development of a joint agenda.
* It is often the regions that have a main responsibility for social policies. They should be supported in developing sustainable approaches.
* Research policy and practice have to be confronted with the view of service users and those directly affected. Examples of anti-poverty policies have shown how important it is to involve people with experience of poverty in the policy making process.
On the topic of Active Citizenship
* Service using and service user rights create a dynamics of perceiving, seizing, and realizing rights. This dynamic endorses successful social interventions.
• What comes first ? Social, consumer or civil rights? How to handle the dynamic?
• Are we as professionals prepared ? Do academics contribute enough to this?
* The relation between service users and social professions is not only service-related.
• But also coming together as citizens, encountering or confronting as citizens
• Are we citizens (practitioners, clients, academics) really belonging to the same “city” or do we belong to different / overlapping spheres of rights, spheres of inclusion, spheres of influence and power ?
* From social citizenship to (social) entrepreneurship ? … to societal citizenship !!
• Further mercantilization and commercialization of more domains in life ?
• Ready for transforming our economy into a “dematerialized” sustainable way of living more efficiently (as less costly in resources as possible), sufficiently (not more than you really need), consistently (as stable / cohesive as possible) ?
• Sustainability means guaranteeing social rights at a high minimum in order to give EU-citizens the necessary economic basis in order to really live and experience societal citizenship.
On the topic of Professional Intuition
* Social work is based on theoretical foundations, technical procedures and ethical framework – a professional field as social policy “do-ers”. Managerialism, standardization and technocratic performance seem to lead to de-professionalization of social work.
* Social work must regain passion, enthusiasm, commitment to stimulate creative, cooperative efforts of professionals, in spite of increasing bureaucracy, challenging the innovating and learning potentials of social professionals.
* Professionals must demonstrate activities to raise public consciousness, must cooperate in building partnership, must transfer knowledge and skills to future activists, and transform tendencies to produce direct impact in social reality.
* Study programmes must facilitate these qualities, developing the newly graduate’s resilience, faith, commitment and belief in the social worker’s capacity to continue as effective, competent and optimistic practitioners.
* Professional intuition and passion in social training and practice shall be shared – practitioners shall be empowered to disseminate the valuable ‘practice wisdom’ they hold, within their communities and on a wider scale.
On the topic of Innovation
* Service users and clients provide valuable experience that needs to be incorporated in social work education, service design, provision and quality monitoring.
* People in poverty are experts by experience and should be co-creators in developing training and service delivery.
* New ICT opportunities should be actively applied to increase quality of life for users, but with an open mind to their limitations.
* The EU should focus its Innovation Union efforts on creative solutions for effective quality social services provision.
* In looking to the future we should not forget to learn from the past.
On balance, social work conferences like these are always an excellent opportunity to exchange views, to network and become more aware of what the social work profession stands for, and how passionate social workers are about the work they do on a daily basis. That in itself is priceless.
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