By any standard, child protection work is a demanding field of social services work. Throughout much of the post-industrial world, child protection agencies face significant problems in recruiting and retaining front-line staff with the abilities required to undertake this often complex and stressful work. The capacity of these agencies to achieve their social policy objectives can be compromised by workforce instability. Despite a growing body of evidence about the contribution of local organisational and caseworker characteristics to workforce turnover, policy-makers face a dearth of information about how the broader institutional context of child protection systems contributes to challenges in workforce retention. This lack of evidence is notable given the varying rates of caseworker turnover observed internationally, particularly between social policy regimes where different institutional contexts shape workforce conditions. This article aims to contribute to the evidence base for improving workforce retention in child protection services through an institutional comparison of child protection systems in Queensland (Australia) and Norway. We analyse the role of the institutional conditions in shaping the nature and scope of child protection work, characteristics and responsibilities of caseworkers, and their financial remuneration for this work. We discuss how these institutional effects help to explain the differences in workforce turnover among child protection workers in Queensland and Norway.
In this article, we explore how ‘family’ is conceptualized and negotiated in a Mexican and a Chilean child protection institution. We draw on empirical material from two qualitative studies, employing a multi‐method approach. By using a theoretical framework from family sociology, we explore how ‘family’ is done and displayed by families of children in residential care despite socio‐economic, structural and institutional constraints. These displays consist mainly of ‘little things’ of a mundane character, such as homemade food, sweets, gifts, clothing and family photos, and more intangible displays as family narratives, affection and parental responsibility. The empirical material reveals how professionals commonly disregard these displays in favour of ‘big things’ such as housing, employment, nuclear family structure, therapy and parental school attendance. The professionals' recommendations and decisions in child custody cases can be interpreted as recognitions or rejections of family displays, as the acceptable limits of unconventionality are legally, socially and culturally drawn.
This article builds on 13 audio-recorded and transcribed encounters between counsellors and users in the Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration, where a client-feedback system plays a mediating role in interactions. We study how counsellors and users establish and maintain common ground in interactions and the role the feedback system plays in this regard. We analyse their interactions in light of Goffman's concept of a working consensus, as it illuminates how interaction tends to steer towards intersubjective consensus. The findings show that the feedback system is both a 'facilitator' and 'troublemaker' in this process. The feedback system both functions as an interactional resource that helps counsellors and service users define and manoeuvre the situation and sometimes causes interactional problems that must be dealt with without damaging the relationship. Possible consequences are discussed, including implications of using a feedback system in activation encounters where the overall goal is employment.
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