Developing the social work role in the Indonesian child protection system

Abstract

Indonesia is building a child protection system where primary preventions aim to support families and intervention is based on community-based care options rather than the current reliance on institutional care. Social work has been identified as the lead profession in this structural change. This requires social work to be better recognized as a profession in Indonesian society. This article outlines exploratory research in establishing a role for social work in child protection in Indonesia. Key learning outlines the need for global collaboration and the need for an indigenous Indonesian approach to the identity of social work.

Barriers to implementing learning from child protection training in Saudi Arabia

“…By interviewing participants 18 months after they had undergone the training, we were able to explore their experiences on the ground over a longer period, in addition to establishing their perceived knowledge and skills. The findings can thus be of value to training programme developers in similar contexts (O’Leary et al, 2018). The key messages are the need to link training with ongoing changes in policy, legislation, service development and procedures and its integration with ongoing awareness and education in tackling wider beliefs that can place children at risk or hinder their protection.…”

Barriers to implementing learning from child protection training in Saudi Arabia

“…By interviewing participants 18 months after they had undergone the training, we were able to explore their experiences on the ground over a longer period, in addition to establishing their perceived knowledge and skills. The findings can thus be of value to training programme developers in similar contexts (O’Leary et al, 2018). The key messages are the need to link training with ongoing changes in policy, legislation, service development and procedures and its integration with ongoing awareness and education in tackling wider beliefs that can place children at risk or hinder their protection.…”

Peace, love, and justice: A participatory phenomenological study of psychosocial well-being in Afghanistan

“…The study adds to the already rich and growing traditions of social work research in Muslim-majority countries, including the long-standing history of publication, from Pakistan and Iran where social work has been continuously taught at the university level since the 1950s (Nadkarni, 2011) to studies from emerging faculties in Indonesia (O’Leary et al, 2019b; Sukmana and Abidin, 2020), Central Asia (Murphy, 2011), and the Middle East (Ibrahim et al, 2020). Emerging social work faculties often partner with colleagues from more established research institutions, as in this study, including those from diverse cultural traditions.…”

‘From volunteer to social worker’

“…In some countries, social work is still working to become an established profession. For example, in Indonesia over the last two decades social work has been developing to become the lead profession in child protection (O’Leary et al, 2019), while in China social work is still evolving both as a discipline and as a profession (Fu et al, 2024). In developing contexts, a challenge is distinguishing social work from volunteers.…”

Barriers to implementing learning from child protection training in Saudi Arabia

“…By interviewing participants 18 months after they had undergone the training, we were able to explore their experiences on the ground over a longer period, in addition to establishing their perceived knowledge and skills. The findings can thus be of value to training programme developers in similar contexts (O’Leary et al, 2018). The key messages are the need to link training with ongoing changes in policy, legislation, service development and procedures and its integration with ongoing awareness and education in tackling wider beliefs that can place children at risk or hinder their protection.…”

Peace, love, and justice: A participatory phenomenological study of psychosocial well-being in Afghanistan

“…The study adds to the already rich and growing traditions of social work research in Muslim-majority countries, including the long-standing history of publication, from Pakistan and Iran where social work has been continuously taught at the university level since the 1950s (Nadkarni, 2011) to studies from emerging faculties in Indonesia (O’Leary et al, 2019b; Sukmana and Abidin, 2020), Central Asia (Murphy, 2011), and the Middle East (Ibrahim et al, 2020). Emerging social work faculties often partner with colleagues from more established research institutions, as in this study, including those from diverse cultural traditions.…”

‘From volunteer to social worker’

“…In some countries, social work is still working to become an established profession. For example, in Indonesia over the last two decades social work has been developing to become the lead profession in child protection (O’Leary et al, 2019), while in China social work is still evolving both as a discipline and as a profession (Fu et al, 2024). In developing contexts, a challenge is distinguishing social work from volunteers.…”

Barriers to implementing learning from child protection training in Saudi Arabia

“…By interviewing participants 18 months after they had undergone the training, we were able to explore their experiences on the ground over a longer period, in addition to establishing their perceived knowledge and skills. The findings can thus be of value to training programme developers in similar contexts (O’Leary et al, 2018). The key messages are the need to link training with ongoing changes in policy, legislation, service development and procedures and its integration with ongoing awareness and education in tackling wider beliefs that can place children at risk or hinder their protection.…”

Peace, love, and justice: A participatory phenomenological study of psychosocial well-being in Afghanistan

“…The study adds to the already rich and growing traditions of social work research in Muslim-majority countries, including the long-standing history of publication, from Pakistan and Iran where social work has been continuously taught at the university level since the 1950s (Nadkarni, 2011) to studies from emerging faculties in Indonesia (O’Leary et al, 2019b; Sukmana and Abidin, 2020), Central Asia (Murphy, 2011), and the Middle East (Ibrahim et al, 2020). Emerging social work faculties often partner with colleagues from more established research institutions, as in this study, including those from diverse cultural traditions.…”

‘From volunteer to social worker’

“…In some countries, social work is still working to become an established profession. For example, in Indonesia over the last two decades social work has been developing to become the lead profession in child protection (O’Leary et al, 2019), while in China social work is still evolving both as a discipline and as a profession (Fu et al, 2024). In developing contexts, a challenge is distinguishing social work from volunteers.…”