Research On The Influential Factors Of Social Workers’ Occupational Instability

One of serious problems that the professionalization of Chinese social work confronts is the high instability of social work practitioners. This high instability is demonstrated on three aspects: social workers’ confusion, mobility and turnover. The instability of social work practitioners exerts negative influences on the professionalization of Chinese social work. Then what factors lead to the instability of social workers?Employing qualitative research method, this thesis conducts in-depth interviews with 35 social workers, who were once or are right now working in this sector. Based on the theoretical perspective of Social Ecology System, this paper explores the influential factors of social workers’occupational instability from micro, meso and macro levels.Two general conclusions are drawn from the analyses. Firstly, social work organization shows great impacts on social workers’ occupational instability, which include poor management, lacking of professional and emotional supports, unclear promotion mechanism, and too complicated work relationships within social work organization. Secondly, the internal dynamics of social workers are the most important individual factors that influences social workers’instability, including sense of working accomplishment, sense of belonging, sense of working enthusiasm and sense of occupational identity.