Research On The Policy Practice Of Social Work Agency

Policy practice is an important part of macro social work,and it is an important means and method for social work to fulfill its professional responsibilities and achieve its macro mission.In recent years,the social work profession has gained significant development in China,although professional activities are dominated by micro services such as casework and group work,and to some extent,macro policy practice is more or less neglected.In 2017,the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau issued the Notice on the Piloting of Social Work Services for Social Assistance to promote social work participation in social assistance and summarize and refine mechanisms and methods.After several years of efforts,social work agencies in Shanghai have not only established and improved the social assistance service system,but also contributed to the improvement of social assistance policies to a certain extent.From the perspective of social work profession,how did the policy practice of social work agencies happen?What stages have they gone through?What action strategies have social work agencies adopted in this process?Taking the "Bridge Program" as an example,this study presents the policy practice process of a social work agency through in-depth interviews with 16 social workers from the Light and Fire social work agency.This paper uses resource dependency theory to analyze the policy practice process of social work agencies and reveal the action strategies behind it.The study found that:conceptual fit,deep qualifications and coupling of interests are the basis for social work agencies to participate in policy practice,and the policy practice of social work agencies has gone through the stages of taking over and landing,pilot implementation and promotion and improvement.In the stage of taking over and landing,social work agencies explore resources by adopting the strategies of selecting power,transforming force and embedding.In the pilot implementation stage,social work agencies acquire resources through self-improvement,service-oriented and resource integration strategies.In the promotion and improvement stage,social work agencies promote resource expansion through strategies such as expanding resources,independent innovation and active voice.It can be seen that social work agencies in the local context gradually reach the macro policy practice through the accumulation of micro services under the existing institutional framework.In this process,social work agencies enhance their capabilities through solid professional services,gain more trust and resource support from the government,and then promote the improvement of social policies and the development of social service system.This is an institutional,cooperative,and incremental policy practice that is reformist,depoliticized,and technical in nature.The insight of this paper is that the policy practice of social work agencies needs to follow the general policy and grasp the power of the current situation,continuously improve macro awareness and capacity,and gradually participate in the development of social policy through the accumulation of professional services.