Output 1

The literature review proved to be more challenging to perform following the guidelines in Appendix 1, than originally thought. In two of the countries there appeared to be very little published in the field of user participation in social work, and even less on issues combining user participation and reflexivity. In the Portugal case study there were no hits, even when a very open research strategy using Google and Google Scholar search engines was used. An in situ library search for any documents that would match with the criteria did not prove more successful. After a collegial consultation, the Portuguese members of the team found one book chapter related to the subject, recently published in Brazil. 

The review in the Czech Republic (CR) yielded a moderate result in terms of the amount of  research publications (five), this was achieved by widen the search to publications of more than five years old. These publications were based on studies conducted by teachers from only two of CR’s 13 universities that are regular and/or irregular members of the Association of social work educators. These limited numbers of research references are in contrast to the clear interest in issues of user participation, as expressed in many professional publications, and of using it within various fields of practical social work in the country.

In the case of Ireland, the authors drew upon their knowledge of relevant Irish literature, most of which does not refer directly to social work and participatory research approaches. They added to this knowledge by searching the Google Scholar and the Scopus databases, using the search terms: social work + participatory research + Ireland to confirm that all relevant, social work related literature was captured. The Irish report focuses on examples of different approaches to participatory research and it gives a number of more localized examples of practices across a number of client groups, for example young people in state care and older people in hospitals and other institutions. It was apparent that there was moderate number of studies on these topics, but relatively few from a social work perspective.

These finding are in contrast, in particular to two of the other countries, Belgium and Finland. Here, the literature searches resulted in a plethora of publications and attempts at systematizing the publications proved challenging, with the national teams choosing different paths in the search process. The Belgian literature search resulted in a number of publications dealing with participation and reflexivity in social work, which were systemize through a more chronological approach. The country report points at a major emphasis on issues of reflexivity in social work (including practitioners, researchers, and educators) and, in particular, on participatory and democratic approaches in social work research, policy and practice development at the academic level in Flanders. This focus is explained by the ‘Anglo-Saxon turn’ within social work academia in Flanders during the last 20 years: As a consequence of a growing pressure to publish in peer-reviewed journals, the reading and writing habits of Flemish researchers have changed. The French speaking social work researchers in Belgium, in turn, are mostly in contact with developments in France, Quebec and French-speaking Switzerland. The scoping literature by the Belgian team focuses on English language journal articles published by researchers dealing with these developments in academia in Flanders, as well as on contributions in Dutch.

As with Belgium, the Finland team reviewed a fairly large amount of publications. These were thematised into three categories in order to achieve an overview of their content: The categories included a) studies about action/ activities/ processes/ forms/ methods of participation, b) studies about experiences/ feelings/perceptions/ attitudes/ interactions related to participation, and c) studies about legislative/ political/collective discourses on participation. The review indicated that the  experiences of service users is a well-researched area. Many studies highlighted how service users perceived their position to be one characterized by conflicting positions and expectations. At one level they were supposed to be active agents in charge of their own lives, but, at the same time, they are had to adapt themselves to the demands and logics the service system (Närhi et al. 2015), resulting in a kind of ‘hybrid user services’ (Valkama 2012). Professionals interviewed in the studies appeared to have limited concerns about the practical implementation of user participation, or means to increase it (for example through the notion of ‘participation as action’). One reason for this seems to be that the service system ‘pre-defines’ participation; (certain forms of) participation in the public service system are considered far more important or legitimate than participation in a community or society at large. Even though social workers tend to be critical about the tendency to pre-define what user participation should be there are some perceived problems with the profession’s views on this issue. Närhi et al. (2015), for example, note that social workers rarely, even rhetorically, suggest any concrete action about how user participation could be strengthened (for example through collective action or collective participation). This maybe be, the authors suggest, reflect a weak Nordic tradition of understanding of user movements within (social)services.