TY - JOUR
AU - Ikeda, Janice
AB - In this paper, we explore the ways in which child welfare, adolescent mental health and juvenile justice service providers engage in processes of responsibilisation. Drawing on qualitative data gathered from service files of youth receiving concurrent services from child welfare, corrections and mental health services, this article will discuss how a neo-liberal approach to service is reflected in the case notes of front line staff. Analysis reveals an overarching reliance on discourses of youth responsibilisation in the service files, where the risks which young people are exposed to were perceived as rational choices rather than contextual factors that needed to be accounted for in case management and service plans. Front line workers discussed case plans in terms of youth being willing or unwilling, compliant or non-compliant with regard to programming. This view of youth as autonomous actors had repercussions for youth who did not present as ‘co-operative’ and ‘mature’. The article concludes with a reflection on the role of services in the lives of vulnerable youth and implications for practice.
TI - Neo-Liberalism and Responsibilisation in the Discourse of Social Service Workers
JF - The British Journal of Social Work
DO - 10.1093/bjsw/bct172
DA - 2015-04-10
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/neo-liberalism-and-responsibilisation-in-the-discourse-of-social-C0WKkoSb7N
SP - 1006
EP - 1021
VL - 45
IS - 3
DP - DeepDyve
ER -