Social work and neoliberalism: the Trondheim papers

The ‘medieval castle approach’: social work and the Irish and Swiss asylum-seeking processes

“…More theoretically, Bourdieu perceived social workers as 'agents of the state', who are 'shot through with the contradictions of the state' (Bourdieu, quoted in Bourdieu et al, 2002: 184; see also Garrett, 2018a: ch 7). Hence, he pays particular attention to the 'real institutional dilemmas haunting "street-level" bureaucrats' (Stabile and Morooka, 2003: 337), recognising that many social workers are likely to 'feel abandoned, if not disowned outright, in their efforts to deal with the material and moral suffering that is the only certain consequence of rampant neoliberalism' (Bourdieu, quoted in Bourdieu et al, 2002: 183; see also Garrett, 2010;2015b;Marthinsen et al, 2021). One of the main problems confronting practitioners is that they 'must unceasingly fight on two fronts: against those they want to help and who are often too demoralized to take a hand in their own interests, let alone the interests of the collectivity; on the other hand, against administrations and bureaucrats divided and enclosed in separate universes' (Bourdieu et al, 2002: 190).…”