Ten-Year Development of Collaborative Social Work with Families in Complex Problem Situations in Slovenia: Thematic Analysis of Project Documentation

Social work with families has developed in response to the needs of people in the community but has moved away from them over the years of specialisation. The neoliberalisation of social work, with its emphasis on efficiency and procedure, has eclipsed the processes of collaboration with people, which are a prerequisite for hearing their voices and establishing a partnership in which we can co-create desired outcomes. In Slovenia, over the last 10 years, we have been looking for ways to bring social work with families in complex problem situations back into the community and to prioritise the processes of co-creating the desired outcomes in national and international projects. The most important milestones of the development, identified by the thematic analysis of the project documentation (58 documents) of seven projects, are presented here. Several themes were interwoven in the development and implementation of change: knowledge development; relevance of the institutional context; (micro-)innovation in social care; development of projects with practitioners and family representatives; broader social context centred on family support. Ten years of development in the field confirms that complex questions require complex answers, which must be (co-)created in collaboration between families, practitioners, policymakers and researchers.