Children's multi-local residency in the context of Finnish in-home child welfare social work

In many European countries children’s multi-local residency is a current phenomenon describing social change, and also being part of social work practices. By multi-local residency, we refer to situations where the child... [ view full abstract ]

In many European countries children’s multi-local residency is a current phenomenon describing social change, and also being part of social work practices. By multi-local residency, we refer to situations where the child lives simultaneously in two or more places or s/he frequently has one place of residence after another. Among other things, parents’ divorce, migration and various local and global crises, as well as the societal interventions associated with these, bring diversity into children’s residential arrangements. Such housing situations of children can be seen as forced multi-locality. Nevertheless, children’s multi-local residency is a phenomenon with a weak social recognition. In this paper we will focus on the results of our explorative study, in the context of municipal in-home child welfare social work that attempted to establish the existence and nature of the phenomenon. The data consists of case descriptions of child clients drawn up by social workers. The data was analysed by the causes and the nature of the residential changes. As a result the multiple changes and their accumulation in the lives of child clients were remarkable. Discussing the results were a momentous experience for many of the social workers. Without no doubt, mapping the geography of wellbeing in terms of children’s sense of places or place attachment would deserve to be elaborated as a tool for social work with children.