Europe's transnational social work research history

From its very beginnings in the late 19th century, the development of social work research in European nation states has been closely interconnected within Europe (Hering and Waaldijk, 2002) as well as between Europe and North... [ view full abstract ]

From its very beginnings in the late 19th century, the development of social work research in European nation states has been closely interconnected within Europe (Hering and Waaldijk, 2002) as well as between Europe and North America (Rowbotham, 2010). Early protagonists, such as Alice Salomon (1930) promoted the internationalization of social work which led to an intensified travelling of knowledge and ideas (Chambon et al., 2014). Comparisons and transfers of social work methods and research has been in the centre of attention. These developments were framed by the dominant paradigm of modernization and rationalization.
A transnational historiography (Iriye/Saunier, 2009), however, reveals that this ongoing knowledge exchange in social work research took not only place between nation states, but aimed at establishing and transforming the nation states themselves. Thus nation states were not only the context of knowledge exchange, but also their outcomes through an array of activities (Conrad, 2011), including the establishment of schools of social work, research methodologies, social policies etc. A transnational perspective is aware of the power relations within and between nation states and the ongoing colonization and resistance of local actors and their knowledge.
This symposium aims at carving out the ongoing process of knowledge translation across national, ethnic, cultural, and religious boundaries in European social work history. Contributors take up the well-established framework of transnational history and lay a focus on the interconnections of social work a) between North America and (Eastern) Europe at the beginning of the 20th century (M. Johnstone) b) within Europe in the 1930s and 1940s (M. Isabel Santos), c) between Europe and Russia after the end of the cold war (E. Iarskaia-Smirnova), d) between Europe and Kazhakstan (S. An) at the end of the 20th century. A short introduction into the transnational history approach will be given by S. Köngeter.