Client centeredness within institutions and the Albanian juvenile justice system

In our presentation we will outline some central principles in safeguarding children’s rights in social work with children and youth, and discuss how these principles can be applied to Albanian juvenile justice system. ... [ view full abstract ]

In our presentation we will outline some central principles in safeguarding children’s rights in social work with children and youth, and discuss how these principles can be applied to Albanian juvenile justice system.

First, we will talk about the juvenile justice system in Albania. Many of the factors leading to conflict with the law are of a social nature. Children who offend often live in families facing difficulties such as poverty, substance abuse or separation; they may be excluded from school or be without a job; they may be involved in risky behaviors. As stated in Article 40 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, every child in conflict with the law has the right to be treated in a manner that takes into account “the desirability of promoting his/her reintegration and his/her assuming a constructive role in society”. There is a need to increase knowledge and find best practices and methods for children who are today in a justice system where they face (suspended) sentences involving deprivation of liberty, albeit with the aim of ‘rehabilitation’ rather than punishment.

Second, we will focus on more human-rights based approaches to care for children and youth. Nowadays there are more human-rights based approaches to care for children and youth, and client centered care is a dominant concept in social work with clients in different settings, e.g. residential care. The UN Convention on Rights of the Child is also important in safeguarding children’s rights, and particularly article 12; the child’s right to be heard. Client participation, decision-making and empowerment have thus become increasingly important in the delivery of services to children and young people. Even if empowerment of children and parents is an im-portant goal, it raises challenging questions about the appropriate role of professionals and or-ganizations in the service delivery system. We will discuss how client-centered care in institutions can be accomplished in the following areas:
• Role of the professional
• Empowerment of children and youth
• Client centeredness and organizing client centered care
• Influence of the institutional environment within care
Our basis for this part of the presentation is theory and empirical qualitative research, mainly from a Dutch context of social work with children and youth. Based on a literature review a the-oretical framework will be presented on client centered care from an organizational perspective. The main results are that there are several processes within an organization that can increase cli-ent- centered care and empowerment, but also increase for instance the viability of the organiza-tion, knowledge sharing etc.
In addition based on a ‘best practice’ case study, that included ten interviews with professionals who work with children and youth, we will present the view of these professionals on client-centered care and how to organize this. Besides that, we will also focus on how these profession-als interact with the institutional environment and what the effects of the institutional environ-ment are on client-centered care. The first results show that professionals make use of a combi-nation of the demand led and the demand driven orientation to accomplish client- centered care combined with empowerment. It isn’t quite clear when they choose which orientation. Further research will be needed to further explore this. Second, results show that the institutional envi-ronment influences client-centered care in both positive and negative ways. Professionals state that the positive influence results from possibilities created by the institutional environment and the and the negative influence results from the way in which the institutional environment ex-pects organizations to organize care.

Third, we will discuss how the presented principles of client centered care can be integrated within the Albanian system.