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This paper uses a neo-institutional perspective to examine possibilities and obstacles for participation in coordinated individual planning (CIP) for people with intellectual disabilities. CIP is a tool for interprofessional and interorganizational coordination with the objective of creating a joint plan for a person needing cohesive care. Participation by the service-user is considered important for effective coordination but involving someone with an intellectual disability may require special adaptations. A thematic analysis of interviews with 17 professionals from different organizations in Sweden reveals that service user participation is considered an important goal by professionals, but also that it is difficult to put into practice. The results indicate that CIP is characterized by tensions and policy-practice decoupling that limit the service-users’ possibilities for participation. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

The objective of this paper is to further the understanding of young people's experiences of out-of-home care (OHC). The focus will be on the tension between negative and positive experiences of OHC, refracted through the concept of liminality. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 10 young people aged 15–22 (7 women, 3 men) with long-term contact with social services and psychiatric care. OHC can be experienced as a liminal space in both a negative and a positive sense. It is negative when perceived as containment rather than meaningful treatment. It can also be a negative experience when connected to fear, a lack of influence, and uncertainty in terms of being in between the social services and psychiatric care. It is positive when it is perceived as a turning point that enables positive change. It is then connected to feelings of meaningfulness, being respected, hope, and empowerment. The young people participating in the study also connect their experiences of OHC to a context of greater austerity in the welfare state. They reflect upon the benfits of OHC in terms of costs for society, but also the costs for the young person if the OHC is not perceived as meaningful support leading towards positive change. The participants have complex, interrelated needs and problems, and they also experience institutional gaps between psychiatric care and social services. It is important to overcome these gaps, so that young people are not located in ‘in-between spaces’ in terms of service provision. 

Social work is a field in which budget and debt counselling are offered, and instruments have been developed to map this type of problem. The aim of this paper is to present a scoping review of validated instruments in budget and debt counselling with over-indebted people. The study's questions are: How do the instruments studied address problems related to over-indebtedness? What assumptions about the causes and remedies of over-indebtedness do the instruments for budget and debt counselling rest on? How can the ways in which these instruments address over-indebtedness be understood as micro-managing this social problem? How may the use of these instruments affect the possibility of budget and debt counsellors taking structural conditions and barriers into account? The study results show that most of the instruments are designed to map resources or problems related to the household economy. Using these instruments, social workers can be seen as part of the governance of citizens through reformatory technology and micro-management of subjects in a financialized society. On the one hand, they can be used to support clients. On the other hand, the instruments can also shift the focus away from structural conditions in society and the consequences of economic inequality. Budget- och skuldr & aring;dgivning & auml;r ett omr & aring;de inom socialt arbete som ska erbjuda st & ouml;d och hj & auml;lp till & ouml;verskuldsatta. Instrument har utvecklats f & ouml;r att anv & auml;ndas av budget- och skuldr & aring;dgivare i kartl & auml;ggningen av denna typ av problem. Syftet med denna artikel & auml;r att presentera en kartl & auml;ggningsstudie (scoping review) av validerade instrument f & ouml;r bruk inom budget- och skuldr & aring;dgivning. Studiens fr & aring;gest & auml;llningar & auml;r: Hur adresserar de studerade instrumenten problem relaterade till & ouml;verskulds & auml;ttning? Vilka implicita antaganden om orsaker till problem som r & ouml;r & ouml;verskulds & auml;ttning och l & ouml;sningar p & aring; dessa problem bygger utformningen av instrumenten p & aring;? Hur kan s & auml;ttet som dessa instrument hanterar & ouml;verskulds & auml;ttning f & ouml;rst & aring;s som mikrostyrning av sociala problem? Och vilka effekter kan bruket av denna typ av instrument f & aring; f & ouml;r budget- och skuldr & aring;dgivares m & ouml;jlighet att beakta strukturella f & ouml;rh & aring;llanden och hinder? Studiens resultat visar att de flesta instrumenten & auml;r utformade f & ouml;r att kartl & auml;gga resurser eller problem relaterade till hush & aring;llsekonomin. Genom att anv & auml;nda dessa instrument kan socialarbetare ses som en del av styrningen av medborgare genom reformatorisk teknik och mikrostyrning i ett finansialiserat samh & auml;lle. & Aring; ena sidan kan de anv & auml;ndas f & ouml;r att st & ouml;dja klienter. & Aring; andra sidan kan instrumenten ocks & aring; flytta fokus bort fr & aring;n samh & auml;lleliga strukturella f & ouml;rh & aring;llanden och konsekvenserna av ekonomisk oj & auml;mlikhet.

The paper uses the concept of recognition to investigate how young people labelled as having ‘complex needs’ experience their encounters with welfare state actors. Semi-structured interviews were held in 2018 with 14 young people, aged 15–22 years, in two Swedish municipalities. The participants have received multiple, long-term interventions from social services and psychiatric care. Research questions are: What aspects in the encounters between welfare state actors and young people may contribute to complexity in their life situations? How can Honneth’s concept of recognition illuminate this complexity? Aspects that have contributed to complexity in young people’s life situations are related to acts of dismissal. These dismissals by welfare state actors are interpreted as forms of disrespect as regards affection, rights or solidarity. Barriers to recognition are also related to the participants’ young age and position as children, and what this implies in a particular society. Our findings show that the difficulties young people face in their encounters with welfare state actors are partly due to the high level of specialization which contributes to an increased organizational complexity. Implications include that, when encountering young people in complex life situations, welfare state actors need to consider the importance of recognition as regards affection, rights, and solidarity. Recognition is central to achieving a positive outcome in working with young people in complex life situations and is expressed in social interactions. Therefore, building relationships needs to be more highly prioritized in welfare state organizations. young people in complex life situations and is expressed in social interactions. Therefore, building relationships needs to be more highly prioritized in welfare state organizations.

The aim of this chapter is to explore Motherhood ideology from the perspective of mothers with a neuropsychiatric diagnosis. The analysis draws on interviews with Swedish mothers with the diagnosis ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and is informed by the theoretical concepts able-mindedness and responsibility. The interviewed mothers experience pressure to comply with what they perceive of as gendered expectations on mothers to possess specific cognitive abilities. Keeping the order, plan and organize family life are described as cognitive abilities that are more connected to motherhood than fatherhood. Experienced difficulties with this type of cognitive abilities are framed by a diagnostic discourse and turned into objects for pharmaceutical treatment. A gender equality discourse is however also used to resist or renegotiate ascribed gendered responsibilities in parenting and gendered norms of cognitive prowess.

Increasing mental ill-health among youth and young people sent back and forth between different welfare state actors have been subjects of concern in Sweden in recent years. These young people are often labelled as having ‘complex needs’, with a placement as the social services’ possible intervention. What do young people stress as positive as well as negative experiences with placements? How can the concept ‘complex needs’ be understood in relation to placements? Semi-structured interviews were made in 2018, in two municipalities, with 9 young people between 15-22 years. They have received support from social services and psychiatric care, often related to substance abuse. The young people’s history is often a long-term process of different forms of placements, both in families as well as in residential care. Too short-term interventions may lead to discontinuity in care. Residential care is often perceived of as more storage than treatment and care. Implications are that the young person’s placement need to be more carefully monitored. Treatment introduced at the placement need to be better coordinated and evaluated jointly by social services and psychiatric care. It is important that professionals have more interventions to suggest and are working proactively to avoid future placements.

The aim of this paper, based on data from two Swedish interview studies conducted in 2010-2013 and 2015, is to critically investigate constructions of motherhood among women who identify themselves as having neuropsychiatric disabilities. The data, based on a selection of participants in the above mentioned interview studies include participants who identify themselves as women, who are parents to children under the age of majority, and who identify themselves as being a person with a neuropsychiatric disability. In the paper the women’s struggles of being perceived of, by others and by themselves, as "good mothers" are highlighted. To be a ‘good mother’ are by the women in the study constructed as abilities to organize the daily life of the family, organize and do household chores, keep track of the children’s activities, as well as the ability to clean and present a tidy and respectable home. Against these normative images of motherhood, where a ‘normal woman’ is positioned as someone who has an ability to organize the daily life of the family and present a respectable and tidy home, women in the studies position themselves as ‘deviant moms’. When they explain their lack of ability to organize and clean as being an effect of them having a cognitive, neuropsychiatric disability, they position themselves within a bio medicalizing discourse, where a certain way to ‘do mothering’ is constructed as a disability and a pathological deviation from normative motherhood. However, they also resist to be positioned as deviant and ‘bad mothers’ by positioning themselves within a norm critical resistance discourse that problematize gendered power relations, and notions of normative femininity connected to images of motherhood.