The Institutional Evolution and Professionalization Logic of Rural Extremely Poor Support System since the Founding of the People's Republic of China:Based on an Examination of Administrative Social Work
Due to the differences in social structure,cultural traditions,and eco-nomic and political environments among various countries,there are also differences in the origin,mode,logic,and path of the professionalization of social work.Regard-ing social work in China,its extension encompasses both imported Western social work and local social work,and its professionalization includes the process of local-izing Western social work and professionalizing local social work.Local social work refers to effective and institutionalized modes of assistance that are adapted to the economic,political,and social systems,as well as cultural traditions,of the local community.In practical terms,it primarily refers to administrative social work,which is carried out by government organizations to provide services to the public and community members in accordance with national policies or organization regula-tions.These individuals essentially assume certain social work functions by provid-ing specific,particularly material,assistance to eligible workers and families accord-ing to the state's policies or organization's regulations.There has been extensive aca-demic research on the localization of Western social work imported into China,with the"embedding theory"serving as a representative example summarizing a wealth of theoretical and practical experience.However,all of these studies have been con-ducted from the perspective of"professional social work",which has prevented a comprehensive depiction of the full picture of Chinese social work.This study,from the perspective of administrative social work,takes the practice of rural extremely poor support,which was established earliest,has the best continuity of development,and has the longest duration since the founding of the People's Republic of China as a case,to sort out and reflect on the professionalization process of administrative so-cial work,with the aim of exploring local resources for constructing an independent knowledge system of social work in China.This article details the origin of the rural extremely poor support system in the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China(1949-1952),the for-mation stage during the Cooperative Movement period(1952-1958),the develop-ment stage during the People's Commune period(1958-1978),the recovery and le-galization stage after the Reform and Opening Up(1978-2000),the transformation and financial support stage after the rural tax and fee reform(2000-2014),and the stage of integrating and providing assistance to extremely poor people in both rural and urban areas(2014 to the present),revealing the"bottom-up"institutionalization and nationalization process of the rural extremely poor support system from joint re-settlement,cooperative mutual assistance,collective welfare,overall support,state support to assistance and support.Based on the institutional evolution,the profes-sional development logic of extremely poor support is discussed from the perspec-tives of professional concepts,theories,and methods of social work,including the"shift from relief to assistance"in concepts,which has brought about the realization and promotion of formal institutionalized helping for rural extremely poor support;in the theoretical perspective of the"transformation of the relationship between the state,society,and community",it is necessary to handle the relationship among the"provider at the bottom line,executor,and service provider"well,and form a new model of community-based social assistance under the cooperation of the state,com-munity,and society;in terms of methods,"from political mobilization to the stan-dardization of social administrative methods",the assistance work for extremely poor support has formed a professional division of labor management among differ-ent departments,improving the refinement level of extremely poor support.The extremely poor support system originating from rural areas and having the longest history of continuation serves as a representative and typical case for study-ing the development of administrative social work.Currently,reform and improve-ment of the social assistance system calls for the establishment of a multi-layered and classified social assistance system,the active development of service-based so-cial assistance,and the formation of a"material+service"assistance mode.This points the way for the integration of administrative social work and"professional"social work,and explores the possibility of providing necessary home visits and care services to the target population of special poverty relief through government pro-curement of services.Strengthening professional social work services and drawing on the excellent experiences of collective mutual aid support,social service support,and national bottom-up support can also contribute to the development of a collab-orative support model,in which multiple stakeholders,including the government,so-ciety,and community,can leverage their respective advantages.
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