Editorial

A key question for social work lies in how it positions itself in its social and political context. This inevitably engages debate about the profession's relationship with the state, and its ability to challenge measures of negative impact as well as to seek or rediscover alliances that inspire change. Here in the first of a series of occasional guest editorials on the theme of social work at the crossroads, we welcome Dora-Dimitra Teloni, from the Department of Social Work at the Technological Educational Institute of Athens, as our guest editorial author.

Society and social work in the times of crisis in Greece

In the Greek case, the combination of economic crisis and overwhelming austerity measures resulted in a humanitarian crisis. Interestingly, the massive cuts in health and welfare and the further degradation of social work stand against a promising emerging solidarity movement and the mobilization and resistance of the people against austerity.

As it concerns the consequences of austerity in society, by 2014 36.0% of the population was below the poverty line, while the risk of poverty for children is rising up to 26.9% (National Statistical Service of Greece, 2015). Greece holds the highest percentages of unemployment 27.5%, while the unemployment for young people reaches up to 60.0% (Eurostat, 2014). Those that still had a job faced the decrease of their income by up to –14.7% in the public sector and at –11.8% in the private one (Matsaganis, 2012), within the parallel deregulation of the labour markets.

Although social services are generally conceived as more necessary during periods of recession, a totally different trajectory has been followed in the Greek case. Specifically, a significant shrinkage of pensions and welfare provisions (Robolis, 2013) in combination with a decrease of the expenditures of up to 11.0% (from 2009 until 2011) in the crucial sector of public health, along with parallel reduction of public spending, have been significant causes of the crisis in Greece.

Up to 2013, about 3,000,000 people (32% of the population) dropped off the social security system due to the loss of their jobs and/or inability in paying for insurance, which in turn resulted in their exclusion from the right to free medical care. The consequences of the austerity programme in correlation to the lack of social services are exemplified by the increased number of HIV infections amid drug users and the rise of suicides during the first half of 2011 up to 40.0% compared with the corresponding period of 2010 (Ifanti, Argyriou, Kalofonou, & Kalofonos, 2013; Kentikelenis, Karanikolos, Papanikolas, McNee, & Stuckler, 2011).

In the years of the austerity programmes, the already weak Greek social protection system was struck further with large cuts in social services, pensions and social benefits. It seems that the crisis has been used as the alibi for the implementation of neo-liberal policies in health welfare but also in the educational sector. Thus, in 2013 the government decided to close down until 2017 one of the four social work academic departments. Moreover, the already understaffed academic social work departments across Greece encounter smaller budgets for academic fellows—within a parallel degradation of the labour conditions for external staff—as well overcrowded classes of students.

In parallel, in social service departments the number of service users has been dramatically increased. Social workers provide support not only for the poorest, as in the past, but also for the new-poor, the ex-middle class who now ‘reach at the door’ of the social services. Alongside, social workers in Greece confront more than ever similar problems with service users, not only due to the deficient welfare state but also due to the high rates of unemployment and the deregulation of labour relations. The degradation of the public sector and the lack of staff are now accompanied by the shrinking of income for public servants and the extremely low salaries in non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The short-term contracts in public and private sectors, the very low wages and the lack of insurance are only some of the side effects of the deregulation of the labour markets.

More than ever in contemporary Greece the pressure for social workers in finding solutions for helping service users effectively is particularly high, where the practitioners struggle for resources and against bureaucracy, while they also need to use their imagination in ‘discovering’ resources. Practically, they use every kind of support they can find, either by charity organizations, community support, informal carers and the family, or through the social solidarity movement (welfare grassroots initiatives), with the latest having flourished during the five years of recession.

For example, the health solidarity movement through the social medical clinics (more than 75 across Greece) provides free primary health care, both to Greeks without national insurance and to undocumented immigrants and refugees. In total, up to 2014 the solidarity structures reached up to 400 across Greece, covering the areas of health, food, education, social economy, housing and debt, immigrant solidarity (antiracist movement), culture and legal advice.

The main slogan of the solidarity movement, ‘solidarity—resistance’, highlights its basic dual aim: the maintenance of social bonds in times of crisis through the provision and interchange of goods and services, but also political agitation against austerity. The solidarity movement stands away from philanthropy but also differentiates itself significantly from the mainstream approaches of social work that dominate in state social services and NGOs. It is a new hopeful paradigm, which reclaims community work and shows alternative paths for social work and society in the times of extreme austerity and humanitarian crisis.

More specifically, these initiatives have been structured in a ‘bottom-up’ way, operating on a horizontal basis. In many cases there is a universal provision of services that do not exclude parts of the population such as undocumented immigrants and refugees, deserved/undeserved poor and so on. Additionally, the solidarity movement contributes significantly in the mobilization of the community (in their vast majority women, unemployed but also health and welfare workers) and succeeds in the participation of the people—not as volunteers who substitute for public social services, but as active ‘actors’ of the new alternative experiment, which combines solidarity in practice within political demand and agitation for social change. Interestingly, the solidarity initiatives have developed alternative structures based on the needs of the people such as ‘collective kitchens’, time banks, free information for welfare rights, Greek lessons for immigrants, campaigns and so on.

In parallel with the development of the solidarity movement, Greek people had to fight strongly and with a great courage against austerity (hundreds of strikes, demonstrations, disobedience to inhuman laws in health and welfare). In the social work area some of the academics, students and practitioners united their ‘voice’ with the struggles of the people in the square movement of 2011, in solidarity initiatives, in antiracist activities or against the close down of social work departments. In this direction the Greek Social Work Action Network applied in practice radical approaches in the community and is linked with the solidarity movement.

It is often mentioned during the years of austerity and neo-liberalism that social work is at the crossroads. In my mind social change and social justice—as the corner stones of the profession—cannot be achieved inside the offices without uniting our ‘voice’ with those who suffer. The solidarity movement in the Greek case has shown the need for reclaiming community work, not as ‘experts’ but as those who share common goals with those who suffer. Social work can be inspired by the social movements, community action and their alternative structures. After all, in this emerging new era, both societies and social work need to create new roads, and social work cannot but break down any boundaries, such bureaucracy and managerialism, which keep the profession away from society.