Organizing for agency: rethinking the conditions for children’s participation in service provision

摘要

In the organization of child care services, constraints restrict the potential for children’s participation in the formation and delivery of support programmes. These constraints involve the prioritization of risk management, poor understandings of what participation entails, and entrenched socio-cultural perspectives of children as vulnerable and requiring protection. However, when children’s participation is recognized as an imperative, both morally and as a means of enhancing service efficiency, and when organizational visions and practice ideologies uphold the importance of children’s involvement in decision-making, spaces for children’s agency can become part of everyday practice routines. Drawing on three examples of organizational innovations in child-directed social work, this article explores the benefits involved in “organizing for children’s agency”.