In the 2010s, a new role began to be defined for the territorial social services in Italy. The agency of the people and families attended became more critical, as well as the idea that the social services have to care about social well-being, not only taking charge of the individual cases. Many factors contribute to these developments, including the expansion and diversification of people in difficult situations (no longer only those who live in situations of marginalization or serious impediments, but also those who don’t make ends meet), the relative reduction of resources, the arrival also in our country of paradigms already established in Europe for some time, such as that of activation (reinterpreted, for example, in the model of generative welfare). Related to that, but on top of it, this is the season where have born the national measures to combat poverty, inaugurated in 2016 by the Sostegno all’Inclusione Attiva, followed by the more complete policy of Reddito di Inclusione.
In this context, some Piedmontese territorial social services, sensitized by the officials of the Province, are involved in a training course that, starting from financial education, directly faces the paradigm change mentioned above. After the first experiment, which lasted a year, the action expanded, involving almost half of the Territorial Social Areas (Ambiti Sociali Territoriali) of the Region. The project extends not only territorially, but also in terms of scope, becoming in fact one of the first Italian experiments of a community of practices aimed at translating into concrete actions the requirements of the multidimensional take-in-care envisaged by the SIA and the ReI. The innovation of the experiment involves both the typology of participants – managers, social workers educators of social services, officials, workers and operators of the Centri per l’Impiego (active labour market services), exponents of the Civil Society Organisations – and the laboratory methodology, with practical results too. in terms of operational tools and guidelines, and the form of financing – the project is in fact made possible by the contributions that each institution makes available, from the FSE/PON Inclusione funds. The activity became advocacy, formulating precise recommendations to the regional Ministry of reference. Finally, it hosts spin-offs, including one in particular, in which the beneficiaries’ participatory evaluation of the ReI is tested.
For a concise presentation of the project, cf. the minisite (in Italian).