(En)Compassing Heart explores and documents the organizational journey of POR AMOR Community Enhancement Initiatives. POR AMOR is a current, Toronto based, youth-led, non-profit organization I co-founded with three other young women in 2003. POR AMOR initiatives focus on youth empowerment and specifically helping young people to make responsible transitions into adulthood and become active leaders in their communities. Through the use of arts-informed methodological practices, this project is constructed as a modern narrative, infused with spoken-word poetry, to track the journey of a young girl from her passion for the arts to becoming an empowered individual within her community. The young protagonist is representative of the journey of POR AMOR, our journey as young people navigating our way to meaningful work in communities. The mission of POR AMOR is to promote and facilitate art-based youth empowerment initiatives in local and international community contexts.

(En)Compassing Heart explores and documents the organizational journey of POR AMOR Community Enhancement Initiatives. POR AMOR is a current, Toronto based, youth-led, non-profit organization I co-founded with three other young women in 2003. POR AMOR initiatives focus on youth empowerment and specifically helping young people to make responsible transitions into adulthood and become active leaders in their communities. Through the use of arts-informed methodological practices, this project is constructed as a modern narrative, infused with spoken-word poetry, to track the journey of a young girl from her passion for the arts to becoming an empowered individual within her community. The young protagonist is representative of the journey of POR AMOR, our journey as young people navigating our way to meaningful work in communities. The mission of POR AMOR is to promote and facilitate art-based youth empowerment initiatives in local and international community contexts.

Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC): one of the richest nations in natural resources; one of the poorest in human rights. In the past decades, DRC has undergone two civil wars, alongside with a history of exploitive colonization. In North Kivu Province, DRC’s most volatile province, non-government organizations (NGOs) take leading roles to provide welfare for marginalized groups, such as orphans, children involved in armed conflicts or living on the streets. This case study aims to describe how two local NGOs operate in order to explore the ways they are making use of social capital to empower marginalized children in North Kivu Province. I chose empowerment and social capital theories combined with a contextualized model of analysis created by the author and based on meaning condensation to analyze the interviews collected from eight workers from NGOs specialized in child welfare. The main findings (1) reinforce that networks between and among NGOs have great potential to impact positively the work on marginalized groups and (2) highlight that volunteer participation and community leaders have vital roles in such organizations. / République Démocratique du Congo (RDC) : un des pays les plus riches en ressources naturelles ; une des plus pauvres en droit de l’homme. Pendant les deux dernières décennies, RDC a enduré deux guerres civiles ajoutées à une histoire d’exploitation coloniale. À la province du Nord Kivu, la région la plus volatile de DRC, organisations non gouvernementales (ONGs) jouent un rôle principal d’apporter assistance aux groupes marginalisés tels comme orphelins, enfants engagés aux conflits armés et enfants (dit) de la rue. Cette étude de cas se propose à décrire comment deux ONGs locales fonctionnent afin d’explorer leurs respectives utilisations de capital social pour épanouir des enfants marginalisés au Nord Kivu. J’ai choisi les théories de capital social et d’autonomisation liés à un modèle d’analyses créé par l’auteur et basée sur la méthode condensation deiiisignification pour analyser les interviews collectées de huit employés d’ONGs spécialisées dans l’assistance aux enfants marginalisés. Les conclusions générales (1) renforcent que les réseaux entre et dedans les organisations ont la potentialité d’avoir un impact positif sur le travail avec des groupes marginalisés et (2) soulignent que l’engagement volontaire et la participation de leaders communautaire jouent rôles capitaux dans ces organisations.

The thesis focuses on the creation of Nature consult Inc. aimed at providing advice to municipalities in comprehensive land consolidation. The intention of creating this com-pany comes out of the growing need to improve the effectiveness of prevention of negative impacts of climate change, and from the findings of the project Čistá voda pro Plzeň, which was realized largely at the expense of investigators (volunteers). The goal of the thesis is to create a business that is based on the use of community work which will help municipalities with the realisation of purposefully conducted comprehensive land consolidation. The expected activity of the company is education, facilitation, help with preparing applications for the realisation of comprehensive land consolidation and su-pervising the final solutions. The benefit of the company will be restoration of the main functions of the cultural landscape and enhancement of the quality of rural life.

Imposing Punishments in Czech and Polish Legislations Abstract The comparison of the legal systems of individual states is an important source of inspiration for the further development of legislation. In my work I compare the legal regulation of punishments in the Czech Republic and in Poland, namely those of them which both Czech and Polish legal systems refer to as punishments. These are Czech fines, community service, imprisonment, and an exceptional sentence together with their Polish equivalents. The aim of the thesis is to find inspiration and stimuli for de lege ferenda considerations for further development of Czech criminal law by comparing Czech and Polish regulation of punishments, as well as the types of punishments most often imposed by courts in both countries. In the first part of the work I deal with the systems of criminal sanctions in both states in order to introduce the context for the subsequently analysed punishments. Furthermore, each part is devoted to one type of punishment and a comparison of its regulation in the Czech Republic and Poland. The second part is devoted to the Czech fine and the Polish sentence of grzywna, the third part to the Czech community service and the Polish sentence of imprisonment, the fourth part is related to the regulation of imprisonment, and the fifth...

Samhällsarbete som begrepp och praktik är närmast bortglömt inom den offentliga sektorn i dagens Sverige. Det har inte alltid varit så. Under 1970-talet var samhällsarbetet välkänt och praktiserat inom många av kommunernas socialtjänster. Denna uppsats intresserar sig för diskurser om det offentliga samhällsarbetet i Sverige. Studiens syfte är att klargöra den hegemoniska diskursutvecklingen om det svenska offentliga samhällsarbetet över tid. För att uppnå detta syfte undersöks tre förarbeten till socialtjänstlagen som spänner från förarbeten till socialtjänstlagen 1982 fram till den senaste statliga offentliga utredningen om socialtjänstlagen 2020. Genom användandet av diskursteori med utgångspunkt i Foucault och Rothmans teori om samhällsarbete, undersöks hur samhällsarbetet och närliggande begrepp beskrivs i förarbetena, men också hur samhällsarbetet skulle kunna beskrivas. Vidare undersöks hur samhällsarbetet regleras rättsligt och vilka effekter detta kan ha på samhällsarbetet. Resultaten visar att förarbetena intar en kritisk hållning till samhällsarbetet. Enligt analysen av förarbetena framstår samhällsarbetet och närliggande begrepp som toppstyrt, individualiserat och konsensusorienterat i linje med en nyliberal diskurs och nyliberal socialpolitisk utveckling. En annan slutsats är att socialtjänstlagens form som ramlag försvårar samhällsarbetets etablering inom svensk socialtjänst. Ett annat invånarbaserat samhällsarbete vore dock möjligt där människor ges ökade möjligheter att påverka samhället de lever i. / Community work as a concept and practice is almost forgotten today within the public sector in Sweden. It has not always been like that. During the 1970s community work was well-known and practiced in many of the Swedish municipal social services. In the current study, discourses on public community work in Sweden is investigated. The purpose of the study is to explore the development of hegemonic discourses on public community work and its variation over time. To achieve this purpose, the history of community work is examined as well as the academic debate on community work. Also, legislatory histories of the social service act from 1982 are compared with the latest government public inquiry of the social service act from 2020. By using discourse theory from Foucault and Rothman’s theory about community work, the study explores how community work and similar concepts are described in the legislatory histories. Also, the study explores how community work could be carried out. Furthermore, the study investigates the legal framework of the social service act and its consequences for community work. The results are showing that the legislatory histories are taking a critical stance towards community work. Community work and similar concepts were found to be top-down, individualized, and based on consensus, in agreement with a neoliberal discourse and neoliberal socio-political development. Another conclusion is that the social service act’s shape as a framework law is hindering the establishment of community work within the social services. However, a people-oriented community work could be possible, where people have better opportunities to affect the society they live in.

The thesis aims to look into the possibilities for the use of community work in the process of immigrant's integration into the society. The community work as an instrument of social work serves as a mean for building mutual bonds within a urban community, encourages development and exercise of the potential of the community and its citizens. This strengthens the active citizenship and involvement of the citizens in the processes that imminently concerns their lives. The thesis desribes the ways of possible inclusion of the immigrants in these processes in order for them to become equal fellow citizens of local communities and equal citizens of the country into which they decide to emigrate. The theoretical and philosophical background of this approach is an implementation and development of the political, civil and social rights that the immigrants acquire when given the permission of stay in certain country. The thesis describes results of a qualitative research lokking into community practise of two cities - Sheffield (United Kingdom) and Graz (Austria). These two examples describing the city council's involvement and the organizations-in-the-community's involvement are used to both define the realms of integration where the community work plays an undeniable role, and to come up with concrete...

(in English) The main goal of the diploma thesis "The Possibility of Social Work in Rural Areas. On the Example of the Village Majdalena" is to introduce possible implementations of social work in villages or rural communities on the example of Majdalena, a village located in the South Bohemia region, Czech Republic. The theoretical portion of this thesis describes different approaches to social work and the status of a small community in the Czech welfare system, primarily with focus on social work. Legislative background of social work in a village and community social worker's job duties and responsibilities are also discussed in the thesis. The hands-on research presented in this work focuses on Majdalena, Czech Republic. A sociodemographic analysis and a field survey were conducted to characterize the investigated community, in addition to two case studies targeting Majdalena citizens. Finally, conclusions include suggestions of particular goals and objectives for a social worker in Majdalena.

Communitydans är en metod som går ut på att icke-dansare får möjlighet att uttrycka sig med dans och som kan syfta till att stärka individer och grupper. Metoden har likheter med samhällsarbete, som är en inriktning inom socialt arbete som förebygger olika typer av samhällsproblem och inkluderar de utsatta i processen. Inom forskning i socialt arbete finns en kunskapslucka gällande kopplingarna mellan communitydansens och samhällsarbetets historiska utveckling och nuvarande praktik. Syftet med denna studie är att åskådliggöra dessa beröringspunkter och belysa hur communitydans kan användas inom socialt arbete. För att undersöka detta användes kvalitativ metod där semistrukturerade intervjuer genomfördes med fem aktiva danskonstnärer. Det empiriska materialet analyserades genom tematisk analys och vidare användes ett teoretiskt ramverk bestående av kategoriseringar av samhällsarbete och den kritiska pedagogik som har utformats av Paulo Freire. Resultatet gör gällande att communitydans kan ta formen av samhällsarbete och att metoden kan användas för att stärka socialt utsatta människor på individ- och gruppnivå, bland annat genom dess fokus på deltagande och empowerment. Utifrån detta diskuteras vikten av att socialarbetare och danskonstnärer samarbetar över professionsgränserna för att med hjälp av communitydans bidra till positiv förändring för individer, grupper och samhället i stort. / Community dance is a method that allows non-dancers to express themselves through dance and that can aim to empower individuals and groups. The method shares similarities with community work, which is a direction within social work that prevents various types of social problems and includes disadvantaged people and groups in the process. Within social work research, there is a knowledge gap regarding the connections between the historical development and current practice of community dance and community work. The aim of this study is to illustrate these similarities and to highlight how community dance can be used within social work. The research method applied was qualitative and semi-structured interviews were conducted with five active community dance practitioners. The empirical material was analyzed through thematic analysis, and furthermore a theoretical framework consisting of different models of community work and the critical pedagogy formulated by Paulo Freire was employed. The results suggest that community dance can take the form of community work and that the method can be used to empower socially disadvantaged people at individual and group levels, through its focus on participation and empowerment. Based on this, the study highlights the importance of social workers and community dance practitioners collaborating across professional boundaries through the use of community dance, in order to contribute to positive change for individuals, groups, and society.

La ricerca ha l’obiettivo di illustrare la tesi secondo cui le donne hanno un ruolo importante all’interno dei processi rigenerativi delle comunità e possono essere considerate il “motore” per lo sviluppo dei legami sociali. In particolare, le donne di diversa nazionalità, all’interno dei quartieri multietnici, possono agire da “ponte” capaci di mediare tra la cultura del paese d’origine e quella del paese ospitante, capaci di unire mondi culturali e sociali diversi, rappresentando quindi una possibile e preziosa via per promuovere l’integrazione sociale. La ricerca si basa sul case study di un progetto di Community Work chiamato “il mondo in un quartiere”, nato nel 2012 all’interno del contesto multiculturale del Comune di Pioltello. Sono state realizzate 43 interviste a persone in vario modo coinvolte nel progetto. Attraverso le interviste, analizzate su tre livelli di lettura, sono stati messi in luce i nodi tematici rilevanti, la percezione delle persone sul progetto e l’efficacia della metodologia di Social Work. Infine, i dati emersi dalle interviste sono stati commentati e connessi con i temi emersi dalla letteratura internazionale evidenziandone gli aspetti di conformità, di diversità, gli aspetti non osservati e quelli innovativi introdotti dall’esperienza sul campo. / The research aims to prove the thesis according to which women play a foremost role in the regenerative processes, as well as they can be considered as the “driving force” in the development of social connections. In particular, women of different nationalities, within the multiethnic neighborhoods, they can act as a "bridge" able not only to mediate between the culture of the native country and that of the host country, but also to connect different cultural and social worlds, representing in this way a potential and worthy way to promote social integration.The research is based on the case study of a Community Work project called "the world in a neighborhood" arised in 2012 within the multicultural context of the City of Pioltello. 43 interviews were conducted to people differently involved in the project. The interviews were analyzed on three different levels of reading; first finding the focal themes, following people’s perception of the project and finally the effectiveness of the Social Work methodology. To sum up the data collected from the interviews were analyzed and connected with the themes resulted from the international literature, highlighting the aspects of: compliance, diversity together with the not faced aspects and the innovative ones introduced by a first and experience.