Kjeld Høgsbro

Evidence and research designs in applied sociology and social work research

Today, social work is confronted with a political demand for being evidence-based, and researchers investigating social work practice are discussing the premises of this demand. They are asking if this discussion was substantially different from the one taken more than 50 years ago, and whether it had to be repeated all over again. This article tries to answer this question by reviewing the considerations in the history of applied sociology and its relevance for recent social work research. The ambition of delivering a research that has an impact on social work practice is not unique, neither for the evidence movement nor the practice research tradition we see today. The article reviews statements from Weber to Dorothy Smith and looks at the similar ambitions within the traditions for Sociological Practice, Clinical Sociology, Urban Anthropology, Social Engineering, Action Research, Formative and Realistic Evaluation and Institutional Ethnography. Some of these approaches share common roots with Social Work Research in the Chicago milieu of social science in the 1920s and 1930s, and the ambitions and aims are almost identical. The article identifies the more important experiences from the history of applied sociology and discusses its contributions to understanding questions of validity, evidence, methodology, practical relevance of research and scientific legitimacy in the areas of research which aim at contributing to the practical development of social services for marginalized people. By doing this, hopefully the history of applied sociology may prevent deeper mistakes, illusions and misleading in the development of social work research today.

Contradictions and conflicts in brain injury rehabilitation. A systematic inquiry into models of rehabilitation

ABSTRACTThe approach of addressing biology as the sole process to recovery after a brain injury has been criticized since the 1980s. Based on the bio-psycho-social model (BPSM), new national guidelines stipulate that brain injury rehabilitation should be based on dynamic approaches and interactive principles. Proceeding from a Systematic Inquiry into Models for Rehabilitation (SIMREB) and Institutional Ethnography approach, we identify possible contradictions, barriers and conflicts hampering the implementation of the BPSM with reference to basic discourse conflicts within the field of acquired brain injury rehabilitation. We find four main barriers within practice that may hamper the implementation of the new paradigm: institutional premises that sustain biological discourses, difficulty of predicting recovery, lack of interdisciplinary collaboration and a general ignorance regarding the life-world of people with ABI. The analysis is based on fieldwork in a Danish Neuro-Rehabilitation Centre.

Struggling Giants: City-Region Governance in London, New York, Paris, and Tokyo

a new ‘‘spirit of community’’—that social transformation is possible through voluntary action. Drawing on Foucault, they suggest that the sixties opened space for a variety of identity-based rights movements providing ‘‘heterotopic alternatives to the mainstream way of living’’ (p. 227). The editors add that ‘‘what was most distinctive and original about sixties radicalism was its attempt to create a ’lived radicalism,’ with consistency between its ends and means, within the womb of civil society rather than through violent revolution or conventional party politics’’ (p. 228). Concluding on an optimistic note, Jones and O’Donnell affirm that the ‘‘values and sensibilities of the radical sixties, as well as many of its organisational techniques and strategies, have survived into a new era’’ (p. 238). Setting aside the obstacles associated with identifying and interpreting the persistent structural, cultural, and biographical impacts of a decade’s worth of collective action by the New Left, the volume’s contributors shed empirical and conceptual light on factors affecting activist and movement continuities. Students of the sixties, historians, and social movement scholars will find this collection of original and well-written papers informative and provocative.

Vidensbasering og innovation i det sociale arbejde

Artiklen ser pa forholdet mellem samfundsforskning og praksis i socialt arbejde. Den tager udgangspunkt i diskussionen om evidensbaseret socialt arbejde, som startede for 10 ar siden, og gennemgar de forbehold og kritiske overvejelser, der fulgte i kolvandet pa denne diskussion. Herefter ser den pa en raekke af de forskningsdesign, forskerne har arbejdet med indenfor efterkrigstidens lange tradition for anvendt socialforskning for pa denne baggrund at indkredse et udgangspunkt for at forsta deres funktion i forhold til det vidensbehov, praktikere og beslutningstagere har, nar det gaelder en forskningsbasering af socialt arbejde. Pointen i denne tilgang er, at effektvurdering, tilpasning (implementering) og udvikling (innovation) stiller forskellige krav til forskningsdesignet. Derudover spiller det en rolle, om indsatsen og konteksten for indsatsen er mere eller mindre veldefineret. Forhabentligt kan praktikere og beslutningstagere hermed fa et bedre grundlag for at vaelge mellem forskellige forskningsdesign i forbindelse med udvikling og prioritering af praksis i socialt arbejde.