Supervisors info:
Δήμητρα Λαμπροπούλου, επίκουρη καθηγήτρια, τμήμα Ιστορίας και Αρχαιολογίας, ΕΚΠΑ
Έφη Αβδελά, ομότιμη καθηγήτρια, τμήμα Ιστορίας και Αρχαιολογίας, Πανεπιστήμιο Κρήτης
Μαρία Παπαθανασίου, αναπληρώτρια καθηγήτρια, τμήμα Ιστορίας και Αρχαιολογίας, ΕΚΠΑ
Summary:
The subject of this study concerns the establishment of welfare and penal institutions for the management of unprotected and/or delinquent minors in twentieth-century Greece. Particular emphasis is placed on the 1980s, which includes the primary archival material of this work, namely, the individual files of minors who resided at the Adolescents' Shelter of the Association for the Care of Minors (hereafter referred to as ACM) during that decade. The primary working hypothesis for selecting this topic was that, through an in-depth examination of the historical trajectory of a welfare agency that had maintained a residential structure since the 1920s for housing juvenile boys categorized as "unprotected" or "delinquent," it would be possible to highlight issues broadly connected to the history of child welfare in twentieth-century Greece. Concurrently, regarding the 1980s, the hypothesis was that through the study of a unique archival material, like the individual files of minors who stayed at the Adolescents' Shelter, which include numerous documents from welfare professionals, it would be possible to shed light on the ways welfare specialists operated and the dynamics that developed through the interrelation of welfare professionals and minors. The objective is twofold: to monitor the process of supervision and intervention by specialized professionals towards subjects considered vulnerable, and to highlight the forms institutional life took. The structure of this study consists of four sections. The first section aims to outline the historical context within which the ACM and the Adolescents' Shelter are situated, focusing on the history of welfare for "unprotected" and "delinquent" children in Greece. Special emphasis is placed on highlighting common themes that traverse the history of child welfare, which are carried throughout the subsequent sections of the study. The second section focuses on the history of the ACM from its establishment in 1924 up to the 1980s. Through the narration of the ACM’s historical journey, issues such as the concept of the "mixed economy of welfare" and how characteristics of this operational model appeared in the ACM, as well as the emergence and reproduction of networks of institutions and individuals who emerged as "welfare specialists" and occupied high-ranking positions in the social welfare structure, are brought to light. The third and fourth sections concentrate on the content of the individual files of minors who resided at the Adolescents' Shelter during the 1980s. The third section focuses on questions regarding who the subjects involved in the archival material were, whether as professionals or minors, elements about the history of the formation of the professions of social work and juvenile probation officers in Greece, and information concerning the social background and experiences of the minors until they were placed at the Adolescents' Sheler. Additionally, particular emphasis is given to cases of minors who had connections with juvenile justice, the process of their admission to educational institutions by administrative decision of the Ministry of Justice, and the rhetoric about moral danger and antisocial behavior, which was still active in the 1980s. The fourth section deals with the forms of social work that took place within the Adolescents' Shelter and the interaction between social workers and minors within the framework of the Adolescents' Shelter during the 1980s. Specific issues examined separately include the work of the minors and the stance of the Adolescents' Shelter's social service towards it, the placement of minors' families under the investigative lens of welfare professionals, as well as the issue of minors' same-sex sexuality and the contradictory manner in which it was perceived by child welfare professionals of the period. The final issue addressed in this section is the traces of crises and ruptures between the minors, the social workers, and the ACM administration, in an effort to bring to light aspects of institutional life that rarely come to the surface, while simultaneously emphasizing that the minors, who were under the supervision of welfare professionals, were active participants in the process in which they were involved and not merely passive recipients of it.
Keywords:
Social welfare, child welfare, juvenile delinquency, social work, juvenile justice, juvenile probation, juvenile delinquency, institutions, orphanages, institutional care, mixed economy of welfare
