Blurred Rights, Local Practices: Social Work and Immigration in Italy

This article analyses the role of professional social workers in managing immigrant clients' needs in Italy, against a background of residual welfare provision, inconsistent immigrant policies and piecemeal integration. After framing the main challenges migration poses to the Italian welfare system, with particular regard to social services, we highlight the centrality of practitioners' commitment and discretionary power in addressing migrants' needs. On the one hand, the increasing diversification of the client population is still relatively under-debated in social work curricula and research. On the other hand, social workers' pivotal role in formal service provision is affected by more or less effective networks with other local actors, and often constrained by an institutional lack of vision on immigrant integration. The primacy of street-level initiative, within a poorly coordinated institutional framework, is a double-edged sword—one with potentially relevant downsides in terms of reflexivity, service equity and consistency. Overall, the Italian case provides hints for a reflection on social work theory and practice: for culturalised categorisations of clients, for the shifting boundaries of professional discretion and for conflicting professional and institutional mandates. It is also revealing of dilemmas of network building, professional training and advocacy practices that new immigration countries can face.