Social work in the Netherlands is attracting an increasing number of Turkish and Moroccan Dutch professionals, mostly second-generation migrant women from a Muslim background. Inspired by Amartya Sen’s capability approach, this article presents the findings of a qualitative content analysis of 40 interviews with professionals by peers from the same background. The question is, what kind of professionals do these newly started social workers desire to be and what hindrances do they encounter? The professionals challenge the dominance of Western beliefs and values. This becomes tangible in their desires and constraints and especially in the process of choice.
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Purpose: Self-managed institutional homeless programmes started as an alternative to regular shelters. Using institutional theory as a lens, we aim to explore the experiences of stakeholders with the institutional aspects of a self-managed programs.Method: The data we analysed (56 interviews, both open and semi-structured) were generated in a longitudinal participatory case-study into JES, a self-managed homeless shelter. In our analysis we went back and forth between our empirical data and theory, using a combination of systematic coding and interpretation. Participants were involved in all stages of the research.Results: Our analysis revealed similarities between JES and regular shelters, stemming from institutional similarities. Participants shared space and facilities with sixteen people, which caused an ongoing discussion on (enforcement of) rules. Participants loathed lack of private space. However, participants experienced freedom of choice over both their own life and management of JES and structures were experienced more fluid than in regular care. Somestructures also appeared stimulated self-management.Conclusion: Our analysis showed how an institutional context influences self-management and suggested opportunities for introducing freedom and fluidity in institutional care.
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Summary Self-managed shelters claim that participants who have been homeless, are better able to run a shelter than regular providers. Little research has investigated self-managed shelters. In this paper we described the experiences of participants and peer workers with empowerment processes in Je Eigen Stek (Your own place, JES), a self-managed shelter, based on an eight year qualitative responsive evaluation. FindingsWe distinguish three clusters of individual experiences: 1) enthusiastic, 2) moderate to critical, and 3) negative, respectively associated with decreasing engagement with social life in and management of JES. Those not engaged can still benefit materially and from the freedom of choice JES offers, which is generally appreciated. Empowerment provides a useful framework and JES in turn offers new insights into the dialectical nature of empowerment. Empowerment consists of freedom of choice and capacity development and neither should be emphasized over the other. The emphasis in JES is on freedom of choice, which does not automatically lead to developing capacities. Social workers try to balance both aspects of empowerment.Applications Our analysis shows how offering freedom of choice can contribute to empowerment, although social workers need to be aware that participants might opt not to work on capacity development.
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Participant empowerment is a foundational goal of selforganisedhomeless care. We aim to understand how a selforganisedsetting contributes to participants' empowerment.The data we analysed (56 interviews, both open and semistructured)were generated in a longitudinal participatorycase study into Je Eigen Stek (Your own place, JES), a lowcostshelter for people experiencing homelessness in theNetherlands. JES participants experienced the freedom ofchoice and influence on their living environment. JES' fluidstructure allowed participants to adapt the program to theirdesires and needs, though participants were sometimes aspects to be either enabling or entrapping. We found someaspects (e.g., size, freedom of choice) could be entrapping orenabling, depending on personal factors. Our analysis revealedindividual freedom of choice, balancing freedom of choicewith support, offering opportunities for engagement andmaintaining fluidity in program management as core aspectsof how JES contributed to participants' empowerment.negative about having to live together. Most participantspreferred JES over regular shelters. Unlike empowermentliterature, participants mostly emphasised freedom of choiceover capacity development. JES offered opportunities forsocial and organisational engagement, through which participantsdeveloped roles, skills and self-image. However, alimited number of participants developed leadership rolesthrough self-management. Literature suggests setting
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Implementation of the United Nations Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (UN CRPD) requires countries to harmonise their legislative frameworks with it. This paper investigates the national legislative frameworks of four Asian countries to see the extent to which they provide support services in accordance with Article 19 of the UN CRPD. The UN CRPD requires persons with disabilities to have access to and choice and control over support services. To analyse the policy alignment with the UN CRPD, an analytical framework based on the Capability Approach (CA) was developed. The results show that most countries address support services, including assistive devices, only from the perspective of a social security measure for persons with disabilities living in poverty, failing to uphold the rights of those not meeting those eligibility criteria. However, while support services are inseparably linked to social security, they also are a right for persons with disabilities. Therefore, a paradigm shift is required in the approach of support services and the distributive systems of countries, from one that addresses persons with disabilities as those requiring care considered a burden, to one that considers them rights holders with equal opportunities, for which, support services are a pre-requisite.
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The current study analyzed blogs written by four Dutch parents of children with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities, with the aim of deepening the understanding of the parents’ concerns. Thematic analysis was conducted and five main themes were identified: Dealing with uncertainties addressed the impact of unpredictability present in the everyday lives of parents, Love and loss described the complexity of concurrently cherishing the child and grieving various types of loss, Struggling with time, energy and finances detailed imbalances and struggles related to parents’ personal resources, Feeling included in communities and society specified social consequences, and Relating to professional care services reflected on stress and support associated with professional care delivery. The study findings demonstrate how care professionals should acknowledge parents’ vulnerabilities by being aware of their existential distress and empowering parents to exercise control of family thriving.
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The worldwide obesity epidemic is a major and complex problem, resulting from the interaction of individual metabolic, genetic, and psychological factors with meso- and macro environmental factors. Adolescents, with their rapid changes in body composition, together with their shift in orientation from the direct family to the peer-related environment, are particularly vulnerable to unhealthy changes in life style. Habits with respect to food and physical activity tend to change substantially in this period as compared to earlier childhood, and peers seem to play an important role in shaping the behavior of adolescents. Adolescents tend to mimic their peers' behavior related to both healthy and unhealthy food choices as well as to physical activity and sports participation. This influence of peers depends on environmental circumstances such as availability of snacks, and is affected by individual psychological and demographic factors, and by macro-environmental factors such as cultural and social norms, legislation, food distribution, and media and advertising. A rapidly expanding source of influence on health behavior are media such as television, the internet (e.g., Facebook, twitter), and smartphones. These media may enhance overweight and reduce physical strength by reinforcing a sedentary life. However, potentially these media could be used to monitor and influence snacking behavior and physical activity for the better. An example of the use of new technology to enhance health behavior is the 'Wii' home video game. Using insights from social psychology, thoughtful choice architecture can be established to nudge adolescents to choose what is best for them without restricting freedom of choice and to help them with really implementing healthy intentions. A challenge for the coming decade is to develop 'Apps' aimed to decrease adolescent obesity while making use of social networks.
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Much research has been conducted into the determinants of customer experience. However, these studies do not include relationship norms as a possible determinant of customer experience. Nevertheless, there are strong indications that the relationship norms used by a customer are an important factor in customer behavior and customer experience. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of relational models on customer experience and to explain possible differences in presence of relational models. This paper describes the results of two studies. The first study focuses on the effects of relational models on customer experience. This first study shows that the type of relationship has a strong influence on customer experience in terms of consumption emotions, customer satisfaction, and recommendation intention. Knowing that differences in the presence of relational models have a strong influence on customer experience, a second study focuses on finding a possible explanation for the differences in the presence of relational models. We hypothesize that differences in the presence of relational models can be explained by how organizations approach their customers and how customers perceive the organization. Especially, the perceived organizational involvement and freedom of choice as perceived by the customer play an important role. The second study, therefore, focuses on the influence of perceived organizational involvement and freedom of choice on relational models. The study shows that organizational involvement and freedom of choice have a significant impact on the activation of relational models. The findings are interesting for organizations that want to improve customer experience
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Het ideaal van persoonlijke autonomie speelt niet alleen op allerlei manieren een belangrijke rol in de samenleving, ook in het onderwijs geldt het als uitgangspunt en doel van vorming. In dit artikel wordt dit ideaal geproblematiseerd en opnieuw doordacht door het te verbinden met de oorspronkelijke betekenis van auto-nomie als zichzelf de wet opleggen. De vraag wordt gesteld waarin deze 'wet' bestaat en hoe zich deze verhoudt tot de christelijke notie van afhankelijkheid van God als een vorm van heteronomie. Wat betekent dit alles voor vormingsidealen in het onderwijs?
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Several western governments have implemented environmental policies which increase the cost of air travel. Such policies aim to reduce the impact of air travel on climate change, but at the same time they restrict tourists in their travels. This study examines the extent to which the average tourist's happiness is affected by 'involuntary green travel', defined as reduced CO 2 emission travel imposed by government regulations. This issue was addressed in a study among 588 Dutch citizens who completed a self-report questionnaire containing questions about their happiness. The strongest determinant of tourists' happiness is freedom in choosing a destination. Any policy measure that interferes with tourists' freedom in destination choice will negatively affect tourists' happiness. Six percent of their happiness is at stake and potentially 17% of all holiday trips are affected. The number of tourists involved is possibly much smaller. The best options for governments are to impose taxes on long-haul destinations, which affect only a small share of all tourists, and air routes which can also be travelled by a variety of alternative modes of transport and thus less limiting to destination choice within this market segment.
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