Transnational histories of social work and social welfare – An introduction

Social work and social welfare emerged as institutions of modern nation-states, circumscribed by nation-state borders and inscribed in specific local and regional contexts; as such they have been examined traditionally as institutions confined to nation-state borders. While social work has constantly been searching for its domain and identity (Dominelli, 2007), more recently social work has been facing a number of new challenges on a national and global scale. First, the collapse of state socialism in the 1990s, interpreted as proof of the singularity of modernization and development, facilitated the dismantling of socialist welfare systems and the emergence of social work as a post-socialist welfare institution (Beblavý, 2008; Iarskaia-Smirnova, 2011). Second, the neoliberal logic continues to shape the ongoing restructuring and downsizing of Western welfare states, increasing the burden for social work (Baines, 2010). Third, welfare institutions of nation-states appear to be inadequate when dealing with global and transnational issues and processes (Chambon, Schröer, & Schweppe, 2012). Fourth, national welfare institutions are becoming increasingly interconnected and influenced by global policy actors (Deacon, 2007) and by cross-border processes of policy translation (Good Gingrich & Köngeter, in press; Lendvai & Stubbs, 2007). While these transnational developments have multiple and profound effects on social work, they have been only tangentially addressed by social science and historical research. Much of the conventional research into social work and social policy has suffered from “methodological nationalism” – the implicit assumption of nation-states as natural entities of investigation bounded by territorial borders (Wimmer & Glick Schiller, 2002). Nation-statecentric perspectives fall short in examining the dynamic and intrinsically transnational welfare institutions and processes (Kettunen & Petersen, 2011). Moreover, “methodological nationalism” built in social policy analysis has been intertwined with nationalism underlying the practice of designing social policies and contributes to the growing disjuncture between sedentary welfare systems and transnational citizens (Baines & Sharma, 2002). Similarly to contemporary analyses, historical accounts of social work and social welfare often exhibit methodological nationalism. Kettunen and Petersen’s (2011) critique of nation-centric historical analyses pointed to three common types of historical research on welfare states: (1) history as national specificities, when welfare institutions are studied as formations bearing nation-specific and intrinsic characteristics; (2) history as origins, exemplified by research concerned with identifying the origin of welfare states; and (3) history as