Conflict in confidentiality and reporting obligations in social work

The bachelor thesis deals with the issue between confidentiality and reporting obligations (mandatory reporting) in the area of social workers. One of the areas of social work where this conflict most often occurs is the social and legal protection of children. The obligation of confidentiality of a social worker is explicitly stated in Section 100 of Act No. 108/2006 Coll., the term of mandatory reporting is contained in the Penal Code Act No. 40/2009 Coll. However, this issue also has the other side of the coin, which is the definition of confidentiality and mandatory reporting in terms of ethics, which is constituted in the Code of Ethics of Social Workers of the Czech Republic. Thus, a social worker often finds himself in a number of situations where he faces a dilemma of decision-making within the framework of law or ethics. The theoretical part deals with the role of social worker, values and moral and ethical issues. There is also information from the point of view of confidentiality and mandatory reporting in the area of social work with various aspects of performing this activity in the area of social and legal protection of children. The aim of the bachelor thesis was to map the experience of social workers in the field of social and legal protection of children with conflict between confidentiality and reporting obligations. To answer the research questions, the qualitative research method based on semi-structured interviews with open questions was used. The interviews were conducted with a target group of social workers working in the area of social and legal protection of children. The main research question set in this work were: Do social workers in social and legal protection of children distinguish the ethical and legal aspects of a dilemma? Do social workers in social and legal protection of children favor the legal or ethical way of thinking in their decision-making? The results of my work can serve mainly for pedagogical purposes as illustrative cases of dilemmas in social work