Kontaktfamiljsordningen som förhandlingsstrategi : En djupstudie av relationen mellan kontaktfamiljer och socialtjänsten

Objectives: The aim of this study is to examine how the Swedish contact familysystem works in practice. The main focus of the study is on the relationship between the contactfamilies and the social services. What kind of help can the contact families expect to get from the social services and what do they feel could be added to that information? I also focus on the perspective of the social services and ask what kind of support they usually try to give contact families both before and during an assignment. Theory: The theoretical framework draws on ideas about which kind of families are connected to the ideal family, who the contact family system should support, role of the contact family, problems surrounding the system and the teamwork between social services and the contact families. Methods: The study is based on four semi-structured interviews with one social secretary and three contact families selected througha targeted selection. Results: I found that the contact families are dependent on the social services and their support in order to complete their assignment. Good relations between the social services and contact families is an essential part of this since confidentiality agreements make it difficult for the contact families to confide in other parties. There are a variety of things that could help contact families, such as education, one specific contact at the social services among other things. However these actions need to be led by the social services since a part of their job is to protect the children. As it is today the contact families feel that the support is lacking a bit, due to the difficulties connected with reaching the right parties in the social services, among other things. The respondents had a variety of suggestions connected to strengthening the system. Conclusions: The results show that the social services do not have any kind of official support to offer the contact families, however the social secretaries usually take it upon themselves to support the contact families even though they don't have any official time set out for it, since it is needed in order to enable the contact families to carry out their assignments. In order to strengthen the system it could be helpful for the contact families to have their own social secretary who is theirs regardless of their assignment