Abstract
The starting premise of this chapter is the insight made by some theorists of vulnerability, that responses to vulnerability should, to the greatest extent possible promote the agency of others through non-paternalistic forms of care. We use this as an injunction to discuss the role of vulnerability as a dimension of children’s well-being. Drawing upon two multi-stage qualitative studies with children, 8–16 years, in New South Wales Australia, on children’s well-being, the chapter proceeds by discussing the relationship between vulnerability and autonomy in children’s discussions of what is important to their well-being. We suggest, from an analysis of children’s discussions of safety, that safety is associated with well-being when it also promotes a sense of autonomy. We discuss two aspects of safety—‘rule safety’ and ‘metaphorical safety’, as autonomy promoting. We go on to show, from children’s discussion of self-determination, that expressions of self-determination important to children’s well-being include children providing care to others (practical care) and demonstrating concern about other people and causes (abstract care). We discuss some implications of the interrelatedness between protection/autonomy and self-determination/care for social work theory and practice, arguing that social work practice with children must provide opportunities for self-determination and secondly, that children, as well as being care recipients (those being protected) must also be recognised as being agents who have the capacity to care, and that this is often an expression of their self-determination.
We would like to thank Michel Edenborough for her valuable contributions to this chapter. In particular her involvement in discussions about early drafts of this paper and in being part of the fieldwork team for this project.
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Notes
- 1.
The names of the suburbs, like those of the participants, are pseudonyms.
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Drake, G., Falloon, J., Fattore, T., Felton, R., Mason, J., Mogensen, L. (2022). Children’s Standpoint on Vulnerability: Implications for Social Work Practice with Children and Young People. In: Tiliouine, H., Benatuil, D., Lau, M.K.W. (eds) Handbook of Children’s Risk, Vulnerability and Quality of Life. International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-01783-4_24
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