Researching documents as active texts in social work

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Researching documents as active texts in social
work

• Jo Warner
• University of Kent
• 10th UK Joint Social Work Education Conference
  with 2nd UK Social Work Research Conference
• Homerton College, Cambridge
• 9th July 2008

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• Methodological approach based (loosely) on
  Dorothy Smiths institutional ethnography but
  more specifically the idea of textually mediated
  social relations
• That is, how a text has the power to coordinate
  and concert to hold people to acting in
  particular ways (Campbell Gregor 200232)

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The data

• Documents in the form of inquiry reports policy
  documents and legislation linked to inquiries
  media accounts of inquiries
• How are such texts activated in everyday
  practice?
• Transcripts of semi-structured interviews with
  practitioners

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• Predictably, the subject of inquiries came up at
  an early stage in interviews, before explicit
  questions were asked
• Towards the end of their interviews, respondents
  were asked which, if any, inquiry reports they
  had actually read
• They were then asked detailed questions about the
  impact of inquiries and/or the so-called culture
  of inquiry

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Analysis

• Analysis of texts in the form of inquiry reports,
  media accounts of events, and policy documents
• Mapping the activation of these texts through
  analysis of themes in interview data with
  professionals

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Findings

• Communication within teams both informally and
  formally, through in-service training meant
  that practitioners felt the impact of inquiry
  reports even if they had not read them directly

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• I think there is a trickle down effect so that,
  even if they havent read the reports, but people
  doing training have or their managers might go on
  training courses that allude to the reports, so
  there is a slow trickle down (Interview 10,
  female ASW with 4 years experience)

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• The format of inquiry reports clearly had a
  direct impact on practitioners reading of them
  and their likely impact on practice. Their
  intertextuality with policy documents was also
  indicated

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• Interviewer Do you think these inquiry
  reports have any effect on the way you practice
  as an ASW care manager?
• Manager I think the Clunis report has. I think
  that was a very well written report and also a
  very interesting report. I recommended it to my
  student.

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• I was thinking that it balances out very well
  with material that has been written on working
  together with the health service, the Building
  Bridges document government guidance on
  inter-agency working, Department of Health 1995
  and I think because it is written in what I would
  call an entertaining way, it brought it to life
  more, in a dramatic way. It read like a thriller
  to me. (Interview 27, female ASW with 7 years
  experience)

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• There is an acknowledgement that the nature of
  media reporting affects professional attitudes as
  well as public opinion

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• JW Is that your experience? That there is an
  increase in disturbed people?
• That is my opinion, but there again, it is a
  vicious circle because it is also partly
  media-based as well. I am looking at the sort of
  people I see passed through our system and am
  also reading some of the literature, including
  some of the hysteria-tinged reports that you see
  in the newspaper, etc. . (Interview 30, male
  with 7 years ASW experience

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• Anxiety about being the subject of an inquiry was
  a relevant factor in instituting a changed
  approach to practice with documents such as case
  records receiving explicit attention

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• I think the key thing that really exercises
  everyone about inquiries is that when you start
  to think about if an inquiry happens here with
  me have I covered myself in a way that makes it
  quite clear that I have done my job? Which is
  rather different from doing the job. (Interview
  26, male ASW with 8 years experience)

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• Interviewer An extra emphasis then on keeping
  clear records?
• ASW Yes, keeping clear records, not from the
  point of view of recording the data that is
  needed in order to manage it the risk, it may
  even add an extra tier because you know if
  something goes wrong, someone is going to ask you
  to evidence what you did do and your documentary
  evidence is the way in which you protect yourself
  in an Inquiry. (Interview 26, male ASW with 8
  years experience)

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Conclusions - The organising power of inquiry
reports as active texts is realised through

• Their intertextuality with media accounts, policy
  documents and other inquiry reports
• Their format in terms of
• the description of events in a linear sequence
  and a dramatic narrative
• the allegorical power of the inquiry report in
  socio-cultural terms they are good stories
  (hence their media appeal)

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The outcome of their activity as texts is

• success (from an institutional viewpoint) in
  focusing attention on individual failings rather
  than the broader context for service delivery in
  services
• The creation of a culture of inquiry and blame
  characterised by heightened levels of anxiety
  among professionals
• The promotion of specific forms of defensive
  practice as good practice

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• Warner, J. (2006) Inquiry reports as active texts
  and their function in relation to professional
  practice in mental health. Health, Risk and
  Society, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 223-237
• Further research that focuses on how these issues
  might be addressed is currently at the planning
  stage