DWELLING PROFILE OF ORPHANAGE-INMATES

Sergey Vinkov PhD student in Sociology

NRU HSE, Moscow, Russia

The 3rd Summer School of Nordic-Baltic Doctoral Network in Social Work

15th – 19th of August 2011 University of Jyväskylä, Kokkola University Consortium Chydenius, Finland

“UNDERSTANDING THE OTHER”

http://www.sosnet.fi/

Russian population Russian population is 141 mlnis 141 mln**

*Russtat data (2010) Centrale Base of Federal Service Statistics of State statistics http://www.gks.ru/dbscripts/Cbsd/DBInet.cgi

** Korchagina I.A., Pishnyak A.I., Malkova M. A. Family problems factor and mechanisms of preventing social orphanhood   / Edited by L.N. Ovcharova, E.R.Yarskaya-Smirnova - М.: Independent Institute of Social Policy , 2010. -192pp. – P.10.

2009 – 690 thousands.; 2008 – 714; 2007 – 727.

Orphans Number Evolution in Russia **

The basic characteristics of orphanhood

Reasons of orphanhood• Not depending on the parents’

will, conditioned by objective factors complete orphanhood

• Depending on the parents’ will, conditioned by subjective factors social orphanhood

• At the same time it is worth taking into account that depriving the child’s parent of the parental rights can be both due to sudjetive factors (asocial life style mostly) and objective ones- acknowledgement the person incapable due to certain deseases.

Multibeneficiarity

Multibeneficiarity (from beneficiary – one who gets profit, Lat. multus - numerous) – is a characteristic of the social and legal status of an individual which means a combination of rights to obtain privileges for different categories of people in the status of one person. Thus when an orphan is entitled to claim his drelling rights as a disabled person, or an unemployed, or a poor etc., we may say that his status is multibeneficial.

Research of housing problems of orphans in Russia

• Inna Nazarova fully evaluated the problems which which graduates of orphanages face, showed th basic barriers on the way of their dwelling rights realization, described orphans life stories and situations connected with the problems in orphans dwelling needs satisfaction, the role of non-commercial organizations helping to defend orphans dwelling rights.

• Galina Semya researches orphans dwelling issues in within the context of orphans social

• adaptation where sah shows how orphans can remain without dwelling during 15 years after graduation from the orphan asylum.

• Angela Mamaeva studies orphans legislative status, juridicial aspects of orphans delling needs satisfaction.

Nazarova, I. B. (2000). Adaptaion and possible patterns of orphans' mobility Moscow: Moscow Social Scientific Fund  (Vol. 120). [URL: http://www.ecsocman.edu.ru/text/19160640/ , 10.08.2011] (In Russian)

Semya, G. (2006). Implementing Rights and Interests of Orphanage Inmates and Leavers during the process of Institualization in Russia  – Report - Stockholm , 14-15 November 2006г. [http://www.childcentre.info/projects/institutions/dbaFile14089.pdf ]. (In Russian)

Mamaeva, A. (2011). Implementation of the Dwelling Rights of Orphans and Children without Parental Care: Problems in theory and practice. PhD Thesis in Law. Vladikavkaz. (In Russian)

Which definition is wider?

Children without parental care, parentlesss children ≥ Orphans

* Cf. works below: Dekkers, M. (2011). Dwelling, house and home: towards a home-led

perspective on dementia care. Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy,14(3), 291-300.

Hurdley, R. (2006). Dismantling Mantelpieces: Narrating Identities and Materializing Culture in the Home. Sociology, 40(4), 717-733.

Mallet, S. (2004). Understanding home: a critical review of literature. The Sociological Review, 52(1), 62-89.

Dwelling ≥ Housing, house > Home*

Housing policy background in Russia• Shift from paternalistic to market housing policy on condition that only a small

part of the society can join in these processes ( only one third of the population has savings, the rest simply don’ have them)

• The majority of the population don’t have dwelling ( 77 percent of them are attributed to the lowest 4 stratus where the money is enough only on the current spending, that is why they satisfy their dwelling needs through rents or the use of staff dwelling)

• A high portion of ill- equipped buildings and shabby dwelling ( there is no system of water and gas supply, sewerage)

• Imperfection of legislation ( there is no definition of dwelling , no technical requirements of comfortable dwelling and the term of dwelling supply for separate categories of people- servicemen who suffered from the accident on Chernobyl atomic station, etc.- are stated)

Cf. works below: Shomina, Ye .(2007). Housing policy and housing reforms in Russia. Congress Presentation, IUT 17:th Congress , Sept. 20-23 ,

Berlin, Germany [URL: http://www.iut.nu/Congress/Congress2007/PresentationsNational/Shomina_Russia.ppt , 23.02.2011]Tihonova, N. E., Akatnova, A.M., Sedova, N.N. (2007). Housing und housing policy in the modern Russland. Sociologicheskie

issledovaniya.1, 71-81. (In Russian). [URL: http://demoscope.ru/weekly/2007/0307/analit02.php , 04.08.2011]Vihavainen, R. (2005). Housing in Russia – Policies and Practices. Working Paper. [URL: http://blogit.helsinki.fi/respublica/key5.htm,

04.08.2011]

The basic problem and goal of the research

• Orphans dwelling problem is the absence of the dwelling in itself, the chances and the means of the children’s dwelling rights realization without parental care and also by the youth from the number of such children

• The object of the research is the orphans who are at present in an orphanage and aged 7- 17.

• The goal of my research is to study the state of the problem on the elementary level- in orphanages, to describe the orphans dwelling status analyzing their personal history/profiles.

Theoretical framework

• Structural social work (Moreau, M., Leonard, L., 1989; Mullaly, R., 1997)

* I undertake the effort to structurally describe the state of orphans dwelling situation who are in orphanages on the documentary level which we can find in wards’ personal histories, because many documents confirm the child’s status for getting this or that welffare, describe his social origin.

Moreau, M., Leonard, L. (1989) Empowerment. Through a structural approach to social work. A report from practice. Otawwa: National Welfare Grants Program, Health and Welfare Canada.

Mullaly, B. (1997) Structural social work practice: Ideology, theory, and practice (2nd ed.). Toronto: Oxford University Press.

Dwelling profile of orphanage-inmatesA system of structured information about implementing rights and housing warrants of orphanage-inmates.

Method and toolContent analysis of 103 personal files (case files history) of inmates, the data is in Excel, the data is in numeric and text formats. 

Time and space limits February 2011 – October 2011 (scheduled date) A city in Orel region  (population 40 000)

The Unity of Observation: the Personal History

5 groups of indicators:• № 1-9 – the personal ward’s characteristics and general characteristics of the

history ( the dates, the reasons, the number of documents, the data about the state of health, gender, names of places- birth places, the places of previous residence, etc.)

• № 10- 14 – brothers/ sisters ( the number, gender, birth dates, the present residence, data about health)

• № 15- 20 – parents ( the status of te parental rights, dates, gender, information about diseases, the presence/ absence of marriage, the whereabouts)

• № 21- 26 – the dwelling ( presence/ absence, type, area, location, etc.)• 27- 29- the circulation of the documents ( the date of the documents

circulation, the names of the addresses)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 …

“SOCIAL HOUSING RISE”

 Homeless (inhabitant of an asylum)

Source: Shomina, Ye. Social Urban Movements on Different Stages of Civil Society Development: Comparative Analysis of Housing Movement in Russia and Abroad: doctoral thesis: 23.00.02 [e-resource]. – М.: RSL, 2001 – 385p. – P.67.

  Squatter (invader of a dwelling)

Tenant of a municipal house

Tenant of a private house

Member of a cooperative housing

    Owner of a flat in a condominium

Owner of an individual dwelling

The Current Results1) In most cases orphans get into orphanages from rural areas

and children from rural area have more brothers and sisters2) A significant number of children have living parents ( 91

percent)3) 7 percent have health deviations ( usually cardiovascular

diseases)4) Many parents lead asocial life style, are in bad social-

economic conditions, do not take care of their health which is enough condition for social services’ interference into the household

5) The main part of orphanage children were born out of wedlock

The Current Results6) The child’s removal into an orphanage is formed by the court decision ( it

passes the judgments about the parents deprival of the parental rights) and decree of the head of the area where the child was found)

7) Some already have their own dwelling but it is as a rule, is rented by other people for the period when the child is in the orphanage and the rent is transmitted into his/ her bank account

8) Formally, the majority of children do not need dwelling because there is some document confirming their right for getting a dwelling in the area where they come from

9) But in fact, the residence, the dwelling where the child lived before entering the orphanage has no system of central heating, gas and water supply because many of them were found in a rural area

10) The longer the child stays in the orphanage tha more documents accumulates in his/ her personal history, an average period of the

children’s stay in the researched orphanage – 7- 8 years.

Suggestions for the practice• The development and introduction of specialized programs of

doing orphans’ documents where one of the appendixes could be called “The Dwelling Profile”, the use of this Software could favour strengthening interdepartmental connections of the institutions ‘child welfare system’

• The perfection of the norms and procedures of orphans’ dwelling supply ( to define the dwelling standards, unify the procedures, reduce the burocratic barriers)

• To prepare for the defense of their dwelling rights already in childhood through the system of trainings and not to limit yourself by simple education about the rights

• The development of social work in rural area• Modernisation of the rural and town infrastructure

svinkov@hse.ru http://www.hse.ru/en/