Philipp Sandermann

Monday 12 September, 09:30-10:30
Hörsaal 1A

Professional social work began to develop at the end of the 19th century.

Since then, it has expanded in strong coherence with the idea of social disintegration, which emerged throughout the western world at about the same time. The concept of disintegration as a “social” phenomenon itself is deeply related to a historical process we usually call urbanization. Therefore, we can observe commonalities between social work and urbanity, as well as between the emergence of social work research and urban studies.

Nonetheless, for a long time social work research in Europe did not focus its interests on urbanity as an objective. Lately, however, there has been a turn. While for decades such theoretical entities as the national state and national policies provided the most important framework for both social work programs and the research on social work, we can now clearly identify an increasing reception of urban studies, particularly from the US. This goes along with a growing interest in transnational research programs.

In my talk, I will firstly give some examples regarding the continuous historical similarities between traditional social work research and urban studies. Secondly, I will present some latest examples of contemporary social work research that focuses on urbanity and transnational social work contexts. The aim is to draw some conclusions regarding the extent to which urban studies will continue to play an important part for future research on social work.

Dr Philipp Sandermann is Research Associate, Work group Social Work, at the Freie Universität. Having completed his PhD at the Freie Universität, (Title of the thesis: “The new debate on community and the welfare system of the federal republic of Germany. An explaining approach using critique of ideology and systems theory.”), he was a Visiting research associate, School of Social Service Administration, at the University of Chicago and worked as a social worker for the “Berliner Rechtshilfefonds Jugendhilfe” (Eng: “Youth welfare legal aid fund of Berlin”). His areas of expertise are international comparative research on social work, theory of social work, and representation for those involved with youth welfare services. Dr Sandermann is a Board member of the "Berliner Rechtshilfefonds Jugendhilfe e.V.”, Berlin, a Member of the Netzwerk Wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchs Soziale Arbeit (GER) and Deutsche Gesellschaft für Erziehungswissenschaft (DGfE).

Selected Recent Publications

• Sandermann, Philipp (2010): Die Kontinuität im Wandlungsprozess des bundesrepublikanischen Wohlfahrtssystems In: Neue Praxis, 40. Jg., H.5/2010, S.447-462
• Sandermann, Philipp (2009): Die neue Diskussion um Gemeinschaft. Ein Erklärungsansatz mit Blick auf die Reform des Wohlfahrtssystems. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag • Neumann, Sascha/Sandermann, Philipp (Ed.) (2009): Kultur und Bildung. Neue Fluchtpunkte für die sozialpädagogische Forschung? Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften
• Neumann, Sascha/Sandermann, Philipp (2008): Hellsichtige Blindheit. Zur vermeintlichen sozialwissenschaftlichen Wende der sozialpädagogischen Theorie. In: Widersprüche. Zeitschrift für sozialistische Politik im Gesundheits-, Erziehungs- und Sozialbereich, H. 108, Juni 2008, S. 11-30