Information And Communication Technology And Labor Control Of Frontline Social Workers

This study took front-line social workers in the Chengdu and Chongqing area as the research target and analyzes the role that the use of information and communication technology(ICT)plays in their labor control.The development of Internet information technology,in recent years has improved labor efficiency,and greatly facilitated communication and interaction between social workers and their clients and agency superiors.However,existing studies have paid less attention to the issue of Internet use on social workers’ labor control.Therefore,this study introduces The Power Resistance Paradigm as an analytical framework and attempts to place social workers’ labor issues in a "triadic" labor relationship of "employer-social worker-client".This study used in-depth interviews to obtain research data.Through analyzing the in-depth interview data of 20 front-line social workers in Chengdu and Chongqing,the studyexplored the labor control suffered by social workers in the Internet era and their resistance strategies.The study found that although the development of ICT has facilitated the work of social workers,it has also strengthened the labor control of frontline social workers by social work organizations and broken the work-life balance of frontline social workers in two ways: firstly,the use of ICT has placed social workers in what Foucault called a "super-panoramic prison",where social workers are monitored and controlled by their superiors,clients,and even third-party workers in their daily work and behavior through the medium of the Internet.Secondly,the frequent use of ICT has brought a high degree of uncertainty and unexpectedness to social workers’ work schedule and efficiency,so that social workers are unable to achieve their goals within the institutional working hours and have to squeeze out free time and extend their working hours,which has led to a "time shortage" of social workers.This has led to a "time shortage" for social workers.Due to the use of ICT,social workers’ bodies are managed and their time is taken up,and the control of social workers’ work by their superiors and clients is further strengthened.In order to cope with the labor control caused by ICT use,social workers have developed three resistance strategies,such as avoiding absent interactions,setting latent scripts,and maintaining professional boundaries.In particular,avoiding absent interactions means that social workers use the characteristics of ICT to reduce the frequency of contact with clients and agency superiors during non-working hours by turning off their phones and ignoring messages.Setting up a hidden script means that social workers indirectly confront their supervisors by using two methods: whining and disguise to perform a hidden script,which is more covert and indirect.Maintaining professional boundaries means that social workers maintain the boundaries with clients through two types of confrontation:concessions and outright refusal.Specifically,social workers clarify their relationship by emphasizing rights and obligations to maintain an appropriate distance from each other;or they screen clients who can maintain contact with them out of hours based on the status of the program.By adopting these three action strategies to maintain work-life boundaries,social workers weaken labor control to some extent.Based on the power-resistance paradigm,this study analyzes the impact of ICT use on social workers’ labor processes and uses it to clarify the labor relations between social workers,clients and agency superiors in the Internet era,which has implications for the long-term development of the social work profession.At the same time,based on the findings of the study,this paper puts forward the following three suggestions: First,the industry should pay attention to the labor control faced by social workers and establish sound policies such as payroll system.Second,set up and fully implement the "power list" and "responsibility list" to clarify the power and responsibility relationship between labor,management and clients to avoid multiple management.Thirdly,we should link up with universities,research institutes,social organizations and other organizations to train social workers on ethics and interpersonal skills.