Little Silent Spiders: Social Workers in Building New Relationships at the Time of COVID-19

Abstract

Italy was reached by the pandemic 21 February 2020. Right away, Social Services launched initiatives to support and respond to the needs of vulnerable people, strengthening their professional experiences and changing, in a flexible manner, their ways of intervening. Social workers have woven the network, which now allows ensuring people the continuity of emergency interventions. By reorganizing their services, they have started innovative ways of being closer to people, to families and local communities, re-creating and strengthening relationships and social networks. In networking, social workers have a connecting role in creating links and synergies between various formal and informal resources in order to promote the well-being of the individual. The modus operandi of social workers is constantly evolving, as they are becoming promoters of the process of change and creators of new best practices that shape, with new professional awareness, the new social and historical context marked by the COVID-19 pandemic.