This chapter contains reports on violence and victimization experienced by children and young people. This can trigger experienced trauma. Please be aware of this when reading this chapter! This chapter examines the relationships and relational social work of professionals in different residential group care facilities based on the project “Participation in Residential Childcare” funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). The project examined how processes for participation and complaints, according to Art. 12 of the UN CRC, are organized in the residential groups in everyday life. One result indicates that informal processes – inparticular between professionals and children and youth, such as conversations in-between – have a significant influence on the realization of participation and the experience of full participation among young people in the residential groups. Therefore, the role of relational social work was evaluated in more detail, and there are clear connections between the relational social work and the implementation of participation in the residential groups. First, the chapter gives an overview of relationships and physical contact in residential groups.
This is followed by a description of the project. The presented results highlight
the connections between organizational culture, which was investigated in the
project, and the respective relationships described from the perspective of the
professionals and the perspective of the children and adolescents in the residential
groups. It is shown that relational social work takes on a special significance
in participatory idiocultures of residential living groups. Finally, the potentials
and limitations of the study of relational social work in residential groups and
safeguarding the participation rights of young residents are discussed against
the background of the outlined state of research at the beginning of the chapter.