From July 2024 until the end of the year, Prof. Dr. Tanja Klenk will be awarded the “Social Services & Digitality” Fellowship at DIFIS. This fellowship is part of Research Field 5, “Social Policy as a Process,” at DIFIS and will explore the significance of social services and social counseling in the provision of welfare state services. The focus will particularly be on questions related to the digitalization of social services and counseling.
Digitalization, as one of the major societal trends, is often seen as a key to the sustainable and reliable provision of social services. However, the digitalization of social services and counseling has lagged significantly behind other societal fields. Although administrative software, electronic case files, and online appointments via video calls are utilized in the context of social services and counseling, digital tools and media are often used only as supplements to traditional analog operations. Their implementation and actual use depend on specific configurations at the political, organizational, and individual user levels. As a result, model projects and isolated solutions prevail rather than widespread and uniform structures. The much-discussed Online Access Act (OZG) in recent years has only led to an electrification, rather than a digitalization, of existing processes.
These inconsistencies in the digitalization process are problematic because they create inequalities in access to social services and contradict the equality promise inherent in the welfare state. The digitalization of social services is an ambivalent process: if uncoordinated, it can create new disadvantages or exacerbate existing ones. Conversely, it is conceivable that digitalization could help reduce inequalities, for instance, between urban metropolitan regions and rural areas where travel to social counseling centers is long and public transport is infrequent.