Is Romania a child-centered society? The attitude of social

workers to family violence exerted on children1

Oana Pirneci2

Abstract. When it comes to violence against children, governments seek to develop a flawlesslegal frame, institutions and procedures and give less attention to the quality of human resource.Unfortunately, Romania does not represent an exception. Even if our national legislation definessocial workers as the frontline workers in cases of family violence, their role in such cases is ofsecondary importance for the authorities. In this respect, on the basis of ten interviews conductedwith social workers from the General Directorates of Social Work and Child Protection, this studyaims at exploring their attitude towards the problem of violence against children in the family.Implications for social work practice are discussed.

Keywords: social worker, violence against children, family, culturalnorms

Introduction

A family’s right to privacy and self-regulation is a fundamental

right stipulated in the text of the Universal Declaration of

Human Rights, which states in article 12 that “no one shall be

subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family,

home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and

reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law

against such interference or attacks”. Further, the third

1 This article was published in the Social Work Review, 4/20142 University of Bucharest, Faculty of Sociology and Social Work , 9 Schitu Magureanu Street, District 1, Bucharest, Romania, E-mail: oanapirneci@gmail.com

1

paragraph, article 16 of the same declaration, establishes the

role and the importance of the family for the proper functioning

and development of the society: “the family is the natural and

fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection

by society and the State”. If we consider the cases of family

violence exerted on children, this will raise the following

legitimate question: does the respect towards a family’s right to

privacy violate the principle of the best interest of the child?

And, keeping in mind the circumstances, how are the limits of

social workers’ interventions established?

Based on ten semi-structured interviews with social workers

from the public system, the study aims to explore the behavioral

attitudes of the social workers towards family violence exerted

on children. In this respect I sought to obtain information

regarding the way social workers define and identify the types of

abuse exerted by parents over the children, the intervention

procedure in cases of child abuse as well as information on

training needs of the social workers.

From family’s right to privacy to the best interests of the

child: the role of the social worker in cases of family violence

exerted on children

Although violence against children is the first form of domestic

violence legally regulated (Muehlenhard and Kimes, 1999), this

2

did not lead, however, to resolving or decreasing this problem,

but rather it just increased its social visibility. For example,

Ian Hacking (1991) considers it a matter of defining the problem.

And who is then qualified to determine the violence against

children, in terms of what it is and what it is not? Could it be

the parents or the professionals, such as doctors, lawyers,

psychologists, sociologists or social workers? Things become even

more complicated when we also bring into discussion the influence

of the cultural context that impedes violence from being a

"unitary phenomenon" (Korbin, 2003, 432).

At the EU level, the results of a study conducted by E.

Gracia and J. Herrero (2008, 210) show a high degree of

acceptability towards physical child abuse, both among

individuals and across the country. Thus, in terms of

individuals, men with older age and low education are those that

record high acceptability of physical abuse; however, at the

country level, a low degree of acceptability of this form of

abuse is observed due to the existence of a legal framework to

prohibit the employment of violence against children, and to the

low number of child deaths caused by abuse.

In Romania, the issue of violence against children is

strongly justified by the socio-cultural norms of raising a

child, so that “although visible, violence is not regarded as a

problem where the community members should invest resources for

solving it” (Rădulescu, 2008, 137). As proof, there are many3

sayings that place the child in his/her parents’ “property”:

“I’ll beat him until he comes to his senses”, “mom’s beating

makes him grow”, “beating comes from heaven” or “I gave birth to

you, I can kill you!”

Regarding the statistic dimension of this phenomenon,

according to the data from the National Authority for Child’s

Rights Protection and Adoption (ANPDCA) 3 between January 1, 2013

and December 31, 2013, there were 12, 192 cases of child abuse

that occurred at the national level, out of which 11,466 took

place within the family. As to the profile of abused children, a

high frequency of violence was observed in the countryside,

totaling 6, 671 cases, among female children there were 6, 336

cases, and amid children aged 10 to13 years there were 2, 718

cases. Regarding the types of abuse, neglect had the highest

values for all age groups, with a total number of 8, 403 cases of

neglect.

During 2013, the Save the Children organization from Romania

published the study titled Child abuse and neglect. A Nationally Sociological

Study, according to which 38% from the surveyed parents confirm

that they physically abuse their children, while 63% from the

questioned children state they are beaten by their parents. Out

of the last ones, 18% affirm they are beaten with a stick,

another 13% of the children sustain they are beaten with a belt,

3 Data available at: http://www.copii.ro/alte_categorii.html. Accessed on 30.06.2014.

4

while 8% say they are beaten with a wooden spoon. The recorded

results are not surprising at all, considering that 20% of the

parents understand physical violence as an educational tool for

the child, while slapping and ear-pulling are not defined by them

as a type of abuse (Save the Children, 2013, 47).

On the other hand, at the national level “it’s still

difficult to document the real need of social services for

preventing child abuse, neglect or child abandonment, given that

there are no monitoring systems that allow a risk assessment for

those children living with their families in communities,

especially those rural ones” (Buzducea, 2013, 97), so that the

social worker’s intervention can be defined as the main tool for

respecting a child’s right to protection against all forms of

violence. Is Romania though one of those “communities/societies

where compliance is a fundamental principle so that the legal

requirements are sustained by what we refer to as human resources

or human infrastructure” (Rujoiu, 2012)? The study that I will

present in the following section aims at outlining an answer to

this question.

Research Methodology

The current study is a qualitative approach where the data was

collected through sociological survey method based on semi-

structured interviews. The interviews were conducted with 10

5

social workers (2 men and 8 women) from the Abuse Service of

DGASPC District 1, DGASPC District 3, DGASPC District 6, DGASPC

Argeş, DGASPC Braşov and DGASPC Bacău, during March-April 2013.

The subjects’ selection was done according to the following non-

probabilistic sampling methods: depending on availability, on

quotas and scope. It is noted that subjects’ experience in the

field ranged from 1 year (2 social workers) to 12 years (1 social

worker).

During the interviews, the discussion focused on: 1) defining and

identifying types of abuse exerted by parents on the child, 2)

the procedure of intervention in child abuse cases and 3) the

need for training of social workers. Each interview was audio -

recorded and the maximum duration of an interview was 64 minutes.

Interpretation and analysis of information obtained was performed

based on a qualitative data analysis.

Results

Defining and identifying the types of abuse exerted by parents on

the child

The study’s results show that in Romania, child abuse continues

to be a disciplinary tool for the child, with broad use by the

parents, supported by the convincing force of some older sayings

such as: “mom’s beating makes him grow”, “beating comes from

heaven”, etc. and transmitted through generations as a legitimate6

form of raising and educating children. There are also situations

where “disciplining” the child takes extreme forms. During the

interview, one social worker mentioned that “many parents feel

they have the right to disable the child, so to speak. There are

cases where this is truly what happens” (social worker, female, 2

years of experience). Similar situation to one found in other

cultures, such as Chinese or Jamaican, where physical punishment

is considered both a legitimate educational method proven

efficient and a religious obligation (Smith et al., 2011, 52).

Basically, in these cultures, parents use physical punishment as

a way of ensuring the child’s proper integration within the

society. With that being said, how can we talk about abuse?

Results of the study conducted by Delores E. Smith et al. (2011,

51) show that: “many have argued that the effect is dependent on

the cultural perception and meaning of the practice, how the

practice is perceived by the child, ethnicity, socioeconomic

status, and whether the punishment is administered in the context

of love and emotional support”.

Regarding the types of abuse seen in the social work field,

the social workers surveyed firstly stated the emotional abuse,

followed by physical abuse, neglect and sexual abuse, which is

contradictory with official statistics. Emotional abuse of the

child occurs more often due to divorce cases, when the child

himself becomes a bribing object:

7

“There are cases where the parents separate and one of them,usually the mother, leaves with the children. And the fact thatthe father, or the other parent, is not allowed to see thechildren is considered emotional abuse. That is…well, there’s abroader spectrum for emotional abuse…or the parents argue or theyfight, rather fight between themselves than beating thechildren….and the children are exposed to it all” (social worker,female, 1 year of experience).

This is a statement that enforces the current studies.

Ernest N. Jouriles et al., (2008, 233), for example, observed

that: “children in domestically violent families are at

substantially elevated risk for physical child abuse compared

with children in homes without domestic violence.” Certainly, in

such instance is very important to remember Carolina Øverlien’s

observation (2010, 82) regarding the terminology used by relevant

literature for defining the child victims of violence: witnesses,

observers, exposed to violence or who live the experience of

abuse. Although in the case of the first two terms it is

considered that being part of a violent act reduces the abuse’s

experience suffered by the child, the term of “exposed to

violence” “is inclusive, since it encompasses watching, hearing,

direct involvement, and/or experiencing the aftermath” (Holden et

al., 1998, apud Øverlien, 2010, 82). On the other hand,

“experiencing the abuse” transitions the child from passive actor

to active actor of the violence act to which he/she is exposed,

centralizing on the child’s perception of violence and

highlighting at the same time its specific intervention

(Øverlien, 2010, 82).8

As to the causes of abuse cases seen in their practice, the

social workers identified poverty, parents’ low educational level

as well as behavioral characteristics of the aggressor (e.g.

choleric temper, high anxiety), mental health of the perpetrator,

use of alcohol/other substances, the influence of other family

members, the family model, lack of a job, the marital conflict or

the parents’ divorce, stress, and also victim’s characteristics

(e.g. gender, age, premature birth, disease). On the other hand,

in terms of abuse’s effects on the child’s subsequent psycho-

social development, research participants identified the

inhibition of the child, fractures, burns, mutilation,

delineating an anxious personality, running away from home,

aggression in relation with peer groups or with younger children,

low self-esteem, poor school performance as well as engaging in

high-risk sexual behavior.

If I were to propose a profile of the violence cases exerted

on the child by the parents, the social workers mentioned that

the rural areas registered the most cases of abuse reported, with

the 10-14 age group being the most affected, but without any

major difference of abuse cases sorted by gender. Social workers

say that despite the visible growth of the phenomenon, the

authorities’ response usually stops in front of “closed doors”:

“unfortunately, it seems that this phenomenon is expanding. I

don’t know if now it shows more current because of the media or

9

it was always this way, but maybe ignored” (social worker,

female, 2 years of experience).

On the other hand, if the identification of a violence case

(real or perceived) against the child can be accomplished in

several ways: direct request from the family/child/legal

representative, referral from a public or private institution,

written or verbal complaint reporting (over the phone) from

persons other than the family members/legal representative or own

initiative; the confirmation or rejection of a case being or not

an actual abuse, is usually determined at the initial evaluation

stage by a social worker and a psychologist from the relevant

department of the General Directorate of Social Work and Child

Protection (DGASPC); after this, it will be decided whether to

establish emergency placement, case management continuation or

case closure by reference or orientation to another service or

authorized institution. In these conditions it is necessary to

mention that for the determination of a case being abuse or not,

the social workers place importance on the relationship between

the risk indicators for the child in a given situation, their

expertise and the existing resources (institutional/family-

based/community-based): “Well, it depends, but you can make a

better determination if you go on the field for a little while

and….true, the way that the house looks, the condition of the

children….if there’s also an experienced psychologist who sees

the child being afraid, and if the parent is present you can see

10

the relationship between them….” (social worker, female, 2 years

of experience).

Consequently, the information obtained from the surveyed

social workers allows the justification that, despite aiming to

international conventions which allow the development of legal

and institutional framework necessary for the implementation of

measures to protect and promote children’s rights; unfortunately,

in Romania the issue of defining abuse falls under the cultural

relativism. If “mom’s beating makes him grow” and there are not

reported cases of extreme violence where the effects are

physically obvious, then, even if there are indicators of abuse,

the social workers tend to avoid confirming the existence of

abuse exerted by parents on the child/children. We can even bring

into discussion the social workers’ dealing with cognitive

dissonance, given that on one hand they have the obligation to

respect the family’s right to privacy, independence and method

used to raise the child in a family environment4, while on the

other hand, the social workers need to ensure the child/children

benefit from protection against all types of violence. The

definition of abuse occurring in the family doesn’t imply the

disregard of parental authority, but rather it employs the

development of a collaboration relationship with the parent,

aimed towards the resolution of the crisis. However, we can’t

allow that the misunderstanding of the social worker’s own role

4 A notion which should not be mistaken for that of living within the family of origin.

11

in defining and initial evaluation of the abuse cases sustains

the relativity of the abuse, because as P. Iluţ (2004, 40) states

“one thing is to promote diversity of musical styles, clothing,

language and another thing is to relativize between child abuse

and the implementation of non-violent educational methods”.

Intervention procedure in cases of child abuse

Regarding the actual intervention in cases of abuse, social

workers mention a number of obstacles, out of which the most

important, unanimously reminded by research participants, is the

abusing parent’s attitude towards DGASPC specialists’

intervention and thus establishing a relationship with them.

Additionally, social workers face situations where their physical

integrity is endangered, while on the field. Here's what a social

worker states: "It was a severe situation and the father was

standing behind the door with a lever and an ax, saying Come on,

are you going to take my child away from me? I mean, you are somehow

trying to calm down the waters and no matter how skilled you are

at that point, it's difficult! It's difficult! Please allow me, I

will not take away the child...it is difficult!" (social worker,

female, 2 years of experience). It is important to note in this

case the social workers’ difficulty of handling such situations.

Other obstacles identified at the intervention level are

represented by the number of reported cases the total number of

the institution’s employed staff ratio, the incomplete number or

12

lack of needed specialists within the multidisciplinary team,

which leads to collaboration with external specialists, fact

which makes it difficult to achieve the same results as those

from the team or which delays the submission of the Specific

Intervention Plans (PIS). In the case of DGASPC, the social

workers also state the difficulty of collaborating with the

social worker coming from within the city hall (SPAS), that in

most cases cannot respond to the requirements of the social

workers from the DGASPC, due to his/her lack of training or to

being overwhelmed with tasks that are unrelated to the social

work field, which limits the intervention to realizing the

initial assessment.

"On top of it all, it’s also the local authorities’ fault becausesometimes the city hall employees are those who have no knowledgein the social work field, such as accountants and so on…and theyare called persons with social work attributions. And they don’treally understand the situation, meaning that you ask them to makea social inquiry and they end up providing a 3-sentences inquirywithout a conclusion, where you would usually see thedetermination of the child being able to remain in the family ornot. This happened many times and I can say that it is veryimportant that every city hall location employs a competent socialworker who can properly assess the situations on the field andprovide the relevant opinion, otherwise... " (social worker,female, 5 years of experience).

At the same time, social workers bring up the material resources

of DGASPC which many times make it difficult to get to the

child’s home for completing the initial assessment of the case or

monitor its development. Even more, the lack of official

resources limits the intervention of social workers to its13

administrative side, thus confirming S. Leigh and C. Miller’s

prediction (2004, 264): “social workers may become effective

organizers of welfare provision but give up doing social work, at

the core of which sit the concepts of therapy, choice and change,

and a capacity to act as reflective advocates and to use

authority appropriately”. Without denying the importance of the

administrative component of social work, we can’t keep from

noticing that beyond a certain point, this negatively affects the

actual work with the beneficiary.

On the other hand, another obstacle in resuming the

intervention is the social workers’ attitude towards their role

in evaluating cases of violence, while keeping in mind the

autonomy of the family. The following statement of a social

worker is quite supporting in this sense:

“It’s all wrong to know that you are doing the right thing forthat child, while on the other hand you see how much sufferingcomes his way. The child basically got emotionally attached tothat women and you, the social worker, are practically taking himaway from her to some place where he doesn’t know anybody, hopingthat it will be better for him. [...] So you have moments likethat, you know, where you end up asking yourself Was it really the bestway? (social worker, female, 8 years of experience).

This type of situation emphasizes the need for training and

supervision of social workers who work with children victims of

violence, but not only. This need is also indicated in the report

titled We Can Do Better – Child Abuse Deaths in America (Every Child

Matters Education Fund, 2012, 9), according to which: “child

14

protection work is labor intensive, difficult and emotionally

stressful. The consequences of the decisions that child

protection workers must make can be enormous: leave a child in

harm’s way, for example, or exercise powerful state authority

that can result in the termination of parental rights”. That’s

why “focusing on the way practitioners’ understand and realize

the abuse cases they are facing is a challenge for the research

filed which needs to be taken into account” (Darlington et al.,

2002, 55).

Unfortunately, public institutions for Child Protection

still don’t implement evidence based intervention programs,

reason why the efficiency of the current processes raises many

questions. We note the fact that social workers face many

situations which exceed their competence and the NGO’s that have

signed partnership agreements can’t always compensate through

their programs the limitations of DGASPC.

From 2004 until now, the framework law for social protection

and promotion of children’s right5 has undergone 18 revisions. In

these circumstances, we can’t ask whether these modifications

occurred due to circumstances raised by competent authorities or

if they were made with the scope of being compliant to

international standards? And if so, were they tailored to the

socio-economic and cultural reality of Romania? For any of the

two cases, the social workers state that this is not applicable.

5 Law No. 272/2004 regarding the promotion and protection of children’s right15

Therefore, we can’t be shocked by the low efficiency of the

programs carried out by DGASPC and by the poor qualitative

intervention of the staff assigned to handle cases of family

violence.

The need for training of social workers

All the surveyed social workers stated that at one point they

felt emotionally overwhelmed by a case of violence they have

worked on and inability and anger are the most frequently

associated feelings in dealing with such cases.

On the other hand, it happened very frequently that the

social workers faced situations where their lives were

endangered. These situations could have been diminished by

availability of all necessary specialists so that the social

workers didn’t have to perform the psycho-social evaluations on

their own. A social worker recalled such a circumstance during

the interview: “Yes, I faced a case once where they threatened me

with the knife….I was talking with the child’s mother when the

partner arrived home not knowing what was being discussed. The

wife only got a chance to mention my presence in the house,

coming from the Child Protection office, before they started to

fight each other, yelling and pointing the knife” (social worker,

female, 8 years of experience).

Discouragements of social workers who work with abused

children and their families are gradually created by the large

16

number of child abuse cases compared to human and material

resources available within DGASPC, by the poor quality of the

current social services or even by their inability and lack of

accessibility, by the obstacles faced while on the field,

represented mainly by the attitude of the abusive parents.

Working with this group of beneficiaries involves a significant

emotional consumption and from a public institution’s standpoint,

the access to continuous professional training classes and

supervision is quite low. Not to mention the lack of incentives

for these professional workers, required by the institutional

context to give priority to administrative work rather than one

in which their expertise could be valued and that could allow

them to plan an intervention based primarily on the social

worker-child relationship.

For example, T. Ronen (1994, 14) states that “treating

children … requires those involved with it, in addition to

acquiring specialization in treatment processes, to preserve the

spark of innocence, faith, and enthusiasm that are natural to

children; to be an artist who is capable of approaching and

peeking into the child’s soul, an artist who knows how to create,

improvise and use various means to bring the child close” (apud

Hamama, 2012, 122). This is a professional development level that

social workers from DGASPC can reach only by great personal

efforts, considering the current socio-economic and political

framework in Romania.

17

Order no. 288 from July 6, 2006 approving the minimum

required standards for the case management within the children’s

rights protection field suggests that the employer should ensure

that the social worker’s training covers “at least 42 hours for

case management knowledge” and “at least 42 hours for child

protection or related fields knowledge”, respectively, for case

management or case responsible social workers. This provision is

practically impossible to achieve by both DGASPC and NGO or any

other independent types of social work service. And then we come

back to the question: how are all the field related revisions

taking place? What criteria are taken into account? Can the

criteria ensure that the principles of efficiency and

effectiveness are accomplished? In Psychology it is said that

having a high level of achievement can be constraining….

Conclusions

Since the 90’s, children’s right has been a constant concern for

decision factors and specialists of this field in Romania and,

since 1997, the entire child protection system has undergone a

reorganization process. Therefore, I am in agreement with R.

Zanca’s statement (2010, 84): “a series of positive elements

allow us to support progress in this area, including essential

ones such as the development of an adequate specific legislation,

aligned with European standards, the reorganization of services,

18

the closure of large residential type institutions and the

availability of alternatives for child placement and diverse

child and family services, the sustained activity of non-

governmental organizations and successful partnership with the

governmental establishments and the clarification of a social

worker professional status [...]”. On the other hand, children’s

rights and particularly the phenomenon of violence against

children has received great space in psychology literature,

social psychology, social work, referencing pieces such as Child

abuse and neglect in Cluj County (Rotariu et al., 1996), Child Protection -

dilemmas, concepts and methods (Roth-Szamoskozi, 1999), Domestic violence

and child abuse (Muntean, 2000), Child Abuse in Residential Care Institutions in

Romania (Stativă, 2002), Violence. Psychosocial issues (Ferréol and

Necula, 2003), Children and women victims of violence (Roth-Szamoskozi,

2005), Victims of violent crime in Romania: evolution and trends (Voinea and

Banciu, 2005), Psychosocial dimensions of domestic violence (Liiceanu et al.,

2008), The abuse of children in the family. A multidisciplinary perspective

(Rădulescu and Dâmboeanu, 2010), Violence, trauma, resilience (Muntean

and Munteanu, 2011), Family violence: between social perception and individual

assumption (Rujoiu and Rujoiu, 2012), Violence and Society. Contemporary

debates (Rujoiu, 2013) and the list goes on.

Besides all this, we can’t admit noticing the distance

between theory and hands-on practice which has major effect on

the efficiency and efficacy of actions taken in the field of

child protection. Simply adopting different European or North

19

American strategies will not guarantee an improvement in the

quality of services provided to children at risk. It is therefore

required a “deep” fundamentally scientific knowledge of the

issues faced by this category and the development of social

policy based on scientific evidence.

Considering all the previously mentioned aspects, the study

aims to identify the social workers’ attitude towards family

violence exerted on children. To this end, I conducted 10 semi-

structured interviews with 10 social workers (2 men and 8 women)

from the Abuse Service of DGASPC District 1, DGASPC District 3,

DGASPC District 6, DGASPC Argeş, DGASPC Braşov and DGASPC Bacău,

during March-April 2013. During the interviews, the discussion

focused on the following 3 themes: defining and identifying types

of abuse exerted by parents on the child, the procedure of

intervention in child abuse cases and the need for training of

social workers.

The information obtained per above method supports the

literature in this field, Romania being part of those societies

where “geographic location” (Every Child Matters Education Fund,

2012, 8) and cultural position support the relativity of various

types of violence and particularly of physical abuse.

Unfortunately, the competent authorities’ efforts to align the

legislative and institutional framework to international

standards were not accompanied by adequate human resources

investment, situation seen in the poor quality of the provided20

social services. At the same time, due to limited financial and

material resources of the institutions, the interventions in

child abuse cases are rather “unplanned”. A social worker affirms

that experiencing the abuse can be defined as part of the child’s

destiny: “of course everyone has its own experience, at a certain

point this is part of a child’s experience, there’s nothing you

can do! Yes, that’s it!” (social worker, female, 5 years of

experience). This approach is seen not only in the social

worker’s intervention, but also in the fragmented collaboration

between institutions, dictated by allocated material and

financial resources.

On the other hand, even if DGASPC established abuse services

with free phone line available 24 hours for reporting abuse

cases, the results obtained show that from a training

perspective, the human resources is usually exceeded by the abuse

complaints and the intervention performed is based mainly on the

expertise and intuition of the social worker, while focused on

administrative objectives of the service. This situation is

reflected by the way in which social workers define their role in

investigating the abuse cases and in their limited subsequent

abilities for developing a therapeutic relationship with the

child as the victim of the abuse as well as with the abusing

parent.

This situation was previously noted by H. Ferguson (2005) in

an evaluation of the psychosocial and emotional dimension of21

social work intervention in cases of violence against children.

According to the author, when investigating violence cases, the

social workers fear for their physical safety due to caregivers’

hostility but also as a consequence of risk contamination with

different diseases that the child victim was diagnosed with. For

this reason, R. Ingram (2013) argues for providing supervision of

social workers with great detail given to management of feelings

faced by them, besides the procedural aspects of the said

intervention.

In a social work system focused on procedural rigor, as is

the case in Romania, the intervention in abuse cases will be

predominantly administrative if absence of professional and

emotional support given to the social workers.

Finally, social workers play a major role in defining cases

of abuse complaints as well as in planning and implementation of

the intervention, therefore facilitating the psycho-emotional and

social recovery of the abused child/children, but also in

reducing the marginalization cases and social exclusion of

parents who abuse their children. For this reason, investing in

continuous training and supervision of these social workers is an

essential condition for reducing the individual and social costs

associated with child abuse. At the same time, adopting evidence

based programs would allow providers of social services to have

efficient spending and increased quality of the provided services

22

in the protection and promotion of children’s rights. Only then

we could mention the principle of the interests of the child.

Limitations and further directions

As the main limitation of the study I’ll mention the small number

of subjects which prevents the generalization of the information

obtained to the entire population of social workers working with

children victims of domestic violence. Also, the surveyed

subjects were selected only from the public system of child

protection, where the intervention is carried based on the steps

listed on the current regulation, while the NGO environment

promotes the development and implementation of evidence based

intervention programs where the social worker’s role has a

different level of complexity and flexibility.

On the other hand, it is required that the quality

assessment of the social services provided by DGASPC to children

victims of abuse and to their families, as the main provider of

such services at the county level, is performed taking into

consideration the perception of the decision factors from the

system (general manager/general deputy of child protection)

towards violence exerted on the child within the family and

towards DGASPC’s role in the development and delivery of

supporting services for this type of beneficiaries; and

alternatively, taking into consideration the beneficiaries’

23

attitude (legal representatives of the child/children) towards

accessing these services.

Acknowledgments

„This paper was co-financed from the European Social Fund,

through the Sectorial Operational Programme Human Resources

Development 2007-2013, project number POSDRU/159/1.5/S/138907

"Excellence in scientific interdisciplinary research, doctoral

and postdoctoral, in the economic, social and medical fields -

EXCELIS", coordinator The Bucharest University of Economic

Studies”.

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*** The Universal Declaration of Human Rights from December 10,

1948.29

*** Law No. 272/2004, republished, regarding the protection and

promotion of children’s rights, published in the Official Journal of

Romania, Part I, September 30, 2013.

*** Government Ordinance No. 288/2006 regarding the approval of

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of Child protection, published in the Official Journal of Romania,

No. 637, July 24, 2006.

30