By Yossi Korazim-Korosy,
Division for Research,Planning and Training,The Ministry of Social Affairs,Jerusalem,Israel,
Shalva Lebovitz,
Child and Youth Services, The Ministry of Social Affairs, Jerusalem, Israel,
and Hillel Schmid,
The Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
The article describes and analyzes the process of privatization of the foster care services in Israel. According to this process the responsibility for delivering these services was transferred from the departments of social services to nonprofit organizations. The financing of the services and the supervision functions are controlled by the government. The article indicates that after four years of implementation there was an increase of 16%in the number of children in foster care.(from 1,479 children in 2001 to 1,713 children in 2004).The main increase was in the Arab sector. The article presents the preliminary findings of the privatization related to the recruiting of foster care families, training and professional supervision, initiating new programs, providing individual and group treatment, joint activities for families and children and the development of expertise in specific areas of foster care.
The process of privatization also involved with several dilemmas -professional, organizational and structural -which are discussed in the article, in addition to the analysis of the implications of the process on the privatization of social services in general.