Breaking the deadlock: defining the quality of social work in the Czech Republic through social work research

To ensure the quality of social work performance, governments or national professional associations usually employ binding quality standards, codes of ethics, or laws on social work. In Czechia, all previous attempts to establish comprehensive institutional and formal pillars for developing the quality of social work performance have long been in a deadlock, due to their being diluted by lobby groups, opposing interests, or political pressure. This text aims to show the potential of social work research for developing social work profession pillars under such circumstances. The basis of our ‘research-led approach’ to establishing national-wide quality criteria for social work performance was a well-chosen participatory research methodology fine-tuned to facilitate discussions among various stakeholders, leading to the reconciliation of their positions and interests. During the research project, we managed not only to reach agreement on the formulation of the Set of Social Work Quality Criteria and Indicators, valid across all areas of social work practice in Czechia, but also on the desirability to implement it. We believe that the proposed research-led approach for developing social policy instruments is transferable to other national or local contexts, perhaps even as an initial solution, not only as a means of overcoming deadlock.