Browsing by Author "Jongman, Kgomotso"

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    The role of social workers in promoting entrepreneurship among the youth in Botswana
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2020-03) Jongman, Kgomotso; Engelbrecht, Lambert Karel; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Social Work. .
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Social work has been said to be a profession of many faces, it is deeply entrenched in socio-economic and to some extent political influences because it deals with policy that guides social welfare. With so many faces and too much influence from outside, there are a couple of roles that social workers perform and this array of roles that social workers perform can end up leading them to forget the core mandate of social work which is social justice and end up feeding the cravings of neoliberalism especially from government and donor organisations. Botswana has been classified as upper middle-class economy with a reasonable GDP per capita but it is clear that despite the high economic success and stable political environment, the country is still experiencing the challenges experienced by poor countries. There is high poverty incidents, national unemployment, and high unemployment among the youth. The youth are the most important because they make up to 70% of the whole population which means they should be given priority in a developmental intervention. Unemployment among the youth in Botswana is at 40% which is more than the national unemployment statistics which is at 20%. This high unemployment has led government to come up with different interventions since 1945 up until now. The aim of this study was to explore the role of social workers in promoting youth entrepreneurship in Botswana. The research objectives included the following: to contextualize social work in Botswana; to analyse theories of positive youth development within a social development paradigm and consider international and local perspectives; to synthesize theories of entrepreneurship based on theories of positive youth development within the context of social work in Botswana; to investigate the role of social work in promoting youth development in allied programmes in Botswana; to make recommendations to the Botswana Ministry of Youth Empowerment, Sports and Culture Development and to the academic community (University of Botswana and others) and other youth worker stakeholders regarding the role of social work in promoting youth development in entrepreneurship. These objectives also represented the chapter layout of the study. This research was ontologically cemented in the interpretivist paradigm, focused on understanding the narratives, dialogues and meaning; it was a exploratory and descriptive study, within a purposive sample section of the ministry of youth empowerment, sports and culture development where 21 social workers were interviewed. The primary research instrument within the case study framework was the semi-structured interview schedule, which through a reliance on such theoretical propositions, logic models, and pattern matching. The resultant empirical analysis explored the narratives of social workers when reflection on their roles in promoting youth entrepreneurship in Botswana. The social workers felt the ministry is more in achieving more numbers of those who have been given programmes without considering, the quality of service, talent, passion, environment where the youth are based. They further reflected on the lack of empirical evidence in terms of their interventions and this has made their work to be difficult because they cannot apply their skills and expertise as social workers and they end up being relegated to only performing clerical work of giving out forms and collecting forms without purposeful interventions which is aimed at social change, empowerment and social justice.