ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes that person-centred approaches are an important way to return human beings to the centre of social care and human services. Realistic person-centred care (PCC) emerges from 'negotiated relationships', which are part of a hermeneutic dialogue between persons, their care providers, their social environment, and the resources available to them. Person-centred approaches capitalise on and foster resilience. Such a paradigm shift has implications not only for residential and patient care, but also for policy, funding, research, and ethical decision-making about populations and communities that have been marginalised, and have been labelled 'vulnerable'. As PCC requires a shift from traditional approaches to care to more involvement by the recipients of care, it necessitates a different way of work for professionals. It appears that even if practitioners were universally to commit themselves to PCC that is iterative, dialogic, and hermeneutic, the systems of care in which they practice may prevent person-centeredness.