ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of the global and regional policy contexts within which the study is situated, highlighting the roles of supranational agencies in establishing conditions for local adoption of neoliberal social welfare policy, and the effects of the European Union (EU)'s accession requirements on Poland with respect to social policy and programs. It presents the case study, which reveals the ways in which neoliberal social policy was adopted (or not) at the local level. Concurrently, at the regional level, supranational agencies had begun, albeit very gradually, to attempt to affect the form that social policy would take in East Central European (ECE). The chapter discusses the findings of the case study, focusing on how social policies and programs affected the daily routines of social workers. Municipal Social Assistance Centre (MSAC)'s pilot Conditional Cash Transfers (CCT)/workfare programme was welcomed by some social workers because it proscribed methods for working with long-term clients and those deemed resistant to leaving assistance.
