ABSTRACT
This remark from a parent, quoted from a client feedback study in one of the largest organizations for child and youth care in The Netherlands - the Horizon Foundation-is illustrative for the attempts of this institute to listen actively to what clients (youth and parents/caretakers) have to say about the help they receive. Making use of client feedback is a significant way to shape a client-oriented assistance process (Jumelet, de Ruyter and Kayser, 1999). It is part of a development that is going on in the Netherlands, but also in other European countries like Belgium, France, Germany and the United Kingdom; a development that can be characterized as a move towards a more participatory, client empowering child and youth care practice. It means that youths and parents have an active role in the helping process, that the emphasis is on the their strengths rather than on their deficits, that they have their own responsibility concerning the implementation and the success of the applied interventions, and that their evaluation of and feedback on the process is recognized as being unusual valuable (Knorth, Van der Bergh and Verheij, 2002).
