Youth services at a crossroads - mapping the challenges of youth health and social services in wellbeing services counties

As a result of the reform of the social welfare system, responsibility for organising services will be decentralised so that they will be organised by the welfare regions, while youth work, for example, will remain the responsibility of the municipalities. This project, carried out in cooperation with the Finnish Institute of Health and Welfare (THL) and the Youth Research Society, aims to strengthen the integration of youth services throughout the welfare service system, overcoming the division between welfare regions and municipalities. The project aims to monitor and analyse the administrative reorganisation of youth services in two wellbeing services counties – Vantaa and Kerava and North Savo – from the perspective of both those in leadership positions and those working in practice. Youth services here refer to both youth work and social and health services. The project asks how the current service models implement youth participation and the use of multi-professional co-operation, and how experts in different fields assess the accessibility and appropriateness of youth services in different in the new organisational model.