Socially Endangered Families in the Solidarity Network

The paper is oriented toward an empirical examination of the characteristics of social networks of socially deprived families. The topic is set within the context of previous sociological studies into this problem, and then observed in a wider milieu of social relations and mapped onto the social reality of socially deprived families in Serbia. The idea is to employ an analysis of the narratives from the respondents’ in-depth interviews from a temporal perspective of the past and present so as to detect the changes in social networks with regard to the altered social context. The previous (socialist) period was determined by the dominant role of the state in the resolution of crucial social problems of families, while the transition (present) is defined by a reduction in the importance of the state and the transfer of this role to the family itself or, partially, to the private sector. At the practical level, the paper will show which types of networks are activated under these changing structural circumstances and what their role is in the lives of socially deprived families. Thus, solidarity networks are understood as an alternative to the withdrawal of the state from the social security system in the neoliberal global concept of the state, now linked to the selective, discriminatory clientelistic practices which emerged over the past thirty years. The findings stem from the analysis of the qualitative material obtained by in-depth interviews of 25 families whose status is characterized by social deprivation. Typologically speaking, it is the case of families receiving social welfare, accompanied by Romani, single-parent, pensioner, and small agricultural families.