Ready, Steady, Go? Obstacles to the Spread of Eco-Social Work Approaches: An Italian Case Study

While eco-social work as a strategy that combines responses to environmental and social risks is gaining ground in Europe, it has not evenly spread across countries. This paper looks at Italy, country which arrived only recently found difficulty establishing itself, order understand the factors have hindered fostered its development. To do so, explores two cases of innovation and, using neo-institutionalist framework, mechanisms encouraging or impeding establishment work. The research suggests three mutually reinforcing obstacles an Italian context: limited space for policy agenda; inability reframe practices used by existing integration initiatives; reproduction established relationships between public non-profit organisations competition scarce resources.