The work of social workers in the protection of quilombola and ribeirinha children in the Amazon, Brazil

Abstract

We address the role of the social worker and the protection of children in the Brazilian Amazon, having as locus the municipality of Cametá/PA, which concentrates riverside and quilombola families. This research, carried out since 2020, articulated works in a virtual and face-to-face way. We started with a bibliographic and documentary survey and later institutional visits, semi-structured interviews and focus groups carried out by Google Meet and application of questionnaires via Google forms. Reached 20 professionals, including social workers, guardianship counselors, pedagogues and others. The text is organized in three moments: The nature of the work of the Social Work professional and its potentialities, possibilities and the encounters of the profession with child protection policies and, finally, Cametá and the challenges faced by social workers and the child protection network. We found that it is urgent to constantly hire, train and qualify professionals so that they can be present in the different public policies, in the same way that it is necessary to strengthen the network of agencies for the protection of this child.