Preventio, sosiaalioikeus ja kunnat - ehkäisevä sosiaalipolitiikka kuntia velvoittavassa lainsäädännössä

Abstract

Tutkimuksessa kootaan kuntia velvoittava ehkäisemistä määrittävä lainsäädäntö. Tarkastelun kohteena on kunnan ja oikeusjärjestelmän välinen suhde, jonka sisältö ulottuu sosiaali- ja terveydenhuollon ulkopuolella lasten ja perheiden välisiä suhteita, opetusta ja kulttuuria, työtä ja työllistymistä, onnettomuuksien estämistä, ympäristönsuojelua, elinympäristöjen suunnittelua ja rakentamista, ravintoa, kulutusta ja tuoteturvallisuutta käsittelevään sääntelyyn. Preventiivisiä säännöksiä tarkastellaan sekä sosiaalioikeuden että hyvinvointivaltiollisen sosiaalipolitiikan kautta. Suhde hyvinvointivaltioon on tutkimukseen sisältyvä arvolähtökohta, suhde sosiaalioikeuteen määräytyy sääntelyn systematisoinnin kautta esille nousevien oikeusperiaatteiden ja niihin sisältyvien käsitteiden kautta.

Tutkimus tarkastelee kunnan roolia paikallisen hyvinvoinnin toteuttajana, lainsäädännön nojalla määrittyviä ehkäisemisen keinoja ja sitä koskevia vastuita kuntaorganisaation sisällä.

Tutkimusaineistona olleesta lainsäädännöstä systematisoitavissa olleiden suojelun, inkluusion ja syrjäytymisen ehkäisyn periaatteiden ja niihin sisältyvien käsitteiden muodostaman koherenssin nojalla preventiivisten säännösten voidaan katsoa erottuvan muusta sääntelystä erillisenä säädösten ryhmänä. Periaatteiden kautta on mahdollista hahmottaa, mitä muilla hallinnonaloilla toteutuva "sosiaalinen" on ja mitä se merkitsee kunnallisessa toiminnassa.

Kunnan toimivalta ehkäisemiseen liittyvissä tehtävissä on laaja. Kunta päättää strategisista perusvalinnoista ennakollisen tai jälkikäteisen toimintamallin välillä, samoin kuin siitä, minkälaisten keinojen tai palvelujen avulla ehkäisemistä toteutetaan. Tehtävät jakautuvat toiminnan rakenteellisia ehtoja määrittäviin poliittisiin linjauksiin ja viranomaistoimintoina suoritettaviin asiantuntija- ja valvontatehtäviin. Ehkäisevän sosiaalipolitiikan kannalta merkittävin rooli kunnan sisällä on valtuustolla, joka päättää talousarviosta myös erityistoimialojen toimielimille kuuluvien tehtävien resursoinnissa. Missä asemassa ehkäiseminen on kunnallisessa politiikassa määräytyy vain osaksi sääntelystä käsin. Olennaista on, pyritäänkö kunnallisten toimintojen suunnittelussa ja toteutuksessa tietoisesti ehkäisemään ja estämään hyvinvoinnin kannalta ongelmallisia kehityskulkuja ja myönnetäänkö palveluja ehkäisevinä vai vasta ongelmien syntyessä. Kunnan yhteys paikalliseen toimintaan ja ihmisten arkeen voi muodostua juuri prevention kautta edellyttäen, että paikalliset tarpeet ja kuntalaisten hyvinvointi hyväksytään politiikan lähtökohdaksi. Kunnan rooli ehkäisemisen järjestämisessä on pitkälle rinnakkainen valtionhallinnon kanssa. Kun valtio hoitaa kansalliset ja alueelliset tehtävät, kunnan vastuulla on paikallisen prevention toteuttaminen.

Prevention, social law and municipality - local authority as an implementer of preventive social policy in current legislation

This research investigates the role of the municipality as an implementer of preventive social policy in current legislation, the tasks given to municipalities under that, whether or not these statutes reach beyond social welfare and health care and the liability distributions of the preventative action within municipal organisations. The legal objective in this study was the assembly of statutes and the formulation of rules of interpretation. In addition the objective was the systemisation of legislations, particularly in relation to social law. The purpose was to examine whether the systematised legal principles or concepts make visible the legislative content supporting municipalities preventive regulations as a special area of social law or as a distinct body of enactments from other legislation in general.

Although prevention as a part of social activities has almost as long a history as poor relief, the related judicial research has not been performed. Moreover, very little research has been conducted on prevention through social policy. Considering the above, defining preventative social policy as a concept was necessary to rendering the topic researchable and the resulting research reliable.

The theoretical approaches of this research are based on jurisprudence and the sociology of law. Through the use of systemisation and interpretation, judicial research aims to answer questions concerning the content of the current legislation. In this study legal concepts are treated mostly as concepts defining the regulated domain and not as expressions of the judicial systems normative content. In addition, legal principles are approached more as arguments to be taken into account in the interpretation of regulations than as applicable norms.

As a research on the sociology of law the study examines the relationship between the legal order and the municipality in social policy of the welfare state. Through prevention, this approach is also connected to the discussion of the Risk Society. Particularly the examination of the preventive aspects of the Social Welfare Act and its implementation bring the dimensions of legal policy to this research.

The research material primarily comprises the Constitution, parliamentary law, Government bills and preliminary works, and judicial and social policy literature. From the viewpoint of traditional jurisprudence research, the approach of this thesis is extensively empirical. The preliminary understanding of the research scope originated in the Social Welfare Decree, that defines responsibilities of the Social Welfare Board. The Board must take into consideration the social aspects in health care, education, land use and construction, housing, employment, cultural and leisure activities as well as public transport and other services.

The examination of the content of single regulations is based on a framework derived from the concept of preventive social policy. Functional characteristics of this concept comprise goal, intervention and approach, as well as their respective attributes, empowerment, prevention and precaution.

The research methodology comprised juridical interpretation and qualitative social science research content analysis in which a content-based approach and established theoretical models alternated and were materials and theoretical models combined in various ways.

According to the research findings, the preventive duties of municipalities extend beyond the social welfare and health care and touch upon education, teaching, employment, environmental planning, construction and use of the environment, and monitoring industrial health and safety functions, foodstuffs, consumer products and environmental protection. Planning, improvement of living conditions, provision of services and financial support, information, direction, advice and supervision are means of precaution of the risks, dangers and problems.

In addition to planning, other methods of surveillance include inspections, granting permission to start up and practice a business or activity, notifications, suspension or shutting down operations and conditional fines. The intensity of the intervention varies in scope from providing advice to extreme limitations on individual autonomy and intervening in private actors possibilities to operate.

In education, employment, social welfare and health care the primary interventions are the services provided to individuals. It is a particular characteristic of social services as well as e.g. mental health care services that they can be granted either preventatively or for other purposes. Legislation does not define the time or circumstances upon which services should be granted in order to be preventative. These decisions depend on the operational culture within the municipality, and its policies. On the contrary in the case of supervision, as well as benefits and services falling under subjective rights form an exception, where the question of prioritising preventative interventions is determined by the legislator.

A municipality has broad authority in preventative functions, almost to the extent of sovereign. It may determine basic strategic choices based on an anticipatory or retrospective model, as well as the type of services and means by which preventative measures are implemented. Tasks and interventions are divided into specific policies defining the structural conditions of the operations and expert functions carried out by authorities. Like in other municipal functions, the municipal council plays a significant role within preventative social policies. The council also determines the budget for issues falling under the specific sphere of authorities. As the basis of the council's decisions are determined the orientation and resources of the municipality's employment policy, as well as whether employment policy aspects will be considered in municipal investments. The council approves in the municipality both general and local plans, and makes decisions to apply for state approval to provide educational services, e.g. vocational training.

In addition to the municipal council and government, other bodies have related political mandates. For example, the body responsible for the tasks of Social Welfare Board has a broad development mandate which obliges it to prevent the formation of unfavourable living conditions. The weight placed on prevention in municipal policy depends on whether the municipality aims to prevent problematic developments from emerging based on the improvement of living conditions, land use planning and the related implementation, and on whether services are provided on a preventative basis or only after the problems occur. The connection between the municipality, local activities and the everyday life of citizens can form precisely through preventative activities, as long as local needs and the welfare of the municipality s population are accepted as the policy bases.

To a great extent, the competence of the municipalities in preventative activities are of the equal quota that of the state. While the state attends to national and regional responsibilities, the municipalities have responsibility for local ones. The municipalities have the competence to arrange the preventative functions and decide on how to organize them. The delegation of preventative tasks to private actors can take place only by an Act or by virtue an Act. However in social and health care on the basis of current legislation this is possible regardless of the nature of the service as a subjective right or the allocation in the budget. This, however, presupposes that the municipality decides on the criteria to be applied in the provision of preventive services, and that these criteria are included with adequate specificity in the contract between the municipality and the service provider. For example, outsourcing compulsory basic education and supervisory functions of municipalities would require changes in legislation.

In the main prevention will be implemented via structural solutions, whose tasks cannot be transferred to the private sector and whose context lies almost wholly beyond the scope of the current legislation. While the municipal task is to attend to local people s welfare, a private actor s interests lay either in profitability or in promoting the interests of certain groups. Attending to the public good requires comprehensive local expertise covering various administrative sectors, something which private operations can not be assumed to posses. Furthermore, reaching an adequately detailed agreement, e.g. concerning municipal obligations for development of living conditions, so that the realization of public interests could be supervised, would not be feasible in practice. Any extent transfer of municipal tasks would at the same time mean a withdrawal from safeguarding the interests of the general public and rescinding the municipal powers which constitute a municipality s autonomy.

The legislation that formed the research material in this study systemically demonstrates three principles of law: protection, inclusion and the prevention of social exclusion. These principles and the concepts they contain form a coherent whole, on the basis of which preventive provisions emerge as a group of distinct regulation among other legislation. Based on this it is possible to outline what the realised social aspect is in other public administration areas and what it means in municipal activities. The knowledge generated by a single research project is limited. Prevention, and the implementation of the related regulations at both municipal and national level requires additional research.