Exploring the Structure of the Power Imbalance Between Practitioners and Clients in Case Management

In case management, the power imbalance between practitioners and clients has been pointed out as a structural problem that restricts core values such as client centeredness, participation, and mutuality. This study analyzed how power imbalances are formed, operated, and reproduced in the case management field, focusing on Foucault's concept of governmentality and Bourdieu's concept of symbolic violence. As a result of the analysis, neoliberal welfare discourse, institutionalized practice structure, practitioner's authority and professionalism act as key factors constituting the power imbalance, and it was analyzed that this is carried out through practical skills such as performance-oriented intervention, standardized procedures, and practitioner's speech authority. It was found that this power relationship forms a hierarchy through specific discourse, institutions, and practical skills from the beginning of practice, and constitutes and reproduces the practitioner and the client as the subject of discipline and compliance, respectively. The power imbalance in case management has been identified as a problem of structured power mechanisms throughout practice beyond simple ethical issues or limitations of intervention skills.