Reframing Urban Parks as Social Infrastructure: Citizen-Centered UniPark Practice Connecting Green Social Work and Community Resilience

This paper is an expanded and reconstructed version developed from the oral presentation “Building Community Resilience through Social Work Ethics: Citizen-Participatory Social Work Practice Utilizing Urban Parks and Inclusive Sports in the Era of Climate Change,” presented at the 28th Asia Pacific Social Work Conference (APSWC 2025), held in Colombo, Sri Lanka, 18–21 November 2025. Drawing on practice records and quantitative data from UniPark Kokukoen during 2023–2025, the paper examines citizen-centered social work practice through the lenses of Social Isolation → Social Connection, Green Social Work, Community Resilience, and Mitate → Shitate. It reframes urban parks as social infrastructure in which diverse citizens can repeatedly meet, develop roles, and build relationships of mutual support.