A critical reflection on the changing capacity of surveillance in digitally mediated welfare services

This chapter offers a critical examination of the shifting modalities and implications of surveillance within digitally mediated welfare systems, with a specific focus on the European context of social work. Anchored in surveillance studies, critical data justice, and social work studies, the analysis traces the historical and theoretical lineage of surveillance as both a mechanism of care and control within welfare capitalist societies. We argue that the intensification of datafication and algorithmic governance has reconfigured traditional welfare practices, embedding surveillance logics into service delivery through predictive analytics, citizen scoring, and automated decision-making systems. These developments, aligned with neoliberal ideologies and New Public Management (NPM) reforms, risk entrenching forms of marginalizing surveillance that disproportionately affect disadvantaged populations, with the risk of eroding the discretionary, relational, and ethical dimensions central to social work. Yet, this chapter also explores the emancipatory potential of counter-surveillance practices and critical professional resistance. It contends that social work, when grounded in a relational ethics of care and committed to democratic participation, can challenge technocratic rationalities and reassert its normative orientation toward social justice and human dignity in the digital age.