Institutional Isomorphism in Poverty Alleviation within Armenia's Social Protection System: A MULTI-Layered Analysis

The article discusses the poverty alleviation policies in Armenia from the point of view of the institutional contradiction of the goals set and interventions applied. With an insufficient number of social service workforce and a low level of professional competence a centralized approach to decision-making, Armenia's social protection system is unable to apply social activation approaches. However, it has announced its intention to abandon residual policies.

In the country, the factor of non-governmental organizations and charity foundations has also changed significantly. NGOs have traditionally offered more personalized and innovative services. However, recently, the policy of co-financing these services by the state has led to a state of institutional contradiction, forcing NGOs that are usually innovative in the social sphere to adapt to the working style of state institutions.

The article discusses the existing institutional obstacles to the self-sufficiency policy application in poverty alleviation strategies targeting the institutional capacities and practice specifics in the country.

Within the framework of the study, a system-analysis approach was applied, with a focus on the mechanisms for the development of social work, decentralization of decision-making, reduction of institutional contradictions, development of professional competence, which will allow for substantive and semantic revisions of the strategies of social work and social services to combat poverty.