Social policy implications for disadvantaged groups in municipalities in Turkey: The case of Municipal Kütahya

When the history of social policies is examined; In every period of the history of human beings, examples of social assistance can be found both in the individual and in the organization. Social assistance in the hands of the state in a planned way with the Industrial Revolution. As a result of industrialization, intensive migrations have started from rural areas to urban areas and population density in urban areas has increased. With the increase of the population in cities, some environmental, cultural, economic and social problems have occurred. Therefore the state has started to implement social policies to solve these problems. Today, social policies are implemented by central and local governments. After the 1980s, with the adoption of neo-liberal policies, the idea that only the central administrations would lead to a number of problems, and the local governments came to the forefront. Local governments take a more active role in identifying and addressing local needs in a specific geographical area than in central governments. important role in this respect falls to the municipalities of the local government units in Turkey. As a matter of fact, with the arrangements made after 2000s, municipalities have been given social responsibilities as well as traditional municipality services, and their activities towards protecting disadvantaged groups have been increased. In this study; social municipal applications for the disadvantaged groups of local governments in Turkey is discussed on the example of Kütahya Municipality. In the first part of this study; The concept of social policy is explained in detail. In the second part; Turkey has been mentioned in the institutions involved in the implementation of social policies and policies for disadvantaged groups. In the third part; He evaluated the services of Kütahya Municipality for disadvantaged groups. Keywords: Local Governments, Disadvantaged Group, Kütahya Municipality, Social Municipality, Social Policy