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Ms Sara Jayne Mizzi
Department of Social Policy and Social Work, Faculty for Social Wellbeing

Public support is a fundamental pillar of welfare state sustainability. Public attitudes to welfare are best understood as a multi-dimensional construct; when this support is compromised, it directly undermines public willingness to fund the system through taxes and weakens support for redistributive policies. This study examines whether the Maltese welfare state enjoys sufficient public support to be considered ‘socially legitimate’ using a quantitative survey (n=314) based on the European Social Survey and the framework developed by Roosma et al. (2013).

The analysis proceeded in two stages. First, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were employed to test the latent structure of welfare attitudes. The results indicate that the literature-derived model fits the Maltese dataset significantly better than an alternative exploratory solution, confirming the cross-national validity of established legitimacy dimensions. Second, factor scores were calculated to evaluate the relative strength of these specific dimensions within the Maltese context.

While the respondents were almost unanimously in favour of a comprehensive welfare state, the findings identify one critical vulnerability: perceived overuse. This dimension scored substantially lower than others, revealing a sharp public concern about the misuse of the system. These results suggest that while the public supports the welfare state in principle, perceived procedural failings act as a primary pressure point that could threaten its long-term stability. For policymakers, this highlights a significant risk to the implicit social contract between citizens and government, with clear implications for debates on welfare conditionality, enforcement, and the future of social reform. 

Ms Maya d'Ugo
Department of Social Work and Policy, Faculty for Social Wellbeing

Beneath Malta’s surface lies a well-kept secret: a homelessness crisis that remains largely misunderstood and undocumented. This research investigates a welfare landscape where Catholic charity, neoliberal ideals, and socialist remnants intersect. These forces create a unique social friction, shaping the way services for people experiencing homelessness and deprivation are delivered and received.

Using multi-site critical ethnography, the study moves through shelters, social work agencies, and food distribution sites to meet with and understand both those who provide these 'human services' as well as those who make use of them. Participant observation and interviews reveal a hidden dialogue between the provider and the recipient, as well as overarching narratives surrounding the 'homeless' or 'deprived' person in wider social policy.

Drawing on critical theory, I examine the power dynamics at play, with a specific focus on themes of resistance and the lived experiences of Malta's unhoused communities. This study exposes the gap between institutional control and actual human needs, while also exploring the myriad of ethical and logistical challenges faced by service providers. It ultimately questions whether these services are designed to address the lived reality of poverty or to enforce a moralistic status quo.

Ms Pimpernel Maria Sieders Preston
Department of Youth, Community and Migration Studies, Faculty for Social Wellbeing

The European Union’s most philanthropic country, according to the World Giving Index, is also its smallest island state, and the world’s tenth most philanthropic country is also its tenth smallest in size. Philanthropy has nevertheless never been studied in this small island state of Malta. This research is the first to study its breadth by mapping the philanthropic landscape and its depth by conducting a case study of the most prominent philanthropic foundation in the country.

The Malta Community Chest Fund Foundation (MCCFF) is chaired by the President of the Republic and has a high income and expenditure through its fundraising activities, such as the annual telethon of L-Istrina. This research asks how it endeavours to fulfil the roles outlined in its mission and the responsibilities outlined in its objectives. This research uses a case study methodology and the methods of mapping reviews, documentary analysis and individual interviews.

This research expands on State Philanthropy Theory as a theoretical framework by exploring how Malta’s government shapes the voluntary sector through regulation, governance, grant-making and ideology. It explores whether the state crowds in or out philanthropy or if instead it crowds over civil society. This research adopts Critical Realism as a research paradigm, which is ontologically realist, epistemologically relativist and axiologically critical.

Ms Julia Alegre Mouslim
Department of Education Studies, Faculty of Education

This presentation explores the historical process of Malta from a ‘fortress colony’ in the Mediterranean to a modern neoliberal state, and its subsequent impact on social movements and their resistance.

This research is grounded in sociology, social movement theory, and ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the local, left-wing organisation Moviment Graffitti, analysing how historical and colonial powerlessness and pervasive clientelism have shaped contemporary political alienation. By tracing the archipelago’s trajectory from British rule to EU membership, I argue that these historical contingencies serve as both a barrier and a catalyst for resistance. Through qualitative insights, participant observation, and interviews, the presentation identifies how activists navigate the tensions between a (post)colonial identity and the ‘new fortress’ of Europe.

Ultimately, this presentation illustrates how Maltese activists critique the culture of clientelism to advocate for social resistance, grassroots organising, and collective agency. By bridging historical analysis with ethnographic data, the study highlights the unique activist challenges inherent in organising within a small-island state defined by its colonial past and neoliberal present.

Ms Emily Galea
Department of Gender and Sexualities, Faculty for Social Wellbeing

This doctoral study involves generating femicide fatality reviews of local cases, to create a specialised review process for Malta, and developing policy recommendations that may contribute to the prevention of femicide. It is being supervised by Prof. Marceline Naudi and is in collaboration with the Malta Observatory on Femicide (MOF). The participants in the study will include the stakeholders of each case, such as police, social workers, and family members of the victim.

Action research is being used as a methodology, and feminist Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) as an epistemology. The process will involve conducting multiple in-depth interviews while extracting and analysing the data qualitatively. The purpose of this is to identify whether there could have been points of intervention that could have prevented the femicide from occurring, such as better agency cooperation and communication, law enforcement, or the processing time of reports.

Thus far, the literature review and methodology have been completed. The literature review has entailed compiling reports and studies related to domestic homicide reviews, exploring processes adopted by countries such as England and Wales, and contextualising the local and international situation in terms of femicide and patriarchy, demonstrating the need for a review process that is specific to Malta. The methodology chapter involved outlining how action research and feminist IPA will be used to collect data, while also justifying their use within the context of femicide fatality reviews.