Social Work, Sectarianism and Anti-sectarian Practice in Northern Ireland

Correspondence to Dr Jim Campbell, Department of Social Work, The Queen's University of Belfast, 7 Lennoxvale, Belfast BT9 5BY, Northern Ireland. Jim Campbell lectures in the Department of Social Work, The Queen's University of Belfast. His doctoral thesis was on the concept of violence in social and political thought. His current research interests include social policy in Northern Ireland and mental health social work Summary This paper addresses a subject relatively unknown to the Britishand international social work audience—that of trainingfor anti-sectarian practice. In doing so, it points to someof the complex, even dangerous issues raised by such trainingfor social work students and practitioners in Northern Ireland.The paper comments upon the limited but significant ways inwhich social work educators and practitioners have tried tochallenge sectarian discrimination in Northern Ireland, andproposes methods in train ing and research which might facilitatea better understanding of these processes.     

The Changing Nature and Context of Social Work Research

Summary Social work research is constantly diversifying and expandingand this article explores its changing nature; including changesto epistemology and practice; and the critical influence ofthe wider economic, political, theoretical and practice changesoccurring to social work itself. The author discusses a numberof issues facing social work research: the enduring conflictsof ways of knowing, doing and valuing social work research;the role of practitioners as researchers; and the challengeto empower service users as self-determining researchers.     

Notes on Theory and Practice in Social Work: a Comparative View

Please address reprint requests to Robert van Krieken, Department of Social Work, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia. Summary There are still a number of problems surrounding the relationshipbetween theories of social work practice and that practice itself.This paper examines the factors underlying those problems andemphasises their roots in the failure to examine the diversityof social work theories and practices. We refer to one attemptto resolve the problems—the distinction between ‘practicetheory’ and ‘theory of practice’—pointout some difficulties with it and suggest an alternative, three-folddistinction within theorising: between (a) materialist socialtheory, (b) strategic practice theory and (c) working concepts. As an example of how those distinctions can be used, we thenbriefly discuss the work of Oskar Negt and its introductioninto the Dutch welfare context, as it was the issues raisedby that which stimulated the ideas in this paper. We concludeby arguing that only this kind of perspective on theorisingcan produce ideas which are of real use to progressive socialwork practitioners.     

Social Work, Liberty and Law

Correspondence to Professor John Williams, Department of Law, University of Wales, Aberystwyth, SY23 3DY, UK. E-mail: jow{at}aber.ac.uk Summary The relationship between law and social work is complex. Doeslaw assist practitioners to promote rights, or is it confinedto ensuring accountability and regulating practice? This articleexplores law's role, and its limitations, in promoting liberty,or more accurately ‘constitutional liberty’. Doeslaw provide practitioners with liberty-based values capable,if necessary, of legal enforcement? The paper argues that thereis no simple answer; law impacts on social work in differentways and there is little consistency across and within clientgroups. However, it concludes that law is one of the tools thatsocial workers can use to promote liberty.     

Contracts in Social Work Practice

Summary This article explores the paradigm of Contract Law to identifyproblems and advantages of introducing a contractual model intosocial work practice. Recent social work literature on the useof contracts is reviewed and a social worker's record of howa contract was negotiated is analysed. The author argues thatthe value-base of a contract model must be founded on reciprocity.     

Social Work Education: Tackling The Theory--Practice Dilemma

Summary The integration of theory and practice has long been a topicfor debate and concern amongst social work educators. A longitudinalparticipant observation study of one cohort of social work studentsconfirmed that the ideal of theory—practice integrationwas also high on their own list of self-established priorities.Students' efforts towards attaining this goal were also hamperedby the perspectives which they themselves brought to bear ontheir training. Attempting to resolve the conflict between theirown perspectives and their perceived demands of professionaleducation students appealed to and reconstructed afresh variousmodels of theory application endorsed both by social work educatorsand practitioners. These models, however, are essentially contradictoryand pose serious problems for the development and maintenanceof social work standards.     

Social Skills Training with Delinquents: A Look at the Evidence and Some Recommendations for Practice

Correspondence to Dr Clive Hollin, School of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT Summary Following an overview of the use of social skills training (SST)with delinquents, it is concluded that SST can be successfulin changing some aspects of social behaviour but that it haslittle effect on offending. A number of reasons for this ‘failure’are discussed: a failure by practitioners to utilize the fullSST model; and a failure, by practitioners and researchers,to explore the relationship between social skills and offending.Recommendations for both practice and research are made to remedyexisting shortcomings.     

Social Networks and Social Service Workers

Correspondence to Peter Sharkey, School of Law, Social Work and Social Policy, Liverpool Polytechnic, 98 Mount Pleasant, Liverpool, L3 5UZ. Summary ‘Networks’ is a word often used in the discussionof social work practice and within social services departments.It was a word which was central to the Barclay Report (1982)and important within the more recently published Griffiths Report(1988) on community care. It is a word also known to sociologistsand anthropologists through the development of ‘networkanalysis’. There is, however, a fairly wide gap betweenits use within social work and its use within social science.This article tries to explore this gap and the ways in whichsocial science ideas might have some use and relevance to socialservice workers. It does this by using some illustrative datafrom a study done of the personal networks of thirty elderlypeople who were all clients of a social service district office.     

Keyworkers Re-examined: Good practice, quality of care and empowerment in residential care of older people

Correspondence to Rosemary Bland, Department of Applied Social Science, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, Scotland Summary Social work definitions of ‘good practice’ in residentialcare which were originally developed in work with children andyoung people have also been applied to residential settingsfor other user groups, including older people. However, anylink between such elements of practice and positive outcomesfor users has not always been demonstrated. The introductionof market principles and orientations into social welfare inthe 1980s re-defined the social work ‘client’ asa ‘consumer’ with the associated power to make choicesin the area of social care. The success with which such an approachcan be applied to services for people who are very often, notin a position to exercise much choice, is debatable. Alongsidethe notion of the ‘consumer’ or ‘user’of services has grown the ideology of ‘empowerment’of people who use social work services. Drawing on findingsfrom a recent study, this article explores the contributionof the keyworker role to good practice and the empowerment ofolder people living in residential homes. It concludes that,because their understanding of the concept and practice is largelyundeveloped, the role as currently interpreted is not consonantwith good practice and tends rather to reinforce the power ofstaff.     

Improving the Interpersonal Skills of Social Work Students: The Problem of Transfer of Training and What to do About it

Correspondence to Dr David Dickson, Head, SST Centre, Dept of Communication, University of Ulster, Jordanstown, Co Antrim, N Ireland, BT37 0QB. Summary Interpersonal skills which enable the worker to engage meaningfullywith the client, lie at the heart of effective social work practice(Cournoyer, 1991). The acceptance of this proposition has importantand obvious implications for the preparation of would-be socialworkers. While the increasing popularity of structured approachesto training in this domain has been commented upon (Sowers-Hoagand Thyer, 1985), it is, perhaps, surprising that relativelylittle has been published by way of a systematic explorationof current social work education/training provision in promotingskilled professional interaction. This paper critically reviews some of the research investigatingthe effects of structured training on interviewing performance.While reported outcomes have been largely positive, methodologicalweaknesses are identified and discussed. The issue of trainingeffects persisting and being applied outwith the training environmentis dwelt upon. Contrasting paradigmatic perspectives on theprocess, reflected in such labels as ‘transfer of training’and ‘generalization of outcome’, are considered.These differing conceptualizations are synthesized in the illuminationof factors that seem to be pivotal in the transfer process.Finally, recommendations are made for improving interpersonalskill training procedures for social work students.     

Disability and Social Work: Applications from Poststructuralism, Postmodernism and Feminism

Correspondence to Barabara Fawcett, Department of Applied Social Studies, University of Bradford, Bradford, West Yorkshire BD7 1DP, UK. Summary In this article it is argued that poststructural and postmodernperspectives have something useful to offer social work, providedthese orientations are informed by the ‘social criticalpower of feminism’ (Fraser and Nicholson, 1993, p. 428).A case study is used to consider the utility of applying feministpoststructural and postmodern perspectives. It is contendedthat these orientations not only serve to link practice to theoryin a different way and to open up new avenues for exploration,but can also be seen to make a contribution to the debate aboutthe current constitution of social work.     

The Changing Conditions of Social Work Research

Summary This paper seeks to make a contribution to the current debateabout the changing nature and purpose of social work research.It identifies several approaches to social work research evidentin the UK and further afield and, in particular, examines differentways of engaging with research participants in the researchprocess. The changing role and relations of research arisingfrom the use of more inclusive practices are then considered;first in terms of the relevance of research for practice, andsecondly, in relation to knowledge claims in the developmentof social work theory and practice. With the ever-growing developmentsin information and communication technologies, where Westernideas and initiatives continue to dominate in relation to bothmodels of social work and research approaches, an argument ismade for dialogue throughout the research process, the centralityof negotiating skills and reflexivity, and a more creative useof conventional research skills. Dialogue, in the form outlinedhere, provides a means of encouraging a ‘connectedness’between research, practice and theory, at all levels—theparticular location where the research takes place, the widernational context and the international or global stage.     

Values in Social Work: investigations of the practice of family placement

Professor Noel Timms, University of Leicester, School of Social Work, 107 Princess Road East, Leicester LEI 7LA. Summary This study explores values in social work distinguishing valuesat the levels of practice and of rhetoric A small scale projectwas undertaken in family placement work in two local authoritiesand four voluntary agencies. A pattern of activity was foundcommon to both voluntary and statutory workers engaged in familyplacements. Workers in both agencies rendered comparable accountsof a distinctive practice which stressed virtuoso skills inthe collection, appraisal and use of knowledge. The practicedepended on confidence in the ability to make good within theform of work known as family placement, and on the recognitionof what people are owed. The work was undertaken in a socialcontext which acknowledged—in the eyes of the social workers—theobvious (rhetorical) goods of the proper flounshing of children,and respect for rights. Beliefs about certain aspects of thesocial context, particularly in relation to religion, differedbetween the two groups, but such differences could not be seento reverberate in the practice.     

Supervision, Role Strain and Social Services Departments

Correspondence to Department of Social Work and Social Administration, University of Western Australia, Nedlands, Western Australia, 6009 Summary The paper analyses the potential for ambiguity and ambivalencetowards the supervision of practice in social services departments.While supervision may be integral to much social work practicein clinical settings, the culture and tradition of supervisionin social services departments looks to be permeated with confusionabout ‘supervision’ or ‘consultation’,the nature of accountability and the functions of supervisionof qualified and experienced practitioners. To move beyond anideology prescribing supervision, the paper considers evidenceof the effectiveness of supervision practice, analysing thetransition from practitioner to line-manager/supervisor andthe subsequent strain on the supervisor's authorities of positionand of expertise in some current arrangements for supervisionin field-work ‘teams’. Finally, there is an unequivocalassertion that effective supervision is an essential componentin the monitoring of client service and the maintenance of practitionersengaged in stressful forms of practice. Such supervision needsto recognize the managerial and administrative tasks necessaryto protect the agency and the client from poor quality practice,while also respecting the emotional and educational needs ofnewly qualified and experienced practitioners exposed to thedemands of high-risk judgement and practice.     

Conceptualizing Community Social Work--a Response to Alan York

Summary This note takes further the task of conceptualizing communitysocial work begun by Alan York in his paper for the June 1984edition of this Journal. York's approach is criticised firstlyfor unhelpfully conflating ‘community work’ and‘community social work’ and, secondly, for developinga schema unable to satisfactorily theorise the range of communitywork approaches currently to be found within social work. Buildingupon York's suggestion that ‘dichotomous formulations’provide an appropriate way forward for analysing community practice,three, distinct, dichotomies are elaborated, and recommendedas a basis for locating and comparing current approaches tocommunity social work.     

Constructivism in Social Work: Towards a Participative Practice Viability

Summary Social work has traditionally drawn upon an expansive rangeof social science research and theorizing as its claim upona ‘knowledge base’. Recent debates have exploredthe need for the profession to develop its own theory of socialwork knowledge arising from practice. This paper seeks to extendthe boundaries of these ideas through an operational and epistemologicalelaboration and critique of Sheppard's (1995a; 1998) notionof a practice paradigm. In an examination of the contributionof constructivism and the seminal work of George Kelly's (1955)Psychology of Personal Constructs, arguments are put forwardfor social work practice to focus upon the co-construction ofviable working relationships with service users as the basisfor an anti-oppressive and participative professionalism. Itargues that the sterile philosophical dichotomies between objectivism/realism-subjectivism/interpretivismand the equally unhelpful social work division between practice-theoryshould be integrated within a situated, participatory, constructivistapproach to knowledge creation in social work practice and continuingprofessional development.     

An Interview: Constructing Reality

Summary This paper is concerned with the relevance of interactionistperspectives in sociology to social work practice. Crucial tothese perspectives are the ‘meanings’ that peoplegive to situations and the ways they interpret actions. Basically,they are grounded on the assumption that there is no such thingas a single social reality. There are many different constructionswhich depend on the identities of the different people involvedand on the context in which they occur. The paper is based ontape recorded excerpts from an interview between a client, MrsSmith, and a social worker, from a discussion about some aspectsof that interview between the social worker and the writer,and from a discussion about the case between the team leaderand the writer. This material suggests different interpretationsof the situation, information gained in the discussion withthe social worker providing new ideas about the original interview.The views of the different people involved indicate that itis helpful to take into account the organizational context ofthe interviews. It is also suggested that conceiving of interviewsas ways of constructing reality has implications for the studyof social work practice.     

Connecting Anti-racist and Anti-oppressive Theory and Practice: Retrenchment or Reappraisal?

Correspondence to Charlotte Williams, Centre for Applied Community Studies, University of Wales, Bangor, Bangor LL57 2UW, UK. Summary In this paper the author offers a review of some of the majorcritiques of anti-racist theory and practice within social workand critically examines the trend towards anti-oppressive theoryand practice as the ‘way forward’. She argues thatthe uncritical acceptance of the move away from specificallyanti-racist perspectives towards the broader approach of anti-oppressivepractice may lead towards the retrenchment of all such criticalperspectives within social work rather than their regeneration.The author concludes that such a rigorous review will more fullyground the moves towards anti-oppressive practice as a paradigmfor social work.     

A New Structure for Intake and Allocation in a Field Probation Unit

Summary From a background of practice and a post-qualifying fellowship,the author draws on the experiences of other Senior ProbationOfficers, as well as his own and his team members. In this article‘intake’ within the probation setting is taken asinitial agency impact as well as that part of team strategywhich has a bearing on allocating new work. Allocation and theconsequential deployment of resources are then seen as centralto the professional lives of team members. A structure is presentedwhich in practice pervades the totality of the team's life;most radical is the author's notion of allocating ‘workepisodes’. The model provides a structure for team membersto specialise in different forms of social work, and at thesame time allowing clients choice to be supervised without being‘sentenced to social work’. It also depends uponthe active use of a team as a group of interacting, interdependentprofessionals who share their work.     

Themes and Continuities in Radical and Traditional Social Work

Summary Traditional and radical social work are amongst the principalcombatants in the paradigm-crisis that is alleged to characterisecontemporary social work. In considering the way in which thesetwo theoretical stances approach one of social work's centralproblems—the relationships between the person and society—itis argued that what is revealed is as much overlap as disagreement.This is in part through the subdued radicalism of a traditionalapproach which struggles to comprehend the effects of societyon clients' lives, and in part because radicalism is incorporatedinto prevailing ways of thinking through having to answer thesame questions as social work orthodoxy. It is because of thisthat Marxist social work is shown to be inevitably compromised,though this is not to deny the important contribution of radicalismin providing more satisfactory answers to crucial social workproblems.