A Political Critique of Kantian Ethics in Social Work

Correspondence to Stephen A. Webb, Department of Social Work, University of Dundee, DD1 4HN. Summary This paper addresses the Kantian theory of the subject whichis found in contemporary social work discourse on ethics andvalues. It is argued here that the Kantian idea of persons as(i) rational, (ii) autonomous, and (iii) ends-in-themselvesis wholly inadequate to the social work doctrine of ‘respectfor persons’. To show this, we counterpose a Foucauldianview of history, moral codes and theory of the person, and themeaning this can have in the social worker-client relation.This alternative reading claims that social work is essentiallya political practice which is constructed by various discursiveand institutional strategies of power. Therefore, it is suggestedthat social work needs a political reading of its own discourse.To this end we outline a Foucauldian micro-political analysisof the social work ‘subject’ or person as a pointwithin a field of discursive-knowledge based strategies.     

Community Development, Partnership Governance and Dilemmas of Professionalization: Profiling and Assessing the Case of Ireland

Over the last two decades, Ireland has emerged as a paradigmaticcase of partnership governance. Underpinned by state-facilitatednational agreements that sought to maximize economic and socialdevelopment, ‘partnership’ was also held to includethe development of progressive social policies. The ‘communityand voluntary sector’ has been both the site and purportedvehicle for these progressive policies. In this context, communitydevelopment emerged as a discourse of social action that wasboth popular with what Donnelly-Cox and Jaffro (1999) have inthe Irish context called ‘second generation communitydevelopment’, i.e. the emergence of self-activated localcommunity groups informed by a social justice ethos, and tothe Irish state as a route to social inclusion for an arrayof marginalized social groups. Since the early 1990s, thesegroups have been the recipients of significantly increased statefunding. This resource has had a dramatic effect on the structureand nature of community development. In this paper, we outlineand assess the model of community development that has emergedin Ireland during this period. Based on empirical data arisingfrom a nationwide survey of community workers, we profile theextent of state funding; the consequent employment profile ofcommunity development workers and the impact on volunteerism;and the nature and consequence of community development’semerging relationship with the Irish state.     

Some Questions About the Reverse Tariff

Summary The modified version of the reverse tariff theory, developedby Pauline Hardiker, claims that a matrix combining risk andneed is implicit in the recommendations made to courts by probationofficers. This version of the theory is criticized on threecounts. (i) A number of counter-examples are examined: someof them imply factors other than risk and need which probationofficers take into account; others illustrate types of recommendationwhich, relative to the theory, have an anomalous form; (ii)it is suggested that, in any event, Hardiker does not have anadequate theory of how ‘need’ and ‘risk’are combined; (iii) it is argued that, given the evidence onwhich it is based, the reverse tariff model cannot have thestatus which Hardiker appears to claim for it.     

The Psychiatrization of Post-Traumatic Distress: Issues for Social Workers

¹Howard Davis, Centre for Studies in Crime and Social Justice, Edge Hill, St Helens Road, Ormskirk, Lancashire L39 4QP, UK. Summary The psychiatric category of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)is described and critiqued. Problems of definition and applicationmay lead to the non-inclusion or minimization of some formsof post-traumatic distress. Questions of what constitute ‘healthy’and ‘unhealthy’ reactions to trauma are raised andthe depoliticization of trauma explored. The absence from theliterature of sufficient acknowledgement of traumagenic actionson the part of official agencies is noted. The potential forcritically informed social work interventions in prevention,mitigation and longer-term response is outlined.     

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.     

Social Work, New Public Management and the Language of 'Service User'

The purpose of this paper is to offer insight into the possibleconsequences of language developed at the political level byan authoritative body for the purpose of designing social policythat is then adapted as discourse in social care. The focusis on the UK government’s policy toward the language of‘service user’ in the context of New Public Management(NPM). It begins with a brief introduction on the importanceof language. Next, it outlines the move towards NPM and changesthat have facilitated the shift from ‘client’ to‘service user’, presenting some of the implicationsthese changes have had on social work in Britain. Finally, itdetails the possible detrimental effects of labelling language,and discusses research from other countries on preferred termsof reference for individuals who use health and social careservices.     

Community Practice Researchers as Reflective Learners

The article outlines a process for community practice researchas a reflective process. Through the interplay of key conceptsassociated with subjective research–personal engagement,experiential affinity and parallel struggles–and transcribedinterviews with community practitioners, the authors elaboratethe subjective community researcher posture. Subjectivity contributesto the researchers’ position as learners within the researchprocess. The research team plays a key role in reflecting onthe effects of the research on participants.     

Breaking the mould: new trajectories in the domiciliary care of older people in Ireland

This article reviews the development of domiciliary care services for older people in Ireland over the last decade. It reveals three central developments, namely (i) the first steps, in the Irish context, towards a quasi-market; (ii) the introduction of cash-for-care and the subsequent notable segmentation of care tasks among three provider groups; and (iii) a rapidly increasing reliance on for-profit private home care providers. The authors conclude that while the Irish social care regime is still anchored in important ways in the primacy of informal (family) care and the subsidiarity principle, it has broken path-dependency by evolving towards an increasingly complex mix of public, not-for-profit and for-profit provision and financing. The most policy-relevant aspect of this new constellation is the lack of a regulatory framework that would enable the State to monitor the multiple and diverse providers with the view to ensuring the quality of home care services.     

Good Practice in the Education of Children in Residential Care

Correspondence to The Directors, New Horizons (Child Care) Ltd., Unit B, Silkmoor, New Street, Frankwell, Shrewsbury, Shropshire SY3 8LN, UK. E-mail info{at}new-horizonschildcare.co.uk Summary Research shows that the education of children in residentialcare is generally poor, in terms of both process and outcome.This has highlighted the uncertainty over how best to educatethese children and a pessimism over what they can achieve. Drawingupon the findings of an evaluation of a children’s home,this paper argues that children in residential care can havegood educational outcomes. It also shows that it is possibleto identify the processes by which these outcomes can be broughtabout. However, this largely positive assessment is predicatedupon education being defined broadly in respect of ‘process’and ‘outcome’. Moreover, it is important not tounderestimate the formidable challenges inherent in this work.While the multi-agency nature of this work gives rise to oneof the most significant, it has to be recognized that responsibilityfor the education of children in residential care falls primarilyto children’s homes. If children’s homes are tomeet the increasing expectations that are being made of them,national and local government will have to undertake a radicaltransformation of residential childcare, especially in termsof attitudes towards, and resources invested in, this sector.Central to this is the establishment of a qualified and properlysupported workforce.     

A Comparison of Child-sex-abuse-related and Mental-disorder-related Suicide in a Six-year Cohort of Regional Suicides: The Importance of the Child Protection-Psychiatric Interface

Correspondence to: Professor Colin Pritchard, Department of Mental Health, School of Medicine, Southampton University, Royal South Hants Hospital, Southampton SO14 0YG, UK. E-mail: cp1{at}soton.ac.uk Summary The study compares Mental-Disorder-Related (MDR) suicide rateswith Child-Sex-Abuse-Related (CSAR) suicide of ‘Victims’and ‘Perpetrators’ of child sex abuse, based uponan examination of all Coroners’ inquest files over a six-yearperiod (n = 1,017). Census data, psychiatric case register andpolice records were used to calculate the potential MDR andCSAR populations. There were five main findings: (i) male andfemale CSAR victim suicide rates were 2.2. and 2.5 times theGeneral Population Suicide Rate (GPSR), respectively; (ii) everyfemale, and 80 per cent of male CSAR victim suicides, also hada mental disorder but none of the CSAR perpetrator suicides;(iii) male and female MDR suicide rates were 5 and 6 times theCSAR Victim rates; (iv) the sex abuser perpetrators’ suiciderate was more than 3 times the male MDR rate; (v) the intra-and extra-familial perpetrator suicide rates, were 25 and 78times the GPSR, respectively. Possible explanations for thesesurprising results are briefly discussed. They confirm the overrepresentationof people with mental disorder amongst suicides, and identifyan overrepresentation of CSAR suicides, particularly perpetrators.The results have implications for suicide prevention programmes,whilst highlighting the importance of the child protection-psychiatricinterface, and indicates the futility of simple explanationsin an area of practical and moral complexity.     

Care Proceedings: Exploring the Relationship Between Case Duration and Achieving Permanency for the Child

The 1989 Children Act in England and Wales and the derivative1995 Children (NI) Order in Northern Ireland provide the legislativeframework within which issues pertaining to the care and supervisionof children that come before the Courts are examined. Both piecesof legislation were intended to address a number of problemswith the way that such issues were dealt with by the Court,particularly the tendency for proceedings to become protractedand for children to ‘drift’ in care as a consequence.The imposition of the ‘No Delay’ principle in bothjurisdictions was designed specifically to address these concerns.However, since the introduction of both the 1989 Children Act(implemented in October 1991) and the 1995 Children (NI) Order(implemented in November 1996), there has been a steady increasein the average duration of proceedings and concerns remain aboutthe impact that this may be having upon the children involved.This paper presents the findings of a research study (McSherry et al., 2004)that explored the complex relationship between the durationof care proceedings and costs to children in terms of the likelihoodof achieving permanency.     

The Trouble with Harry: Why the 'New Agenda of Life Politics' Fails to Convince

via e-mail: paul.garrett{at}nottingham.ac.uk Summary Harry Ferguson (2001), referring largely to Britain and Ireland,maintains that social work should be committed to a ‘newway of thinking’ which is rooted in ‘life politics’.This idea, uncritically grounded in the ideas of Anthony Giddensand Ulrich Beck, fails to convince because: the assertion thatwe are now living in a ‘post traditional order’is undermined by the resilience of key historical forms of regulationand control which continue, for example, to limit women's choicein the sphere of reproductive rights; identified changes inthe texture of family relations are not evidenced by research;the ‘life politics’ perspective places too greatan emphasis on human agency, choice and volition and not enoughon structural constraint; the structural location of the ‘lifepolitics’ proponents is not interrogated; the analysisis too stridently dismissive of the idea that ‘emancipatorypolitics’ should be social work's primary orientation.     

Building the case for the study of the middle class: shifting our gaze from margins to centre

This article argues for the study of the middle class in Canada, an overlooked dimension of the scholarly works and public debates on income polarisation. The article includes four sections: (i) original empirical research, sharing snapshots into the status of Canada's middle class emphasising its changing economic performance; (ii) an exploration of the sociological and political functions of the middle class; (iii) an articulation of the avenues through which the middle class can be operationalised for study; and (iv) the implications of a deteriorating middle class, which suggests both a deepening of destructive effects of neo-liberalism yet also highlights opportunities for resistance. Recommendations for social movements are highlighted. While the context of this article is the Canadian experience, the political consequences for this study spread beyond its borders, particularly in the north where the benefits of neo-liberalism are accruing.     

Gaining Access to Data Sources in Statutory Social Work Agencies: The Long and Winding Road

This paper details a researcher’s experience of gainingaccess to three statutory social work agencies in order to conducta study examining how social workers respond to family supportcases and how parents and carers experience the interventionof social workers in these cases. The stages in gaining accessare outlined, the gate-keepers involved at each stage are identifiedand some of the difficulties encountered are highlighted anddiscussed. The paper concludes that researchers need to givegreater priority to access considerations and that social workagencies need to give greater priority to co-operation withresearchers.     

'Anti-Oppressiveness': Critical Comments on a Discourse and its Context

This paper identifies and aims to explain an apparent dissonancebetween the dominance in Britain of ‘anti-oppressive’social work discourse and the socio-political context surroundingits use; a context often claimed to feature excessive regulationand control. Pursuing this, some politically radical aims associatedwith ‘anti-oppressiveness’ are spelt out, and thedifficulty of achieving these in an unconducive climate is discussed.Then, a distinction made by Robert Merton between ‘latent’and ‘manifest’ functions is used to suggest thatthe manifest radicalism of ‘anti-oppressive’ discoursecan helpfully be distinguished from some latent largely unrecognisedconsequences of its use – not consequences with politicallyradical impact, but with a social meaning congruent with a climateof control. It is concluded that the ‘success’ ofanti-oppressive discourse might well be viewed as requiringmore of the kind of critical analysis that the discourse itselfwas supposed to espouse.     

The Missing Assessment Domain: Personal, Professional and Organizational Factors Influencing Professional Judgements when Identifying and Referring Child Neglect

Professionals encountering possible cases of child neglect facea complex task when judging whether a particular concern warrantsa referral to social work services. A study of referral practicein cases of child neglect, completed in the Republic of Ireland,highlighted that it is not just the nature of the concern thatinfluences referral practice but a range of other factors thatare not related to the needs of the specific child. Assessmentframeworks and tools, designed to assist practitioners makedecisions about potential cases of neglect, usually focus ontechnical–rational activity associated with assessingchildren’s needs, parenting capacity and family and environmentalfactors. The findings from the study described in this paperindicate that assessment practice is as much a practice–moralactivity as a technical–rational one. In other words,it is both a head and a heart activity. In this article, thefactors influencing practitioners’ approaches to the identificationand referral of cases of child neglect are explored. A rangeof factors appear to influence practice. These include the practitioner’sown perception of what comprises neglect and the extent to whichthey use ‘gut reaction’ or an evidence base to reachthis conclusion. Their interpretation of role and the viewsof their colleagues and team manager also influence practice.In addition, their perception of social work services and thebenefits of referral affect decisions to refer. Finally, theirown personal feelings such as fear, guilt, over-empathy andanxiety about the response of the community have an effect onpractice. The paper concludes by drawing together the findingsof the study to produce a ‘practitioner domain’alerting practitioners and managers to the head and heart activitieswhich influence referral practice.     

Direct Payments and Disabled People in the UK: Supply, Demand and Devolution

Direct payments have brought new opportunities for self-determinationand independent living to disabled people in the UK, featuringprominently in government strategy and the 2006 White Paper,‘Our Health, Our Care, Our Say’. However, ten yearsafter direct payments legislation, take-up remains low and implementationvaries greatly. Rates of take-up in England remain more thandouble those in other parts of the UK, raising questions aboutdevolution and equity. This paper presents data from a nationalstudy to examine some of the mechanisms underlying uneven outcomesfor disabled people in different parts of the United Kingdom,with particular reference to the politics of devolved governance.The analysis focuses on scope for interpretations of policy;resources for information and training; the impact of mandatoryduties and targets; extensions to new user groups; and the roleof support organizations and disability activism. The evidencesuggests that local variations have been produced not only by‘local’ factors, but also by different opportunitystructures for policy development in England, Scotland, Walesand Northern Ireland. This raises questions about the impactof devolution on equity and opportunity for disabled peoplein the UK.     

Care Management and Professional Autonomy: The Impact of Community Care Legislation on Social Work with Older People

Correspondene to Mark Lymbery, Centre for Social Work, School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK. e-mail: Mark_Lymbery{at}nottingham.ac.uk Summary The 1990 National Health Service and Community Care Act appearedto herald a new dawn for social work with older people, whichhad previously been a relatively neglected and undervalued areaof social work practice. The legislation proposed a new rolefor social workers as ‘case managers’, with considerableautonomy and flexibility about the way in which the ‘casemanager’ responded to need. By the time community carepolicy was implemented, the role of ‘case manager’had been transformed into that of ‘care manager’,with a focus which emphasized procedural and managerial requirementsrather than a more flexible professional practice. This paper explores the extent to which this shift has substantivelyaltered the nature of social work practice with older people.It outlines key theories of professions and their applicabilityto social work, and critically analyses the impact of the ‘newmanagerialism’ within social services departments. Thepaper also examines the nature of social workers' practice witholder people following the impact of community care legislation,and concludes that the impact on the social work professionhas been to locate an increasing control of practice with socialwork managers, with potentially serious consequences for thecontinuation of a distinctive social work role in relation toservices for older people.     

Violence Across the Lifespan: Interconnections Among Forms of Abuse as Described by Marginalized Canadian Elders and their Care-givers

Elder abuse is recognized as a major problem, with profoundeffects on the health and quality of life of older persons.In our aging population, elder abuse represents an escalatingclinical issue for social workers and health care professionalswho provide care to older people. A major gap in our examinationof elder abuse is the potential contribution and applicationof knowledge developed within research derived from other formsof family violence. This paper explores the interconnectionsamong various forms of violence across the lifespan, and theexperiences voiced by marginalized elders and their care providers.We interviewed seventy-seven rarely consulted older adults andforty-three formal and informal care-givers of older adultsin focus groups in Ontario and Alberta, Canada. Study findingsrevealed four major themes that describe interconnections amongtypes of abuse: (i) intergenerational cycles of abuse; (ii)violence across the lifespan; (iii) exposure to multiple subtypesof elder abuse; and (iv) ongoing spouse abuse that shifted intoelder abuse. The results from this study indicate that victimsoften ‘suffer in silence’ and cultural factors,ageism and gender are ubiquitous to elder abuse. Recommendationsto reduce elder abuse include education, formal and informalsupports and services.