Deprofessionalizing Social Work: Anti-Oppressive Practice, Competencies and Postmodernism

Correspondence to Lena Dominelli, Department of Sociological Studies, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 ZTU Summary Social Work is in a state of flux. One of the key factors impactingon the direction it is currently taking is market forces. Thisarticle argues that the globalization of the economy and theinternationalization of the state are affecting social workeducation and practice in Britain through the competency-basedapproach being promoted by CCETSW and the government. This isleading to the demise of the autonomous, reflective practitioner,creating instead, a fragmented, deprofessionalized senice thatis poorly placed to meet the requirements of anti-oppressivepractice.     

Research as Social Work: Participatory Research in Learning Disability

The social-work literature has already made links between socialwork and research, and has argued in favour of practitioner–research.This paper turns the argument around and looks at how researchcan come to look and feel like social work. This happens particularly,but not exclusively, in participatory research in the learning-disabilityfield, especially in auto/biographical or life-story research,where long-term research relationships are more in evidence.Drawing on the participatory research methodology literature,and her own oral and life-history research, the author exploresthe areas in which research comes to emulate social-work practice.There are, of course, practical and ethical issues to be addressedand, as the author concludes, safeguards are needed to clarifyroles and foster openness in research relationships.     

后现代主义视角下对社会工作谋求专业合法性的思考

在政策的推广下,社工的合法性建设在中国如火如荼地开展。本文将合法性建设置于场域—惯习理论下进行检视,并从后现代女性主义理论视角出发,认为合法性惯习可追溯到男权制文化的建构,实际上是社会场域中的男性资本的要求。社会工作的发展在受到场域的男性规则阻碍的同时,又在利用其改变自己在场域中的利益位置。笔者在文章中论述了攀附男性资本的发展只是自缚手脚,并提出建立社会工作气质。     

Social Work,Social Welfare,and Research:

No abstract available for this article.     

Disability Beyond Stigma: Social Interaction, Discrimination, and Activism

This article critiques the assumptions about the nature and meaning of disability advanced in social-psychological writing, suggests the origins of these assumptions, and proposes a return to a Lewinian/minority-group analysis of the situation of people with disabilities. It concludes by placing the articles in this issue of the Journal of Social Issues in context and by presenting questions in need of further exploration.     

Community Work, Social Work: Green and Postmodern?

Correspondence to Mary Lane, Department of Social Work, Social Policy and Sociology, The University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia Summary Opening with a story about community work, this paper exploresdevelopments and challenges in social and political theory andthe implications for social work, particularly for collectivepractices. Feminism, postmodernism and green political theoryare of particular interest. The paper argues for an interpretiveapproach to practice which emphasizes the local and specific,yet aspires to broader political action in the pursuit of socialand ecocentric justice. Feminism has much to contribute to thisexercise, challenging, as it does, a modern/postmodern divide.The emerging discourse of ecofeminism offers a synthesis ofsocial and ecocentric purposes and values as a basis for tacklinginequalities, whilst postmodern feminists enlighten our understandingof difference and encourage us to renounce certainty and lastproofs.     

Applications of Reward Structures in Social Group Work

Group reward structures have been found to provide social workers with effective procedures for sustaining changes made by group members. This paper provides a review of the literature on reward structures in an effort to determine which work best with clients in sustaining changes they make in a group context. The pros and cons of individual and group reward structures are discussed and six principles to increase success are identified: (1) appropriate behavior must be reinforced; (2) reinforcers must be available to all members, but not too easily available; (3) reinforcers should be delivered close in time to the occurrence of Lhe behavior they reinforce; (4) reinforcers must be consistent in their application; (5) reinforcers must be appropriate to the chosen behavioral change; and (6) there must be a pattern of consistent reinforcement by significant others in a person's environment.     

The Role of Ideology in Community Work: Contributions from Feminism and the Left

Mainstream Australian community work has consistently attempted to present itself as an ideologically neutral professional discipline. In this paper we point to the inherent conservative nature of non-ideological practice and suggest that through adopting leftist and feminist ideologies the people we service are advantaged.     

Social Movements, Social Justice and Social Work

Correspondence to: Neil Thompson, Avenue Consulting Ltd, PO Box 2060, Wrexham LL13 OZG, Wales, UK. Summary This paper explores the relationship between social movements,social justice and social work. It examines the role of socialmovements in promoting social justice and considers the influencesof such movements in the development of emancipatory forms ofsocial work practice. It also considers the question of whethersocial work can be viewed as a form of social movement in itsown right. A central theme of the paper is the fundamental tensionbetween social work as a force for social regulation and asa force for social development and emancipation.     

On Systematic Reviews in Social Work: Observations from Teaching, Learning and Assessment of Law in Social Work Education

This paper draws on the experience of completing a systematicreview of teaching, learning and assessment of law in socialwork education. It reviews core elements of the process andquestions whether systematic reviews as currently conceivedfor social work education and practice can realize the claimsadvanced on their behalf. The paper considers questions of evidence,quality, knowledge, dissemination and research use, and offersobservations on the potential of systematic review to provideknowledge for policy makers, practitioners, researchers andacademic tutors.     

Social Exclusion, Inequality and Social Work

This paper sets out the environment of inequality in which social work and the poor have recently operated. It explores pragmatic and idealist arguments concerning whether or not the poor need social work. Finally, policy solutions developed in consultation with social service users and carers are suggested in relation to poverty and social exclusion. Social exclusion can be linked to relative poverty as exclusion from economic and social norms. However, there is a wider brief in our own government’s publications and those of Europe, of examining how people are excluded from actions and policies of agencies who are there to support them. This paper will retain the concepts of poverty as lack of material income, and inequality as the gap between the rich and the poor, while being aware of the policy implications for social service users and carers of the more comprehensive process of being shut out partially or fully from social, economic, political and cultural systems. The debates around social work, social exclusion and inequality that follow establish: that some of the poor do need social work; that the poverty of social service users is related to policies that have restructured welfare in Britain; that the reason for individuals approaching or being referred to social services are complex but are likely to include financial deprivation as a key contributory factor; that if the poor do need social work, advocacy is essential rather than social work being seen as concerned only with social control—taking children into care, mentally ill people into hospitals, and advising the DSS on the suitability of claimants for benefits. Finally, the discussion turns to new policy agendas on social exclusion instigated by the Labour government. What positive difference can such policies make for social service users, their carers and social workers?.     

Feminism and Social work: Resistance or Dialogue?

Summary This paper seeks to explore some of the factors underpinningsocial work's apparent resistance to feminism and to dilineateways in which a more active relationship might benefit socialwork's women consumers. It argues that, by marginalizing feminism,social work has perpetuated individualistic explanations andresponses to women's specific needs and problems. Finally, insuggesting some practical strategies for making use of feministideas and experiences, particular consideration is given tosome of the contradictions which may be engendered for thosesocial workers who are actively endeavouring to integrate feministperspectives into their practice.     

Models of Disability, Work and Welfare in Australia

In discourse around disability there has been a shift away from a ‘medical model’, which perceives disability as an individual problem to be ‘cured’ or contained, towards a ‘social model’. The latter focuses on the relationship between people with disabilities and their social environment, locating the required interventions within the realm of social policy and institutional practice. Drawing upon a small qualitative study conducted in Melbourne, this article argues that recent plans by the Australian government to introduce mutual obligation requirements for recipients of the Disability Support Pension (DSP) sit in tension with this shift from the medical to the social models of disability. Mutual obligation is based on the assumption that income support recipients need to be taught how to be more ‘self‐reliant’, to ‘participate’ in society more fully and to become ‘active’, rather than ‘passive’, citizens. This language appears to overlap with that used to articulate a social model, which places emphasis on participation in the community and attempts a shift away from reliance on the medical profession. However, examples from interviews conducted with current and former DSP recipients demonstrate that, in practice, mutual obligation is likely to reinforce a medical model of disability, frame DSP recipients as ‘conditional’ citizens and ignore the obligations of the state and society regarding access and inclusiveness for people with disabilities.     

Poverty, Social Work and Social Justice

Correspondence to: Gary Craig, Professor of Social Justice, University of Hull, Hull, HU6 7RX, UK. E-mail: G.Craig{at}hull.ac.uk Summary The concept of social justice has become a common part of thepolitical lexicon in recent years, with New Labour identifyingit as a key goal of its social strategy. In this article, Iset out my understanding of what the elements of a social justiceprogramme should look like and apply it to the performance ofthe New Labour government in the policy area which has traditionallypresented a major challenge to social workers, the issue ofpoverty. Finally, I raise some questions about what this analysismeans for the future role of social work shaped by values ofsocial justice.     

Social Work: Gender, Care and Justice

Correspondence to: Joan Orme, Department of Social Policy and Social Work, Lilybank House, Bute Gardens, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8RT, UK. Summary This article, in examining gender and justice, seeks to examinethe relationship between feminist theory and social work. Specificallyit reviews writings on social work ethics and suggests thatlittle attention has been paid to feminist scholarship thatresonates with social work practice. Focusing primarily on communitycare, it demonstrates how debates within feminism have becomemore complex and have problematized understandings of both careand justice. It argues that for social work it is unhelpfulto dichotomize justice and care; we should aspire to just socialwork practice.     

Social Policy, Feminism, and Research on Violence in Close Relationships

The history of research on intimate partner violence is reviewed, with a special focus on how my own work in this area has evolved. The role of researcher values in the research process is highlighted. Some of the issues emerging from this review are the need for better measures of intimate partner violence, reasons why women's violence has been ignored by many researchers, and a discussion of the conditions under which women display violence. Policy implications of this research are discussed .     

Social Policy in Singapore: Insights from a Social Work Perspective

Social work practice, irrespective of the location of practice, is shaped by local conditions, particularly the laws and policies applicable to the practice. Most governments adopt some form of institutional arrangements pertinent to local conditions to meet local needs, such arrangements in Western contexts commonly being described as the welfare state. In other contexts, notably the East Asian context, the Western welfare state has been deemed inappropriate for meeting local needs. In this discussion there will be a focus on arrangements developed in Singapore, a country in the East Asian region. Although Singapore has eschewed any notion of a welfare state, this discussion will demonstrate that it does have in place a range of policy responses to meet Singaporean needs and that these measures are consistent with the frameworks adopted by emerging Confucian welfare states.