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Showing items related by title, author, creator and subject.
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Policy and Politics matter: The shaping of contemporary social work in times of neoliberalism.The commentary draws on a range of work to demonstrate the argument that policy and politics are of central importance in shaping social work in England. I outline the development of my practice wisdom and then examine the contested nature of social work knowledge. Drawing on my practice with people who were poor and marginalised, I came to believe that social work must have a commitment to equality and social justice and that to achieve this social work must engage with policy and politics. My outputs begin by examining the connection between my practice wisdom and the dialectical nature of social work’s enduring tensions, located in a work that underlines the importance of sociology. A further four outputs focus upon aspects of social policy, notably key elements in the rise of neo-liberalism in contemporary social work in a text that argues explicitly that social workers need to develop a politically engaged practice. My other outputs illustrate the impact of politics, neoliberalism and its attendant policies in the early 21st century, gathering evidence from three broad areas. First, the nature of globalisation is examined focusing upon the movement of social workers and ‘cross-national’ social work. Second, there is an explicit exploration of social work under neoliberalism, drawing on the case of Children’s services and learning disability. Third, I examine ‘policy practice’ and the concept of ‘choice’. I argue that social work has always had a concern with politics and policy but that in more recent years this has declined and has been overtaken by a focus upon individualism. My core theoretical themes are the dialectic and an examination of hegemonic structures which impact on social work. I explore the continuing importance of my work in relation to contemporary social work, showing that policies and politics matter more than ever. I conclude by arguing that, as social work is under political attack from the current Government, the ‘radical tradition’ needs to be kept alive.
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Social Work and the Community: a critical context for practice.How important is the notion of community to skilled social work? This book explores how the concept relates to policy, theory and professional practice. With analysis of contemporary social problems throughout a variety of community settings, this book demonstrates how important community-based approaches are to all social workers today.
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Mental Health, Social inclusion and the green agenda: an evaluation of a land based rehabilitation project designed to promote occupational access and inclusion of service users in North Somerset, UK.The current debate about social inclusion in the field of mental health reveals a tension between the political and economic objectives of social policy. The former utilises the language of citizen empowerment and rights, whilst the latter is concerned with reducing welfare dependency through labour market activation. A central question here is whether a suitable programme of therapeutic work, training and support will produce better outcomes than those predicted by either a clinical diagnostic assessment or indeed open employment in the labour market. This article evaluates a research project with mental health users designed to develop pathways towards inclusion. The principal means for achieving this was a programme of 'green' land-based activities, training and social support. The researchers employed a mixed method approach, utilising a quasi-experimental design with a hypothetical control and standardised testing. This was followed by interviews with users, staff and focus group discussion. The evaluation produced some unexpected findings; for example, it was found that no strong correlation existed between diagnosis and performance. Many users performed better than had been predicted by their diagnostic assessment. However, the reasons for this remained unclear until the qualitative interviews enabled users to give accounts of the problems they faced, explain what inclusion meant for them, and outline how the project had brought gains in confidence, motivation and self belief. The data gathered during the research derived from different epistemological positions. This can be seen as representing two ways of 'slicing the reality cake' rather than producing one complete view of mental health users reality. One construction related to how 'the system' diagnosed, processed, and 'objectively' managed them. The other was about how users' responded to their situation, utilised the opportunities available, and made 'subjective' sense of their experience.
