Search

This article examines pivotal issues relating to social workers' search for professional recognition in Nigeria. It begins with a historical discussion of social work's universal quest to establish a distinct professional identity. Thereafter, it examines Nigerian social work's path to professionalisation before introducing an analytical framework through recourse to an R-lexicon to highlight the interrelated processes by which professions establish their credentials and attain legitimation. These are registration and regulation, relevance, recognition, representation, relational connection, rights and research. This R-lexicon highlights key strategic areas Nigerian social workers might address to advance their quest for professional status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the progress of the social service professions delivering developmental social welfare in South Africa, a subject we have followed closely over the last 20 years. Being policy‐driven, developmental social welfare stemmed from expert social analyses that resulted in technically oriented solutions, including the broadening of social service professions. Twenty years on, it is hard to see developmental social welfare, as envisaged in government policy, in action, since the practice reality does not differ drastically from the prior apartheid system with the government's heavy reliance on social security as a poverty‐alleviation measure. The expanded social security budget has led to underfunded services and a crisis for social service professionals. This paper focuses on the regulated professions of social workers, and child and youth care workers. Our examination of critical issues for these occupational groups revealed that South Africa still has a long way to go in building a strong social service workforce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a critical analysis of the challenges global social work standards present for mainland China (hereafter China) with its authoritarian political ideology that is in tension with the profession's universal values grounded in liberal individualism. China is caught between the Scylla of universal standards and Charybdis of indigenisation seeking to adapt social work to its unique sociocultural contexts. Based on our extensive literature review, we identified four challenges for Chinese social work: (1) balancing personal social services and social development, (2) negotiating global standards and local realities, (3) responding to poverty and other national social development issues and (4) pressures towards indigenisation, while remaining in step with social work's global standards. China favours the continued adaptation of imported knowledge and practice interventions within local and national sociocultural, economic and political realities. This study also highlights social work in China's urban bias and limited attention to rural issues, acknowledging this is a concern for social work even in Western contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following massive socioeconomic reforms over the past three decades, social work in the People's Republic of China (hereafter China) has developed at an unprecedented pace. To respond to social issues arising from accelerated economic development, the government has launched a large-scale programme to train a professional social work workforce of 1.45 million by 2020. Social work in mainland China has developed, and continues to develop, rapidly in major urban centres, while rural areas remain largely neglected. This article describes developmental issues in rural China and argues that social work requires indigenised knowledge and interventions to address context-specific problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on a study that examined how fieldwork education in Southern and East Africa was responding to the developmental social work agenda. The study used semi-structured qualitative interviews with key informants from 15 social work programmes in 11 different Southern and East African countries. It investigated whether the social work fieldwork placements on offer provided practical experience of a developmental approach to social work practice. The study showed the creativity and enthusiasm with which social work educators were embracing the goals of developmental social work education, despite the pitfalls and limitations of doing this within fieldwork resource constraints. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on free-text survey comments from the Australian Longitudinal Study of Women’s Health (ALSWH), this article explores themes of transition and change in the lives of 150 women baby boomers (born between 1946 and 1951) in relation to Beck’s theories of the risk society, reflexive modernisation and individualisation. Few studies have explicitly explored ageing through Beck’s theoretical lenses. However, Beck’s emphasis on interactional processes of social, individual and structural change has much to offer for sociological studies of ageing. A key premise is that of complex adaptation and change as people age, with focus on the socio-political contexts in which the post-Second World War baby boomer generation will live out their later years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding individual resilience helps to improve employment opportunities of people with epilepsy. This is significant because, in Zimbabwe, as in many other countries in the Global South, people with epilepsy encounter several barriers in a context of less-than-ideal public services. Despite this disadvantage, some people with epilepsy have better employment outcomes for reasons including level of seizure control, social background, employment support services, and individual resilience. This article reports on data from participants (n = 8), who were part of a larger study (n = 30) on employment experiences of people with epilepsy in Harare. The study used in-depth interviews with the participants, who were all service users and members of the Epilepsy Support Foundation (ESF) in Harare. The eight resilient participants comprised four males and four females aged between 26-48 years, who were selected because, unlike the remaining 22 participants, they had overcome chronic unemployment. Seven of the eight participants were employed, while one had recently become unemployed. Views of service providers (n = 7) were sought on the experiences of people with epilepsy through a focus group discussion. The service providers included two health workers, three social service workers, and two disability advocacy workers. Data were analysed using NVivo, a computer-assisted qualitative data analysis package. The study found that participants experienced barriers, such as a lack of medical treatment, yet this was important for education and training, lack of finances for training, and negative attitudes at workplaces. Despite these barriers, participants had overcome chronic unemployment due to their individual resilience characterised by: (i) a ‘fighting spirit’, (ii) being their own advocates, and (iii) having a mastery over, and acceptance of, their epilepsy. The research concluded that, where people with epilepsy faced barriers, as in Zimbabwe, individual resilience acted as a strong coping mechanism that resulted in better employment outcomes. This suggested service providers should strengthen resilience-building initiatives and make them more accessible to people with epilepsy. However, this is only a coping mechanism that should not stop service providers and service users from advocating for government-provided employment services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on the findings of a study on the role of social work field education programmes in the transmission of developmental social work knowledge in Southern and East Africa. It highlights the challenges in locating developmental social work placements and the creativity shown by social work educators in addressing these challenges and improving learning opportunities for social work students. Both academics and students were found to be committed to developmental social work, within a willing practice environment hampered by knowledge, capacity and resource constraints. Social work education was found to be playing a transformative role through the teaching of a developmental social work curriculum and the creation of collaborative developmental social work learning experiences. Social work educators trained and supported agency supervisors in developmental social work, while students served as conduits, modelling developmental social work practice. What has yet to be determined in future research is the students’ perspective of this developmental educational environment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Gray M., Davies K., Butcher L. Finding the right connections: Peer support within a community-based mental health service This article reports on a qualitative study that examined the organisational enablers and barriers to implementing peer support work in an Australian, rural, community-based mental health service. Interviews with 19 peer and non-peer staff were conducted to identify attitudes towards peer support and whether there were organisational values, practices and strategies that might support the implementation of peer support. The findings revealed that peer support workers were valued for their ability to build trusting connections with clients and to accept client choice in a non-judgemental way. However, peer support workers tended to 'fill service gaps' within intensive, administrative case-management environments. These findings highlight the importance of an organisational-wide approach to integrating peer support, where the responsibilities for adopting new ways of working fall to all staff, not just the peer support workers themselves. Key Practitioner Message: • Practitioners placed high value on the peer support workers on their teams due to their unique personalised engagement with clients; • The roles of peer support workers were poorly understood by team members; • Organisational integration of peer support principles could improve the way all staff engage with clients to reflect a recovery orientation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background While legitimate practice tools have been the subject of debate within the profession, little attention has been paid to psychological frames of reference ( PFs OR). Hence, this article explores the ways psychological theories and therapies shape occupation-based practice in mental health settings. Methodology Narrative inquiry methods and thematic analysis were used to explore the career stories of nine occupational therapists who had worked in mental health practice for more than five years. Findings Respondents found it difficult to hold onto their occupational focus in the psychology-dominated world of mental health practice. The main themes to emerge were (i) tension between occupation and psychology; (ii) overwhelming pressures to adopt PFs OR; (iii) resistance to PFs OR; and (iv) using PFs OR to enhance professional repertoires. Findings pointed to the need to ensure PFs OR include occupational considerations for occupation-based practice in mental health. Conclusion A occupation-based perspective means balancing PFs OR with occupation-based considerations, so service-user issues are holistically addressed. There is a need to critically review occupational therapists' use of PFs OR lest their most visible practical actions appear psychologically based rather than occupation based. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary This article considers the place of service-user knowledge and expertise within an evidence-based practice perspective. It makes a strong argument that client involvement is a core principle of Sackett et al.'s foundational approach in evidence-based medicine. In so doing, it draws on research on service-users' perceptions and experiences of evidence-based practice. Findings For service users, evidence-based practice lacks relevance and trustworthiness unless it explicitly factors in the expertise of service users themselves. Evidence-based practice is seen to have merit as a tool for enhancing accountability, but service users see a role for themselves at individual and representative levels in the process of evidence-based practice. They place a high value on the expertise derived from lived experience, and recognise that fluctuations in capacity and changes in circumstances of many service users require a flexible approach to their participation in decision making. A pragmatic approach to the conceptualisation of evidence is recommended, which not only maintains scientific rigour inherent in evidence-based practice but also more strongly emphasises the process of analysing evidence appropriate to a particular individual's preferences and circumstances. Applications For human service practitioners, this study emphasises the need to develop professional skills in assessing the capacities, circumstances and preferences of clients and analysing and applying evidence for practice in ways that conform to a client-centred approach. It also indicates a need for researchers and practitioners to recognise and value service-user expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A central question in the research utilisation literature is what happens to research evidence once it is produced. In social work, this has frequently translated to questions of whether and how social workers use research in practice. Despite these questions, relatively little is known about the ways in which research comes to be used in social work practice. This paper reports on a study of research utilisation in social work, which examined researchers' perceptions of the factors impacting on research use in social work. The specific focus of this study was on the impact of interaction between researchers and practitioners on research use in practice. The study replicated a scale used in prior studies on knowledge utilisation to collect data from 60 Australian researchers publishing in social work journals, all of whom reported some level of research use by practitioners. Key variables were coproduction, engagement, and research utilisation. Implications for future use of the survey instrument for the measurement and implementation of research use in social work are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary Social work is a discipline that focuses on the person-in-the-environment. However, the social domains of influence have traditionally received more attention from the profession compared with the impact of the natural world on human well-being. With the development of ecological theories, and growing threats to the environment, this gap has been addressed and now the notion of eco-social work is attracting more interest. This article builds on this corpus of work by exploring, and augmenting, the thinking of the philosopher, David Abram, and his phenomenological investigation of perception, meaning, embodiment, language and Indigenous experience. The implications for eco-social work are then addressed. Findings The development of Abram's philosophical thesis is charted by reviewing his presentation of the ideas of the European phenomenologists, Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. It is argued that Abram uses phenomenology to explore the character of perception and the sensual foundations of language which, in Indigenous cultures, are connected with the natural world. A gap in Abram's thinking is then revealed showing the need to set human perception and language within an understanding of power. Overall, this re-worked thesis is underpinned by a meta-narrative in which ecology engages with philosophy, psychology and Indigenous experience. Applications By grounding such ideas in Slavoj Žižek's construct of the sensuous event, three applications within social work are evinced, namely: (i) reflecting on the sensuous event in social work education; (ii) rekindling the sensuous event with Indigenous Peoples; and (iii) instigating the sensuous event with non-Indigenous populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the recent movement towards greater research use in many areas of social work, criticisms persist that decision making in practice is seldom informed by sound research evidence. Discourse about the research-to-practice gap in social work has tended to focus on the feasibility of evidence-based practice for the profession, but has rarely drawn from the broader knowledge utilisation literature. There are important understandings to be gained from the knowledge utilisation field, which spans more than six decades of interdisciplinary research.This article introduces the wider knowledge utilisation literature to a social work audience. It considers the potential of this body of literature to facilitate research use in social work, as well as conceptual issues that may be hindering it from informing improvements to research utilisation in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses three feminist research principles through three doctoral studies and their accompanying supervision and support group: (i) capturing women’s experience; (ii) improving women’s lives; and (iii) equalising power. These guiding principles assisted in understanding the connections between feminist theory and the respective studies on: older people experiencing family estrangement (Kylie); a mentoring program with women from disadvantaged backgrounds (Jennifer); and arts-based intervention research to raise awareness of domestic violence in a disadvantaged community (Leanne). It discusses the way in which these guiding principles informed the studies and the supervision process from the students’ and supervisor’s perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to add to the growing literature on environmental social work education which suggests the need for a fundamental rethinking of the humanistic values and theories informing social work to embrace concerns relating to environmental degradation and climate change. For the most part, social work's interest in the environment to date relates to human needs. Of most concern here is the over-representation of people in poverty and subsistence among those impacted by deforestation and climate injustice. However, even here the emphasis is on the human experience of environmental and climate change when this is an outcome of human actions and structural inequalities. The paper begins with an overview of the theoretical terrain of environmental thought before examining issues in relation to perspective transformation and the implications for under- and post-graduate curriculum development. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article provides an overview of recent perspectives on neoliberalism, which serve as a foundation for the assessment of neoliberalism's influence on human services practice. Conventionally, neoliberalism has been conceived of as an ideology, but more recent perspectives regard neoliberalism as an art of government, a thought collective, and an uneven but path-dependent process of regulatory development. We argue that these new perspectives have the potential to contribute to our critical capacity and open avenues for the analysis of contemporary transformations of public policy and its delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses ‘the making’ of the Global Agenda in social work by situating the process of agenda-setting itself as an object of critical reflection. It discusses the way in which the agenda positions social work as part of a global civil society network somewhat removed from grassroots social work and raises concerns about its failure to address the causes of or possible solutions to social and economic inequality. The authors deploy recent empirical research relating to object-oriented politics, particularly the ‘no issue, no public’ debate on political mobilization as a more viable alternative in contributing to structural change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Models of service-user participation have derived from citizenship or consumerist agendas, neither of which has achieved the structural reforms important for the most marginalised social work clients. This article proposes Fraser's model of 'parity of participation' as an appropriately multifaceted frame for capturing the social justice aspirations of service-user participation. A qualitative case study compared the experiences and expectations of people who had used Australian mental health services with a sample who had used Australian homelessness services to examine their expectations of participation at individual and representative levels. The findings reinforce concerns from Fraser's research about the tendency for identity-based consumerist notions of participation to reify group identity. This leads to tokenistic service-user involvement strategies that have little impact on participation at a structural level. Fraser's parity of participation is shown to have untested potential to reshape service-user participation to meet the social justice aspirations of social work clients. Key Practitioner Message: ● Innovative, service-user driven strategies for collaboration will be those which challenge existing power structures; ● Service users want their contributions to decision making to generate identifiable change in the system of social services; ● The success of service-user participation strategies might be the extent to which political, economic and cultural opportunities are enhanced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the survey of Australian social workers about their attitudes towards evidence-based practice and the factors that affect its implementation in human service organisations. Majority of the respondents supported evidence-based practice (EBP) and reported changes in practice due to the influence of research. Support for EBP was highest among social workers in management positions. The complex dynamics of the transfer of research in social work and human services was noted.

Influenced by its historical beginnings, the production and modelling of knowledge in social work has become a small but diverse field. Ten key models exploring the nature of knowledge and its production in social work are reviewed against significant ideas from the interdisciplinary knowledge production literature beyond social work. In so doing, the place of holistic approaches to modelling the knowledge production process within social work and the human services is highlighted. It is argued that despite the number of models that attempt to describe the knowledge production process, there is scope for a more comprehensive, holistic, complex approach to modelling knowledge production in social work and the human services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the relationship between spirituality and the environment and the changing values required as we move toward a new politics of social work where commitment to social and political involvement is integral to spirituality, most notably surrounding environmental change. The ecospiritual perspective recognizes human interests are inextricably bound with planetary well-being. It serves not only to broaden social work beyond a preoccupation with the social, but also to shift professional thinking away from the pre-eminence of individualism and dualism, and the unquestioned acceptance of progress and uncontrolled growth that make it difficult for social workers to fulfil their role as agents of social and environmental justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the findings of a review of empirical studies examining the implementation of evidence-based practice (EBP) in the human services. Eleven studies were located that defined EBP as a research-informed, clinical decision-making process and identified barriers and facilitators to EBP implementation. A thematic analysis of the findings of the 11 studies produced a list of barriers to EBP implementation grouped in terms of inadequate agency resources dedicated to EBP; skills and knowledge of practitioners; organizational culture; the research environment; practitioner attitudes; and inadequate supervision. Given the limited and exploratory nature of available research on EBP implementation, tentative findings suggest that to facilitate the uptake of EBP in social work and human services practice, strategically driven, adequately resourced, multifaceted approaches to EBP capacity building in organizations are needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gray M, Coates J. Environmental ethics for social work: Social work's responsibility to the non-human world This lead article in this Special Issue begins discussion on an environmental ethics for social work and raises arguments as to whether and, if so, why social workers have duties, obligations, responsibilities and commitments to the non-human world. It provides an overview of the field of environmental ethics in searching for a moral stance to affirm an environmental social work. To what extent should social workers engage in fundamental geopolitical issues concerned with climate change, global warming, environmental degradation, pollution, chemical contamination, sustainable agriculture, disaster management, pet therapy, wilderness protection and so on and, if so, why and how? Are these issues incidental and peripheral and only of concern when they impact upon humans or do social workers have a responsibility beyond human interests? What is the significance of the 'non-human' for social work? The article explores the terrain of the burgeoning field of environmental ethics to determine whether convincing ethical grounds for environmental social work might be found beyond hortatory claims of what the profession ought to be doing to address environmental concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coates J, Gray M. The environment and social work: An overview and introduction This article provides an overview and analysis of social work's engagement with the modern environmental movement. Major trends and themes in environmental social work scholarship and the significance of interdisciplinarity are discussed. Attention is drawn to the importance of a broad knowledge base and of working in unison with other professions in order to respond effectively to the many dimensions of climate change and environmental degradation. Responding to the challenges of environmental destruction has opened opportunities for the profession to review its foundational knowledge and obligations to people and environments. The articles in this Special Issue are introduced and include theoretical frameworks, examples and case studies of what social workers are doing, or might do, in relation to environmental and educational initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gray M, Schubert L. Sustainable social work: modelling knowledge production, transfer, and evidence-based social work This article is a first attempt to present a model of knowledge production and transfer in social work, drawing on the expanding literature on knowledge production. It highlights features of knowledge production in social work, such as the diverse contexts in which knowledge is developed and applied. It argues that knowledge production by itself is not enough. Equally important is knowledge transfer and implementation. The literature on knowledge production highlights problems with the implementation of actually existing knowledge and the potential resistance to this implementation as highly important issues for social work research. It leads to a greater awareness of the context in which knowledge is produced and applied and creates a bridge between traditional informal and tacit ways of knowing in social work and the demands of evidence-based practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mubangizi BC, Gray M. Putting the 'public' into public service delivery for social welfare in South Africa Int J Soc Welfare 2011: 20: 212-219 © 2010 The Author(s), International Journal of Social Welfare © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of SocialWelfare. The privatisation of some essential services in South Africa has raised severe difficulties for those for whom the idea of fees for services is quite foreign and who, in any case, cannot afford to pay for services. The government has developed several initiatives to educate people about the need to pay for services provided by local government, the largest of which was the Masakhane fees-for-services campaign. This article describes two recent initiatives that seek to engage local citizen participation, namely, Integrated Development Plans and izimbizo (or traditional forums). These are examined along with the challenges faced by local government in promoting citizenship participation in service delivery within a decentralised system of governance. The article concludes with some recommendations on how citizen participation can be enhanced so as to make the 'public' visible in public service delivery and thus improve social welfare services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article takes an in-depth look at the strengths perspective, examining its philosophical roots, its core characteristics (according to its key proponents), and its limitations. It suggests that the strengths perspective is underpinned by a mix of Aristotelianism, humanistic individualism, and communitarianism. The article highlights the synergies between the strengths perspective and contemporary neoliberalism and suggests the need to go back to basics to achieve some distance from the harsher aspects of welfare reform policy, which affect most domains of social work practice. It ends with some suggestions as to how the limitations of the strengths perspective might be addressed, in order to devise a more complete theory for social work practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gray M. Social development and the status quo: professionalisation and Third Way co-optation Int J Soc Welfare 2010: 19: 463–470 © 2010 The Author(s), Journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and International Journal of Social Welfare. Social development is a massive undertaking that has spawned a multitude of organisational forms. It nevertheless remains an ambiguous term and ill-defined area of work, though some social development practitioners have succeeded in making small-scale local differences in particular situations. While largely a tool of the status quo, some believe that social development has transformative potential and provides valuable space to confront inequalities and deprivation. In this article, I argue that in contemporary neoliberal environments social development is being co-opted by Third Way politics and professionalisation processes. As it professionalises through the creation of professional structures and educational systems, it is becoming increasingly like social work, despite arguments that it is as an alternative approach to poverty and social exclusion. In the process, it is losing its transformative, critical edge, and morphing into a neoliberal, social investment approach that absolves government of its responsibility for the welfare of citizens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article attempts to extend the discourse on 'indigenization' from a marginal movement in social work to chart its course as a field of knowledge development that uses knowledge, training and resources that is particular to a culture and in which increasing numbers of leading researchers creatively pursue culturally and locally relevant research. It argues for the development of truly indigenized and culturally appropriate social work knowledges that are free from the restrictions and expectations of positivistic western worldviews. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2003, following a Parliamentary announcement by President Thabo Mbeki, a new cadre of public servants – community development workers (CDWs) – was introduced in South Africa to serve as agents of change within local government municipalities charged with the responsibility for social and economic development. This paper examines the context of this initiative, the role of CDW, the progress of the Community Development Workers Programme (CDWP), and the challenges faced by this emerging occupational group. It begins with a discussion of community development theory and highlights the difficulties for CDWs as state employees whose goal is to foster support for and participation in government-initiated programmes. It argues that community development practice can be a far cry from its sometimes hortatory theory. Given the institutional confusion within which they operate and the harsh practice realities in South Africa, success seems most unlikely. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In a recent article published in International Social Work, two writers from Mainland China - Huang Yunong and Zhang Xiong - presented an insightful analysis into indigenization in social work. This article responds to some of the issues and challenges they raise and, in so doing, outlines some diverse views on indigenization in contemporary social work literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we argue that the biggest challenge facing an Ageing Australia is care, specifically, the labour shortages in the care industry and the high demand for care, which exceeds the supply. We propose that this situation has arisen out of the extremely divergent discourses about the need for care, from feminist to neoliberal, managerialist responses. The aged care context in Australia is predominantly female, because women live longer than men, and 90% of formal and informal carers are women. We therefore see the continuing relevance of a gendered view of care and believe that the feminist ethics of care is a theory which offers much to our understanding of ageing in Australia. To illustrate key issues for older people and their families within the aged care system in Australia, a case study is presented and referred to throughout the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a follow-up to our article ‘Revisiting social work as art’ and in part a response to Karen Healy's reply [both published in IJSW 17(2)]. It is, however, also a significant extension of this material since it engages with more general concerns about the critical project that is intrinsic to social work. Social work is not just about self-foundation based on knowledge, values and skills formation, but also about self-assertion. Crucially, it is through this notion of self-assertion that social work can be best understood as an agent of change. This transformative aspect of social work is our central focus. We are not concerned with structural conditions of power and domination but with theorising what a transformative politics would look like for social work using the lens of the French political philosopher Alain Badiou as a conceptual medium for permitting the return of the political for social work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I persist with my argument that indigenous, local, culturally relevant practice ought to trump the external imposition of social work definitions, standards and professional models. The challenge, however, is not to fall prey to false dichotomies. Importantly, social work in China is not static but emergent, and no-one is sure of the exact shape it will take. And the essential question is to what extent will Western knowledge and standards be uncritically appropriated into China? Most contributors to the debate thus far have taken the international definition of social work as their starting point, but far more significant are the political dimensions involved in this process of indigenisation. This article proposes that empirical evidence from within China regarding culturally appropriate, effective local responses – and some clear benchmarks for international engagement – should form the basis for dialogue between China and the broader social work community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the transformation of social work in South Africa in response to the transition to a developmental welfare approach. Always moulding and shaping itself in response to its social context, social work in South Africa, as elsewhere, is a reflection of the broader political landscape. In South Africa the social work profession has struggled to assert its independence and become self-regulating. It is unique in the Western world in that since 1978 it has been regulated by a legislatively constituted statutory council. While the profession has tried to transform itself in the new democracy, outside pressures have found it wanting and deeply divided. Thus, despite progress in other areas social workers have not yet been successful in forming a strong, united professional association and this severely limits its ability to lobby politicians and advocate on behalf of clients. It seems, however, that the tide is turning and social workers are gaining recognition but, once again, the challenge remains deciding on the extent to which the profession cooperates with the government's agenda for change. Social work educators took the lead in setting education standards in response to higher education policy and are also playing a part in devising practice standards through their involvement in the social work board which falls under the umbrella of the Council for Social Service Professions. However, education and practice are somewhat out of step and professional unity remains a pressing issue on social work's transformation agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we revisit ‘social work as art’, noting that it is just over 20 years since England's book on the subject provided a direction for the profession's early defence against empiricism. Those who picked up the ball handed to them by England tended to focus discussions of social work's ‘art’ on its soft side, embedding it in notions of ‘creativity’, ‘meaning’, ‘self-expression’, ‘intuition’ and ‘quality’, all of which were said to characterise the ‘aesthetic dimensions’ of social work practice as a counterpoint to the rising tide of hard empiricism, proceduralism and managerialism. Within these ‘aesthetic dimensions’, proponents of social work as art sought to resolve tensions through advocating a value-based ‘artistic’ approach to care. Against this we argue that art is struggle and resolution, soft and hard, joy and grief. Further, we posit that social work's art lies not in the social worker as artist but rather in social work as the ‘work’ of art, which is implicitly a ‘non-productivist’ endeavour. In a fundamental sense we argue that it is the art of social work and not the social worker that assembles what is practice, that provides bounds and lets everything stand in relation to everything else. This enables us to construct a speculative ‘radical agonistics’ for social work that draws attention to the relation between art, truth and event. In so doing, we substitute a subjectivist reading of social work as art with an ontological analysis drawing on Heidegger's phenomenology, supplemented by the work of Alain Badiou, to cast social work as art first, as artistic attunement, and second, as an art in the service of a politics of liberation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses several reports published within the issue including one by Antoinette Lombard on non-governmental organizations, another by Dorothee Hölscher on government resources for developmental welfare system and one by Mel Gray on social service professionals.

• Summary: Mysticism holds that there is an unseen non-empirical reality which is just as important in people's lives as concrete, observable reality and experience. Practical mysticism implies that this unseen reality results in concrete experience and a particular kind of knowing which is just as influential on people's actions and behaviour as observable reality. The authors draw a connection between practical mysticism and the increasing interest in themes relating to religion and spirituality in social work. These themes relate mainly to issues of meaning, motivation and intention in social work. Like all service professions, social work is undergoing re-evaluation away from merely pragmatic and instrumentalist conceptions of its mission to ones concerned with broader issues of meaning and purpose. In this context, issues of religious and spiritual motivation and intention become relevant. • Findings: We propose that `practical mysticism', arguably revived in Habermasian critical theory, has particular relevance to debates relating to the role of religion and spirituality in social work education and practice. Importantly, practical mysticism has the effect of impelling a rethinking of the relationship between spirituality, religion and the applied values inherent in day-to-day social work practice. We see the consideration of practical mysticism to be a fruitful way of embracing religious and spiritual discourses relevant to social work, including their link with social work ethics and practice. • Applications: When combined with Habermasian critical and communicative action theories, a practical mystical approach to social work impels a practice (or praxis) with enhanced potential to motivate the actions of social workers themselves, including in their sensitivity to the religious and spiritual motivations and needs of their clients, and so their capacity to engage more effectively with these clients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on mapping the variations of social service profession in the West. He believes that international social work is under the pressure within the three-pronged dilemma of social work, including indigenisation, universalism, and imperialism. He suggests that culture could play a vital role in allowing indigenisation and retailing universals while veering away from a type of postcolonial imperialism.

This paper presents Midgley's theory on social development to an Australian social work audience. It explores the concept and theory of social development, examines the relationship between social work and social development, and discusses the relevance of social development to social work in Australia. The paper suggests that although social work and social development may share similar broad goals, their strategic approaches differ, with the former cast within a professional model concerned with welfare broadly conceived and the latter directly concerned with the alleviation of poverty in the less-developed parts of the world. The paper concludes with thoughts on the Australian face of social development and suggests changes that would need to be made if social work were to embrace social development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The push towards "global standards" in social work is part of a movement to generate uniformity, quality control, and benchmarking for professional education programs. It acts as a powerful vestige of modern institutions and professional associations to prescribe through processes of standardization, formalization, and technical specificity. In social work "global standards" attempt to create a fixed set of minimal requirements to which all professional programs should adhere. Standards are viewed along two dimensions: (i) as a necessity due to the changes and scale of complexity in social work; and (ii) as a vehicle for importing dominant forms of knowledge, values, and skills. Those parties who enthusiastically underwrite attempts to construct "global standards" in fact create a powerful network of allies that undermine local or cultural differences and fail to reconcile them. Global standards in social work undercut indigenous skills and values and negate the expertise of professional judgement. They constitute an unnecessary and politically motivated intrusion in the world of social workers. Ultimately, standards such as these are an illegitimate, impersonal, and voluntary means of regulation. As such, global standards are inherently political because their construction and application formally regulates the local practices in which they become embedded. Over time, they modify the position of social work practitioners and alter relations of accountability to the standards themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In teaching students about ethical decision making in social work, it is essential that the students are able to recognise the moral implications of their work and develop a deep understanding about ethical issues and their personal responsibility for making ethical choices. Thus, more than a "how to do it" approach is needed and teaching students about values and ethics is an essential thread that runs through our experience-based social work education program. The present paper describes a learning unit that sought to teach students about ethical decision making as a critical thinking process and, in so doing, to integrate students' knowledge and experience of values, ethics, policy, and research in the final year of study. The relationship between values, ethics, policy, research, and social work practice provided an ideal context within which students could learn to integrate their knowledge and experience and apply it directly to their fieldwork practice. The paper ends with our critical reflection on this teaching experience and a critique of decisionist ethical frameworks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reflects on the relationship between theory and practice in social work. The author believes that the need to connect the divide between social work theory and practice is an artificial distinction since practice is the enactment of theory. He added that a radical re-engagement with phenomenology, art and neuroscience is what social work needs to challenge the artificiality of the "theory-practice" distinction within the field.

In this paper we attempt to counter misconceptions about the silencing of Indigenous voices in mainstream social work. We contend that Indigenous voices are present in several emerging bodies of mainstream social work literature, such as the literature on spirituality and ecosocial work, but most social workers do not hear them because they are more inclined to turn to the crosscultural or anti-oppressive practice literature, predominantly in the United States and United Kingdom, respectively, when seeking answers for issues relating to diversity in social work. Few look to the Indigenous social work literature. Thus the central question this article addresses is 'what might we learn about diversity and culture from the Indigenous social work literature that might inform mainstream culturally relevant social work practice?' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author discusses a variety of issues concerning the influence of diversity in social work in Australia. He expressed his views on the importance of dealing with the commonalities and differences among diverse cultures to providing social service. He described his experiences in social service. He also characterized the Australian social work.

• Summary: Many of the profession are pursuing ways to develop and promote good and accountable practice. One of the most popular courses suggested is evidence-based practice. Locating our discussion within the context of neo-liberalism, we argue here that evidence-based practice has arisen not only in response to the ongoing desire to promote scientific practice, but also to increase social work's `fit' with the current context. • Findings: We conclude that social work is an extremely complex set of activities and that evidence-based practice is too conceptually narrow and theoretically limited, particularly in its constrained capacity to take up many of the developments in social theory. Finally, we suggest that the conceptual objectives of evidence-based practice can be met by the integration of ethical reasoning in practice, which we suggest is a strategy of mature professionalism that can be more readily applied in the diverse contexts and forms of social work practice. • Applications: The ethical intent (and indeed, the cognitive discipline) of evidence-based practice can equally be realized through deployment of ethical reasoning as a mode of good practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gray M. Dilemmas of international social work: paradoxical processes in indigenisation, universalism and imperialism Int J Soc Welfare 2005: 14: 231 –238© Blackwell Publishing, 2005. This article explores current paradoxical processes in inter-national social work concerning the global diffusion of the social work profession's principles, values and practice methods or approaches. Some criticise these activities on the grounds that they are imperialistic. Others advocate strongly for the indigenisation of social work. Still others believe in social work's universality. This article attempts to stimulate debate on, and promote greater understanding of, and mutual respect for, divergent views on these critical questions. It puts forward the notion that culture is an important consideration that enables indigenisation, retains universals yet avoids imperialism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]