Politics for Social Workers

Politics for Social Workers PDF

Author: Stephen Pimpare

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2021-11-23

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 0231551894

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The social work profession calls on its members to strive for social justice. It asks aspiring and practicing social workers to advocate for political change and take part in political action on behalf of marginalized people and groups. Yet this macro goal is often left on the back burner as the day-to-day struggles of working directly with clients take precedence. And while most social workers have firsthand knowledge of how public policy neglects or outright harms society’s most vulnerable, too few have training in the political processes that created these policies. This book is a concise, accessible guide to help social workers understand how politics and policy making really work—and what they can do to help their clients and their communities. Helping readers develop sustainable strategies at the micro-, meso-, and macro-levels, this book is a hands-on manual to contemporary American politics, showing social workers and social work students how to engage in effective activism. Stephen Pimpare, a political scientist with extensive experience as a social work practitioner and instructor, offers informed, practical grounding in the mechanics of policy making and the tools that activists and outsiders can use to take on an entrenched system. He distills key research and insights from political science and related disciplines into a practical resource for social work students, instructors, and practitioners looking to deepen their policy knowledge and capacity to achieve change.

Political Social Work

Political Social Work PDF

Author: Shannon R. Lane

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-12-16

Total Pages: 505

ISBN-13: 3319685880

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This social work book is the first of its kind, describing practical steps that social workers can take to shape and influence both policy and politics. It prepares social workers and social work students to impact political action and subsequent policy, with a detailed real-world framework for turning ideas into concrete goals and strategies for effecting change. Tracing the roots of social work in response to systemic social inequality, it clearly relates the tenets of social work to the challenges and opportunities of modern social change. The book identifies the core domains of political social work, including engaging individuals and communities in voting, influencing policy agendas, and seeking and holding elected office. Chapters elaborate on the necessary skills for political social work, featuring discussion, examples, and critical thinking exercises in such vital areas as: Power, empowerment, and conflict: engaging effectively with power in political settings. Getting on the agenda: assessing the political context and developing political strategy. Planning the political intervention: advocacy and electoral campaigns. Empowering voters Persuasive political communication. Budgeting and allocating resources. Evaluating political social work efforts. Making ethical decisions in political social work. Political Social Work is a potent reference for social work professionals, practitioners, and students seeking core political knowledge and skills to practically advance their work. For specialists and generalists alike, it solidifies political action as vital for the evolution of the field.

The Politics of Social Work

The Politics of Social Work PDF

Author: Fred W Powell

Publisher: SAGE

Published: 2001-05-25

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9780761964124

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The Politics of Social Work provides a major contribution to debates on the politics of social work, at the beginning of the 21st Century. It locates social work within wider political and theoretical debates and deals with important issues currently facing social workers and the organisations in which they work. By setting the current crisis of identity social workers are experiencing in international context, Fred Powell analyses the choices facing social work in postmodern society. Fred Powell explores in this text contemporary and historical paradigms of social work from its Victorian origins to the development of reformist practice in the welfare state to radical social work, responses to social exclusion, the rennaissance of civil society, multiculturalism, feminism and anti-oppressive practice. In conclusion the he examines the options facing social work in the 21st century and argues for a civic model of social work based on the pursuit of social justice in an inclusive society.

Working with Class

Working with Class PDF

Author: Daniel J. Walkowitz

Publisher: UNC Press Books

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 444

ISBN-13: 9780807847589

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Polls tell us that most Americans_whether they earn $20,000 or $200,000 a year_think of themselves as middle class. As this phenomenon suggests, "middle class" is a category whose definition is not necessarily self-evident. In this book, historian Daniel

Practical and Political Approaches to Recontextualizing Social Work

Practical and Political Approaches to Recontextualizing Social Work PDF

Author: Jacques Boulet

Publisher:

Published: 2020

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9781799867852

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"This book will explore practical and political ways in which social work practice has been updated and reconstructed both in its relational approach to the work with its clients and in contexts which differ greatly from those customary focus occupied by mainstream human service organisations and government agencies covering the welfare and other relevant areas of program delivery"--

Global social work

Global social work PDF

Author: Carolyn Noble,

Publisher: Sydney University Press

Published: 2014-06-30

Total Pages: 394

ISBN-13: 1743324049

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Global social work: crossing borders, blurring boundaries is a collection of ideas, debates and reflections on key issues concerning social work as a global profession, such as its theory, its curricula, its practice, its professional identity; its concern with human rights and social activism, and its future directions. Apart from emphasising the complexities of working and talking about social work across borders and cultures, the volume focuses on the curricula of social work programs from as many regions as possible to showcase what is being taught in various cultural, sociopolitical and regional contexts. Exploring the similarities and differences in social work education across many countries of the Americas, Asia, Europe and the Pacific, the book provides a reference point for moving the current social work discourse towards understanding the local and global context in its broader significance.

Economics for Social Workers

Economics for Social Workers PDF

Author: Michael Lewis

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2002-03-27

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 9780231505550

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This primer for social work students introduces the general definitions and concepts of economics and uses case studies in social work to develop applied knowledge. The case studies include stories of job training, substance abuse centers, counseling, therapy, child protective services, and services for the poor. The concluding chapters are devoted to topics directly related to social work: economics of poverty, health economics, household economics, the economics of labor, and government failure.

International Perspectives on Social Work and Political Conflict

International Perspectives on Social Work and Political Conflict PDF

Author: Joe Duffy

Publisher:

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781138557307

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International Perspectives on Social Work and Political Conflict provides an important basis for readers to recognise and understand the unique and specialist role that social workers have played and continue to play in international contexts of political conflict. Social workers make an important contribution in these difficult and sometimes dangerous situations across all continents. This book highlights the importance of social work in these very challenging contexts. The first part of this book includes four chapters that summarise the existing knowledge base. The second part focuses on a case study of Northern Ireland where, for the first time, a detailed examination of the social work role was completed which involved researching the views of social work practitioners, managers and educators. Part three then draws together international experts in the field who have written chapters on those regions where social workers have been dealing with long standing periods of political conflict. At a time when violent conflagrations are currently a feature of many countries and regions across the continents of the world, this book offers a critical view of the social work role in these contexts and should thus be considered essential reading for all social work academics, students and professionals working in conflict-affected societies.

The Emotional Politics of Social Work and Child Protection

The Emotional Politics of Social Work and Child Protection PDF

Author: Joanne Warner

Publisher: Policy Press

Published: 2015-01-12

Total Pages: 217

ISBN-13: 1447318420

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Social work and child protection systems have for several decades been subject to cycles of crisis and reform, with each crisis drawing intense media and political scrutiny. In this book, Joanne Warner argues that to understand the nature of these cycles, we have to pay attention to the importance of collective emotions such as anger, shame, and fear. To do so, she introduces the concept of emotional politics. Using a range of cases from the United Kingdom, the United States, the Netherlands, and New Zealand, Warner reveals that collective emotions are central to constructions of risk and blame--and that they are generated and reflected by official documents, politicians, and the media. She also suggests strategies for challenging emotional politics, including identifying models for a more politically engaged stance for the social work profession.

Critical Ethics of Care in Social Work

Critical Ethics of Care in Social Work PDF

Author: Bob Pease

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-10-06

Total Pages: 429

ISBN-13: 1315399164

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This book argues that the concept of care is a political and a moral concept. As such, it enables us to examine moral and political life through a radically different lens. The editors and contributors to the book argue that care has the potential to interrogate relationships of power and to be a tool for radical political analysis for an emerging critical social work that is concerned with human rights and social justice. The book brings a critical ethics of care into the realm of theory and practice in social work. Informed by critical theory, feminism, intersectionality and post-colonialism, the book interrogates the concept of care in a wide range of social work settings. It examines care in the context of social neglect, interdisciplinary perspectives, the responsibilisation agenda in social work and the ongoing debate about care and justice. It situates care in the settings of mental health, homelessness, elder care, child protection, asylum seekers and humanitarian aid. It further demonstrates what can be learnt about care from the post-colonial margins, Aboriginal societies, LGBTI communities and disability politics. It demonstrates ways of transforming the politics and practices of care through the work of feminist mothers, caring practices by men, meditations on love, rethinking self-care, extending care to the natural environment and the principles informing cross-species care. The book will be invaluable to social workers, human service practitioners and managers who are involved in the practice of delivering care, and it will assist them to challenge the punitive and hurtful strategies of neoliberal rationalisation. The critical theoretical focus of the book has significance beyond social work, including nursing, psychology, medicine, allied health and criminal justice.