History Of Social Work Research Articles

Understanding the Critical Role of Social Work in Safety Net Medical Settings: Framework for Research and Practice in the Emergency Department

Social workers in Emergency Departments (ED) provide counseling, community resource linkage, and discharge planning. The ED is a critical intervention point for patients with multiple unmet medical, psychological, and social needs, and little or no other contact with service providers. In part because of its role as a medical safety net for underserved populations, use of the ED has steadily increased over time. There is limited research examining the utility of social services in the ED. This article provides a brief history of hospital social work and a literature review of ED social work research with the goal of advancing current research and practice agendas.

The Human Genome Project: An Historical Perspective for Social Workers

Having mapped the human genome, the Human Genome Project maintains that certain genes can be linked to specific diseases and certain forms of human behavior. This breakthrough, it is hoped, will lead to the effective treatment, even the elimination of serious, debilitating illnesses for all groups of people. However, because the project conjures up memories of eugenics, the project raises concerns about its potential for identifying and linking diseases and social conditions (e.g., criminal behavior) to certain groups. This article places the Human Genome Project in historical context in terms of its resemblance to the eugenics movement in America and a period in social work history when the profession embraced eugenics and was guided by the movement's premises in its response to poor people.

Michel Foucault and Dorothy Smith in case file research: Strange bed-fellows or complementary thinkers?

The aim of this article is to provide an exploration of how the work of two theorists with notably different stances could be used effectively to enhance critical research methods in relation to the history of child welfare social work. Our proposition is that the design and implementation of child welfare policies, practices and discourses could considerably benefit from a more historically well grounded scholarship that enables actors to connect their present concerns with the broader historical dynamics of social regulation. The article begins with a statement of the ‘problem’ and our questions to justify our reasons for engaging in this exploration. The article reports on the authors’ reflections to date on how the work of Michel Foucault and Dorothy Smith might be considered in parallel as two different perspectives to the same scene in time and place. The differences and similarities in their approaches are explored with an emphasis on concepts most relevant to researching child welfare archives including discourse; text; the subject and power-knowledge. The article concludes with a commentary on further developments which are necessary to take forward this methodological analysis.

Expanding imperialism, exporting expertise: International social work and the Greek project, 1946—74

Although dominant interpretations of international social work history argue that the profession has always been unconditionally committed to social justice, the Greek case demonstrates otherwise. The development of the Greek project was in close collaboration with authoritarian regimes and served as a tool for Anglo-American interests in the region.

История социальной работы в России (с привлечением материала по Саратовскому краю)

In this article the ancient and modern social work in Russia was analyzed. The author shows the history of social work in Saratov’s region since XVIII Century. Materials on the data of the rich actual sources including archives were prepared.

Selective Memory: A Note on Social Work Historiography

Since the Second World War, histories of social work have regularly confirmed that the activities of philanthropic visiting societies, chiefly the Charity Organisation Society (COS), supplied the principles and practices of late-twentieth-century social work. Similarly, histories of social work have asserted that there was no legacy from public sector welfare workers to the development of social work after 1948, which date marks the start of social work in the public sector. This paper reviews these orthodox assumptions, concluding that both are flawed. There is evidence that the reported legacy of charitable visiting societies owes a great deal to a particular set of circumstances after the Second World War and also that the public sector hosted social work roles and activity from before the Great War. Such practices and roles in the public sector developed in the interwar years and there was considerable continuity of staff and practice from before the Second World War into the 1950s. This public sector legacy was ignored, then forgotten by post-1948 historians of social work—partly by chance, partly as a deliberate policy by some social work historians and latterly because of a lack of rigour by those reviewing social work history.

History of Child Welfare and Protection Social Work in Northern Ireland: Finding Continuity amongst Discontinuity in Case Files from 1950 to 1968

This article reports on research carried out on 189 child welfare files from the largest welfare authority in Northern Ireland from 1950 to 1968. The literature review provides a commentary on some of the major debates surrounding child welfare and protection social work from the perspective of its historical development. The report of the research that follows offers an insight into this important period of child welfare history in Northern Ireland between the two Children and Young Persons Acts (1950 and 1968). Using a method of discourse analysis influenced by Michel Foucault, a detailed description of the nature of practice is offered. This article is offered as a work in progress, focusing specifically on the case file analysis. Further work is planned for dissemination of more detailed analysis and discussion of the broader context within which the practice operated. The research seeks to raise questions based on problems identified in the present with our current understandings of child welfare and protection histories. While recognising the limitations of this study and the need for contextualisation surrounding child welfare practice at the moment, it is argued that some salient conclusions can be drawn about continuity and discontinuity in practice that are of interest to practitioners and students of child welfare social work and can raise questions for further research.

Dance and Sexuality: Many Moves

This literature review of dance and sexual expression considers dance and religion, dance and sexuality as a source of power, manifestations of sexuality in Western theater art and social dance, plus ritual and non-Western social dance. Expressions of gender, sexual orientation, asexuality, ambiguity, and adult entertainment exotic dance are presented. Prominent concerns in the literature are the awareness, closeting, and denial of sexuality in dance; conflation of sexual expression and promiscuity of gender and sexuality, of nudity and sexuality, and of dancer intention and observer interpretation; and inspiration for infusing sexuality into dance. Numerous disciplines (American studies, anthropology, art history, comparative literature, criminology, cultural studies, communication, dance, drama, English, history, history of consciousness, journalism, law, performance studies, philosophy, planning, retail geography, psychology, social work, sociology, and theater arts) have explored dance and sexual expression, drawing upon the following concepts, which are not mutually exclusive: critical cultural theory, feminism, colonialism, Orientalism, postmodernism, poststructuralism, queer theory, and semiotics. Methods of inquiry include movement analysis, historical investigation, anthropological fieldwork, autoethnography, focus groups, surveys, and self-reflection or autobiographical narrative. Directions for future exploration are addressed.

Gisela Hauss and Dagmar Schulte (eds): Amid Social Contradictions: Towards a History of Social Work in Europe

Gisela Hauss and Dagmar Schulte (eds): Amid Social Contradictions: Towards a History of Social Work in Europe

The Feminist Perspective and Social Work Education

Although the feminist perspective has been significant throughout the history of social work, its presence in the contemporary profession seems less prominent. This qualitative pilot study explores the views of social work educators (N=56) on the role of the feminist perspective in social work education and their experience with student responses regarding the tenets of feminism as applied to social work education and practice. Although a majority of respondents expressed support for integrating feminism into the curriculum, some sought guidance on the presentation of the feminist perspective in social work education and practice. In addition, an analysis of social work scholarly periodicals for feminist topics and perspectives revealed an apparent fading of feminism in the literature.

Does American Social Work Have a Progressive Tradition?

Social work authors in the 1950s claimed progressivism as a unique social work "tradition" and set ofvalues, and this historical interpretation has influenced many versions of social work history since that time. Today, other voices in the profession claim various divergent traditions for social work and note that the progressive tradition has waned in the profession. Given these uncertainties, the question of whether social work has or still possesses a progressive tradition is once again revisited, and the current relationship between social work and progressivism is evaluated.

Evidence of public service motivation of social workers in China

To investigate how generalizable public service motivation (PSM) observed in Western society is to China and examine the instrumentality of public service motivation, two studies were conducted independently. In Study 1, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is implemented to test the existence of PSM based on 99 social workers in Region A of one city located in Eastern China. In Study 2, another CFA process is implemented to confirm the construct validity of PSM, based on 474 social workers in Region B of the same city. In Study 2, we evaluated the instrumentality of PSM. These studies not only provide evidence for the construct validity of PSM, but also produce interesting results that relate to the history and institutional background of Chinese social work. Points for practitioners Results of the study have confirmed the generalizability of public service motivation (PSM) observed in Western society in China and examined the instrumentality of the construct in China. The results identify several key implications for professionals working in social work management and administration: (1) PSM can be used as an additional tool to recruit and select individuals who are best suited for social work; (2) For management in social work or other public sectors, PSM could be as a direction in training and development; (3) More importantly, PSM could provide additional view of incentives in social work or other public sectors.

Supervision between critical reflection and practical action

This article describes the history of supervision as a practice of professional reflection in social work in Germany. Supervision in Germany after World War II developed from a practice of control of professional action (as in the USA) towards professional reflection, particularly self-reflection. Different concepts of supervision include different ideas of subjectivity and intersubjectivity and are positioned between the contradiction between critical assessment and uncovering of social conditions and the imperative of their acknowledgment in practice. Thus, supervision is permanently in search of its identity. That means, as the article illustrates by means of vignettes, that practical action is always caught between reflecting and acting. On this point a link has been made between the history of supervision and social work. The current debate in social work has to do with the old question of how far social work should and could be critical or adaptational. This is mirrored in the current discourse between supervision and coaching, and it will become clear that to act as a professional is to manage this contradiction between reflection and action.

Rereading The Jack-Roller

I revisit one of the iconic Chicago School studies, Clifford Shaw’s The Jack-Roller. A naive reading of Shaw’s book leaves the reader with a sense of having been inducted into a mélange of what we now know as “sociology” and “social work,” but which to Shaw seems a coherent stance. I suggest that this is close to the heart of how things were, and not a temporary distortion in the distinct histories of sociology and social work. I develop and illustrate this argument through a hidden history of an intellectual case for reciprocity between the two disciplines as seen in some barely noticed work of Ernest Burgess. I conclude with a suggested rereading of The Jack-Roller that supports a relationship between sociology and social work based on egalitarian respect and a commitment to practicing history in the sense of positioning ourselves in a historical context.

Developing Social Work in Vietnam: Issues in Professional Education

The growth of professional social work in Vietnam took a major step forward in 2004, with the approval of a new national curriculum for universities to teach degrees in social work. This article briefly examines the history of social work in Vietnam to provide background to these developments and then examines key questions facing Vietnamese social work education. These include issues of how professional education for social work is structured and integrated within universities, how social work educators are appropriately trained and how practicum opportunities are developed in a context where a formal profession of social work is still emerging. It is argued that while Vietnamese social work education must be understood as part of the global range of approaches to professional training, it is also vital for Vietnam to engage with the process of developing an authentic Vietnamese approach.

The Temperance Movement and Social Work

This article examines a forgotten episode in social work history: the involvement of the profession in the temperance movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.Though some notable social workers such as Jane Addams, Robert A. Woods, and Representative Jeannette Rankin (the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress), championed the temperance cause during this period, little is remembered of their efforts today. Suggestions are also drawn from this historical incident about current efforts in the profession to again deal with social justice issues on a national scale by reintroducing a more vigorous "moral element" into the profession's response to such problems.

Health Care among the Kumiai Indians of Baja California, Mexico: Structural and Social Barriers

In this article, I document the illness and health care problems facing indigenous communities in Baja California, Mexico, by using ethnographic data from research I conducted from 1999 to 2001 with rural, indigenous Kumiai and with their primary health care providers in urban Ensenada. I contend that barriers to care are structural and social, rather than constituted of competing ideas of illness causation and treatment. A history of multiple medical systems and hierarchical social relations work in concert to produce specific patterns of health care problems for indigenous communities. Multiple medical systems in Mexico rarely result in clearly differentiated models of health care, however. Individual health care beliefs and behaviors frequently blend Western allopathic, or biomedical, beliefs and behaviors with those of homeopathy, herbalism, and different spiritual healing traditions. The primary health care problem that faces indigenous communities is that health care, however defined, is frequently unavailable and rarely comprehensive. Nevertheless, most of their health care providers frequently presume that poor indigenous health is largely a result of competing indigenous illness and health care beliefs. Indigenous health and health care problems are largely a result of economic and ethnic marginalization, as the case of Don Ricardo will demonstrate.1 A thin, frail man, fifty-five-year-old Don Ricardo was dying of lung cancer in 1999, when I first spoke with him in his three-room house in an indigenous Kumiai community in northern Baja California. A biomedical physician provided through his employment at the nearby winery had diagnosed his cancer. Don Ricardo was too fatigued to continue his manual labor

Exploring the history of social work as a human rights profession

English The IFSW has declared that social work is a human rights profession. This historical review explores social work contributions to human rights. The compatibility of principles, accomplishments of individual leaders and professional organizations' actions are examined, with particular focus on the period of adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. French La FITS a déclaré que le travail social est une profession des droits de l'homme. Cette revue historique explore les contributions du travail social aux droits de l'homme. La compatibilité des principes, les réalisations des leaders en tant qu'individus, et l'organisation professionnelle des actions sont examinées en portant une attention particulière à la période d'adoption de la Déclaration Universelle des Droits de l'Homme. Spanish La IFSW ha declarado que el trabajo social es una profesión de derechos humanos. Esta visión histórica explora las contribuciones del trabajo social a los derechos humanos. La compatibilidad de principios, los logros de líderes individuales y las acciones de la organización profesional son examinados con un énfasis particular en el período de adopción de la Declaración Universal de los Derechos Humanos.

Some New Perspectives on Early Australian Social Work

The present article re-examines several aspects of the early history of Australian social work. Using primary sources that recently underpinned a PhD thesis, the paper suggests that the traditional historical interpretation of the roles of the Charity Organisation Society (COS) and the British model of lady almoning as the foundation pillars of social work, while applicable to the establishment of social work in Victoria, had less relevance in the case of New South Wales. Second, the present article highlights the valuable role played by a group of Catholic women trained in social work in the foundation decades of the profession in Australia. Led by Professor Norma Parker, this small cohort made a distinctive contribution in an array of social work arenas, including their church, subjects that hitherto have been largely overlooked in the literature.

Whither the Social Workers? Why the Silence?

Act to expand choice and opportunity for all people, special regard for vulnerable, disadvantaged, oppressed, and exploited people and groups [NASW, 2000, p. 27, Sect. 6.04(b)]. The words above are particularly striking as related to two current national conversations on social and ethical issues that affect those who are vulnerable and disadvantaged. One concerns battle about children's health insurance, other wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As congressional debate concerning passage of State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) raged an obdurate president steadfastly vowing veto, I wondered where were voices and actions of social workers. Nationally, we have heard big voices of likes of American Medical Association, AARP, health insurance plans (the insurers' lobby), governors from both political parties, even parties themselves openly endorsing passage of SCHIP to cover 10 million poor children. In local communities, we have heard voices of peace and justice activists along poignant testimony of desperate parents whose children are sick and uninsured. At same time, we have heard voices of those who, like president, argue that SCHIP will bring us to brink of socialized medicine as if that were an affront to democracy. Throughout these conversations, what can we make of silence of social workers? I don't mean our professional organizations and lobbyists, because they usually lobby for our professional interests, or even voices from our specialty practice sections like Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults and Health. I mean social workers like you and me, those of us who know poor children and their families, and know children by name, not just as some aggregate adding 6.6 million children to program, bringing number of children covered to just more than 10 million. We social workers are uniquely positioned by our work and interventions families and their children to inform, to make an especially powerful contribution to SCHIP narrative, but first we must join conversation. Unlike medical practitioners and providers, social workers generally do not sell or provide health goods and services; hence, we have no conflict of interest as most of us will make no financial gain if more of our children are insured. Yet those other practitioners and providers who do are heard. Poor uninsured children--those who are vulnerable and disadvantaged--are truly our children, for we know them and realities of struggles their families have trying to find ways to pay for acute and emergency health care at times of illness or injury. These same families cannot even imagine luxury of preventive health care or coverage for all family members. Where are social workers' voices in this disgraceful episode in our national life? The real disgrace is that there are any children without health insurance. It is a matter of urgency that we join conversation with special regard for vulnerable, disadvantaged, oppressed, and exploited people and groups [NASW, 2000, p. 27, Sect. 6.04(b)]. Another conversation requiring our participation in national narrative, to be true to our ethical responsibilities for our clients and communities, concerns continuing war in Iraq and Afghanistan instigated and perpetuated by United States. The voices of social workers heard during previous wars, remembered as we hear daily news reports of killing and bombing and violent acts of mercenaries and militias, haunt us like specters from our shared social work history. Upon her return from Woman's International Congress at The Hague in 1915, Jane Addams, along fellow social worker pacifists, lectured and wrote of engaging moral forces to bear against continuing The War. Yes, it was thought to be war. She spoke of great difficulty in getting media attention as the press throughout country systematically undertook to misrepresent and malign pacifists as a recognized part of propaganda, and as a patriotic duty (pp. …