Challenging Social Work
The institutional context ofpractice
Catherine McDonald
Contents
Acknowledgements
AbbrCl,iations
Part 1 The Context of Change
IX
xi
Preface to Part 1 3
1 The Professional Project in the Context of Change 9
2 Modernity, Social Work and the Welf."e State 25
3 Challenging Social Work: The Economics of Change 43
4 Challenging Social Work: The Politics of Change 61
5- Challenging Social Work: The Ideas of Change 79
6 Re·constrllcting Practitioners 97
7 Rc·constructillg Service Users 11 5
Part 2 Options for Social Work
Preface to Part 2
8 Entrepreneurial Social Work
9 Evidence-Based Practice
10 Critical Practice
11 Global Social Work
12 Thinking Our Way Forward
Bibliography
Index
vii
135
139
155
171
187
203
21S
237
Acknowledgements
In the first instance, I thank my very good friend and fellow
social worker Luisa SneB for her patient reading and helpful
comOlents. I also thank Rayleigh Joy and Julie Clark for the
robust and hugely enjoyable discussions about the content matter
and the conclusions I reach. I also express my gratitude to 111)'
friends Greg Marston (for the time we spend thinking abollt
developments in critical social theory, neo-liberalism and its implications)
and Lesley Chenoweth (for practically canying me to
America, and for helping me think about welfare reform and
social work). I thank successive classes of final year social work
students at the University of Q ueensland for putting up with my
undoubtedly maddening habit of thinking out loud and going
off on tangents. Finally, I thank my husband, Norrie, who in
his own words {and with a Glaswegian accent) 'kept l11a feet
on the groond'.
ix
List of Abbreviations
AASW
BASW
IFSW
JCT
IMF
ISO
MSW
NASW
NPM
OECD
QA
QC
SSD
TANF
TNC
TQM
UK
UN
US
Australian Association of Social vVorkers
British Association of Social Workcrs
International Federation of Social Workers
Information and Communication Technology
International Monetary Fund
Industry Standards Organization
Master of Social Work
National Association of Social Workers
New Public Management
Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development
Quality Assurance
Quality Control
Single System Design
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families
Transnational Corporation
Total Quality Management
United Kingdom
United Nations
United States
xi
Part 1
The Context of Change
4 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
transformation. I characterize these developments as instittttiouaL
clla'nge in that they rc-writc the foundational conditions upon
which social work as a set of practices developed over the 20th
centUiy . Currently, a new institutional ordc1' is in place, which
re-inscribes the conditions of practice. As I discuss more fully in
Chapter 2, welf.:1re systems (wherever they arc) function as institutions
in that they promote a set of expectations about how
societies will respond to individual and collective unhappiness,
poverty, disadvantage or pain (Powell and DiMaggio, 1991).
Major developments (discussed subsequently) have led to the
introduction ofnew ideas into the domain ofsocial welfare which,
in turn, has spurred the implementation of new accompanying
practices. This affects the way social workers vicw the nature of
client problems, what wc think social work is, and how we do
what we do (Greenwood, Suddaby, and Hinings, 2002). New
rules ofthegame of social work are promoted, shaping the range
of possible responses considered appropriate for the changed
conditions. Without doubt, institutional change of this magnitude
clearly influences professions (see Scott, Reuf, Mendel, and
Caronna, 2000) who show how managed care - the reorganization
of the funding arrangements of private health insurance in
US health care - profoundly impacted on rhe mcdical profession).
This book is predicated on the notion that social workers are in
no way immune fi'om the impact of institutional change.
Further, because the changes occur at the level of institutions,
they are not able to be deflected or dismissed at the level of
practice however much we might like to. Institutions become
institutions very slowly, so much so that the processes involved
can slip below the radar of everyday observation. Once a set of
beliefs and practices becomes institutionalized, they resist rapid
and purposeful change. Institutions, which we take very much
for granted, are everywhere in social life. It is from their complex
inscriptions of how things are done that we drawn the rules of
everyday life in virtually every domain of experience. An example
of one omnipresent institution is the heterosexual family which
provides 'rules' for the management of adult sexuality and the
procreation and development of children. Despite their seemingly
steadfast nature, institutions do not last for ever) and there
are a number of scenarios developed by social theorists which
outline when and how institutional de-stabilization and fragTHE
CONTEXT OF CHANGE 5
mentation is likely to occur (Greenwood, Suddaby and Hinings,
2002; Scott, 2000; Jepperson, 1991; Oliver, 1992). One ofthese,
Christine Oliver (1992) for example, talks abollt what she thinks
arc the antecedents to institutional change i11 organizational fields;
antecedents which clearly apply in the field of social welfare organizations.
These include such processes as a mounting performance
crisis, growth in internal and external criticism, increased
pressure to innovate, changes to external expectations of what
constitutes procedural conformity, shifting external dependencies)
withdrawal of rewards for institutionalized practices, increases in
technical specificity or goal clarity, changes in the statutOlY environment,
growth in intra-field criticism, and conflicting internal
interests. As I show in subsequent chapters, these conditions are
present in the broad field ofsocial welfare-as-institution, and have
already penetrated social welfare organisations in both the state
and the non-profit sectors.
By taking this particular stance (that is, by focusing on institu~
tional change), I talk in this book about change at a level at which
it is rarely discussed in social work. Rather, social workers (even
those cngaged in macro practice) tend to focus on the incremental
decisions made by policy makers and by organizational managers,
seeing these as incidences of (perhaps) poor policy or misguided
management which can, with effort, be remedied or countered.
While such debates are always useful in sensitizing social workers
to the nuances of the contcxts in which dley practice (and to the
specific day-to-day responses they might make), they can also fail
to appreciate tlut, as part ofwider~reachin g processes, the context
itself is transforming into somctlling completely different.
My primary objective in the first part of the book is to sensitize
social workers to such change as institutional change, and in doing
so, help readers appreciate just how wide·spread and invasive
the resultant institutional transformation is likely to be. Further,
by characterizing it this way, I help social workers appreciate
dlat those macro-level developments usually discussed in social
policy texts and debates (but without much reference to actual
welfare practices) have resonating and concrete implications in
the daily lives of social workers and their clients. This appreciation,
I suggest, is a necessary precondition for professional
evaluation ofor suggestions for contemporary social work. Fortunately,
institutional change of the type suggested here is still very
6 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
much a work-in-progress in that the transformations are far from
complete and the new institutional order is nowhere near stable.
This points me to the second reason for writing this book (and
forms dle underlying rationale for Part 2 discussed in more detail
later): institutional instability of the sort I describe here means
that many voices and a range of positions are being articulated in
the general jockeying for a place in dle new order. Social work
has to engage in the fray. My preference is that we do it knowingly,
and with an eye to shaping the eventuating institutional
outcomes.
And so to Part 1. As indicated, 111y objective is to foster
informed and critical understanding of the contemporary institutional
context in which social work finds itself. Throughout
this part, I aim to help social workers engage with sets of ideas
and bodies of literature which, in their ctiversity and complexity,
contribute to an understanding ofcontcmporary contexts ofpractice.
In Chapter 1 I introduce readers to the broad parameters of
change and to the strategic objectives of social work as a profcssional
project. In doing so, I indicate my own position. Chapter 2
sets the foundations for subsequent in-depth discussions of three
specific dimensions of change. In that chapter I explore at some
length the manner in which 20th century professional social work,
operating within the 20th century welfare state, represented a
model of modernity and an archetypal example of the optimism
of the notion of progress. This chapter develops readers' appreciation
of the intricate ways social work is embedded in and
dependent on the institutional arrangements of the welfare state,
and how those arrangements have been reconfigured. Here, I also
draw out in more depth what I have flagged in dlis preface; that
is, social work is an expression of a particular institutional rationality
operating in a context of institutional change. In tlus way
readers are able to appreciate why, institutionally, social work has
to (and can) think about the present and the future in new ways.
In Chapters 3, 4 and 5, I examine why this institutional reconfiguration
has happened. To do so, I traverse three domains of
thought and action which have had considerable impact on social
work, albeit at different levels of analysis and in different ways.
The first ofthese is what I have called the eC()1lom.ics ofch{mgc; the
pressures for change emerging at tlle level of national and global
econom.ies which produced the overall conditions by which instiTHE
CONTEXT OF CHANGE 7
tlItional change withjn nation states came about. Here, I also draw
the links between developments at tlle macro and micro levels
of the economy, the institutional arrangements of the modernist
welfare state, and the practice ofsocial work. By doing so, readers
can more readily appreciate that social work is not a creature of
its own making, and that processes outside of its terms of reference
and its daily practices fashion the conditions in which we
now exist. In Chapter 4, this process of unpicking the primary
elements of change continues. In that chapter I focus on the politics
of cha~tge exploring the reconstruction of the state and the
emergence of new modes of governance in the late 20th century.
The focus shifts to the implications of these developments for the
reiationship between the state and the people it governs. I argue
that this relationship and its refashioning are central to social work
because social work and the welfare state was one ofthe means by
which the old relationship was enacted. What then are the consequences
of the emergent relationslup between the citizen and the
state fashioned by the politics of advanced or neoliberalism?
The final plank in this analysis is the subject of Chapter 5, the
ideas of change, the challenges to social work which have arisen
within the scholarly (and for many, arcane) domain of intellectual
thought. Specifically I examine the challenges to social work
thinking and social work practice posed by developments in a
diverse body of literature loosely grouped under the nomenclature
of 'postmodernism'. My purpose here is not so much
to 'explain' postmodenusm in its entirety to social workers (an
impossible tasl<), but to show how particular ways of thinking
which arise from employing its analytical techniques have the
capacity to consider social work in very different, very challenging
but nevertheless valuable ways.
Havi.ng marked out dlese tlu-ee main drivers of institutional
change, we turn in Chapters 6 and 7 to the specific consequences
for social workers and for the people who use social work services.
In Chapter 6, I focus on tlle widespread l1u~nagerial challenge to
sociallPork practice. The chapter examines how the sorts of polit~
ieal shifts described in Chapter 5 have resulted in detailed orientations,
programs and practices of government which reconstruct
the manner in wluch welfare setvices and social work practice is
produced. It discusses for example, the rise of markets and quasimarkets,
the resurgence of case and care management, and
8 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
the deployment of risk and risk management as a principle and
a technology of service delivery. Following that, Chapter 7 turns
to a discussion of the implications of change for people who use
our serpices, the emerging models of service use embedded in and
promoted by tbe conceptual and political processes discussed in
Chapters 4 and 5. I identifY, for example, three different constructions
of service users. The first two of these, the service user as
customer and the service user as the object ofdiscipline are linked
to the neoliberal project. The third, the service user as citizen
arises from the various service user movements in such areas as
disability and mental health. Again, the implications for social
work arc identified.
In summary, this is a book about change - in this case change
ofsignificant dimensions in the institution ofwclfare. The various
developments discussed in Part 1 are presented not to frighten
readers into abandoning social work as a constructive and desirable
occupation, but to underscore the notion that social workers
collectively and individually should not be passive and uncritical
recipients of policy and management prescriptions developed by
otbers. Rather, social workers should enter the field in all of its
varied locations as knowing actors, well aware ofwhat is occurring
and why. Such social workers will also, I hope, be sufficiently
critical of our own project to move it forward in positive ways.
This, I suggest, is the fimdamental challenge posed by the new
institutional order of welfare.
1 The Professional Project
in the Context of Change
It is almost passe these days to note that the circumstances 111
which social work is practiced have changed considerably and
that the seeming certainties of the past have largely vanished.
Nevertheless change is the reality, particularly in the cases ofwhat
were once thought of as the advanced welfare states ofAustralia,
Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the United States. A brieftour
through the professional social work journals produced in those
countries readily illustrates that this notion of change, in particular
destabilizing and perhaps transforming change is widespread.
Some American commentators adopt an apocalyptic tone (see
Meinert, Pardeck, and Kreuger, 2000; Kreuger, 1997; Stoesz,
2002), suggesting that forces of discontinuity arising from institutional
transformation are so great that they fatally undermine
tlle very future of the profession. Others are less pessimistic,
but still propose tbat social work in tbe United States and in
other countries such as Australia, Canada and Britain is at a critical
juncture (Finn and Jacobson, 2003; Hil, 2001; Leonard,
2001; Lymbery, 2001 ; Sowers and Ellis, 2001; McDonald and
Jones, 2000). Irrespective of the specific position adopted, tbe
core message promoted is that social work as a collective enterprise
(and individual social work practitioners and people tbinking
about becoming social workers) should, at a minimum, take stock
of what has been occurring. Social workers need to evaluate the
impact of developments in the environment, to think about
the realities of the present and the implications for the future,
and to fashion individual and collective directions forward.
In the three decades following World War Two, most western
industrialized democracies developed a version of what many
contemporary social workers take for granted - a system of
welfare known as the welfare state. For a long time there was
widespread consensus abollt welfare; about the desirability of
collective responsibility for the wellbeing of all citizens and
9
10 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
the associated development of a range of welf.:1.re services. This
consensus led Daniel Bell (1960), an influential commentator of
the time, to declare that such societies had arrived at the 'end
of ideology'. Unfortunately, those seemingly halcyon days have
faded into memory. Instead, the welfiue state as an idea, as a
set of institutional arrangements and social practices has became
increasingly contested, and ultimately, largely discredited in the
dominant political debates. As Gilbert (2002 ) suggests, there has
been from Stockholm to Sydney, in Britain, Western Europe,
in North America, and in the 'Anglo' countries of the southern
hemisphere, a silent surrender of public responsibility.
Currently, we live in a world characterized by a retreat from
collective responsibility (Rose, 1999), a world in which the state
and its various instrumentalities re-configures its relationship with
the people it governs in \\fays tl1Jt minimize state responsibility
for citizen and community weU-being. Now, a different version of
economics, neoclassical economics (which abhors budget deficits
and believes strongly in minimizing state expenditure), dominates
government thinking. Further, a new approach to public
sector management (known as New Public Management (NPM))
has become entrenched, a development associated with what is
known as the 'hollowing out of the state' and with the introduction
of market mechanjsms in the delivery of welfare. Finally and
crucially, the welfare state has been transformed into the workfare
state (where access to wel£1.re is predicated on engagement
in employment services). All of these developments are examples
of processes which have fundamentally re-shaped the institutional
arrangements of modern welfare states.
Many other influential factors are nominated; for example
economic globalization, the erosion of the authority and
autonomy of nation states, the rise and entrenchment of neoliberal
or conservative politics, associated programs ofwelfare reform
and shifts in the manner in which social services are produced
and managed. All of these factors operate to a greater or lesser
degree in the industrialized democracies. No country is immune,
though the nature of their response does vary. Using a particularly
evocative metaphor, Gilbert (2002, p. 22) also suggests that
the advanced welfare states are like ships 'afloat on a large bay
at ebb tide', drawn back away from social democratic notions of
progress, care and responsiveness as a 'flood tide ofnew structural
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 11
pressures and socio-political forces' transforms the conventional
arrangements for welfare. In his analysis (ibid, p. 61 ), such developments
are neatly represented in three tightly connected thernes
in the public debates about change: a shift from passive to active
policies tmvards people receiving public welfare payments, an
emphasis on the responsibilities of these people rather than their
rights, and a re-definition of the objectives of welfare from social
support to social inclusion. All, he suggests, indicate that collective
responsibility has already given way (or is in the process of
giving way) to increased private responsibility for most, if not
all oflife's ubiquitous contingencies. Adopted across the political
spectrum and across the globe by leaders and parties of seemingly
velY different political orientations, it is entirely possible that
these themes represent not the end of ideology as Bell (1960)
once asserted, but its re-assertion . Now, many of us live in what
have been characterized as neoliberal or advanced liberallVorkfare
states (Rose, 1999; Jessop, 1993).
As we will see in Chapter 3, a new mode ofcapitalism has developed
in recent times; different fro111 tlle type which underpinned
the modern welf.:1.re states of the 20th century. As a consequence
all modes of social organization, including social work, are
subject to processes of reconstruction. In regard to social work
in particular, such processes translate into a range of disturbing
developments experienced on a daily basis by workers delivering
services) such as the whittling away of professional autonomy,
the tightening ofprofessional accountability to managers, and the
relaxation of professional boundaries and increased competition
for jobs with non-social work trained personnel. Linking such
developments explicitly with the prevaiLing political ideology of
neoliberalism and to the associated sets of management practices
developed under the mantle of NPM, authors such as Lymbery
(2001; 2000) suggest that the benign conditions of the high
point of social work are gone. Instead, the regime surrounding
the welfare state, service delivery and professional practice has
experienced such a degree of change and restructuring that the
fUture of social work itself appears threatened. As a direct result
of the re-fabrication of the institutional framework of social
welfare, the organizational contexts in which social workers ply
their craft have been re-shaped, dismantled and re-Iocated.
12 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
A stark example of the changes is found in the circumstances
facing British social workers, particularly in the re-fashioning of
the social service departments and the partial dismantling of the
once-famous (in comparative welfare terms) British welf.1re state.
Jones (2001) reports that state social work in Britain (that is,
that practiced in state-sponsored social service departments), is
traumatized and defeated. Orme (2001 ) describes how social
work in that country has been subsumed within the recently
articulated category of 'social care" in which social work roles
and practices are reconfigured into unskilled tasks requiring tile
application of simple 'common sense' instead of the knowledge,
skills and attributes of professionally educated social workers.
Skerret (2000) suggests that this new mode of 'care' in Britain
represents a completely distinct paradigm. Readers should not,
however, suppose that such developments are confined to Britain.
Giarchi and Lankshear (1998, p. 25 cited in Powell, 2001 ), for
example, argue tlut this 'social care complex' undermines the
identity and status of social work in Europe as well as in Britain,
while H olosko and Leslie (2001 ) suggest that the credibility of
Canadian social work has been dealt a significant blow by similar
developments.
In many ways, the scaIe and rapidity of change has taken social
workers by surprise, reflected in the almost panicky tone of some
discussions of tile implications of tllese events for the profession
. Fears are expressed about tile future: about the implications
for people who exhibit all the various forms of need and
dependence to which social workers attend; about the future of
formal service delivery structures developed in the second half
of the 20th century, and about individual and collective professional
futures. I use two analytical devices to 'frame' the varied
discussions being had about the institutional transformation of
welfare, about the impact on social work, and about the various
responses members of the profession are promoting. The first,
the notion of social work as a professional project is introduced
below, a construct drawn from the sociology of professions. The
second (introduced briefly in the preface and discussed in more
depth in Chapter 2) is taken from a body of sociological theory
called neoinstitutional theory (Powell, J991 ). Taken together,
and brought together in Part 2, these formulations provide a
means of thinking about the future of social work.
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 13
The professional project of social work
A useful way to begin to think about what are undoubtedly a vel)'
confusing and complex set of processes impacting on social work
is to step back from the perspective of social work itself. In other
words, it is very difficu lt to think about sometlling when tile
mind set is that most commonly adopted by representatives of
dle phenomenon or context under investigation. To facilitate the
capacity ofreaders to think critically about social work, it is helpful
to adopt a position which understands it as a set ofstt'ategic activities
of a group of people located within and responding to a
particular set of (historical) circumstances. Here, we can reflect
on all of the varied activities and practices which make up what
we understand as social work as a professional project. Drawn from
a number of sources (see Macdonald, 1995 for a more thorough
discllssion), this notion of tile professional project builds on the
Weberian conception ofsociety as an arena in which social entities
compete for economic, social and political rewards. In particular,
it develops Weber's nomination of the occupational group, in
some cases holding specific educational qualifications frol11 which
a living is derived, as one category ofcompetitor. Such entities (in
this case tile professions) work to bring themselves into existence
and to maintain or improve their relative standing. In this way,
professions as occupational groups pursue a project. Taken up and
extended by Friedsol1 (1970) and in particular, by Larson (1977),
the idea of the p,·ofessiollal project as strategy developed. Applied
to social work, the professional project refers to the various activities
undertaken and characteristics projected by those wishing to
propel the idea that a collective entity called 'social work' existed
(and still exists).
While the claims asserted throughout the exercise ofthe professional
project rarely explicitly acknowledge it, the professional
project is political in the sense that it is fundamentally concerned
with erecting boundaries which exert a degree of distinction and
create a border between those on tile inside and those on the
Outside (Fournier, 2000). Those on the inside are accorded a
(variable) degree of regard, some status and some reward by the
state in particular and society more broadly. Those on the olltside
a~e not accorded such privileges (or are in receipt of lesser or
dIfferent levels of regard, statlls and reward). In respect of social
14 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
work, the various professional associations such as the Australian
Association of Social Work (AASW), the British Association of
Social Work (BASW) or the National Association of Social Work
(NASW), in conjunction with the state but to different degrees,
propel the professional project ofsocial work within each national
context. This can be overt and deliberate, as in the case of state
Licensure for social work in the United States of America or,
more low-key, through the provision of places for practice, as is
the case of AustraJja. Internationally, the same process is undertaken
by such bodies as the International Fedcration of Social
Work (IFSW), which promotes the idea of social work as a set of
processes (doing soeial work), an identity (a social worker) and a
coherent entity (the profession of social work) which transcends
national borders.
Within most nations with advanced welfare regimes, the state,
at a minimum, nominated and created jobs for social workers
accredited by the professional associations within the particular
institutional arrangements of its specific welfare regime; for
example, in human service agencies, in hospitals and other health
programs, in adult and juvenile corrections, in child welfare and
child protection agencies. The state, its welfare regime and social
work arc (or were) inter-related, and social work itself was dependent
upon the development and maintenance ofpolicies and associated
programs which provided an occupational role for social
workers within human senrice organizations. As we will see in
Chapter 2, social work and the post-World War II welfare state
both display and reflect the high point ofwhat is known as modernity,
and as such, are congruent with or aligned with each other.
In other words, social work can be thought of as an operational
expression of the institution of modern welfare.
The political nature of the professional project is also reflected
in attempts (irrespective of success or failure, or right or wrong)
to exert authority over other people: that is, those who use
social work services, either voluntarily or involuntarily, due to
some sort of (usually serious) problem. This very real authority
which social workers possess is legitimized by reference to a body
of professional knowledge (practice theoty and skills). In fact,
the development and deployment of social work knowledge is
a key feature of the social work professional project. All professions
are supposed to demonstrate ownership of and mastery
THE PROfESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 15
over a defined body of knowledge valued by the society 111
which they are located. As Fournier (2000) explains, successful
professions forge a field of professional expertise not only by
creating boundaries around an area ofactivity, but also by turning
this field into a legitimate area of knowledge and of specialist
intervention.
The quest for articulation and codification of a specific body of
social work knowledge has been a key feature of the social work
professional project since the early decades of the 20th centuty
(Flexner, 1915). As well as marking out a way of thinking about
the social world, social isslIes and social problems, the articulation
of social work practice theOlY also served another key function.
Social work practice theory and its deployment by social workers
in practice contexts serve a discursivejinJ,ction. But what do I mean
by this? The answer is both simple and complex. The development
and usc of practice theory gives social workers a way of thinking,
a specific form of consciousness, a set of cognitive repertoires
within the overarching institutional apparatus of the welfare state
and within the specific practice contexts where social workers are
found. Think, for example, abollt social work practice in an acute
health care setting. The holistic approach of social workers to
the service user, usually including a focus on his or her family,
perhaps focusing on theirstrengths, often contrasts markedly with
the perspective brought by other professions, most notably the
medical profession. Unlike social workers, medical practitioners
arc more likely to focus on the presenting problem or deficit,
often in a way that is disconnected or minimally connected to
the person's environment. In this way, the social work orientation
or cognitive repertoire is very different from the medical
profession.
When used, such specific forms of social work consciousness
construct both patterns of social relations (between workers
a.nd clients, between workers and their employing organiza~
ttons, between workers and the state) and social identities (social
Workers, clients). Social workers will usually, for example, tty and
t~ink about service users as citizens with rights to services and the
nght to be involved in decisions made about them. In doing so,
they construct both the relationship between themselves and the
ser:ice user and the identity ofthe senrice user. This key dynamic
as It relates to the construction ofthe professional project ofsocial
II
I
III
16 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
work is captured by Canadian allthor DeMontigney (1996, p. 71 )
when he states:
It is in the living. material practice of discourse that social workers
construct a distinct identity as professionals and as authoritative and
powerful. It is with in the matrices of discursive power that social
workers and other professionals differentiate insiders from outsiders.
. As \Ve~l as discUfS!Vely constituting social work and guiding
intervention, professIOnal knowledge also gives the profession's
acc?unts of the ~lature of the service user experience a degree of
.lcgltlmacy superior to that of the layperson, largely because the
laype~son is .al~ 'outsider' without access to social work ways of
knowing. It IS Important to remark however, that the promotion
of rhis type of professional, specialized, knowledge-based legitima~y
was equally necessary to the overal1 wel£'lre state project of
SOCIal progress (discussed in depth in Chapter 2), and to support
the complex edJfice of state intervention in the lives of its citizens.
In other words, social work and the welfare state were
en~aged in the comp.atible, mutually supportive meta-project of
soctal p1-'ogress. In this way, the alignment between the social
work professional project and the modern welfare state is further
revealed. (The progressive nature of both social work and the
welfare state, was, of course, highly contested in the past and
continues to be so today.)
Irrespective of that ongoing debate, LymbelY (200] ) also
makes the point about the linkages between the welfare state
and social work by citing Johnson's notion of state-1lJ.ediated
profession (1972), and Parry and Parry's idea of social work as
the bureau-proftssion (1979). Both of rhese are notions designed
to highlight that SOCIal workers, unlike other professions such
as. la~vycrs and medical practitioners, are more likely to practice
\\~Ithl.n state-based organizations (or at a minimum, in an orgal11~atJO!lal
context funded by the state). Lymbcry's intent, like
mme, IS to underscore the symbiotic relationship between the
welfare state and the profession.
The s~cial work professional project is also reflected in attempts
(dependlllg on the country and with varying degrees ofsuccess) to
hitch itsclfto the power ofthe state as that inheres through various
institutions and instinttional arrangements. In other words, social
workers are often granted legal powers to intervene into private
domains. While these powers are not as far reaching as, say,
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 17
police officers, they are nevertheless greater than the average
layperson. The profession is also linked to the state in that it is
the state which allows or affords social work the space to practice.
Accordingly, the professional project is the more or less
conscious strategic efforts of a group of people (social workers)
to be known, accepted and often promoted, for example by the
state and other state-authorized employers, as a distinct occupational
group entitled to sole or at least privileged occupation
of a niche in the steadily expanding post-World War II human
sen/ices labor market. The professional project also entails efforts
by the collective niche occupants to be accorded regard, stat1ts
and reward by significant others; for example other professions,
the state, people who use social work senrices, and the general
community at large.
The social work professional project has largely consisted of
efforts to adopt the strategies of the established professions, and
articulate the possession ofvarious traits or attributes said to characterize
such professions (Greenwood, 1957). Jones (2000) has
called it the aspirant model ofprofessionalism, in that it is aspiring
to the status of the more established professions such as medicine
and law. Taking this view, it could be argued that the social
work professional project has been quite successful in that it has
gained the conventional trappings of a profession. Over time, its
place within universities as a legitimate area of tertiary education
and scholarly endeavor was consolidated. The professional associations
developed and maintained membership and control over
entry, often through control exerted over university curricula. The
professional associations also successfully developed many of the
other characteristics of professional bodies: for example national
stmctures, codes ofethics, academic journals, professional indemnity
insurance, systems of continuing professional education and
regular national and international conferences (McDonald and
Jones, 2000).
Nevertheless, significant differences in the success or otherwise
of national versions of the social work professional project
to pOSition themselves as central to particular welfare regimes
were evident. The Australian experience, for example, stands in
marked Contrast to tllat of social work in Britain. In the British
context, via a significant strategic development known as the
Seebohm Report (Deparrment of Healrh and Social Security,
..~I '
....... Ocil':'lk' >tl0if
(OVa 10
11''1003 tJ\l( ~
18 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
1968), professional social work successfully located itselfcentrally
in the then new arrangements for the delivery of social welfare
and social care. 1n other words it positioned itself as the key
bureau-profession of Britain's welfare state. In that case, professional
social work located itselfas the core labor force in the social
service departments, established witil universalistic orientations
to broad ranging services delivered within a framcwork of social
democracy and social rights. Ironically, what was considered to
be a succcssful strategy at that time is now considered a weakness,
as the British welfare regime is reconstructed in ways which
are grounded in government criticisms of social work and of tile
social service departments which employed them (Jordan, 2001).
In Australia, on the otiler hand, social work never managed to
achieve such centrality, and the Australian welfare service delivery
system was not integral to the establishment of the local form of
social citizenship rights (Wearing, 1994). Overall, the Australian
evidence suggests that social work failed to fully capitalize on the
rapid growth of social welfare services, growth which continued
ITom the 1970s through the 1980s (Martin, 1996). Being only
one of a nunlber ofoccupational groups implementing the health
and social welfare dimension of the Australian welfare state, social
work did not and has not achieved a pivotal, influential, or even
particularly large role. This marginal status is further reflected in
the fact tilat, despite repeated attempts, Australian social work,
unlike some ofits counterparts, has been singularly unsuccessful in
gaining state recognition through formal registration (McDonald
and Jones, 2000).
Irrespective of such local differences, social work as an occupation
overall managed to promote the appearance ofsuccess within
the modern welfare states in that social workers were employed
by human service agencies to operationalize 20th century welfare.
Unfortunately for the profession dlose circumstances have largely
disappeared, and as I indicated in my introductory comments to
this chapter, led some commentators to predict the end of social
work. Prior to turning that important issue (which after aU, is
the theme of Part 1), it is important to re~state ti1e perspective
towards social work which I adopt.
Social work, as weLl as being an entity which works towards the
promotion of individual and collective wellbeing, is also a professional
project. As such, it entails a collective strategy organized
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 19
I gely in relation to the state, and as we discuss in detail in
U I . .
Chapter 2, d1C modern welfare state in particular. ~ t 1e 111Stltutional
complex which constitutes the welfare .state dissolves, .then
the strategic orientation embodied by the social work professional
rOJ·ect becomes increasingly precarious. And if this is the case,
P c ' I . th'continued promotion of the prolcsslona project as e pnmary
strategy for promoting social work may not be the most appropriate
or most productive strategy in the new institutional arrangements.
I do not mean to suggest, however, that the professional
project per se is conceptually or morally inappropriate. Rather, and
as will become clear, my position is that the strategtc uttltty of the
professional project alone is increasingly uncertain in the con:em~
porary environment. This scepticism towar?s the profeSSional
project as strategy is the first of two evaluative themes brought
to bear on the four major options for social work discussed in
Part 2. The second, institutional change and its implications for
the nature of social work is developed in Chapter 2. Prior to
that however, I outline what I consider to be the ongoing moral
legitimacy of social work in the contemporary environment.
Where to for social work?
Docs social work have a role in the current and emerging
institutional and moral landscape of welfare? I suggest that it
most certainly does! The highly influential sociologist Zygmund
Bauman (cited in Powell, 2001, p. 23) remarked that social work
in the contemporary era is haunted by uncertainty. If we reflect
upon it, it is in many ways a welcome uncertainty. Even if the
collective sense of moral responsibility for each other is publicly
repudiated by successive governments (as increasingly seems to
be the case in the neoliberal workfare states), the need for social
work has not gone away. Nor, I argue, has the moral legitimacy
of social work vanished. Ratiler, the contemporary circumstances
make the idea or moral intent of social work, of a profession
responsive to social and individual pain and disadvantage, as relevant
as ever. In such circumstances) Bauman's uncertainty can
be reconceived as fertile grolUld for the development of ideas
and suggestions of ways forward for those with the courage to
engage. In vicw of that, it is incumbent upon us to find ways
20 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
of not only surviving the frosty conditions, but of working out
how to foster the moral agendas to which social work hopefully
remains committed.
Indeed, we can think abollt the rise and entrenchment of
social work as the archetypal example ofthe optimism of the 20th
century - the embodiment of the belief that we as a socienr, ."
could improve the conditions in which people live their lives, and
in which we could maximize people's capacities to live those lives
to their fullest potential. Ultimately, this optimism is what social
work offered and potentially continues to offer to the societies in
which it was and is practiced. Consequently it is at this juncture,
or rather within these objectives that interest in the future ofsocial
work, transcending that ofmembers ofthe profession (or in other
words, transcending the objectives of the professional project),
potentially resides. It is here where the future of social work (or
something like it) becomes relevant for us all, not just members
of the profession. What arrangements, for example, should we
make and what developments should we attend to if we wish to
continue to propel 20th centmy optimism into the 21st centmy?
Is social work the most appropriate vehicle for dIis? Is it capable
of fulfilling such a role, and if so, in what form? If not, what
should replace it? Ultimately, questions such as tllese form the
underlying ethical justification for adopting what is undoubtedly
a critical orientation to the contemporary status of and future
options for social work.
While the specific sets of circumstances which sustained the
professional project ofsocial work, and which allowed social work
as a discursive practice to shape itself and its clients has dissipated,
the future is not necessarily devoid of optimism. Interestingly,
the very same destabilizing processes which seemingly
undermine the traditional professional project we have grown
accustomed to, also produce moments of disruption which actually
encourage re-examination of the ideas, goals, and purposes
o.f social work in fruitful ways. In other words, the contemporary
CIrcumstances in which social work finds itself allow us to appreciate
(or re-appreciate) and engage with its discursive nature. In
doing so, alternate ways of 'doing' social work perhaps more
suited to the present are able to be imagined which in turn
opens up future possibilities for exploration. More im~ortantly:
some of these possibilities re-open up ways of engaging globally,
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 21
propelling sociaJ workers beyond the confines of tlle advanced
liberal democracies and into new spaces of practice.
Moreover, there is a paradox in operation. I have indicated
previously that the centrality of 20th century social work to
various welfare state projects varied from country to country.
The destabilization and fragmentation of those welfare states and
the associated shjft away from collective responsibility for social
responsiveness to human suffering and disadvantage has heralded
a neW set of circumstances. These circumstances often position
social work in an ambiguous position. Despite the contemporary
ambiguities and dilemmas dley raise, social work neverdIeless
remains centrally involved in some of the key developments
in contemporalY welfare. Here I refer specifically to dIe various
manifestations ofwel£1.re reform in operation or being introduced
in countries like the United States, Canada, Australia and Britain.
As social institutions such as welfare states change so to do the
relationships and identities constitutive ofsocial work and welfare
clients.
The liberal welfare states of the second half of the twentiedl
century formed people who llsed social work and welfare services
more broadly than their contemporary counterparts, within and
through normative notions of citizenship, needs and rights. That
is, most categories of clients were constituted as the legitimate
responsibility of ti,e state acting on behalf of society. The neoliberal
welfare-as-workfare regimes characteristic of the 21st century
(jessop, 1993), situate people who use serviees quite differentlyas
claimants with obligations to tlle state. In these countries,
the escalation of (bi-partisan) political desires to manage 'risky'
populations has focused on the implementation ofvarious, highly
controlling and often disciplinary forms of case management. In
~he USA, it is welfare-dependent mothers who are the key target,
ill Australia and Britain it is the long term unemployed. Irrespect~ve
of who actually implements case management in the core
Sites ofclaimant control (that is, which category ofhuman service
~Vorker), more and more areas of service delivery and modes of
Intervention operationally on the fringes of welfare reform are
being drawn into the overall political agenda. Key examples
are the practice domains of mental health, especially communitybased
mental health services, and child protection. Social workers
practice in all of these locations, and increasingly fmd themselves
22 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
drawn into implementing the new modes of welfare just as they
put into operation those of the past.
While there appears to be a degree of continuity operating
here (and in many ways there is, because social work has always
demonstrated an ambiguous relationship with its social control
functions), there is a fundamental divergence at play in the new
institution of weLfare. One of the most crucial relationships in
the new advanced liberal welfare-cum-workfare states in which
contemporary 'welfare' is created is that between workers and
clients (Brodkin, 1997). Now, newly-forged street-level bureaucrats
operating in multiple often non-state locations take on a new
and highly charged significance in determining client experience
(Smith and Lipsky, 1993). A new and individualized approach to
welfare policy and service deLivery has emerged where the primary
responsibility for managing social and economic risks facing individuals
and families is devolved from the bureaucratic-professional
state to the individual and his or her social work or welfare
worker, often working in non-state organizational locations. As a
consequence of this devolution) the outcome of policies are now
dependent) more than ever before, on how they are implemented
by those responsible for working with service users. Herein lies
the paradox: as welfare reform sweeps the globc, systematically
dismantling proactive state engagement in people's lives, occupational
groups such as social workers are increasingly positioned
as the new face of a mode of government radically different from
what preceded it. Furthermore, social workers' relationship with
their clients increasingly becomes the new space in which the new
active citizen is forged .
In other words social workers, despite claims of marginality
and irrelevance, are still important both practically and morally.
In regard to the practicalities of the future of social work,
it is noteworthy to remark in passing that as an occupation, it
continues to grow in, for example, the United States (Morales
and Sheafor, 2001), Australia (Healy and Meagher, 2004), and
Canada (Stephenson, 2001). Fllrtllermore, social work is growing
in China, in South East Asia, and in Alfica (Garber, 1997). The
spread ofso·called Third Way ideas across Europe have, according
to Lorenz (2001) opened up new possibilities for social work
in the European countries. Similarly, Jordan (2001 ) argues that
social work in Britain needs to create a new identity and to
THE PROFESSIONAL PROJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF CHANGE 23
forge new stratcgic alliances to f:1vourably position itself in the
ontemporary regime of welfare. McDonald and Jones (2000)
~gue the same case for Australi~n social work. It is obs.ervatio~s
such as these that make appreciaoon ofthe chalJcnges faCIng SOCial
and its future directions worthy of consideration. To fulJy appreciate
the significance of the changes occurring in the institutional
environment of welfare, readers need to develop an awareness
of the symbiotic linkages between social work and the modern
wclf.1re state. This forms the substance of tile next chapter.
2 Modernity, Social Work
and the Welfare State
Most social work practitioners and scholars hold an enduring but
often unrecognized attachment to the welfare state; the instirutional
arrangements of welfare developed over the 20th century
to manage the problems modern society created. As indicated in
Chapter 1, some authors accuse social work of failing to adjust
to the inevitability of economic, political and social change; all of
which arc promoting institutional instability and change. These
criticisms join a chorus of claims from across the political spectrum
that post-World War II welfare statism has come to the end
of its natural (and in the eyes of many, unnatural) life, that the
variolls welfare reform processes of the advanced welfare states
are essential, and that further ' reform' may well prove necessary.
This theme is not new as the wel£lre state has been considered to
be in 'crisis' for some time (OECD, 1981; Mishra, 1984; Offe,
1984).
The notions of institutional destabilization, reform and
reconstruction are of course the central analytical axes of this
book, setting the tone, pace and subject matter of sLlccessive
debates conducted within the field of welfare. Normally social
workers think about these sorts of processes as the province
of macro analyses undertaken by social policy scholars and practitioners
operating at a level far beyond the rcalm of evel)'day
Socia] work practice - which in many ways they are. As such,
socia] workers are often unsure of or are ambivalent about
why they should engage in any sustained analytical endeavour
to understand complex processes operating at such a distant,
even a]ien stratum. I attempt to invert this mode of thinking;
to. develop awareness that these processes and the debates
bcmg had about them are actually foundational to all forms of
social work. Other discussions and developments, such as
SPecific policies about certain categories of service users or about
developments in service funding and service delivery mechanisms,
25
II
11
26 CHAllfNGING SOCIAL WORK
arc both Illore familiar and more obviously relevant to daily experience.
Nevertheless, they rest on the institutional foundations of
macro processes and policies, and it is from these, ultimately, that
the contemporary conditions of practice are drawll .
In this chapter, r suggest that social work represents a way
of thinking often characterized as 'modern'. As we will sec,
modernity is/was an emancipatory project of progress, and its
assumptions constitute the foundations for the welfare state, for
much social policy and for social work. As Parton and O'Byrne
(2000, p. 39) say: 'the birth and development of social work was
very much aligned with modern ways of thinking and dealing
with social problcn1s'. In this chapter I focus specifically on the
20th century welfare state as a model ofmodernity, as tile crucible
in which contemporary social work was formed, and on its destabilization.
In doing so, the chapter establishes the central condition
of institutional transformation.
Modernity, welfare and social work
Modernity, a summary term for a cluster of social, economic
and political arrangements, is generally held to be the legacy of
the Enlightenment - a shorti13.nd term for a complex constellation
of cululral, intellectual and political forces which emerged
in 18th centillY Western Europe (O'Brien and Penna, 1998).
It is both an actual period in time, and a signal of a new way
of thinking. Its novelty is best appreciated in terms of what it
supplanted. In the preceding era, the world (read pre-modern
Europe) was understood very differently. It was God-given, ti1e
product of God's word, an expression of God's essence, aJways
and forever of God and under God's control. At that time, everything
and everyone occupied a particular status or pre-ordained
position in tl1e social, political and economic order, an inevitable
hierarchy of ranks which was considered completely natural. The
divisions between lord and peasant, between master and servant,
between the rich and the poor, between men and women, and
between £lther and child were all considered part of a divine
order, and hence, unquestionable (\Vallerstein, 1996).
The Enlightenment heralded a major development (modernity),
in which explanations for the natural and social world
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 27
shifted from the divine to the secular. In other words, God was
increasingly removed from the picture as the causal agent of aU
social phenomena. The philosophical and scientific revolution of
the ISdl centell), encouraged educated and literate people to be
curious about the world and the way it worked. The llse of rcason
and systematic inquiry by intellectuals and scientists supplanted
ecclesiastical interpretation ofGod's will (H owe, 1994). Rejecting
superstition, rationality of thought became the new virtue and
scientific dlinking emerged as the dominant creed. The Enlightenment
and the period of modernity which followed was essentially
optimistic in that it was believed that reason could triumph
over ignorance, and order would prevail over disorder.
Science, and more central to the interests of social workers,
social science became the dominant rationality by which tile
world is both understood, and through its application, could
be transformed. In contrast to the pre-Enlightenment period,
modernist optim.ism increasingly asserted ti1Jt tile future could be
made tilfough purposeful human action underpinned by reason.
Science became the founding complex of beliefs of capitalism,
and the power of reason and rationality gradually developed
a stranglehold on tile human imagination, extending from the
natural world to the social world (hying, 1994). Slowly, we
became convinced that better and more advanced expressions
of human life could be promoted in a social world shaped by
human intervention through the application of social technologies.
The emerging social sciences gave expression to the faith
in the possibility of social betterment, the bedrock of modernity.
Social science would, over time, produce a truer understanding
of the real world; contribute to better governance of society and
to greater fulfilment of human potential.
Modernity was as much a political project as an intellec[Ual and
philosophical one (Wallerstein, 1996, p. 15). This was a period in
which the idea of the dangerous classes emerged, a concept which
described persons without power or prestige, but who were, nevertheless,
making political claims. Accompanying the supremac), of
19th century liberalism overconservatism and radicalism, variations
ofthe liberal state developed in the USA, Western Europe and in the
colonies ofAustralia, New Zealand and Canada. Witilin these states,
a threefold strategy of universal suffi:age, the welfare state, and a
national identity project became important piHars of the political
28 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
program designed to manage the dangerous classes. The welfare
state as a strategy arose in response to the historical transformation
of European societies from agrarian, localized and traditional, to
industrialized, national and modern (Pierson, 1998). Holding out
the promise ofsocial engineering as a key process in the betterment
ofhuman kind, the social sciences became part ofa political strategy
to manage thjs change.
Accorctingly, the emergent welfare state was very much an
expression of modernity. Within that, social policy was (and
largely still is) an exprcssion of the ideal of rationality drawn into
the rcalm of the social. Through its manifestation in research and
in the development ofthe social sciences, solutions to a wide range
of social problems could be developed to improve the welfure of
the population. The progressive orientation embedded within the
welfare state and social policy represented a founding proposition
ofEnlightenment thought. The welfare state would, step-by-step,
lead us towards better social outcomes, and to a more just, fair
and well-ordered society.
The welfare state strove to regulate social life, particularly in
its attempts to smooth the bumps of capitalism and buffer the
citizens. At the same time (and as discussed in more depth in
Chapter 3) it facilitated the functioning of a particular regime
of capitalism. The welfare state also developed a specific liberal
approach to governnlent, through which the interests of a variety
of social groups were attended to through social policy interventions.
Protecting disadvantaged people and promoting their
interests, for example, became a legitimate target of government
intervention. The institutional framework of the welfare
state was considered the natural way of maximizing welfare in
modern society. It was assumed that the state worked for the
whole society, and that social policies (and the social services
which put policies into practice) were the most appropriate means
to meet social needs and to compensate for the down-side of
modern capitalism. The welfare state was designed to ameliorate
the worst effects of capitalism, to integrate various interests
within the body politic, and to (modestly) redistribute wealth
(Jamrozik, 2001). Social progress would be achieved through the
agency of the state; through public expenctiture, through stanltory
provision, through government intervention and regulation,
and through the activities of social workers.
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WElFARE STATE 29
The welfare or social state ofthe 20th century was paradigma?c
in that it was an institutional expression of a number of Illoderlllst
·deas (Ferge, 1997). It represented tl,e essence of the modern
;iberal belief in the perfectibility of society, in .the existence. of
tional means to reduce injustices without serIously damagtng
m . I
Ji"eedoms, and in the notion that the state had a major ro e to
la)' in the modernist welfare project. It also represented, for
P' f . Iexample, a particular collective approach to the processes 0 socia
reproduction of society in which, to a greater or lesser extent,
overnment took significant responsibility upon itself over and
~bove that of individuals, families and the market. For influential
analyst Esping-Anderson (1999) the welfare state is more than the
sum total of protective social policies. It also stnlCtured personal
lives (such as when to work and when to retire) and shaped social
structures (such as social class). In all of these ways, the welfare
state was the institutional expression of modernity.
In doing so, the welfare state institutionally established a particular
way of thinking about the social world (Irving, 1994); of
which social work knowledge and practices represent a superlative
example. 20th century social work grew out of the same
modernist set of transformations that lead to the welt:1J"e state;
in particuJar, transformations in the political process and in
the orientations of governments to the scope of government, the
rote of government, and the relationship between government
and their subject-citizens. As the welfare state developed,
more and more domains of social life were opened lip to activity
by government. Looking back at the historical development of
social work, particularly in Britain and America, its links with
the project of modernity as represented by the welfare state are
easily seen. This point, for example, is made by Huff(2002), who
POrtrays social work as being forged in a 'cauldron of change', a
piece of the 'larger story' of modernity.
After making a scientific study of poverty in 1890s London,
Charles Booth for example, a forebear to modern social work,
made public his 'solution'. The state must 'nurse the helpless and
incompetent as we would in O Uf own £1miljes nurse the old,
the yaung and the sick' (cited in Woodroofe, 1962, p. 11). In
doing so, he demonstrated a thoroughly modernist notion that
the society should actively intervene in the situation of the poor.
Similarly, the foundational work of the Charitable Organisation
30 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Soc.icties in Britain and the United States attempted to impose
notions of administrative rationality on philanthropy to counter
the biases of individual philanthropists and promote practice
based on reason. The work of the Settlement H ouses) with their
traditions of research and reform, represented the operations of
the ideas of modernity in the precursors to professional social
work. For Woodroofe (ibid), the Charitable Organisation Societies
stands as the forerunner of clinical social work, while the
Settlements were the forebear of group work a_nd community
development. Both areas of endeavour emphasized the scientific
nature of their work. The Hull House Social Science Club
in Chicago, for example, actively promoted the study of social
problems in a scientific manner in the interests of contributing
to social reform. These new modes of thinking about poverty,
pain and disadvantage ultimately developed into the social diagnosis
or casework of key social work theorist, Mary Richmond
(1917). These ideas ofemergent social work eventually organized
into formal training programs such as that offered by the New
York School of Philanthropy in 1898, and the School of Sociology
with the London Charitable Organisation Society in 1903,
subsequently to become the Department of Social Science and
Administration at the London School of Economics in 1912.
Gradually, social work as an identifiable activity committed
to notions of reform within a scientific modernist framework
developed around the world. Professional education was introduced
in the Netherlands, for example, in 1899, in France in 1907,
in Chile in 1920, in Sweden in 1921, and in South Mrica in 1924
(Morales and Sheafor, 2001; Adams, Erath and Shardlow, 2000).
Over the fi rst two-thirds of the 20th century, social work developed
to occupy a pivotal space created by the modernist orientation
of thc wclf..ue state - between the individual and tlle family
and the state and society. This space was, and to a large extent
remains, an intermediary zone produced and subsequently reproduced
by developments in law,in pllblic administration, in medicine
and psychiatry, and in the social science disciplines and practiccs of
psychology and education. The development ofthc spacc occurred
because the modern liberal states were increasinglyconfronted with
what was progressively articulated as a 'new' problem. It was in
fact a 'problem' created by the analytical framcworks promoted
and developed within the overriding project of modernity - that
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 31
is hoW can the state cstablish the weU-being of weak, dependent
0;poorly functioning people while at the same time preserving the
functioning ofthe key institutions ofthe liberal state?
Enter social work. That is, social work was seen as a positive
response to this 'problem', and social workers were gradually
positioned as kcy technologists of the statc-sanctioned intermediary
zones; the 'pctty engineers' of the 20th century social
state as Nikolas Rose (1999) (somewhat acerbically) comments.
In this way, thc welfare state provided the primary vehicle for
social work, and thc primaty supporting institution for sListaining
its professional project. It is from thcse institutional arrangements
that social work drew its legal and moral authority, along
with thc organizational auspices for practice. To vatying degrees
and depending upon the national choices made in respect of
modernist welfare, social work was the operational embodimcnt
of modern welfare regimes.
Also illustrative ofsocial work as a child of modernity is the way
problem-solving is (optimistically) represented and promoted in
social work practice theory - a mode which rcjccts superstition
and intuition in favour of rational logical thought. H ollis (1966,
p. 27), for example, describes case work as ,oational, and as directive
techniques. Written at the high point of social work in the
20th century, an influential text by Pincus and Minahan (1973)
draws heavily on the positivist rationality of systems theory - a
type of rationality or way of conceiving the social world which
assumes that it is like, for example, the more ordered worlds
of the physical sciences. It dcvelops the notion of systems of
practice - the change agent system, the clicnt system, the target
system and the action system - in which d1Csocial worker proactively
intervenes. A modernist orientation continues to underpin
COntemporary discussions abollt the practice of social work in
the current era. The Social Work Dictionary (Barker, 1999 s.v.
'Social work'), for example, defines social work as 'the applied
science of helping people achieve an effective level of psychosocial
h1l1ctioning and effecting social changes to enhance the well-being
of aU people' (emphasis added). A more recent example of the
projection of Stich modernist logic in dle 21st century is provided
by Sheafor and H orejsi (2003). These authors devote a chapter
of their prominent text to planned change, and go so far as to
provide a formula representing the relationship between a social
32 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
worker's professional resources, knowledge, the practice context
and planned change (ibid, p. 121). These examples illustrate how
practice theory itself constructs the professional project of social
work in a particular way, in this case in a manner complementary
to the conditions and rationalities of 20th century modernity.
On the face of it, the diverse corpus of social work practice
theory illustrates considerable scope, with superficially very
different orientations - for example, between clinical interpersonal
or therapeutic work and radical community development
practice. Despite these overt differences, the range of practice
theories is nevertheless predominantly conceptualized within the
same meta-framework of modernity. At the foundational level of
ideas aboLlt tile nature ofhllman beings and tile nature of human
society, social work practice theories have much in common in
that they pick up and interpret the ideas about people and about
society produced by the grand intellectual projects of modernity
- for example, of psychology and sociology. Sheafor and
Horejsi's formula (2003, p. 121), for instance, represents an
attempt to characterize social work in an abstract and highly
idealized manner, in this case by borrowing the imagery of the
discipline of algebra. Irrespective of whether the formula accurately
represents social work practice and irrespective of its utiJhy
as an educational device, its deployment is illustrative. Whether it
is notions of practice as processes of planned change (ibid), or as
in the radical social work tradition, practice as processes of emancipation
and liberation that are proposed (Bailey and Brake, 1975;
MlLilaly, 1997; Reisch and Andrews, 2001), such descriptions
of social work demonstrate how it draws frol11, is representative
of and complementary to tile rationalities of modernity. Sitting
within the supportive institutional scaffold of the welf.'lre state,
social work in the 20th century was very much a child of modernity.
Along with tile welfare state, it captured the 'zeitgeist' of an
era (Esping-Anderson, 1999). That era has now gone, and the
institutional scaffold has been severely disturbed. It is to this twist
of events that we now turn.
Institutional destabilization
The great hope tllat was embodied in the welfare state has become
increasingly unstable, discredited and undermined - by critics and
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 33
by events. Indeed, a key question being asked by analysts of d,e
welfare state is 'can it survivc?' Some argue that It cannot tn
the forms that it adopted in tile 20th century. Such comtnelltors
would argue that the transformations we have already
m . .
witnessed in the liberal regimes of the GEeD countnes, ~artJcularly
those of Britain, the U nited States, Canada, Austrahan and
New Zealand, have amounted to an emergent paradigm shift
(GJennerster, 1999; Harns, 1999; Ferge, 1997). Od,ers arc more
sanguine, suggesting instead that tile changll1g conditIOns represent
forms of adjustment to new conditions (Esping-Andcrson,
1999). Whether we arc witnessing revolution or reform is debatable.
There is, nevertheless, significant agreement about the
precipitating factors promoting institutional ch~nge. .. .
First, tllere has been a series of developments 111 key SOCial msomtions
central to the ecUtice of the welfare state. The assumptions
embedded in the 20th cennlry welfare state about family structure
and functioning, for example, are no longer tenable (Goodin,
2000). Family breakdown has escalated, particularly in d,e second
half of the 20th century, resulting in an increased incapacity tor
that institution to provide the type and degree of financial and
personal support traditionaUy assumed by welf.1.re states. Similarly,
fertility rates are declining, resulting in a projected imbalance in
the dependency ratio between those in the workforce supporting,
through their taxation, tllose not in the workforce. There have
also been significant changes to the structure of labor markets,
resulting in the emergence of trends running counter to welfare
state assumptions which, in n1fl1, serve to undermine the overall
model. One of these is the movement ofwomen out of tl1e home
into the labor market. In doing so, their capacity to care for
dependent people such as the aged and the disabled is significantly
reduced (Gilbert, 2002; Goodin, 2000). Furthermore, the traditional
welfare state model made significant assumptions abollt the
nature ofemployment itself; that it is full-time, full-ycar, life-long
employment. Those conditions have changed considerably across
the advanced industrial nations or, more accurately, the postindustrial
nations. Those welfare states which embedded forms of
OCcupationally-based income transfers have become increasingly
Unable to meet the needs of their populations. The most glaring
example of this is the increasing failure of occupationally-based
SOcial insurance systems to meet the long-term needs ofcasualized
11,1
34 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
labor forces with intermittent labor force attachment (Goodin,
2000; Glennerster, 1999).
Demographic developments such as the aging of the population
and the declining fertility rates in western countries are often
norninated as factors precipitating what is known as the fiscal crisis
in d,e welr.,re state (Gilbert, 2002; OECD, 1995; World Bank,
1994). In essence, it is argued that increased and unsustainable
fiscal pressure wiUbe placed on welf..1re states because ofincreasing
income security expenditure, and rising expenditure on health
care and othcr forms of nursing and domiciliary care. The OEeD
for exampic, argued that welfare states have, in effect, raised
expectations among their populations about what they can actually
expect from the state in retirement, arguing instead for a shift
in responsibility away from states and towards individuals (HoD
Park and Gilbert, 1999). Such suggestions find expression in the
shift observable in several countries towards mandatory systems of
self-financing for post-retirement income support. Similarly, there
is a persistent theme in the social policy literature about the fiscal
consu'aints faced by states. Such views are often couchcd in terms
of expenditure blowouts caused by the increased expectations of
the aging baby boomers in contexts of resource constraints and
a shrinking of the taxation base. H owever, similar arguments are
made, primarily by neoclassical macroeconomists, about the deleterious
effects of excessive government expenditure on inflation,
and the associated desire to promote continued fiscal constraint
as a permanent feature of government macroeconomic policy.
This type of argument is often associated with discussions
about the impact ofglobalization ofthe economy; the accelerated
mobility of capital, the growth of transnational corporations, and
the impact of information technology particularly on financial
and other trading markets (all ofwhich are discussed in Chapter 3).
In this case, it is argued that economic globalization has intensified
pressures on national governments to both retrench labor rights
and to limit social wel£:'lfe expenditure, as bodl function to constrain
the capacity ofan economy to compete in dle global markct
(Taylor-Gooby, 2001 ; Gilbert, 2002; Standing, 1999). furthermore,
political globalization represented by such developments as
the European Union have created sets of institutional conditions
and a favorable atmosphere for the spread of an orientation to
social policy which downplays state solutions to social dependency
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELfARE STATE 35
Taylor-Gooby, 2001 ). Finally, another source of pressure on the
( ditiona! model of the welf..1re state arises trom shifts 111 Ideas
trb
a
t the moral validity ofwelfare (Gilbert, 2002; Taylor-Gooby,
a Ou . I d . I
2001; Goodin, 2000; Glennerster, 1999). ThIS, coup e . Wlt1
·'ar resistance to increased taxatlon (Taylor-Gooby) Hastie andpoptu.
B Ie)' 2003) has exerted considerable pressure on the welfare
rom " . .
te One highly influential variant ofthis latter process IS the Idea
p . . I Id
ofwclfare as a 'moral hazard')in which the welf-1re state IS le to
promote at best, free riding (wherein so.me people ~onsume welfare
which they do not pay for or appropnately contnbute to) and at
worst, outright cheating (Lindbeck, 1995). The other major POSI .
ndestabilizing the welfare state across dleworld IS the Widespread
00 dd.. .
notion d,atwelfarc creates dangerolls dependency an lS111centlves
to activelyengage in the labor market (Mead, 1986; Murray, 1994).
Such positions have found theiL" most potent expression I.n .~le
United States, institutionalized within the Personal R~sponslblhty
and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (1966), which, dlrough
the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program,
has radically reformed the American welfare state (MartUlson and
Holcomb, 2002).
Even if institutional change is not as advanced in other countries
as it is in the United States, there is still a general drift in
the national policy imagination in the post-industrial states away
from poverty and disadvantage as an important social ~roblem
requiring significant and sustained government attention and
intervention. As suggested in the previous paragraph therc are
a number of'influcntial thinkers and a collection of think tanks
around dle world questioning the capacity and correctness
of governments to take leadership roles and indeed, make a
difference in debates abollt and responses to poverty. While
commenting upon the Australian context Adams (2000), for
example) ponders why poverty has become a precariolls idea wit~l
increaSingly limited legitimacy in public debate, and concom~tantly
why the welfare state has been allowed to become destabilized
politically. H is comments resonate more widely. He suggests
that there has been an erosion of the group of public intellectuals
which provided dle leadership for such welfare programs as
the War on Poverty in the United States, the Community Development
PrOjects in Britain or the Australian Assistance Pla~ in
AUstralia in the 1960s and 1970s. In odler words those vOlces
36 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
which championcd thc wclfarc state, particularly in public debates,
have fullen silent. As we will discuss in detail in Chapter 5, developments
in public policy and public adnlinistration have led to
a situation in which economic efficiency has been substituted for
social justice as a key principle and objective of government. As
a result, faith has shifted away from the welf.1re state towards
the market as the appropliate vehicle for progress. Accompanying
this is the growing belief that poverty is intractable, and that our
confidence in the capacity of the welfare state to eradicate it has
been lost (Fincher and Saunders, 2001 ).
As Adams (2000) suggests, the stakes arc Iligh for the citizens
ofthe advanced welf.:1rc states, and furthermore, they are high for
social workers. What sort of welfare regime is likely to emerge
or has already emerged? What are the implications of the ncw
institutional conditions? Depending on which author to which
one gives chief credence, the fiHure is at worst, very bleak or
at least, very different. Ferge (1997) for example, is one author
who suggests that the emerging welfare regime represents not
only a paradigm change, but one significantly inferior to that
which went before. In tile new post-industrial welf.1re regime, he
suggests, tllere will be an explicit retreat from collective responsibility,
an increasing acceptance ofunernploymcnt, poverty, social
segmentation and marginalization. Economic growth will become
the primary objective of policy, accompanied by a decreasing
interest in and commitnlent to social integration. In this new
regimc, state delivclY will be replaced by markets, and social
justice and equality will be replaced by commitments to individual
freedom of choice, autonomy and responsibility. State sponsored
and managed income security will be replaced by private insurance,
and charity wiJI rcturn as a core mode of social support.
Gilbert (2002) largely agrees. Whether considering regimes
as disparate as Britain, Sweden or tile United States, the degree
of change is such tlllt an entirely new design for welt:1re has
emerged, one which has thoroughly re-constructed the essential
framework of thc progressive welfare state. This restructure
incorporates a shift from commitments to universal and publicly
delivered benefits designed to protect labor against the market
witllin a framework of social rights, to a selective approach to
private delivery ofsupport and services designed to promote labor
force participation within a framework of individual responsibility
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 37
and individual management of risk. For Goodin (2000, p. 146),
the nlture is also very bleak as the pillars of social support are
'collapsing at once for all too many people'.
In his review of European welfare states, Taylor-Gooby (2001 )
however suggests tllat the theme of radical destabilization
is significantly overstated, a conclusion supported by Kuhnle
(2000). Alternatively, Taylor-Gooby suggests that wel!:,re policy
in Europe has, in the recent past, largely resisted pressures for
retrenchment, is not contracting, and is not obsolete. Nevertheless,
he does suggest that tile European welf.1re states are on a
new trajectory, or rather trajectories, as different welfare states
respond idiosyncratically to tile pressure for change. Both Kuhnle
and Taylor-Gooby argue that the primary tenor of change has
been one of adaptation as opposed to destabilization. Yet certain
common themes are apparent: a shift to labor market activation
policies in income support (in which benefits are conditional on
some sort of 'activity'), to greater competition in tile production
and delivcry of personal social services, cost containment
and greater efficiencies. Taylor-Gooby also suggests however that
those factors in tile European welfare states which resisted the
pressure for welfare statc reform and rcconstnlction have wcakened)
and that as a rcsult 'the past does not offer a helpful guide
to the future' (2001 , p. 188).
What docs appear to be the case is that, to different degrees
and following locally contingent trajectories, the 20th
Century
institutional arrangements for welfare arc being re-shapcd. 1n
some cases the reforms arc radical, and in others, more reformist
in intent. Tn all instances, the primary commonalities revolve
arollnd the linkage between employment policy and engagement
with associated labor market programs) the promotion of individual
responsibility and increasingly conditional access to social
support. Importantly for social workers, and as Gilbert (2002,
p. 189) concludes, policies devoted to 'cultivating independcnce
and private responsibility leave little ground for a life of honorable
dependence for tllose who may be unable to work'. This
is tile group for whom the stakes of welfare state destabilization
are highest, the prospects for whom I discllss at some length
in Chapter 7. While the impact of welfare state reconstruction
on dependent populations is clearly of central concern to social
Workers, tile variolls projects ofwelfare reform associated with thc
38 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
destabilization ofthe welf.'1re state also have implications for social
workers - both practical and moral. In the next and concluding
section of this chapter I outline a way we can think about these
sorts of developments theoretically. I do so to faci litate understanding
of welt:lrc reform as institutional change and its implications
for the present, but also to provide a framework for how
we might think about social work in the funlre. Along with the
notion of the professional project introduced in Chapter I , this
discussion outlines the second analytical device I use to think
about the four options for progress suggested in the social work
literature, a discussion which forms the substance of Part 2 of
tlus book.
Social work and the rationalities of welfare
In the concluding section of this Chapter tlle phrase 'welf:1rc
reform' as used as a convenient short-hand term for tlle reconstlUction
of the modernist wel£lre state. Welfare reform provides
the pre-eminent example of an alternative (and increasingly
dominant) rationality or set of ideas about welfare (or lJlorkfm'e) .
Previously in this chapter, 1 illustrated how the ideas of modernity,
particularly those of progress, lUlderpinned the institutional
complex of the modern welfare state. WeJ£lre reform represents
a shift at this level of foundational ideas. Analytically, I draw
selectively on a set of concepts drawn from a particular sociological
theory called neoinstitutional theory (Powell and DiMaggio,
1991). My first proposition, clearly demonstrated throughout this
chapter as well as in the preface to this section, is that welf.'1re
regimes, botll past and present, function as institutions. An institution
is a set ofnorms and expectations reguJating the interaction
ofsocial actors - groups, agcncies and individuals - in this case, in
thc promotion of 'welfare' (Bouma, 1998). Under the conditions
of the modernist welfare state, the state articulated a particular
relationship with its citizens, one in which it cared for and took
some responsibility for citizens' life outcomes. As I suggested
earlier, under the emerging conditions ofwelfare reform, the position
increaSingly taken by the state is that citizens are responsible
to it as an expression of society more broadly. This, l argue, is
suggestive of significant institutional change.
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 39
Institutions are constituted by and reflected in fields. The fi~ld
f social welfare, for example, is rnade up of human servICe
o . o'ons and their employees (government, market and theorgal1lza . I
rofit sectors) those agencies of the state which deve opnon- p , . .
h ecific policies and frameworks for welfare serVIce delivery,
r e sp . d. I r
d ther interested groups (sllch as SOCIal work an SOCIa po ICy
ano . . . lh
chers and scholars) Welfare reform as UlstttuttOlla c a1Jgeresear . . .
disrupts any pre-existing field-level consenSllS by 1l1~'0~UC111g new
ideas and practices (Greenwood, Suddaby and Hllllllgs, 2002;
McDonald, 2000). In other words, the actors within a field more
or less agree about how the primary activities ofthe.fi~ld should be
undertaken. Within institutional fields there are dIfferent grou?s
of people (H offman, 1999; Bouma, 1998) - such as S OCIal
wo'rkers, but also policy makers and managers of human .sen:lCe
organizations - which influence field -level debates to dlffenng
degrees. . . .
Of late, attention has been directed towards to ms~tuuo~1al
change processes that emphasize shifts in domi~l~nt logICS, ratiOnalities
or sets of ideas (in particular, what partiCIpants say about
the field and how it should be structured and managed) (Aldrich,
1999· Scott Rwf Mendel and Caronna, 2000). Scott et al (ibid)
, , , ( . fl
for example, examined the impact of managed care a v~ry Ill . ~ ential
shift in the way health care is funded and delIvered II1
the USA) as a form of institutional change on health care organizations
and health professionals. In doing so, tlley showed
how that field, once dominated by the professional rationality of
the medical profession, is increasingly dominated by the ratJonality
of the market as expressed by profit-making managed care
health insurance companies. Similarly, the rationality of welfare
reform is an institutional logic; that is, it is a common meaning
system wl)jch represents an array of actual practices as w~ll. as
symboHc constructs, which taken together, constitute orgall1zl~lg
principles guiding activity within the field of welfare (GalVIn,
2002). Institutional logics provide the rules of the game, and
shape what answers and solutions are both available and consI~ered
appropriate by actors (policy makers, manag~rs an~ sO.CIal
Workers) (Thornton and Ocasio, 1999). Changes II1 the Ulsotutionallogic
of a field over time lead to changes in the fUllCtlOnmg
and behaviour of constituents (Galvin, 2002). In otller words,
human service managers would increasingly conform to the new
40 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
institutional logic and would attempt to transform their organizations
accordingly. As we will see in Chapter 4 and in more
depth in Chapter 6, this is indeed happening. As a consequence,
this perspective would suggest that social workers, as actors in a
changing institutional field, would likewise change.
Friedland and Alford (1991) use the notion of 'value spheres'
developed by Weber - clusters of values nested within the overarching
institutional logie of a field. They do this to expose differences
between rationalities - for example between welfare and
workfare. Importantly for this discussion, they note that in institutional
fields multiple sub-rationalities can operate at the same
time. Within the welfare field, social work is a value sphere in its
own right; with its particular theoretical, substantive, and formal
rationalities (Townley, 2002; Kalberg, 1980). These provide the
foundations of both professional identity and patterns of action.
They can be contrasted with the rationalities of the new institutionallogic
imported into the field by welfare reform .
A theoretical rationality, for example, refers to how a group
thinks about and understands 'reality' through the applications
of particular ideas. Social workers, for example, use the concepts
of social work practice theory to develop their 'take' on the
field in which they practice and on the problems they confront.
A social worker using the strengths perspective, for example,
will focus on identifYing, working with and maximizing a service
user's personal capacities. Conversely, the theoretical rationality
of welfare reform in relation to unemployed people focuses on
presumed personal deficits of those same people. Further, and as
we will see in Chapter 4, tile institutional logic of welfare reform
promotes an alternate set of ideas drawn from bodies of microeconomie
theory known as public choice and agency theory. As
I demonstrate in that chapter, the assumptions these make about
human nature stand in stark contrast to those of social work
theories.
A substantive rationality is one which shapes action into specific
patterns by reference to an identifiable cluster of values. For
social work, the professional substantive rationality is found
in the profession's formal values and normative commitments
(which also happen to be congruent with the values of a liberaldemocratic
wel£1re state). Under conditions ofwelfare reform, an
alternative substantive rationality is promoted which is informed
MODERNITY, SOCIAL WORK AND THE WELFARE STATE 41
by ncoliberal notions of obligation, mutual responsibility, and
heroic individualism.
Finally, a formal rationality is one in which action is shaped by
reference to rules, laws or regulations relating to the economy and
society. For social work (the bureau-profession) this promoted
practice informed by the policies and organizational logic~ of the
modernist post-war welf.:'lre state - largely played out ill state
bureaucracies or agencies funded by the state. These bureaucracies,
for example, were (usually) committed to notions ofadministrative
equity (that is, treating all people equitably). Under welfare
reform, welfare practices are informed by new configuration of
states and markets and new forms of service delivery. In the new
arrangements, the primary formal rationality of choice and flexi bility
informs the devolvement ofservice provision away from the
state and into new sites of practice organized into a market or
qllasi-market.
In these ways, the dimensions of theoretical, substantive and
formal rationality provide a dynamic analytical tool for evalu ating
the potential responses by social work to change in the
institutional logic wrought by welfare reform. As indicated, these
issues will be taken up in more depth in later chapters as
we explore the extent and dimensions of institutional change.
In this chapter, the trajectOlY of social work as an exemplar
modernist profession within a key project ofmodernity in the 20th
century has been charted. By illustrating the linkages between
social work and the welfare state, the scene is set to appreciate
how the institutional scatFold surrounding the profession is
being dismantled and reconstructed. To augment this analysis,
I explore in some depth in Chapter 5 how the challenges to
social work as an expression of modernity arise not only from
institutional destabilization, but also from the reahn of ideas.
In this chapter, the notion of modernity as particular sets of
ways of thinking about the world has been canvassed. Chapter 5
illustrates how the model of rationality lnforming the social
work project (represented our reliance on the social sciences) is
also destabilized, not only by the logic of welfare reform, but
also by alternative groups of ideas falling within the intellectual
movement known as postmodernism. Prior to that however,
I examine the economic and political developments prompting
the wholesale shift away from the dominant 20th century mode
42 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
of managing industrial capitalism, and the linkages between
that and the institutional rcconfiguration of the welfare state. In
this way, readers can begin to appreciate just how profound
and £.11' reaching the conditions of transformation are. T begin
with economics.
3 Challenging Social Work:
The Economics of Change
Everyone knows that the economy is important, but few of us
understand why. In the main, social workers (like most people)
arc not necessarily as informed as perhaps they should be about
the'economic context in which they practice, a deficit which th is
chapter attempts to remedy if only to a very limited extent. It
does so within a framework drawn from the discipline of political
economy. I have located the discllssion within this body of
anaJysis so as to make clear the institutional linkages between
economics and politics, a theme which constitutes the substance
of this and the next chapter. Much of what I consider here is
related to the ubiquitous processes of economic globalization,
which in recent times have taken on heightened significance and
are ofgreat consequence because ofthe institutional effects within
state systems around the world. Reverberating out to the subject
populations of virtually all states, economic globalization brings
diverse populations in equally diverse regions of the world into
the realm of a common global dynamic. The consequences for
different natibns) however, vary drastically.
There is as yet cenainly no closure in academic debates about
the likely end point of economic globalization. Some even doubt
that it has occurred! A number of authors contend that the
contemporary era is qualitatively different from that which it
succeeds, while others suggest that the claims made about the
convergent and apocryphal tendencies of economic globalization
seriously misunderstand the past and overstate both its extent
and impact (Rieger and Leibfried, 2003; Held and McGrew,
2000). The notion of economic globalization and its consequences
remains hotly contested (also see for example, Wade,
1996; Zysman, 1996). Nevertheless, many argue that a new mode
?f social organisation is developing because of developments
In the realm of the economic, indicating an historic transition in
43 , -
II
44 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
the capitalist world order. This is why it is important for social
workers to consider. This new mode of social organization has
significant implications for the arrangements which provided the
institutional locale for social work. If social workers develop some
appreciation of the various arguments posed about why this is
occurring, they are more likely to acknowledge that strategic
thinking about the future is timely; specifically, thinking about
the likely consequences for people who use social work services,
as well as about the profession's response. In other words, when
reflecting on the impact ofeconomic globalization, OLLr imagining
of alternatives takes on a new urgency.
In this chapter, I give a brief overview of the processes
said to have prompted the current era of economic globalization.
Following this, I introduce three 'takes' on economic
globalization and its impact on national economics developed
within the field of political economy. I do this to help readers
consider the potential linkages between what happens in the
economy and the broader social and political infrastructure of
any given society. One of these frameworks, post-Fordism, is
discussed in slightly more deptll because it is from this analytic
genre that one of the clearest explanations of the rise of the
workfare state replacing the welfare state has been developed.
What happened? Bretton Woods to the global economy
Towards the end of World War II, concerns were raised, particularly
in America and Britain, that the post-war period might
bring on a repeat ofthe damaging economic crisis which followed
World War I (Panic, 1995). At that time, it was generally considered
that the greatest problem facing nations in the years between
World War I and World War II was ti,e breakdown of the international
political economy. It was also argued that the inter-war
economic collapse contributed to the rise of Fascism, a significant
if not tile prime t:,ctor precipitating World War II. A debate
arose at the time about how to protect nations' sovereignty over
the functioning of their domestic economies. Accompanying this
were clearly articulated desires by governments to protect their
economies from the unfettered functioning of the international
market (Panic, 1995; Bessel, 1992).
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 45
In response, 'Pax Americana' or the international post-war
world economic order came into being, arising from the Bretton
Woods agreement of 1944. This was an agreement, basically
between the USA and Britain, to create a mechanism to manage
the international flow of rnoney (international liquidity), to
protect national economics from internationally-produced debt,
and to reinstate international equilibrium. This was achieved
largely through a system of fixed exchange rates, where countries
pegged tJleir currencies against the American dollar. This led
to the establishment of such coordinating and regulatory instimtions
as the International Monetary Fund (IMP), the World
Bank, and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. For some
tihle, this system provided both stability and economic growth.
The latter, however, was not distributed equally across the globe,
manifesting in sustained inequalities between industrialized and
less indumialized countries (Mitchell, 1992).
The United States emerged as tJle dominant economy with its
enormous financial power, a dominance augmented by the fact
that the US dollar was the currency used for international transactions.
Because of the latter, the USA acted as system manager
in control of international liquidity. At first US policy makers
were more or less committed to this role but as the decades
progressed, these commitments to maintaining the international
financial order became weaker (Strange, 1994). The wavering of
US commitment was one ofthe f.:lCtors that led to the breakdown
of tile Bretton Woods system.
Another factor arises from the operations of the system itself.
The fixed exchange rate regime tIleoretically forced a degree of
discipline on participating nations who pegged their currency
against ti,e US dollar. When serious national payment imbalances
arose, countries with payment deficits were supposed to
devalue their currency while countries in surplus were meant
to appreciate theirs. U nfortunately, countries with a surplus (such
as Germany) did not always appreciate tJleir currency, thereby
transferring tJle international adjustment problem to tJle deficit
countries. To manage adjustment, this latter group of countries
were forced to usc restrictive monetary policies which, in
turn, slowed growth and weakened domestic employment rates.
To manage the internal politics of these unwelcome consequences,
such nations implemented protectionist policies which,
46 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
in turn, distorted international trade and damaged other national
economies.
Another f..lctor weakening the Bretton Woods system was the
emergence of the 'Eurodollar' markets, in part a fu nction of
the rapidly increasing profits of the oil exporting countries
(creating a seemingly unlimited flow of Petrodollars), and in part
from successful American multinationals attempting to elude US
banking legislation. The Eurodollar market, for example, was an
off-shore dollar market beyond the reach of national currency and
banking controls. Tills market encouraged the rise of transnational
corporate activity, and especially, the development ofglobal
banks (McMichael, 1996). lt represented the beginning of an
era of financialization, where money and its flows became a key
economic dynamic, largely divorced from the production and
productive capacities of national economies.
As a result, the off-shore capital market outside US control
expanded from USS3 billion in 1960, to $75 billion in 1970, to
Sl trillion in 1984 (Strange, 1994, p. 107). T his put downward
pressure on the ratio of US reserves (gold ) to liquid liabilities
(paper money in circulation), and eventually led to speculation on
the dollar. Evenulally American policy makers were forced to end
the gold-dollar standard, a development which initiated a destabilizing
shift from fixed to floating exchange rates (McMichael,
1996). Fostered by these currency crises, the international financial
relations of the Bretton Woods system unravelled and a new
era of contemporary economic globalization took off. The new
f"inancial markets had the effect of detaching finance from its
original purpose of tlnancing trade, and money itself became a
commodity to be traded like any other commodity. Currency
speculation , plus the increased mobility of capital beyond the
control of governments and central banks, resulted in a situation
where the value ofa currency depended more on the flows of the
market than on the underlying balance of trade in an economy.
Susan Strange (1994, p. 59) described this turn of economic
events as 'casino capitalism'.
The demise of the Bretton Woods system and the rise of
the new economic order can be obsen'ed operating along three
clear trajectories - in finance, trade and production (Held and
McGrew, 1998). The first are the sorts ofdevelopments in finance
discussed above. Since then global financial activity has grown
THE ECONOMICS Of CHANGE 47
exponentially, resulting in the development ofextremely complex
lobal financial markets. These have transformed the management
~f national econOillies. As indicated, the international finance
markets are highly volatile and responsive to shifts in such things
as interest rates, and as such, they render national macroeconomic
policy vulnerable to changes in global fi nancial conditions.
As illustrated by the catastrophic Thai currency collapse
in 1997, speculative currency trading can have immediate and
drastic national economic consequences. Now, there are clear
consequences in the form of different costs and benefits associated
with various national macroeconomic policy options. Certain
choices, for example pursuing expansionary policies (with associated
sustained government expenditures), can prove very expensive
in the sense that it may lead to a flight from a national
currency by financial markets, with associated seriolls exchange
rate consequences. The shifting costs and benefits of various
policy options are, however, unpredictable, a factor which further
destabilizes the management of national economics.
Furthermore, the capacity of the international financial markets
to facilitate short-term capital flows out of particular economies
can have knock-on consequences for other economics in a region,
and in the global financial sector as a whole. As H eld and McGrew
(1998, p. 229) note, in a 'wired world' linked by information
technology, national markets are intimately enmeshed with each
other, so that disturbances in one spill over very rapidly into
others. In such a context no government can successfully inslllate
its economy, This itself has led to a significant shift in the
balance of power between governments and markets, in that it
is market-based decisions by market participants, be they individual
or institutional, who have become the authoritative actors
in the global fU1ancial system. While nation states clearly retain
significant capacity to act, their actions, particularly in tirnes of
crisis, are increasingly driven by decisions made by these nonState
and n1arket-based actors. This qualitatively different financial
market, characterized by increasing complexity, scope, volume,
speed and diversity, operates in a manner utterly unlike that ofany
previous period. It is a 'distinctive new stage in the organization
and management of credit and money in the world economy',
which is 'transforming the conditions under which the immediate
and long-term prosperity of states and peoples across the globe is
II
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48 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
determined' (Held and McGrew, 1998, p. 230). This vast global
pool of money has contributed to the crippling debt crises in
a large number of so-called Third World countries (Hoogveit,
1997), as well as significantly influenced macroeconomic policy
in the OECD nations.
Trade, as opposed to finance , has always had international
dimensions, but it is the contribution of international trade to
national income, and the extent ofthe world output that is traded
which has reached new significance (Perraton, Goldblatt, Held
and McGrew, 1997). Currently, international trade is integral to
the well-being of natia naJ economies. VirUlal1y all economies are
incorporated into global trading networks and are attempting to
position their products and services in global markets. The world
trade system is now institutionalized through such increasingly
important mechanisms as the World Trade Organization, which
actively promotes global trade liberalization and discourages
domestic policies ofprotection. The resultant global competition,
often within national borders between domestic and foreign firms,
occurs simultaneously with the opening up of the global marketplace.
Global trade is also re-shaping pre-existing hierarchies of
trade (H oogvelt, 1997; McMichael, 1996). Whereas once trade
was concentrated within and between OEeD economics, new
trading patterns re-inscribe and re-construct the industrializedindustrializing
divide into more complcx and fractured patterns.
The new era of the global economy was and is also promoted
and characterized by globalization of production as well as
finance and trade. The rise and rise of transnational corporations
(TNCs) - the corporate empires which straddle the globeare
centrally implicated. In 2002, the United Nations Conference
on Trade and Development (United Nations Conference
on Trade and Development, 2002) noted that there are about
65, 000 TNCs today, with about 850, 000 foreign affiliates.
In 1996, there were 44, 000, with 280, 000 foreign affiliates.
Twenty nine of the world's 100 largest economic entities were
TNCs. Further, the value-added activities ofd,e largest 100 TNCs
have grown faster than those of national economies, accounting
for over 4.5 percent of world gross domestic product in 2000,
as opposed to 3.5 percent in 1990. In 2001 , their sales of
almost US$19 trillion were more than twice as high as world
exports. In 1996, thcir total sales were US$7 trillion. In the new
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 49
Iobal economy, production processes themselves arc interna~onalized
by the T NCs. This expansion of international.produc'on
is driven by a number of factors that play out differently
~or different industries in different countries: the opening up of
national markets through policy liberalization, rapid technological
change, and heightened competition. These factors result in. international
production taking new forms, with new ownership and
contractual arrangernents, increasingly institutionalized dlfough
a range of processes such as out-sourcing, sub-contracting and
joint ventures.
In these ways - tllfough developments in the areas of finance,
trade and production - economic globalization was and is
advanced. Not surprisingly, there have also been concomitant
institutional consequences for nation states. To appreciate the
recursive nature of the linkages between economies and societies
(and betwcen economic developments and .th~ ':,elfare sta~e. in
particular), we now turn explicitly to the dlsClplme of political
economy.
Post-industrialism, disorganized capitalism
and post-Fordism
In the 1970s political economists such as Bell (1973) and
Torraine (1974) began to ask whether the extensive developments
evident in industrialized economies represented a fundamental
transformation of tlle capitalist economy, or whether they were
better understood as a minor aberration. vVhile there arc different
emphases in accounts attempting to understand what was subsequently
labeled as tile post-industrial economy, there were some
common empirically observable processes evident tllat seemed to
indicate that a radical departure from the industrial economic
form in GECD countries had occurred.
These processes, indicative of changes propelling these
economies towards a post~industrial form, included shifts in tlle
balance of the economy and in employment from mallut:1cturing
to service industries; the emergencc of a core workforce ill relatively
secure employmcnt and a growing peripheral work force of
low paid casualized labor; and a transformation of the organization
ofwork and occupations, generating new forms ofsocial divisions
and life chances. In 1990, an influential social policy author,
I
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50 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Esping-Anderson, applied the post-industrial thesis to the welfare
state explicitly linking the economy to the institutional arrangements
of welfare. While there has been much subsequent critical
discussion about his typology (see for example, Gilbert, 2002),
the point of interest for us is not whetllcr he got it right or not,
but rather that he was perhaps the most prominent social policy
analyst to highlight the interdependent relationship between the
welfare state and the economy.
Also attempting to explain apparent shifts in the organization
of capitalism, a related theoretical perspective represented
most prominently by Lash and Urry (1987), focuses on what
they argue is the disorganization and reorganization ofcapitalism.
They identify three core periods of capitalism, the first ofwhich is
laissezjaire capitalism, characterized by a lack of central political
co-ordination (the 19th century). The second is industrial capitalism
(the 20th century), characterized by the concentration and
centralization ofcapital, tlle regu lation ofmarkets, a mass production
economy organized within national boundaries, and, with
welfare states. T he third period is that ofdisorganized capitalism,
characterized by de-industrialization of economies, the decline of
national markets and nationally based corporations, a decline
in tlle absolute and relative size of tile indusu'ial working class,
a decline in collective bargaining and tlle growth of company
and plant level bargaining, flexible forms of production and work
practices, a weakening ofthe national state capacity to manage the
economy, a decline in industrial cities, an expansion ofthe service
class, a decline in mass politics, the growtll of new social movements,
and an increase in cultural diversity and fragmentation.
All of tllis, they argue, leads to a polarization of income and
wealth, and a massive growth of poverty, often racialized, in
the de-industrialized cities. Lash and Urry (1987) demonstrate
how, in the United States in particular, these 'rust-belt' cities are
also systematically emptkd of important social and political institutions,
labor markets, commodity markets, trade unions, and
people with sufficient resources to relocate. These cities increasingly
suffer from regulation deficit, as the institutions of social
and economic regulation move out, leaving behind ungovernable
spaces which welfare state agents (such as social workers) utterly
fail to manage, resulting in an escalation of crime, violence, d rug
addiction and so forth.
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 51
. gil' tl,e old political alle"'ances and coalitionsIncreasUl , < 0--
O
· 19 the beleaguered welfare state start to break apart as
NWm l . d·· II I·al d,·visions and cleavages emerge. fra 1tlona c ass po 1new
SOC1 < ' . • • d I
. declines as does support for the mass pohucal parties, an ne\\
ocs
d
s of political and social organization emerge. At the same
010 e . . d · · · I
rime as the economic conditions and pobncal an . 1nStitUtiona
rts underpinning the welfare state collapse; ItS weakened
suppo fl· di ..
agents are increasingly asked to mediate new con lCtS, Vl~IO~S
and social problems. Ultimately, the wel~are state (as. an 111S~tutional
tonn and associated with the penod of orgall1z~d capIlism)
cannot manage, and is not functionally, econonllcally or
m d..
politically viable in the emerging con mons. . .
A closely related body of theory attempong to explal11 th~
contemporary experiences of nations Wl~l a global econom)
and a global society is that of post-Ford,sm. Most commonly
associated Witll the work of Bob Jessop (2002a, b; 1999; 1994;
1993), post-Fordist inspired political economy presents tlle mo.st
detailed accounts of linkages between the econ~mlc, the soctn.l
and the political. In its early stages, post-Fordlsm was l~r~ely
focused on what had passed and on the nature of the ~ransm~n .
More current work tends to shift its attention to what IS comlllg
into being - the new world of the so-called workfare state. Thc.se
still developing analyses stress both tlle material r~ality of socI~1
relations (such as tlle widening gaps between nch and pOOl )
and the social and cultural processes that constitute them (for
example, welfare services). It shows that the operations of the
economy are co-constituted by other systems and e~olve a~~ng
with them, for example, in and through tlle te~hnologles, poliocs,
law, education, science, and even art of a society.
From Atlantic Fordism to the knowledge-based
economy
Post-Fordist political economy takes its analytic~1 o.rientation from
the Marxist notion ofthe recurrent crises ofcapitalIsm. It develops
the work of what is known as the Parisian 'regulationist' school
of economics and as the name indicates, is interested in the
regulation of~he economy. This sounds like a truism, but within
economics the regulationists were unusual in tlut they assume
1111
III
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I
I
II
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52 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
that the frequent disruptions and recurrent crises in the economy
owe little to the 'hidden hand' of the market for their resolu tion.
They also consider the role played by political and culwral
institutions and relations in attempts to regulate the instability
of advanced economies. They stress the role of such institutions
as the state in attempts to balance patterns of production and
sociaJ demand. They recognize that the pattern of accumulation
and growth in advanced economics is secured as much by social
regulation as it is by economic regulation.
Theorists of the post-Fordist school concern themselves with
the structure of regimes of acclt11utlatiotJ. and modes of regulation.
Regimes of accumulation are periods of growth characterized
by whatever it is that ensures a compatibility between what is
produced and what is consumed in an economy. Under a Fordist
regime of accumulation, for example, production and consumption
are both characterized by mass standards (exemplified by the
ubiquitous model T Ford). A mode of regulation is however of
a different order. It functions more or less as a support framework
for the growth regime. It pulls together and directs the
wide variety of actions taken by a range of actors (firms, banks,
retailers, workers, the state, employees) and labor unions) into
a kind of regulatory network. Accordingly, a capitalist mode of
production and reproduction is manifested in a regime ofcapitalist
accumulation. Distinctive historical periods in the development of
capitalism can be discerned. Each successive wave ofcapitalistdevelopment
has its own regime of accumulation and associated mode
of economic, political and social regulation. In other words, each
regime has regime-specific modes, methods or processes ofsocialization,
and regime-specific methods or processes of promoting
social cohesion and integration . Both of the latter arc necessary
strategies to ensure economic growth (or capital accumulation).
Post-Fordism takes its starting point at the period of capital
accumulation between the late 1930s to the mid 1970s, known
as the golden age of Atlantic Fordis",. Tllis lVas a period of
unprecedented and sustained economic growth in western industrialized
nations, predicated on the development and maintenance
of mass production and mass consumption. It was also a period
noted for its political and socia1 stability. There are a number of
central features which account for that. First was the establishment
of a social pact between capital and labor after the class
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 53
of the 1929- 1933 Depression reflecting agreement about\Var '
basic social institutions (the welfare state and a managed market
economy). Second, the 'new' social, institution of ?le welfare
state developed, designed to deal With the dysfunctIons of the
market economy, to establish a minimum wage and thus place
a floor underneath consumption, and promote 'norms' of mass
consumption. Third, there was a general acceptance of the need
for state regulation and intervention in the economic sphcr~ .
In other words, there was a commitment to a set of econonllC
olicies designed to Sllstain demand, to secure fu ll employment
~d promote economic growth. Fourth, as dis~ussed .in th~ first
part of this chapter, mechanisms to control the 1~cre.asll1g1~ mternational
economic order were developed, begll1111ng With the
Bretton VVoods agreement.
The success of mass production (Fordism) required simultaneous
transformation and regulation of consurnption to ensure
mass markets. It is here that post-Fordist political economy would
stress that post-World War II Fordism should be seen less as a mere
system of mass production, and more as a total way of life. While
transformations in the methods ofproduction were at the heart of
the regime of accumulation, to be sustained it also needed transformations
in all social institutions. Therefore, social institutions
such as the state and the familywere reconfigured to facilitate particular
modes ofsocia1conduct conducive to mass consumption.
Post-Fordist-inspired authors, for example, link a particular
family form and a particular order of gender relations with the
Fordist regime ofacCllmulation (Jessop, 2002a). Tllis fanlily form
(the nuclear family) serves as a powerful mode ofsocial regulation
enhancing and embedding the capital accumulation regime. The
nuclear family, it is argued, played a key role, both as a locus
for privatized consumption and as a site for social and emotional
integration. In its simplest terms) women were largely excluded
from the labor market remaining within the private sphere of the
family. In doing so, one of their primary roles was to act upon
and transfer the norms of mass consumption. Around this family
form, a whole series of other social institutions both supported
and extended this order of gt:nder relations. The welfare state,
for example, clearly supported this pattern of relations by overtly
constructing women as dependent upon men (O'Connor) Orloff
and Shaver, 1999).
54 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
As a regime of accumulation and as a particular social order, all
went well for a significant period oftime. As described in the early
section of this chapter, the inevitable seeds of crisis embedded
in the regime eventually grew into full blown contradictions resulting
in a crisis of accumulation. The indicators were sllch
phenomena as stagflation (sustained high levels of inflation), an
increased share of capital going to labor through high wages and
a large welfare state which shitted the underlying balance of class
forces in favor of organized labor in the economic sphere, the rise
of the new social movements increasingly critical of capitalism,
and perhaps most importantly, the combination of the financial
crises, the oil shocks and declining profits.
The last of these was catastrophic for Fordism as it became
progressively exhausted. The declining rate of profit was both the
vital indicator ofdecline and the straw that broke the camel's back.
Critical voices began to be raised, disparaging of the dominant
economic policy prescriptions of the time. Wages were said to be
toO high, wage fixing processes were considered too rigid, and
the rights of labor were considered to have gone too far. As a
consequence, it was claimed, workers were pricing themselves out
of jobs and labor mobility was seriously impeded.
Consequendy, from the 1970s onwards, it became increasingly
'evident' to policy makers that minor reforms to the system
would not solve the crisis, and a ne\v model of socio-economic
organization needed to be established, which would support
continued profit growth. This new 'model' of global capitalism
(with national variations and diverse fortunes) has now cmerged,
and in dle process, has altered the three key elements of the
Atlantic Fordism. The first is accelerated economic globalization.
Second, capital has succeeded in appropriating significantly higher
shares of profits by using a number of strategies, all ofwhich have
reduced the power of labor (i.e. confrontations with the trade
union movement; deregulation of the labor market; deregulation
of dlC wage fixing system; workplace rest.ructuring; employment
ofless well organized labor such as women and migrants). Third,
state intervention has shifted away from political legitimation and
social redistribution towards potitical domination.
The post-Fordist accumulation regime has several key features.
As a labor process, post-Fordism can be defined as a flexible
production process based on flexible technology and on a flexible
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 55
workforce. As a mode of macro-economic growdl, post-Fordisl11
is based on the dominance of permanent innovation - new practices,
new products, new organizational forms, and new markets.
As a social mode of economic regulation, it is characterized by
the polarization ofskilled and unskilled workers, greater flcxibiliry
in i1J,tC1"nai and exte1'llni labor markets, and shifts to local levels
of wage fixing. Also, it is typified by a new mode of socialization
or social regulation - the contours of which arc becoming
clear and which I discliss shortly. The post-Fordist economy is
a knowledge-based economy, in which knowledge is applied to
production, and in which knowledge moves from dlC public
domain to the private in an escalating process ofcommodification
(Jessop,2002a).
The resulting restructuring of social and economic life results
in a number of discernible outcomes (Sassen, 1991): the rise of
global cities divorced from their local and national economics;
an accumulation of government and corporate debts to recondition
and re-service these global cities resulting in a decline in
infrastructure in other areas within the same country; a loss of
manufacturing jobs and a steady increase in senrice sector employment;
an extremely polarized wage structure; deterioration in
economic and social conditions for low wage workers; the demise
of the compact between labor and capital; dle risc of a postFordist
consumerist middle class with a large disposable income
consuming 'new' goods and services (personal services, life style
goods), creating demand for another type of low-wage worker
to service them; and greater demand for the products of sweated
industries and outwork.
The post-Fordist accumulation regime is spacialized (Brenner
and Theodore, 2001; Rodger, 2000; Cox, 1997); d,at is, it
restmctures space - for example, in the large urban conurbations.
It generates new forms of urban poverty that have come
to be called social exclusion. The effects of post-Forclist change
leave some areas of the city suffering from decline (old manufacturing
areas) as others develop (service and lugh technology areas)
(MeUor, 1997). As cities globaUy compete with each other for
mvestment, for the rights to hold prestigious events and confcr~nces,
for dle location of businesses and so forth, investment
IS reallocated towards that development which presents the best
face to the world (up-market inner city development). Uneven
56 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
development contributes to urban decline in some areas and major
disparities in income, wealth and futu re prospects.
The post-Fordist city is marked by spacial polarization, illustrated
by the notion of the dual or quartered city, a metaphor
which aptly characterizes the emerging urban forms. The evolving
city centers, for example, with their considerable up-market
investment, are not places for the poor. Marcuse (1989) has developed
a representation of the idea of the 'many cities within a
city' thesis. H e identifies tile economic city, the prestigious office
blocks where the 'big decisions' are made; luxury housing spots,
enclaves of isolated buildings and blocks occupied by the rich;
the city of advanced services, characterized by downtown clusters
or professional oEllces enmeshed in a complex communicative
network; tile gentrified city, for those professional and managerial
groups that are 'making it'; the suburban city, for single family
housing, the middle professional and managerial groups and the
skilled artisans which can be found both at the outer reaches
of the city or near the center; the tenement city constituting
cheaper single fam ily areas and including areas of social/ public
housing occupied by lower paid workers; the city of unskilled
work, located in relatively cheap industrial units, warehouses and
sweat shops providing goods and consumer services in the city;
and the abandoned city where the 'victims" the poor, the unemployed,
the homeless and the excluded congregate, a city colored
by a sub-culture of drugs, alcohol and street crime. The notion
of the restructuring of space can also be applied beyond urban
areas. In the Australian and Canadian context for example, it illustrates
the effects of economic decline in rural and regional areas,
culminating in the emptying out of once-vibrant towns and an
escalation of rural-urban drift.
This shift to the new mode of production with its far reaching
spatial, political and social implications is encapsulated by the
notion of a shift from a welfare state to a workfare state. Clearly,
social welfare is centrally implicated, as are social workers. It is to
this that I now turn.
From welfare to workfare
T he welfare state has, as has been suggested, been supplanted
by the workf.1re state, as a result of which the definitions of
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 57
wdfure have changed, the institutions and institutional arran.getS
responsible for its delivery have changed, and the practIces
~n . .
. 11d through which welfare IS delivered have changcd (Jessop,
tl1 a C • I '·d .
1999). Social polic~ i.s no~v focused on traI~sl.~n.111~lg t.1C I. .entl.
·111terests capacItles ngllts and responslbiiJt1cs of Its cltlzens
tICS, " . '
that they may become active agents in the pursUIt ofa compeo~~'e
edge in a global economy (Jessop, ibid, p. 353 ). T~1e coalition
f interests that underpinned the welfare state has tragmented,
~nd this fragmcntation has led to demands for a more differentiated
form of economic and social policy - that is, approaches to
poliCY that treat djflerent groups of people in different w~ys.
The workfare state is gcared to promote permanent 1l1novation
and flexibility in an open economy. It has abandoned full
employment for full employability (in which a goven~ment se~ks
to engage tile unemployed in job preparation and Job seeking
instead of providing actual ernployment) as it seeks to promote
structural and systelnic competitiveness. Welfare services, once
delivered as part of a parcel of citizenship rights, are now pulled
apart and bundled together in new ways as additional means to
benefit business, demoting the individual citizen to second place
in the dynamic. Finally, there has been (to shifting degrees) devolution
ofpolicy and its operations to sub-national levels along with
a transfer of delivel), of services away from the state to nOll-state
sectors.
While experienced differently in different countries, it should
be quite clear by now that social workers wherever they are need
to think about what can be learned from post-Fordist political
economy in regard to welfare generally and for social work in
particular. In the first place, it is a framework which encourages
appreciation tlut much of what is occurring in the broader
economy and society, in the human sen'ices and to the wclfare
state in particular, is a result of the role of the welfare state and
the human services within the economy. In other words, a political
economic analysiS rnoves beyond the value-laden rhetoric
normally employed to justify the welfare stat\! (represented , for
example, by claims about the social rights of citizens), but which
cannot account for the recent developments except by bluster, or
conversely, by silence. It also assists social workers to fully appreciate
that welfare is not immune from the economy, and that
indeed it never was. Welfare, in whatever specific regime-inspired
58 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
guise, is very much implicated in the emerging mode ofregulation
in the post·Fordist society.
Similarly, post·Fordism would suggest to social workers that
the various contexts of practice have all the characteristics of an
industry undergoing significant restrucUlring. In other words, the
traditional ways the profession has of understanding its context
may not be particularly useful in this new era. While social work
has the capacity to acknowledge and locate itsclfwithin an environment,
the assumed characteristics of that environment have
altered (if they were ever present). The notion, for example, ofa
logical, more or less integrated and stable service delivery system,
overseen, managed and negotiated by autonomous professional
workers, is patently inadequate in the context forecast for LIS
by a post-Fordist framework. Rather, service delivery systems
have become more complex, particularly since the introduction
of quasi-markets in contexts once characterized by state
bureaucracies.
This and related themes will be developed in Chapters 6
and 7 where I examine the implications of a post-Fordist political
economy for the production and management of welfare in
tlle new mode of regulation. Traditional work practices associated
with professional and autonomous practice in welf..1re states
have and will continue to change. vVages and conditions will
increasingly be exposed to market forces. Significant inequalities
will probably develop in the welfare work force as a whole.
State services will probably reduce their commitment to training
and development, particularly if they are no longer the cl1.ief
provider. Those employees whose skills are in demand will in all
likelihood exert or reassert professional power. Issues of training,
licensing) and credentialing in these groups will arise. The nonprofit
and for-profit sectors will be drawn more tightly into the
service delivery system or structure. vVhat they do will be set by
policy developed at the centre, their ongoing behavior controlled
and monitored by contract provisions. The likely sClv ice-delivery
outcomes for people who usc our sen'ices is unclear) though many
fear that there will be even greater inequality of provision than
existed under the welfare state as the market processes differentiate
between types of providers.
Overall, post-Fordism provides an explanation for many of the
processes and outcomes currently being experienced by social
THE ECONOMICS OF CHANGE 59
workers. These developments are shaking the context, or more
accurately, contexts in which social work is practiced to the very
core. It should, however, be acknowledged that post-Fordism
is an analytical frarnework which has been accused of being
overly deterministic (in dtat is positions the economy as the key
dynamic), and ovcrly silent about the role of human agency (in
cl,at people arc represented as relatively powerless pawns). (See
Williams, 1994 for a good account of the limits of post-Fordism,
and Carter and Raynor, 1996, for a well-argued account of why
a post-Fordist analysis may over-emphasize transformist tendencies
in welfare states.) Nevertheless, post-Fordism, at a minimum,
warns us not to think of welfare or social workers as creatures
entirely of our own making. As it relentlessly draws our attention
towards the role ofthe welfare state cum workfare in the mode of
governance and regulation associated with economic functioning,
it positions social workers and odler human service professionals
as players in a much larger game.
[n conclusion, whatever else it did, the welfare state forged
a social bond between citizens, and between citizens and the
state. It rested on a sovereign state, the political entity which
institutionalized tlle welfare state to stabilize that social bond.
As we have seen, that sovereignty is compromised by economic
globalization, albeit to differing degrees depending on the orientation
ofparticular governments. As Devetak and Riggott ( l999,
p. 487) argue 'dle urge for free markets and small government
has created asymmetries in the relationship between the
global economy and dIe national state'. Economic globalization
does make it harder for governments to compensate for market
mechanisms and market failure; it makes it harder to tax capital
and tllereby to underwrite social cohesion. Finally, it makes it
mare difficu-'t to run welfare states. In such circumstances, how
does the state respond~ This question forms the substance of
the next chapter.
I..
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4 Challenging Social Work:
The Politics of Change
Economic globalization has political dimensions as well as political
implications. It is bodl reality and rhetoric. As has been suggested
in Chapter 3, associated with economic globalization are very real
sets of developments which have placed considerable pressure on
sovereign states. But it has a rhetorical dimension as well in that
some states and some governments cOllch their responses in
terms of urgency and inevitability, and in doing so, position those
responses as the sote policy option available to them. The form
of politics that has emerged and become dominant in some (but
by no means all ) countries has been dubbed 'conviction politics'
of the 'no alternative' school (Peck, 2001, p. 445), drawing on
a highly contested analysis promoted by the 'business school globalization
thesis' (Watson and H ay, 2003, p. 291) . As an upshot
of this, we can sec quite different policy trajectories developed to
manage states and their economies in the current era, evident in
the varying responses of the European countries to those of the
Anglo countries of Britain, the United States, Canada, Australia
and New Zealand. In this chapter, 1 focus specifically on d1C
political responses and policy orientations commonly found in
the latter group; on the overall dominant political assemblage
of neolibcralisl11, on associated developments in how the state
is both managed and transformed, and on the consequences of
those processes.
Attending to this level of response (that is to the politics of
change) is important for social workers because, as will become
clear) aUof the nation states identified above are well advanced
in the process of reconstruction. When viewed together and
within the broader political logic of ncoliberalism, the constellation
of processes identified and discussed in this chapter result
in a comprehensive re-scaling of governance, social policy and
citizenship. In doing so, the assumptions which underpinned
the operations of states, and which breathed life into various
61
62 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
concrete modes of social citizenship via access to, for eX;:'lInple,
social welfare services have been unraveled. Instead, a new set
of assumptions is in place which has significant implications for
social workers collectively as a group of people committed to the
promotion of social citizenship, and individually at the level of
day-to-day practice.
The rise of the neoliberal state
Esping-Anderson (1999; 1990) characterized the group of countries
identified above as the liberal welfare states, with the
emphasis on liberal. As liberal states each was, to a greater or
lesser degree, committed to the freedom of its citizens who as
rational actors sought to advance their own well-being within an
institutional framework that both supports and promotes those
aspirations. T he liberal states were committed economically to
the extension and promotion of market forces in society as widely
as possible. Politically they were committed to a constitutional
state with limited powers of intervention in the economy and
society, and an associated commitment to maximizing the formal
freedom of legally recognized actors both in the economy and in
the public sphere. Thc latter freedom involved freedom of association
of individuals to pursue any activities not forbidden by
constitutionally valid law (O'Brien and Penna, 1998).
The ttcolibcral state is both a continuance and more importantly,
an intensification of liberalism. What is most interesting
aboLLt this new mode of liberalism is that it is a form of what
Beck (2000) calls 'high politics', in that it presents itself and is
represented in the media, for example, as cntirely non-political. In
other words, it has developed a truth-like stature in public debates
which weakens awareness of it as a set of political ideas for which
there are credible alternatives. For social theorists Bourdieu and
Wacquant (2001 ), for example, neoliberalisll1 is the new 'planetary
vulgate' or biblical text for the contemporary era, its ideas
crisscrossing the globe like transcontinental traffic (Wacquant,
1999). For Beck (2000) it is a thought virus, virulently contagious
in the tiberal welf..lre states, but nevertheless quite infectious in the
others. The prevailing dominance of neoliberalisl11 in the intellectual
and practical dimensions of politics serves to limit the
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 63
range of politically legitimate options open to governments and
to oppositions. This, inevitably, increasingly consnains political
debate (Peck, 2001 ).
While neoliberalism, like liberalism varies according to different
national conditions, cultures and histories, it nevertheless has
some generic features (Peck and Tickeil, 2002). Increasingly, the
term 'neoliberalism' has usurped other older and perhaps more
familiar labelssLlch as Thatcherism, Regeanomics and Rogernomics
which referred to specific political projects in Britain, the USA
and New Zealand respectively. Similarly, it is more widely Llsed than
its counterparts (for example economic rationalism, monetarism,
neoconservatism, managerialism and contractualism) .
Lamer (2000) suggests that neoliberalisl11 can be interpreted
three ways, all of which contribute to an understanding of what
it is. It can, for example, be interpreted as a particular policy
fi'al1tCWo1'k emphasizing a shift from the traditional welfare state
to a policy framework that focuses on creating the conditions
of international competitiveness. The (familiar) policy prescriptions
involve the rolling back ofwelfare state activities and a new
emphasis on market provision of public services. NeoliberaIism
rests on five values: the primacy of the individual, freedom of
choice, market security, laissez fairc and minimal government.
These values underpin a body of influential middle-range microe~
conomic theories which 'carry' the neoliberal reform agenda into
the apparatus and functioning of the state and, importantly, its
agents. These are transaction costs economics, public choice and
agency theory, 'all of which I discuss in due course, and which
taken together provide a relatively coherent theoretical and ideological
rationale.
Another interpretation of neoliberalism which deepens our
appreciation of it is provided by the types of political economists
discussed in the previous chapter (Jessop, 2002b; Peck, 2001 ;
Peck and Tickel!, 2002, 1994, 1992). [n these interpretations
neotiberalism was, in its first manifestation, a set of ideas with
intellectual roots traceable back to founding economists Adam
Smith and David Ricardo, revived in 1944 by Hayek in his
polemic tome, The Road to Se1fdom. The contemporary intellectual
agenda of neolibcralism, called proto-liberalism by Peck
and Tickel! (2002 ) was forged in conservative think tanks such
as the London-based Institute of Economic Affairs and the
64 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
vVashington-based Heritage Foundation, and in the Economics
Department of the U niversity of Chicago (the home of Milton
Friedman) from the end of the war to the 1980s. In the 1980s
and early 1990s, it developed into what we now know was an
extremely significant political strategy, exemplified by Margaret
Thatcher in Britain and Ronald Reagan in the USA. Peck and
Tickell (2002 ) call this roll-back neoliberalism, in that it was a
state program which did just that. As is comprehensively docllmented,
its dominant discourses were those ofsmall government,
privatization and de-regulation, its economics were supply-side
and monetarist, its spaces and actors of resistance were organized
industrial and labor conflict, its casualties were the northern
industrial cities of England and Scotland, the rust-belt cities of
the USA and the global army of the mass unemployed.
Many predicted that it would fall apart at the seams as the
casualties mounted (particularly in the public eye). Instead neoliberalism
has transformed itself, become normalized on both sides
of contemporary politics, and is increasingly taken for granted.
Exemplified by the governments of Bill Clinton in the USA and
Tony Blair in the UK (and in an earlier version, in the Australian
Hawke-Keating government), the latest mode of neoliberalism
has emerged. It is a more technocratic and managerial form of
neoliberalism operationalized by cadres of political advisers and
public servants within government and supported by new sets
of ideas about how to achieve the good society drawn not only
from economics, but also from sociology (for example, Giddens,
1998). Peck and Tiekell (2002) call this, the latest and contemporary
phase, roll-out neoliberalism. Here, they argue, it has
acquired a diffuse but consolidated form, and its central tenants
are now firmly entrenched within mainstream political thought.
It is characterized by marketized service delivery systems, low
levels of inflation, full employability instead of full employment,
government debt retirement and moral authoritarianism towards
segments of the population (for example, the unemployed and
welfare-dependent single parents). 1nternal rcsistance within leftleaning
political parties has collapsed and/or has re-located out
into the social movements and tlle anti-globalization confrontations.
One of thc most important implications of this deepening
ofneoliberalism has been the (often successful) attcmpts to
sequester economic policy issues beyond the formal institutions
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 65
of politics and place them beyond the arenas of contestation
behind the (closed) doors of central banks. Again, it is important
to remember that such trajectories depend on the contexts
in which they are enacted. fu indicated previollsly, while Britain
has the Blair Government, Australia had an earlier version of
neoliberal rule in the Labor Hawke-Keating government, whose
policy trajectory has subsequently intensified under an incoming
conservative government. The central point to appreciate is that
roll-back and roll-out neoliberalism represent ideas or a model
about how neolibcralism developed, the actual manifestation of
which varies according to local contingencies.
A tllird way of interpreting neoliberalism is found in what is
known as the govern11'zentality literature (Larner, 2000; Rosc,
1999; Dean, 1999; Dean and H indess, 1998). Drawing on t.he
work of Mchel FOllcault, this is a literature which I discuss in
more depth in the next chapter. For the purposes of this discussion,
neolibcralism is understood by governmcntality scholars less
as a policy framework or set of ideas and practices of government,
and more as a wide-ranging and all-encompassing mode of
governance involving a complex and inter-connected array ofstate
and non-state processes and sites. This new mode of governance
re-draws the relationship between social and economic tllOlIght,
and all aspects ofsocial behavior are reconfigured along economic
lines. Rose (1999) for example, illustrates how lleoliberalism
encourages governments to reject the ideal ofa welfare state which
takes direct responsibility for arranging the affairs of a nation.
Re-vamped Iib'eral states become enabling states that govern indirectly,
by activating and promoting a range ofnon-state processes.
Neoliberal states, for example, govern by acting on an individual's
choices to promote such desirable economic ends as a flexible
workforce engaged in life-long learning and responsive to the
needs of a globalized economy. It is a way of tllinking about
neoliberal governance which draws together a range of developments:
for example the re-shaping of the relationship between
professionals and the state, the rise of risk technologies, the explosion
of audit as a mechanism for government regulation, and the
reconstitution of citizens as consumers. It helps explain why it
is that the neoliberal state is often more not less interventionist
in the lives of its citizens in that it reveals how the state reaches
inside communities and families to activate tlleir capacity for
66 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
self-governance. It also helps explain why, for example, the neoliberal
state can (and often does) involve 1nore expenditure that
traditional Jjberal governments as it organizes and rationalizes its
int~rvcnt:ions in djvcrsc, fragmented and spatiaUy dispersed ways.
Each of these three ways of thinking about neoliberaIism allow
us to appreciate its dimensions and its subtlety as a political
strategy, and one which represents not a break with the past
but an intensification and magnification of trends and impuJses
embedded within liberalism. As indicated earlier, neoliberalislll is
~le dominant political rationality in the Anglo nations, but also
1ll other parts ofthe world. Many of its prescriptions, for example
about how states should organize themselves, have been transported
into the so-called developing nations by the World Bank
and the IMF, via the 'first' and 'second' generations of reforms
nominated by their Structural Adjustment Programs (Common,
1998; World Bank, 1997). In these instances, and in the case of
the Anglo nations, one of the primary agendas and consequential
effects has been a re-configuration of the state. Given the importance
of the state to the bureau-profession of social work, these
developments are of considerable concern. It is to this that we
now turn.
From governing to governance
For some time now, the public administration literature has
discussed the phenomenon known as the 'hollowing out' of
the state, referring to neoliberal-inspired developments in public
sector management. To illustrate the extent of change, I first
est~bljsh a base-line ofwhat went before, particularly in the Anglo
natlons. Clearly, each of these nation states organized the process
of governance differently, and no single 'pure' model existed.
Neverthd ess, some core principles guided the development of
the public administrative apparatus and its role in governance.
These are, for example, an apolitical civil service in which public
servants have no discernible political allegiances and which can
serve any master but witllin a clear framework of serving the
public, a hierarchical organizational design in which the processes
of work arc constrained by explicit and formal rules, life-long
employment tenure, and a focus on ad ministrative equity. Under
the old model, when a public sector body was responsible for
THE POllTlCS OF CHANGE 67
a function, it carried out that function itself with its own staff.
Finally, public servants were held accountable to the public via
elected representatives.
For a variety of(again) contested reasons, tile traditional model
waS at a minimum undermined, and in some cases (such as in
Britain and New Zealand) thoroughly disgraced. Pressure for
change came most directly from the political right, expressed in
their desire to replace the traditional model with a marketized
and minimalist state. These turn of events resulted in the coining
of a new term to capture the parlous state of the traditional
model - the o!'"loaded state (Skelcher, 2000). Responding ro
increasing perceptions of the un-governability of complex indusrriaJized
democracies, the overloaded state adherents pointed to
such developments in the 1970s in particular oframpant industrial
unrest, industrial dcdine and increasing public cynicism about tile
welfare state and the associated economic management model.
The overall conclusion was that government was in crisis, that tile
institutions of government had seriously over-reached themselves
and that reform was both inevitable and highly desirable.
Accordingly, the overloaded state was replaced by the hollow
state. Two influential students ofpublic administration have been
largely responsible for the growing popularity of the hollow state
or hollow crown thesis. One is American (Peters, 1996) and the
other British (lU1Odes, 1994). Drawing on their analyses, four
inter-related trends can be observed which stem from the loss of
legitimacy ofthe overloaded state: tile privatization and limitation
ofthe scope and forms ofpublic intervention; loss offunctions by
government departments to alternative service delivery systems;
the loss of functions by government to transnational institutions
(such as the European Union); and the curtailment of public
service discretion. Such processes, it is said, have rendered the
state a shadow of its former self.
But has tile state hollowed out? According to some commentators
(for example Sbragia, 2000), the hollow state thesis has
been overstated and relics too much on an eccentric period of
speCifically British histOlY (the Thatcher years). While evidence
can be mounted that the state is fragmented, it should be noted
that it was ever thus. Because of its powerful and undiminished
resource-allocation functions the state retains considerable
Control, albeit within a fragmented and often loosely coordinated
68 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
system. T he belief that the state is shrinking has been influenced
by the fate that had bef.lllen the welfare part of it. In public
perceptions the 'big state' was inevitably hitched to the expansive
and expensive publicly provided social programs, income security
payments and other programs which mediated the relationship
between capitol and labor. As the welfare statc has been cut back,
the traditional role of government appea'rs to be under assault.
This view relies on a quite narrow perception of the entirety of
the state, and in doing so, f..1.ils to account for the actual range
of state activity, unaffected or minimally aftccted by cut backs.
Indeed, in some areas (such as law and order and security) state
activity has actually expanded.
What the hollow state thesis really implies is a shift in the form
ofgovernment to one of governance. Governance is a much overused
word in contemporary policy and political discourse, ranging
from a blanket term re-defi ning the extent and form of public
intervention coupled with the use of markets and quasi-markets
to deliver public services, ali the way to prescriptions of how
to manage corporations. It can also refer to such principles and
practices as: an efficient public service, an independent judicial
system and legal framework to enforce contracts, the accountable
administration of public funds, an independent public auditor
responsible to a representative legislature, respect for law and
human rights at all levels of government, a pluralistic institutional
structure and a free press. Championed by the World Bank in the
'developing' nations, this mode of governance essentially involves
a form of neocolonialist advocacy of liberal democracy as 'best
practice' in government.
More recently governance is understood as an integrated, interdependent,
mutually co-operative system ofsocial sectors (government,
market, voluntary, informal) in which central government
is no longer necessarily supreme. Here, governance becomes a
broader term and a broader process no longer purely confined
to the activities of a government, with services provided by any
permutation of the state in conjunction or partne'rship with the
private and voluntalY sectors. In this sense, governance means
managing networks and centrally involves social coordination. In
the social welfare field, this is reflected in the development and
management of a mixed economy of wel£1rc in which the state
works with families, local communities, business and the voluntary
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 69
sector in the provision of a range of supports and services. In
most ofthe Anglo countries, this form of governance, sometimes
known as the netJ110rked state, is dominant. To understand both
why and holV the traditional model of government was reworked,
we need to turn to a body of intermediate mid-range microeconomic
theorizing which carried the intent of the neoliberal political
project into the operations of the state and into the field of
welfare. Again, this is a set of hugely influential ideas which have
transformed the organizational contexts ofprofessional social work
practice. Strangely, they are ideas which are barely acknowledged,
must least discllssed in the social work literature.
The microeconomics of new public management
The constellation ofmanagement prescriptions for re-engineering
the state are known as New Public Management (NPM). Under
NPM a new set of management doctrines take precedence, to
greater or lesser degrees, depending on the jurisdiction. Some
countries (such as New ZeaJand and Britain) went further along
the NPM path than, for example, Australia. In all the Anglo COUIl tries
the field of welfare has been decisively incorporated into the
management reform programs informed by NPM. The sorts of
policy prescriptions are: a shift of focus by public sector leaders
from policy to management, an emphasis on quantifiable performance
measurements and appraisal, the break-up of traditional
blireaucratiO-structures into quasi-autonomous units, dealing with
one another on a user-pays basis, market-testing and competitive
tendering instead of in-house provision, a strong emphasis on
COst-cutting, output targets rather than input controls, limitedterm
contracts for state employees instead ofcareer tenure, monetized
incentives instead of fixed salaries, 'freedom to manage'
instead of ccntral personnel control, more use of public relations
and advertising and encouragement of self-regulation instead of
legislation (Hood, 1991).
Notably, management authorities Osborne and Gaebler (1992,
p. 20) argued that NPM is entrepreneuri"l:
Most entrepreneurial governments promote competition between
service providers. They empower citizens by pushing control out of
the bureaucracy, into the community. They measure the performance
I
70 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
of their agencies, focusing not on inputs but on outcomes. They are
driven by their goals - their missions - not by their rules and regulations.
They redefine their clients as customers and offer choices. They
prevent problems before they emerge, rather than simply offering
services afterwards. They put their energies into earning money rather
then simply spending it. They decentralize authority, embracing participatory
management. They prefer market mechanisms to bureaucratic
mechanisms. And they focus not simply on providing public services,
but on catalyzing all sectors - public private and voluntary - into action
to solve their community's problems.
The concepts of NPM are drawn largely from an interconnected
group of theories applied to the business of government transaction
costs theory (Williamson, 1975), public choice
theory (Buchanan and Tullock, 1980) and principal-agent theory
(Grossman and Hart, 1983). It is the latter two of these that are
of singular interest to social workers because far-reaching decisions
have been and continue to be informed by them, but as
indicated above, do not reside in our field ofknowledge and more
worryingly, are rarely acknowledged by it. Just as neoclassical
economics (the economic version of neoliberalism) is centraIly
implicated in the reconfiguratioll of national economies, public
choice and principal-agent theories re-configure the state.
Public choice theory is the study of politics based on economic
principles, with a key assumption that politicians and public
servants (in fact cvelyone including social workers) are motivated
by self-interest. They are self-interested utility maximizers.
Reasoning deductively, economists consider what a rational actor
(a consumer) an entrepreneur, a trade unionist, a politician,
a public servant, a social worker) would do to maximize his or
her chances of getting what he or she wants or to gain some
advantage. 1n the language of public choice) rational actors 1naximize
their own return. Those involved in government, however,
have the job of providing public goods and services. But they
are rational actors.and as such, will usc their position for material
self-advancement and enrichment. A consequence of this from
the pubEc choice perspective is that policy is distorted away
from the preferences and interests of the majority of citizens
towards those of the elite and those who put policy into practice.
The entrepreneurial and rational actor characteristics of public
servants cause them to run public sector agencies in their own
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 71
. 'ests rather than in the interests of economic and social eAi-mtel < • • •
. Y 111 public choice theon.1terminology, this ISknown as rentClcnc. . .J
seeking. .
From a public choice perspective, the role ofvalues or Ideology
is irrelevant. If anything, values and ideologies serve to ma~k
rational action. Values such as altruism, comJ~itm~nt to SOCIal
. 'ce commitment to the notion of professIonalism and sets
JUsu , . . '
of professional ethics, or commitment. to the Ide.als of a~ Imp~r.
I public service - all of these have lIttle place In publIc chOlceoa - , t..
theory. Public choice prescriptions for the busine.s~ ?f po ~t1~S
d government seek to constrain the power of polinclans. Simi-an .
lady, public choice prescriptions for government seek to constra.In
the power and discretion of public servants (for example, social
workers) by, for example, exposing public functions to competitive
tendering. Another tactic is the relocation of government
functions outside of government (contracting out). By such
processes, public choice-inspired reforms have inf1uen~ed .the
redesign of state organizations (for example, .corpora?Za?Oll,
the establishment of separate business units withlll orgaruzauons,
and introduction of internal markets). It has also inspired the
search for more efficient use of money and people. Furthermore
whereas once such functions were substantially supported
by co'nsolidated revenue, they are now funded increasingly from
user charges and co-payments. .
Agency theol)' is a partiClllarly influential strand of public
choice theory. It introduced rnany of the principles that now
characterize' pubLic service delivery including social welfare, for
example, the concepts of principals and agents. Agency the~ry
examines the relationship between principals and agents. A principal
is she who sets the task; an agent is he who implements
it. The central problem for principals is how to control agents,
particularly opportunistic rent seeking agents. Popularized by
Osborne and Gaebler (1992) in one of that decade's most influential
books, Reinventing Gopernmcnt, the metaphors steering
and rOlPing introduced the model to the public sector.
According to principal-agent theory, principals have twO broad
strategies for keeping agents in line. First, there arc structu.ral
solutions (that is, increasing the information available to prmcipals
through performance indicators and increa~ed fU1anc~a1
accountability). Second, there are contractual solutions (that IS)
72 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
opening up internal operations of state agencies to various forms
of tender, thereby creating competition or increasing contestabiJity
through the use ofcontracts). Contracts are the key medium
negotiating the relationship between principals and agents. Relationships
constructed within a contract are subject to contract
law, and can be enforced though legal action. In a good contract,
the tasks are deady defined, the responsibilities of the agent
delineated, performance indicators set. Contracting, by its specified
and regulated nature, is thought to overcome the risks of
rent seeking inherent in principal-agent relationships. In this way,
accountability is maximized and effects of rent seeking behavior
are lllinimized.
The use ofthese microeconomic concepts in NPM is more than
a decade old and shows little sign offading away, underscoring the
imperatives for social workers to understand both the theories and
their effects. Not only do they re-configure the state as a site for
social workers to engage in practice, they also create new sites run
on different and unfamiliar principles. These issues, particularly as
they relate to the actllal practice of social work, will be explored
in some depth in Chapter 6. Here, we turn to a discussion of
some other developments in the new politics of welfare. The first
of these is the spectacular rise of a new mode of risk and risk
management as a core task of government.
The Renaissance of risk
Welfare states have always managed risk and for social workers,
risk is not an unfamiliar construct. In the new circumstances
confronting us however, the traditional orientation of welfare
states to risk management through income security policies and
programs and other social services has waned. Clearly, many life
risks faced by citizens are still mostly managed by the provision
and use of welfare, but public welfare consumption in whatever
form is an increasingly residual activity confined to fewer and
fewer people. In contrast to the past, contemporary policy debates
deploy risk in two main ways - first, as seemingly technical fix to an
(overloaded) system, and second, as a moral discourse inscribing
new identities. In the first, developments associated with late
modernity are held to pose new sets of risks that the existing
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 73
institutional arrangements of the welfare state cannot manage.
In the second the notion of risk is employed through neoliberal
discourse to reject and invalidate the welfare state, to problematize
welfare dependency, and individualize responsibility for managing
life course risks.
In the first usage, social policy theorists and practitioners are
returning to d1e concept ofrisk, but do so to provide an analytical
framework to think about change, radler than justify the post-war
Keynesian welfare state (see Goodin, 2000; Taylor-Gooby, 2000;
Esping-Anderson, 1999). The core thesis of such arguments is
that the institutional arrangements of the post-war welfare state
were designed to manage certain types of risks and to respond to
the risk structure of its times; predicated on the prevailing family
type and prevailing labor market conditions. As these conditions
have disappeared and as the f.:'1mily disintegrates, the role ofpolicy
is to promote alternative institutional arrangements to manage
the emergent categories ofrisk. An example, drawn from Australia
(and watched carefully by other countries) was the development
of compulsory occupational superannuation to privately fund the
retirements of future generations of aging people.
In the second categOl)" the concept of risk is employed largely
as a political strategy (see Culpitt, 1999; Rose, 1999). Specifically,
these authors develop an analysis that shows how the dominant
political discourses of neoliberalism have problematized welfare
dependency, and privatized the management of all forms of care
and responsibility. In other words, they show how it is that
risk is employed as a device to legitimize dle winding back of
collective responsibility for managing social dependencies, social
problems, and even the small problems of everyday life. FLLrthermore,
they show us how it is that the new strategies of managing
social dependencies as 'risk' involves the ascription of particular
categories of people to new, highly disciplined and socially
excluded social identities. This way ofthinking about risk provides
us with a means to 'read' such influential authors as Lawrence
Mead (1986), whose ideas underpin a whole raft of policy initiatives
introduced in western liberal democracies. What Mead does
in his work is to position d1e dependent as a 'risky' group of
people, requiring a whole new strategic response (welfare reform)
Which is, at the same time, an entirely new political strategy
(workfare).
74 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Taking citizenship to the market
A second and perhaps more important implication of the ncw
politics ofwelfarc is thc re-shaping of citizenship. Again, this is a
developmcnt which is ofcentral interest to social workers because
it re-shapes how the state views the people who usc social work
services. One of the features of modern western democracics is
that they have governed individuals as citizens. In the neoliberal
regimes, they continue to govern citizens, but the question turns
to the type ofcitizens being crcated. Traditionally, the citizen was
understood as a rights-bearing individual who, depending on the
type of welfare regime in place, made claims on the state. Under
the liberal democratic model the citizen was constructed as a
member ofa political community whose interests were collectively
expressed by the system of governance. The citizen contracted
into the social and political community of the nation, and in so
doing, both created and contracted with the body politic. The
citizen, by becoming a member of the body politic, created along
with other citizens a collective or public will. In other words there
was a collective, an all-oI-us that the state embodied, which has
responsibility for us and duty to govern us. In this context, social
rights translated into social welfare services and othcr forms of
SLlpport provided by the state (Bulmer and Rees, 1996).
Accompanying the neoliberal project has been a steady weakening
of the welfare citizenship model, and as we have seen in
this and the previous chapter, a concomitant deterioration of the
institutions of citizenship. Instead, the application of the neoliberal
political strategy to the apparatus of the state through NPM
has lead to the markctization and individualization of citizenship.
The shrinking of the state through privatization parrialiy
devolves the institutional site for 20th century citizenship into
the private sphere. vVhile there are clear variances between nation
states in the extent to whjch this has occurred, the starkest
example of this is the rise of the 'corporate social worker' in
the United States where, routinely, welfare sen'ices such as child
care and disability support services arc provided by large corporations
such as Maximus lnc and Lockheed-Martin (Frumkin and
Andre-Clark, 1999). Indeed, under conditions of welfare reform
in that country (and increasingly in others such as Australia),
social citizenship has practically no place. Further, as nations
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 75
follow the prescriptions of the OECD and dc-regulate their labor
markets, employment and decent working conditions cease being
citizenship rights, but become something differentially extended
by employers to their workers dependent on market considerations
alone (Crouch, Eder and Tambini, 2001 ). Tn this way, the
rights of citizenship are further devolved to and dependent on
the capacities and characteristics of individuals.
Currently, the deve!opments in the public sector resulting
from the application of NPM are fundamentally reconstructing
thc relationship between the citizen, the public and the state.
In the emerging set of arrangements, the contractual relationship
between the collective or the body politic and the state is
replaced by a new contractual relationship, a 'radically disaggregated
and individualized relationship to governance' (Yeatman,
1996, p. 285 ). 111 other words, a type of mdical iudi"idltalism is
emerging; a heroic '1', replacing the lve) embodied in tllC liberal
democratic model. One of the most cogent expressions of this
was made by Margaret Thatcher who once famously asserted that
there is no sllch tiling as society; rather, tllere are ol1ly individuals.
In effect, she was referring to a retreat from acknowledging any
collective, and an accompanying assertion OftilC heroic individual
as the unit of refe rence for govcrnment.
Rediscovering community
The t1lird implication of the politics of neoliberalism as expressed
in NPM is the reassertion of C01H'Htttttity - a development which
has the potential to disguise many of its implications, particularly
to social workers who, for quite some time, saw community
as an arena of constructive practice. The 'community' of NPM
however is one which has become a central location for thc operations
ofneoliberal politics. At the same time and very confusingly,
community is taken up and promoted by many on the political
left as an alternative space tor re-invigorating forms of citizenship
and reconstructing of social bonds. In this murky and contradjctory
conceptual space, a complex matrix of ideas incorporating
and promoting such idealized phenomena as social capital and
civil society are attempting to articulate the ncw and alternative
political strategy to neoliberalism, while at the same time, being
taken up by it (McDonald and Marston, 2002 ).
76 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Political manifestations of community, such as that promoted
by Blair's Third Way in Britain, draw heavily on the morality
of communitarianisl11. This approach is expressed in a number of
key concepts articulated within a framework of valorized community;
rights and responsibilities, stake holding, inclusion, and partnership.
As a political strategy, it promotes a central role for
non-state community-level structures, and non-state collectivities
as active welfare agents in the lives of British citizens. Commtll1ities
are promoted as an essential part of the new 'good society'.
These new politics of community have been reconstituted as
a central terrain of political debate and contcntion (Everingham,
2001, p. 105). Commll11ity is asserted as both thc site of and
solution to thc social problems associated with the new economic
conditions of a globally competitive economy. With its multiple
meanings and undefined ideas, the matrix of ideas surrounding
the promotion of community as a political strategy provides a
binding rhetoric. In these circumstances, community becomes
a very powerful discourse, legitimizing and inscribing various
forms of strategy, often mobilized via the operations of national
welfare reform projccts. Depending on the particular strategic
intent, community is invoked as a locaLity, as an undifferentiated
network of tax-payers to whom obligation is owed, as arenas for
consultation and participation, as enabling and facilitative place
of welfare service provision, as localities in need of public and
private investment, as participants in and spaces of partnerships,
and as sites for surveillance and enforcement (Cass and Brennan,
2002). This vision of welfare and society presupposes that all
citizens, but particularly those who use welfare, belong to a close
enduring community of citizens who have interests in common.
Unfortunately this assumption, while convenient to the politics
of the moment, is flawed. As social workers know only too well,
many people who use welfare are isolated and marginalized, or in
the parlance of the times, excluded.
Why does all this matter? Why is it important for social workers
to understand the politics of neoliberalism, and the ideas, operations
and implications of NPM? Why is the rise of risk, the
marketization of citizenship and the valorization of community
important? These developments matter because they fundamentally
and comprehensively reconfigure the role, responsibility and
responses ofgovernment to the collective citizenry that constitute
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE 77
nations, and to individual citizens. It is here that this development
intersects with core busincss of social work; that is addressing
and advocating for the interests ofparticular, mostly marginalized
and disadvantaged individuals and groups. Modern social work
draws its primary auspice and moral authority from expressions
of the public good, collective responsibiJity and social justice,
notions currently disappearing from the domain of the state as
it reshapes itself. On another more profoLUld level, these developments
at the level of politics have significant implications for
a profession whose prefix is 'social'. Social work draws mu~h of
its mcaning, its sensc of identity and its legitimacy from Ideas
that have currency in social and to lesser extent liberal democratic
models of governance. In other words, it draws its legitimacy
from models of governance which recognize the social dimension.
Currently, social work and social workers are increasingly located
in states that are no longer welfare states, but are becoming or
have already becomc, workfare states. What then, are the implications
for social work and for tl1C people who lise social work
scn/ices? How these processes drill down to the coal face of social
work practice and welfare service use forms the substance of
Chapters 6 and 7. But before turning to that, there is one other
set of developments challenging social work - developments in
the realm of idcas. Explaining these and identifYing the implications
for social work forms the theme of Chapter 5.
5 Challenging Social Work:
The Ideas of Change
As if the economic and political developments discussed in the
previolls chapters were not enough to contend with, a further
challenge faces the profession; in this instance one which operates
at a quite different level. Indeed, a very important question
confronts social work. Does the emergence ofa body of thought,
loosely known as postmodcrnism (which claims to be a radical
shift in the foundat.ion of knowledge) have any relevance for the
protession~ It constitutes an epistemological challenge, in that it
calls into question the profession's knowledge basco It is also an
ontological chal1enge if slich a thing can be said [0 exist in relation
to a profession. By this I mean that the notions that social
workers might have about themselves as, for example, advocates
and change agents for human betterment, are destabilized. At a
minimum, developments in theory are critical of assumptions
social workers might make about the progressive purposes and
positive identities of social work, both collectively and individually.
O riginating largely with a group ofFrench intellectuals in the
1970s, the challenges arising from this complex body of thought
have, since then, spread into many disciplines and practices. It has
spawned an intellectual project (or more accurately projects) of
such breadth, depth and complexity that a single chapter cannot
possibly hope to capmre its dimensions, much less its import. It is
even difficult to know what to call it. Is it, tor example, most
accurately represented as postmodernism or post-structuralism?
Or has the oeuvre moved sufficiently to warrant an entirely new
name? Given the lack ofcoherence within the total body ofwork,
it is easier said than done to make clear distinctions, and for my
purposes here, such distinctions are largely unnecessary. Rather,
because ofthe pelvasiveness ofthe genre and its rapid penetration
into so many disciplines related to social work I shall, tl1follghout
this chapter, refer to it as contemporary theory.
79 ~
80 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
I wish to do several things here) the first ofwhich is to d(~-"clop
an appreciation of the nature of the challenge posed to social
work. This, I suggest, is very important. While there arc several
very good djscllssions of contemporary theory and its relations
to social work in the professional literature (see, for example,
Powell , 2001; Healy, 2000; Leonard, 1997), few of these clearly
spell out why conternporary theol)' is so destabilizing. I attempt
to do this in the first part of this chapter, hopefuUy in a manner
which is accessible to readers, for unfortunately, much of this
body of work is not! My second purpose is to briefly canvass
how the profession is responding, partially pre·figuring a more
detaikd discussion of options for the future in Part 2. Following
this, I illustrate how concepts and analyses drawn from contern·
porary theOl), can be useful to social work. This latter discus·
sion, by virtue of my personal orientation and limitations (as well
as those posed by the relative brevity of the chapter), is partial
and idiosyncratic ar best. 1 include it to provide one, no doubt
limited example of hOIV an individua1socia1 worker might usefulJy
think about contemporary theory. Those readers who wish to
pursue it further should consult an intraductal), work sllch as
Rosenau (1992) who provides a reasonably accessible yet scholarly
initiation.
Before beginning, it must be acknowledged that the relevance
and utility of contemporary theOl)' to social work is a highly
contested isslle. Parts of the social work academy consider its
application to the professional project to be more characteristic
of intellectual fashion, frivolous at best and nihilistic and destruc·
tive at worst; a way of thinking that the profession should not
become obsessed with (scc Noble, 2004; Powell, 2001; Ife, 1999;
Midgley, 1999a; Wakefield, 1998). Others arc embracing it and
are attempting to incorporate (certain) theoretical insights into
how social work might regard itself, and how social workers
might go about their practice (Fawcett, Featherstone, Fook and
Rossiter, 2000; Healy, 2000; Parton and O 'Bl'rne, 2000). The
position I take is that, tempting as it mjght be, social work cannot
ignore or dismiss contemporary theOl), because, as an intellectual
genre, it is just too big, too pervasive, and too in fluential in
shaping thought in our foundation disciplines. rurd1ern'lOrC, it is
not going to go away in d1e foreseeable future . The critical task
for social work in relation to contemporal), theol)' is, I suggest,
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 81
rcaching some appreciation of what is useful and what is less so.
To do that however)social workers need to grasp the nature ofthe
challenge.
unsettling social work knowledge and practice
At its most basic, contemporary theory is a reaction to modernity
(which was discussed in Chapter 2). Briefly recapping, mode.rn.
ity is a set of philosophical principles held to be the foundation
of modern knowledge. These principles incorporate and promote
the tradition ofrationality initiated in the Enlightenment, a largely
European philosophical movement characterized by rationalism,
by an impetus towards learning, by a spirit of skepticism and
by empiricism in social and political thought. Human progress
(as opposed to the maintenance oftraditions) was held to be dcsir·
able, and the development of industrialized society informed by
scientific knowledge was positioned as the key means ofachieving
it. The Enlightenment project is also known as the 'project of
modernity' (Habermas, 1987)) and was based on two related sets
of assumptions: humanism and objective reality.
Humanism is an extremely complex body of thought with
several main variants (Davies, 1997). Secular humanism, d1e
variant of most interest to modern social work, holds the indi·
vidual to be the ultimate source of value and is dedicated to
fostering the individual's creative and moral development in
meaningful and rational ways, and without reference to the super·
natural. H uman beings are not merely reflections of God. Rather,
each person possesses a unique essence or human nature along
with the capacity for rational consciousness. This essence is, never·
theless, transcendental because it rises above and beyond indi·
vidual circumstances. An individual self is not wholly socially
determined, but exists a priori to engagement in society. In this
way, the individua1 or d1e subject of modernity is born. The
humanistic conception of a coherent subject stands separate fi:om
objective reality. This subject is capable of knowing the other; is
capable of knowing the world external to self, and to which our
language and perceptions refer. This sttbject·object dualism leads
to the notion of representational knowledge.
From an Enlightenmcnt·informed humanistic standpoint, the
mind is conceived as a mirror that reflects an objective and
82 CHAllENGING SOCIAL WORK
external reality. Knowledge and its developrnent concerns itself
with assessing and refining the accuracy of the rnirror's reflections.
Knowledge generation becomes the means by which 'true'
or 'truer' reflections of the outside world or objective reality is
developed. Truth is seen as the correspondence between thought
and language. The human subject can (theoretically) become the
coherent, authentic source of interpretation of the meaning of
reality. The project of modernity is tIle pursuit of truth that has
the character of certainty: Knowledge is truth. Science, including
the social sciences objectively developed and correctly interpreted,
is true. Social science represents the world.
It is this fundamental premise that contemporary theol), unsettles
(Rosenau, 1992), and in doing so, undermines the knowledge
base of modernist enterprises such as social work (Parton,
1994). Knowledge (ortruth) from this perspective is not detached
from the subject, but is inevitably a human artifact or creation
(Murphy, 1988). The reasons why contempora,y theory is so destabilizing
to modernist knowledge are quite complex, but it is
worth engaging to begin to appreciate the nature ofthe challenge.
Much ofthe contemporary critique ofrepresentational knowledge
starts with linguistics, and with an early 20tll century structural
linguist called de Saussure (Rossiter, 2000). His basic premises
werc that language, far from reflecting an objective reality, constitutes
reality for us and that neither social reality nor tIle 'natural'
world has fixed intrinsic meanings which language reflects or
expresses. Saussure assumed that meaning is made possible by the
existence of an underlying system of linguistic and social conventions'
in contrast to the notion that language reflects reality.
Meaning is constituted within language, and is not guaranteed by
tIle subject that speaks it. In other words, the origin of meaning
is not in the individual speaker (the rational humanistic subject),
but lies in the language itself.
Key contemporary theorist, Jacques Derrida (1976), developed
tllis furtIler by questioning the notion that signs (words) have
a fixed meaning, recognized by the self-conscious awareness of
the rational subject. For Derrida, specific meanings arc always
located in discursive contexts and in discounes. But what is a discursive
context? What is a discourse? A discourse is a structure of
knowledge, claims and practices through which we understand
things and through which we decide to do things. Discourses
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 83
define all sorts of phenomena: obligations and the distribution
of responsibilities tor example, or the authority of ditlcrent categories
of people such as social workers and clients (Parton and
O'Byrne, 2000). A discourse is a framework or grid ofsocial organization
that makes some forms of social action possible while
excluding otl1ers. A discursive context is the context or arena in
which particular discourses are enacted. A social work assessment
interview is a discursive context - as is this book. Every discursive
context is different from every other and every discursive moment
is unlike every otIler. Meaning constantly shifts; it is open to
definition and redefinition in different contexts and in different
moments. Meaning depends on the discursive rclations in which
it is located, and is open to reinterpretation again and again.
Derrida developed an analytic process known as deco1lstructio1J.,
a method of grasping the 'unwritten' in texts, for example the
unacknowledged biases of accepted representational knowledge.
In doing so, he was critical of the notion tllat tllcre is a 'truth',
or an unequivocal 'best' way of knowing. This type of theoretical
perspective poses a significant challenge to all modernist
modes ofthinking which rely on representational knowledge, and
in its wake, to social work theory and practice. The explanatory
models and theories commonly employed in the field of social
work - at the macro-level of policy analysis and the micro-level
of the worker-dient encounter - become unstuck. An 'emotionally
disturbed client', for example, is not recognized/constituted
by the rational mind of the social worker assessing an objective
reality inherent in tIle service user. Rather, both the client and
the therapist arc understood to be 'resident in' (or created by)
the 'talk' or discursive formation of the 'pathological model'.
Contemporary theory suggests that we can no longer trustingly
accept the assertions and analyses of social theories as being
unequivocally true. The modes of analysis and guiding assumptions
of both neo-marxist theories of society and psychological
theories ofpersonality, for example, unravel. Furthermore, as tlley
are dcconstructed, the unsaid orientations and hidden biases arc
brought to tile surface and the theories themselves arc revealed as
discourses which create one truth by denying others. The gender
biases of some Marxist accounts and the cultural biases of some
western psychology are, for example, revealed. For contemporal),
thCOlY, the notion that there are fundamental principles of social
84 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
organization or that there is a elemental human psyche is questioned.
Social organization is better thought ofas multipk discursive
contexts in which social relations between the social worker
and the service user are constituted. Notions ofthe human psyche
deployed by social workers in practice encounters with clients are,
fi'om this point of view, texts awaiting deconstruction. In this
way, readers can begin to see how the knowledge platforms and
assumptions underpinning social work appear to fold under the
weight of theoretical developments. But it doesn't end there!
Other foundational theorists in the oetfPre such as Lyotard
(1984) and Foucault (1976, 1980) are similarly anti-'truth'. They
point out that despite its hopes, dle project of modernity has
not produced much emancipation. The promise of continuous
enlightenment is confuted by calamities such as senseless wars,
genocide and urban decay (Leonard, 1997). It was Lyotard,
for example, who famously employed the notion of incredulity
tOlPardsgrand narratives; those influential perspectives on history
and society developed, for example, by Karl Marx and Sigmund
Freud. Lyotard maintained that it is not possible tell large stories
about the world, only small local stories from multiple, heterogeneous
subject positions ofindividuals and social groups. Foucault,
on the other hand, insisted that what is understood as 'knowledge'
can (and must) be traced to the different discursive practices
in which it is generated. In other words, there are a range of
discourses and practices that make up various localized knowledges.
Social scientific knowledge constitutes what are called
regimes oftruth which can (at worst) silence or (at best) discount
other knowledges and ways of knowing. Contemporary theory
is profoundly mistrustful of this aspect of dle social sciences,
particularly when they conceal their own investment in a particular
view of dle world and their privileged position in the modernist
regime of truth.
In so far as it relies on social science, social work knowledge is
equally suspect. I present two key examples. First, contemporary
theory disrupts the idea ofthe subject as an a priori self-contained
being who is the holder of sense and meaning. This mode of
subjectivity infuses all social work knowledge, and it is the mode
upon which we assume we act when we practice. From the
perspective of contemporary theory, this mode of self has largely
disappeared, leaving in its wake a jumbled surfeit of potential
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 85
identities. The social work assumption d13t there is a selfwho can
be known or brought to know itself (through social work interventions),
is reduced to acknowledgement that social workers,
as practitioners, both engage with and promote one (or morc)
possible identity (ies) among many. Foucault, for example, would
be curious about the implications of the client-self we create in
our practice. He would suggest, (and this constitutes the second
example), that social work practice theories propel a particular
complex of ,truths' which serve instead to fabricate the individual
or constitute the subject on which it acts. We 'create' social work
clients with particular attributes and dispositions (for example, as
co-dependent, anxious, disempowered) which at the same time,
shuts down possibilities and disallows the expression of alternatives.
In this way, contemporary theory would argue that social
work practice theory (and social work practice) produces the very
bodies and minds (and their 'problems') that we seek to ameliorate
(Jeffreys, 2003).
Clearly contemporary theory challenges social work practice in
many ways, not all of which we can canvas here. Some examples
are, nevertheless, instructive. According to some writers contemporalY
theory challenges the profession's idea of its humanist
mission (Margolin, 1997). Prior to the rise ofsocial work, political
surveillance by government of certain (marginalized) populations
was largely restricted to the public domain of the school or the
street. With the advent and development of social work, governments
were able to keep track ofpeople in their homes and within
their personah·elationships. Social work, Margolin claims, mystifies
and normalizes these intrusive aspects of itself into the lives
of its clients. In like vein (and for Rossiter, 2000), contemporary
theory creates a 'crisis of identity' about who social workers really
are and what social workers actually do.
Contemporary theory challenges social work in what it positions
as the profession's extremely naiVe, but for the profession,
fortuitous understanding ofpower. Foucault, for example, would
suggest that modern forms of power (such as those in which
social work is enmeshed) are, paradoxically, most potent when
they are concealed, as they tend to be in social work relations
(Foucault, 1982). What Foucault means is that social workers are
so industrious in working to weaken or overcome unequal power
relations between themselves and their clients that their efforts
86 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
conceal the fact that such power relations cannot be broken down,
and that social workers' activities contribute to their maintenance.
For authors such as Margolin (1997) and Leonard (1997), social
work adopts a particularly insidious form of denial about power.
Social work denies the productive capacities ofpower, for example
to make identities. It also denies the ubiquitous deployment of
power, especially its repressive capacities in all aspects of human
experience, including every act of social work. More importantly,
what contemporary social theory does is open LIp a new and finely
grained sociology of social control, both for the management of
deviance as well as the administration ofnormaky (Agger, 1991 ).
As I demonstrate in the next section of the chapter, it is a sociology
which centrally implicates the profession.
Social work, society and social control
It is here that the work of Foucault (1977; 1965) ofters insights
which have the capacity to reinvigorate existing ifsomewhat stagnant
debates about the relationship between social work and
social control (see for example, Day, 1981 ), particularly in his
analysis of crime, punishment and madness. He showed, for
example, how criminology creates the category of criminality,
subsequently punitively imposed on behaviors that were formerly
disregarded or ignored. Foucault's approach would suggest that
social work creates the subject of welfare (the client or service
user) in everyday practice encounters in a similar f.:1shion. The
social work subject has (or should have) a rational ego, and is (or
should be) self-determining. Foucault reveals that such a subject
is created by discourses that divide people into groups: in his case
the division of reason and unreason, sanity and madness. Such a
binary dil,ide was necessary for the establishment ofpsychiatry, an
edifice of ideas that constitute a discursive formation. By creating
the discourse of reason versus unreason, the mad are etlectively
separated ITom the sane, and psychiatry becomes the bearer of
reason into the world of unreason.
Both the welfare state and social work developed upon such
billaty divides, some of which became the ground on which
professional social work practice formed: good from bad, lawabiding
from criminal, healthy from sick, good mothers from bad
mothers, and poverty from pauperism. Social work practice theory
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 87
is the discursive formation for our engagement and social work
subjects (clients) are located within discursive constructs drawn
from practice theory such as those listed above. They constitute
subject positions which carry with them both a moral judgment
and permission for moral instruction by state-authorized actors.
Drawing on the insights of Leonard (1997) and Dean (1999), we
can both illustrate and appreciate the mode of analysis by examining
the most pressing and contemporary divide central to the
global project of welfare reform: that between dependence and
independence. As is well known, those pressing for welfare reform
argue that the welfare state creates pathological and debilitating
dependence; presented as an economic, social and/or individual
malaise. The subject position of 'welfare dependent' is one in
which the individual is likely to experience (alongside income
support payments) subjection, which positions that person as
an object of both ethical judgment and/ or moral reform. Such
ethical judgment legitimates increased state surveillance. Moral
reform of the welfare dependent subject only occurs when that
person shifts their dependency from the state to the labor market
or from the state to the £1mily.
The welfare dependent is a discursive construct, explicitly
contrasted to another, the independent worker; a subject position
which signifies autonomy, industriousness and self-reliance.
Further, categories such as the welfare mother constitute conceptual
repositories for socialminorities, forexample Afi'ican-American
single parents in the U nited States. This classification of troublesome
populations parallels Foucault's account ofthe separation of
madness from sanity as a necessary precondition for the establishment
of the mental health profession. The same process gave rise
to the establishment of wel£1.re professions such as social work,
discourses rooted in the claim thatscientificjudgments can be made
on the basis ofsuch classifications. Such processes are nevertheless
always c0ntested, and are always a site of struggle and resistance.
The social worker as case manager and her client meet, for example,
and in that meeting the exercise of power and the production of
resistance results in continuous contestation.
The entire complex of the formal and informal procedures
of surveillance and intervention, of acting on ourselves, by the
State, by the community, by families and by our very selves are
processes of governmentality, the regime of discipline, or the
88 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
conduct of conduct wherein we both govern and are governed
simultaneously. The social worker is one of the modern professions
charged with the conduct of conduct, most specificaIJy the
conduct of risky populations. OUf clients, the subjects of modernity,
'know' things about themselves. Such indigenous knowledge
is, when brought alongside and compared with professional
knowledge, given lesser status or even discounted, except where
self-disclosure is used to confirm professional judgment. The
social worker refers to the disciplinary knowledge of the social
sciences to legitimate her intenrention. The social worker is not
alone in this - she works alongside of the other human senrice
professions - medicine, psychiatry, nursing, teachers, lawyers,
psychologists.
Let us take the example of a social worker as case manager in
a labor market program such as those inspired across the USA
by TANF and in Australia's Job Network. In d1e initial phase,
the welf.:1re dependent subject undergoes processes of scrutiny
and questioning in order to discover what is wrong. T he aim is
assessment. During assessment a classification is made to d1e satisf.:·1Ction
of the case manager and the subject position is further
refined to a more specific identity, from for example, tmemployed
to lea1'1ling disordered. vVhat follows is the cnse plan, mapping
the process of intervention. The welfare dependent subject has
to attend training/classes/therapy. The person is relegated to a
particular population of, for example, the 'learning disordered',
itselffurthcr deeply inscribed into the subject identity. The person
a!.so engages in self-surveillance and self-disclosure, a necessary part
of the professional assessment. Throughout the professional relationship,
the subject is expected to self-disclose as a demonstration
of commitment to changing herself; confessing, for example, her
poor literacy to her case manager. Self-disclosure usually takes
place within a binary discourse wherein the person is required
to bc: more assertive - less passive; more reflective - less introspective;
more nurturing ~ less self-destructive; more straightforward
- less demanding; more self-directing - less dependent.
The changes expected to emerge from engagement involve the
self-constitution of a new subjectivity, and at the same time
submission to the discourse embodied by the case manager.
Where there is welfare, in other words, there is expertise
directed to the organization and control of those who are
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 89
subject to its gaze. Under contemporary conditions and in
respect of those not specifically identified as welfare subjects, a
different mode of governing occurs. Here, deference to statebased
authority weakens along with faith in state-based expertise
and social instimtions. This apparent erosion of state authority is
accompanied by the proliferation of new kinds of experts (counselors
and therapists), providing private contracttlal advice on how
ro live one's life. These private carriers ofexpertise encourage selfsunreillance,
self-intervention and self-monitoring in the life-long
business of constructing and reconstructing identities. Increasingly,
in the conduct of conduct, coercion and overt control give
way to a morc profound internalization of expertise.
Applying the Foucaultian-inspired analysis to social work,
Epstein (1994) and Chambon, Irving and Epstein (1999) develop
the notion of the thc1'apeutic idea, the predominant influence
on the composition of normative standards for how we conduct
ourselves in the contemporary era. The therapeutic idea is, says
Epstein, one of the four great governing faiths (grand narratives)
of modernlsm: psychoanalysis, capitalism, Nlarxism and
democracy. Therapeutic ideas have come to be considered 'transhistorical,
scientifically objective, apolitical and good for you'
(Epstein, 1994, p. 6). At its core and foundation, it is a set
of interlocking beliefs, values, commitments and commandments
based on original Freudianism. As Cruikshank (1999) notes about
the self-help industry in the United States, the therapeutic idea
is seriously ,big business. And as Epstein (1994, p. 7) argues, it
is perhaps the foremost non-religious doctrine about how to live
in the 20th and emerging 21st centuries. It analyses the modern
experience of self, suggests the sources of our ill-being, and tells
us how to pursue personal growth and self-actualization.
The therapeutic idea is organised into technologies of the self,
techniques and interventions designed to manage behaviors and
minds, and which constitute the moral technologies of discipline
(Rose, 1999; Dean, 1999). Therapeutic practitioners are those
Who apply these techniques to others. Therapists of many disci·
plines combine to form the discourse of the d1erapeutic idea.
Epstein (1994, p. 8) suggests that the leaders are the psychiatrists.
Psychologists do the important research, thereby providing
the scientific cachet so necessary to any project of modernity.
90 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Social workers provide the labor power and do the housekeeping.
Together with an array of other therapeutic practitioners, these
three professions 'co-ordinate the control, surveillance, tutelage,
care, protection, treatment of deviants, disturbers of the peace or
the quietly desperate' (ibid, p. 8). Likewise, 'pastoral counselors,
nurses, occupational therapists, family therapists, relationship
counselors, marriage counselors, addiction counselors, rehabilitation
counselors, street workers, community workers and other
technicians all occupy various roles in the therapeutic panorama'
(ibid, p. 13).
The therapeutic enterprise enjoys public and political sanction.
It is, in the terminology of Rose (1999), an 'ethico-politics'
in which a particular mode of being is rendered desirable or
'ethical'. Therapeutics as the mode by which this eth.icality is
achieved is part of the basic polity of the state. T he liberal (and
advanced liberal) state and the therapeutic enterprise co-evolved
and continue to evolve in partnership. The desirable or ethical
citizen is the free citizen, one who by engaging therapeutically
and deploying technologies of agency creates his or her
own 'freedom'. This freedom is freedom to engage in market
society. As Dean says (1999, p. 149), the objectives of policy
(that is, governed citizens) also becomes their means (that is,
through governing themselves). In this way, the therapeutic
enterprise and its technologies allows government to govern
indirectly. And in this governing complex, it is social work
which most immediately conducts the conduct of the risky
populations.
Responding to contemporary theory
It is easy to sec then, why many social work authors are skeptical
about the contribution that contemporary theory makes to
the profession. The critique of social work that can be drawn
from contemporalY tl1COry is, as I have suggested, botl1 relentless
and uncompromising. Before identifying some ways in which
contemporary tl1eory can be applied in potentially useful ways
to social work, particularly to its fUUlre, it is equally important
to canvass the types of objections many in the profession have
raised.
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 91
Evaluating contemporary theory
For the most part, doubts about the application of conten~porary
theory arise out of concern for the status of the emanCipatory
potential oftl1e professional project. Contemporary theory woul.d,
for example, suggest that the profession'S emancipator), potential
waS always more imagined tl1311 real. Because of this negativity,
many are skeptical about whether contemporary theory can mak.e
any useful contribution to practice, arguing, for example, that. It
leads to the promotion of uncertai.nty, diversity and compleXity
(see for example, Meinert, 1998). Furthermore, and ~s illustrated
above, it undermines tl1e entire intellectual hentage of
the profession (Noble, 2004). Even more worrying, the simultaneous
impact of contemporary theory and neoliberalism has
silenced those public intellectuals (often social workers) who once
fervently championed the interests of the poor and promoted the
advancement ofwelfare (Adams, 2000). Social work scholars such
as Midgley (1999a), Ife (1999) and Powell (2001 ) argue convincingly
tlut uncritical acceptance of contemporary theory s~r:es
the interests of neoliberal politics by its persistent undermlTIlIlg
of analytical genres which focus attention on capitalism's worst
effects, for example, the 'grand narrative' of left political thought.
Similarly, activist and feminist social workers argue that contem·
porary theory is counter-revolutionary and inherently conservative
in that it does not acknowledge the patterns of oppression that
transcend locations and historical epochs. Contemporary theory
abandons tlle subject just when, for example, different groups of
women begin to assert their right to define what the subject is
(Fawcett and Featherstone, 2000). The diverse and fragmented
identities of contemporary theory deny categories of class, race
and gender that continue to represent virulent social divisions.
Importantly for social work, can collective and progressive political
practices be founded on tl1e types of slippery notions of
diversity promoted by contemporary theory? Finally, contempofary
theory not only destabilizes the emancipatory and progressive
intent ofsocial work, it also undermines specific sets ofpractices particularly
tl10se social workers use when engaging in social and
community development (Midgley, 1999a).
In tlle main, tlle core of this body of critical commentary
On contemporary theory is that theoretical developments which
92 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
undermine progressive grand narratives (such as nco-Marxist
understandings about the operations of class and social stratifi _
cation) and ul1d~rm~ne representational knowledge (for example,
about poverty) mevltably retreat to a position where we cannot
'~now' about the enduring phenomena the profession has traditloI~all.y
been concerned about. Furthermore, its rejection of the
optimism of the Enlightenment also means a rejection of related
principles. ~f great significance to social work arising from the
same u"adltIon, for example, social justice (Atherton and Bollard
2002). How, it is asked, can social work exist if it denies it~
emancipatory purposes?
Echoing such influential critics as Jerome Wakefield (1998), the
case agamst the .appli~ation ~f contemporary theory is succinctly
made by Australian Bnan Tramor (2003), who provides a detailed
acCOunt of why contemporary theory in certain manifestations is
dangerous. Arguing that social work needs a unitary epistemology
(or knowledge bas~), th~ fragmentary tendencies ofcontemporary
t?eory arc, he claims, mherently damaging. Professional practICe,
he says, would be 'frankly worthless' if, as contempOrary
the?ry suggests,. we abandon representational knowledge and the
notIon of a ul11fie~, coherent subject (ibid, p. 29). Reverting
to a mo.ral reassertIon of a humanist imperative, Trainor argues
that SOCIal workers and their (knowing) clients are 'co-travelers
on a trllth journey', one which seeks to 'genuinely address the
true or .al~thel1tic n~eds of clients'. For Trainor, contemporary
theory IS Ultensely, 111deed immorally pessimistic, and that this
'hyper-pessimism is a form of hyper-irresponsibility' (ibid, p. 33).
In many ways, the position taken by Trainor (and the other
authors noted above) is correct in that if we were to accept the
analyses of the professional project promoted by contemporary
theory, the optimism of social work as an emancipatOlY practice
would be severely dented, and perhaps terminally discredited as
hopelessly naive and misguided .
However Trainor, along with other social work authors (also
Australians) such as Pease and Fook (1999) do allow that there are
versions of contemporary theory which are less destructive of the
professional project, a position also advanced by social scientists
such as Rosenau (1992) and Agger (1991). For Rosenau contemporary
theory can be split into the skeptical and affirrnative camps;
for Agger, these are critical and apologetic. Trainor and Jeffreys
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 93
(2003) call the111 the 'going sOl11ewhere~ and 'going nowhere'
versions of contemporary theOlY. Essenually, rhe~e author~ a.re
distinguishing between those contemporary theOrists who mSlst
upon a strict engagement with the epistemological and ontol.ogieal
assumptions of the genre, and those who adopt a 1110re flexible
approach which interprets and uses the insights more liberally.
The second approach is one which, more llsually, takes up a body
of ideas developed by what is known as the 'latter Foucault'.
It is a body of work which suggests that an ethical impulse or
moral purpose can be held and promoted, while at the same tin1e
attending to the critical impulse of contemporary theory. This, in
my opinion, is a reasonable position to adopt. But as we will see
in the next, concluding section ofthis chapter, adopting this position
does not let social work off the hook but keeps it, squirming
and wriggling, on a velyuncomfortable (metaphorical) pointy bit.
Taking the good
Obviously social workers will react differently and will take from
contemporary theory different suggestions for how it might
usefully inform practice. Here I present some (but by no means
all) of the insights that, for example, confront me. 1 present these
not as 'truths', but as illustrative examples of how one person
engages with the genre. Accordingly, this concluding discllssion
is purposefully conducted in the first person, and it shouJd be
noted, prefigures in a small way further discussion in Part 2. In the
first instance, 'the gift of this body of work to social work is its
destabilization of the professional project. This has many dimensions.
The method ofinquiry developed by Foucault, for example,
seeks to understand the conditions that make certain social practices
(sllch as social work) or regimes of practices (such as welfare
states) seem inevitable at certain times. Such an analytical method
can be reconceived as a liberating device in that it reminds me
that wfiting a histOlY of the present renders the regime of truth
visible for what it is; that is, not a 'truth' at all but a series of
decisions. This, in turn, allows me to fully accept that the social
practices of social work and the regime of practices of the welfare
state (past and present) are social artifacts with a specific historical
trajectory and to which there were and are alternatives. Through
this acknowledgement of the historical, the imagining of present
94 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
and future alternatives becomes possible. Accordingly, as much
as it destabilizes the past, it also dcstabilizes the present - the
policy decisions, for example, creating the workf.lre regimes of
the present day.
Further, by asking me to attend to social work practice dlcory as
discourse, contcmporary theory asks mc to think about dlC sorts
of identities I am offering my clients. It allows me to recognize
that there may be others, perhaps authorized by my clients, and
perhaps more appropriate for the mOlllent. This point was recently
brought to life for me in the reading of a recent doctoral thesis
(Joy, 2004), which drew very clear links between social work
practices with child victims of sexual assault and the subsequent
promotion of the dominant 'correct' identity of the 'victim' by
social workers, even though alternatives (in some instances, more
appropriate alternatives for these 'victims') were present. In this
case, some of the 'victims' did not engagc with that identity at
all and were puzzled, even repelled, by the repeated suggestions
abollt how they should be feeling.
Contemporary theory allows me to appreciate that the welfare
state and social work are not simply systems of state control.
Rather, they arc systems and sets of practices that prodttce the
poor, the damaged, the excluded. In any productive process, all
sorts ofunexpected and local contingencies can intervene, making
the processes unstable and indeterminant. This volatility provides
opportunities or 'spaces' for creative practice. Focusing on this
level, on the real complexities of social work productive practices
also gives me permission to take small steps forward, and relieves
me of the (probably unattainable) imperatives to create the type
of all encompassing ~fix' implied by the grand narratives. This
does not mean an abandonment of the ethical objectives of the
grand narratives; it mcrely renders those ethics more specific. It is
enollgh, for example, to help some onc feel a little happier with
dleir circumstances, which hopefulJy, have been slightly improved
or modified. The focus on the small spaces and small tllings of
practice reinvigorates the traditional social work practice nexus
ofperson-in-environment. Furthermore, the re·conception ofthe
subject by contemporalY theory, as an identity or series of identi·
ties constituted within multiple intersecting discourses, is important.
Acknowledging dut sllch identity formation occurs witllin
THE IDEAS OF CHANGE 95
ubiquitolls power relations, dle insight. nevertheless I:c,·authoriz.es
(at the same time as it re-conceptua!tze.s) the tra~ltI?t~al SOCIal
work concern witll the impact of the SOCIal on the mdlvtdual.
Importantly, the destabilization by contemporary theory. of
social work knowledge allows me to attend to other, perhaps SItuated
and often subjugated, knowledges. This development authorizes
me as a white Australian to properly and indeed respectfuUy
ttend to the knowledges of this country's indigenous peoples
(see Pease, 2002 fot a perceptive discussion of this possibility).
Furthermore it suggests that knowledges are produced III human
praxis, an insight which, paradoxicalJy, suppo~·ts such r~la:ionshipbased
practices as social work. Finally, and 111 my opllllOn most
significantly, contemporary theOlY poses an irr~ducible imperative
for continuous critical reflexivity. The analytical genre suggests
that any and all practices of social work inevitably engage in
the constitution of particular identities, my own and others. It
suggests that my practice is therefore inevitably and continuou~ly
enmeshed in and engaged with both productive and repressive
operations of power. It suggests that I need to develop a capacity
for unrelenting reflexivity.
This is tile 'pointy bit' referred to eadier. Contemporary theory
refuses to allow me the ontological comfort ofbeing a nice person
with good intentions. Neitller does it imply that I am a bad
person. Rather it suggests that in my being a social worker, I am
inevitably engaged in the production of others' identities. (as well
as my own). I cannot avoid tllis. I can only be aware of It. More
importantly, it directs me to develop the will, capacity and strategies
for destabilizing myself.
In conclusion, it is clear that contemporary theOlY challenges
social work at least as much if not marc than the economic and
political developments discussed in earlier chapters. These ellal·
Iengcs strike at the identity of the profession, bOtil in what it
knows and what it does. Contemporary theory does comprehensively
undermine the professional project, perhaps most i mpo~tantly
in that it exposes it for something other than what It
presents itself to be. Critics not withstanding, it should also be
clear that) in my opinion, it would be unproductive to ignore.it,
as in addition to the critique, it has much to offer to an alternatlve
project (or ongoing series of projects) re-f.1shioning the actual
doing of social work.
96 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Having sketched to this point the reconfiguration of the insti~
tutions of we.lfare ~ the e~onomics, politics and ideas rc~shaping
thc contexts 111 wluch socIal work now exists - it is timc to turn
to some of the effects, particularly at the level of practice. In
the next chapter, we turn to the impact on the profession, and
in the following chapter, to the impact on the people who
use our services.
6 Re-constructing
Practitioners
During the high point of modernity the professions were the
equivalent of the mandarins of the Chinese middle kingdom;
the cadres that serviced the various formal institutions constituting
and regulating modern societies. Social work aspired to be
one of these, albeit in a fairly humble way and with less power
and prestige than, say, the lawyers and medical practitioners. The
contemporary position of the professions is somewhat different,
particularly in the Anglo countries. With the exception perhaps of
accountants, the relative power of most of the other professional
groups has waned, but it must be said, to different degrees.
Discussing professions generically Evetts (2003) proposes that
they are under threat from economic, poLitical and organizational
change. The professions are, it is claimed, experiencing
a reduction in autonomy and dominance, a decline in their
ability to exercise occupational control oftheir work, and a weakening
capacity to act as self-regulating groups. A5 Hanlon (1999,
p. 191) suggests, 'the state is engaged in trying to redefine professionalism
so that it becomes more commercially aware, budget
focllsed, managerial, entrepreneurial and so forth'. The linkages
between the emerging marketized culture and the professions
challenges occupational, functional and professional segmentation.
The new culture celebrates integration and flexibility, along
with the deregulation of professions and their monopolies on
competencies (Malin, 2000). Social work is very much if not more
enmeshed in these processes than most professions, processes
which are deliberately designed to reconfigure the way in which
we practice. Social work as a 'bureau-profession' (Parry and Party,
]979) has been largely located within the hierarchies of state
bureaucracies and has never been able to exercise the degree of
autonomy and discretion afforded the other professions. Nevertheless,
the discretion and occupational control it was able to
deploy has eroded significantly in recent years (Lymbety, 2000),
98 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
albeit to differing degrees both within and across the Anglo
nations.
I begin this chapter by briefly canvassing the social work
literature which describes the types of processes said to be reCOnstructing
the profession away from its traditional modes of operations.
In the second part of the chapter, 1 discuss two of the
most overt examples; managed care in the United States and care
management in the Great Britain. To a lesser extent, the same
processes can be observed in other contexts, for example in particular
forms of case management in Australia. As will become clear,
each of these represents variations of an underlying and tor the
most part cOl11l11on theme; the reorganization of service delivery
for economic ends. In the third part ofthe chapter, I discuss some
of the increasingly ubiquitous processes challenging the professional
project: the 'quality' agenda, the rise of ,risk' and 'audit' - in
particular how they, as tools of management, undermine professional
autonomy. Finally, T briefly examine the impact of information
and commwlication technology. For the most part, what
we consider here are functions of and attributable to the applications
to the field of social welfare of New Public Management
(NPM) discussed in Chapter 4 (itself arising from d,e economic
pressures and imperatives described in Chapter 3). H owever, we
will also use some of the insights provided by contemporary
theory in Chapter 5, particularly in developing appreciation of
the role of such seemingly benign and useful notions as quality,
risk and audit.
A professional revolution?
The social work professional project and its modes of practice
are being seriously challenged, so much so that some consider
it to represent a crisis, albeit one which has been underway for
some time (sec, for example, Clarke, 1996). Furthermore, it is
a crisis of de-proJessiollalizatio1l experienced across the Englishspeaking
world (Healy and Meagher, 2004; Hugman, 1998).
A number of trends are identified in the professional literature,
of which I discuss four. First, the domain in which social workers
practice is being continllollsly re-drawn, and parts of what were
once considered to be core practice arenas have been hived ofF.
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 99
A good example of this comes from Britain where probation
and parole services (once a core area of employment) has bet:n
designated as inappropriate for social workers; a practice domain
which, it is said, requires a different body of knowledge and set
of skills (McL.1ughlin, 1998). Previously, probation and parole
work in that countl)' was founded on social work orientations
of care, assistance, facilitation and responsiveness to client needs.
In the contemporary era of corrections, a new model is in place
which emphasizes control, supervision, punishment and discipline.
Because of its compassionate and developmental orientation,
social work it is argued, is not the right profession for the
new era of criminal justice, and social work COllrses have been
displaced as the primary source of pre-service education.
Second, the boundaries around designated social work positions
are eroding. In this instance, people with different professional
(and in many instances, non-professional backgrounds) arc
moving into what were once conceived as social work positions,
for example lawyers, psychologists, nurses, occupational therapists,
even volunteers (Dominelli and Hoogveldt, 1996; Healy
and Meagher, 2004). In several of the Australian states, for
example, cllild protection positions in state child welfare agen~
cies were, at one time, limited to social workers. Over the past
decade, the entry-level qualifications have broadened with social
workers constituting one source ofworkers among several. Third,
social workers afe increasingly required to work in contexts and
with people who have litde understanding of or sympathy for the
social work perspective or for the social work professional project.
Key examples here arc corporations Stich as Maximus Inc and
Lockheed Martin providing wide-ranging welfare-related services
across the United States (Frumpkin and Andre-Clarke, 1999 ). In
such instances, the processes of service delivery inevitably prioritize
different rationalities (the need to generate profit), not necessarily
informed by professional notions, and perhaps not even
particularly syrnpathetic to professional sensibilities. Fourth, there
is a seemingly endless crescendo of loss of faith in the profession
to manage certain functions, particularly child protection, but also
youth homelessness (Kemshall, 2002).
Different authors emphasize different aspects of this overall
trend. Arguing from the British perspective and focusing on causal
f.lctors, Foster and Wilding (2000) claim that d,e neoconservative
100 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, invoking
public choice theory (discussed here in Chapter 4 ), positioned
the professions as rent seeking vested interests effectively accountable
to no-one. Furthermore, they (the professions) were (and
continue to be from the perspective of Blair's New Labor) inefficient,
ineffective, and prone to making spurious claims to expertise
unsupported by evidence. Focusing on social work in particular,
Foster and Wilding argue that two primary processes, bureaucratization
and the move towards competency-based training, have
undermined the profession's status, both issues which I discuss in
due course.
In concert with an escalating critique of social work, a range
of outcomes are discernable. Social workers are increasingly
marginalized from the policy making process, and as a consequence,
are even less able to influence the conditions of their
practice. (This point has been cogently made about American
social work in rclation to welfare reform and the impacts that it is
having on social work in that country. See Reisch, 2000. ) A range
ofexternal forms ofscrutiny and appraisal have been imposed, for
example in the form of benchmarks and performance indicators,
with the result that social workers are held accountable for the
outcomes of their services, not just their processes (Gibelman,
1999). In addition, the escalation of generic management, for
example, the use of pelformance appraisals, drawing on business
management principles as opposed to professional supervision in
service delivery agencies has largely displaced social work leadership
and further weakened the autonomy of social workers.
A major factor destabilizing social work has been the loss of
auspice, which we discllssed at some length in Chapter 2. There,
we noted that the welfare state is beleaguered and is undergoing
significant reconstruction. I made the point in that chapter that
professional social work practice can be thought of as a key operational
expression of the modern welfare state and is, not surprisingly,
in the front line of many of the attacks brought against
it. As practitioners in child protection know only too well, social
workers have been doubly dammed as both too intrusive and
controlling, and at the same time, charged with being ineffective
(Howe, 1994). In other words, social work has not only
been made out to have failed, but is positioned as having actively
contributed to social harm.
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 101
Another factor (discussed in more detail in the next section )
is the contraction of models and methods of intervention. Here,
particu larl)~ in the British conte~t ?ut also to. a lesser extent
in Austraha, I refer to the ublqUltous adoption of care or
case management and brokerage as the dominant model of
intervention. In Australia, for example, case management has
been largely appropriated out of the practice domain of professional
social work and extended as a technique to other groups
of 'practitioners', for example variously qualified and unqualified
people working in labor market programs (Marston and
McDonald, 2003). At the same time, other professional roles
(such as advocacy, community work, developmental roles) have
been constrained, if not actively proscribed (Sunley, 1997).
Another . development frequently cited as influential in the
re-configuration of social work has been the rise of competencies,
an occurrence which is said to be leading to a trivialization of
social work knowledge, and the deskilling and proletarianization
ofpractice (Kreuger, 1997; Dominelli, 1996). In service contexts
where competencies prevail, those in control display little in terest
in developing knowledge and skills designed to diagnose problems,
carry out treatment plans, cure individuals and change social
systems. Ratller, in tlle name of accountability, more interest is
shown in ensuring that practice instances follow particular models
and are undertaken in prescribed ways.
As Chapters 3 and 4 suggested, the (un)making of the profession
has occurred largely due to the ascendance of the logic
of the market and its expansion into other domains, particu·
larly that of the state and its agents. As well as efficiency, flexi bility
and accountability, this now dominant logic asserts a new
type of service user, the 'sovereign consumer'. Although this
is a largely mythical identity (particularly in relation to social
welfare) it nevertheless serves the purpose of displacing other
older identities such as tlle dependent client or patient. These
latter identities are, of course, those created by and invoked by
professionals, and when vanquished by the sovereign consumer,
position professional modes of service delivery as obsolete, or
at a minimum, open to chal.lenge. The logic of the market also
serves to dismantle (or at least undermine) the notion tllat there
is utility in fragmented fields ofprofessional knowledge. The very
turbulence and complexity ofglobalized markets and the societies
102 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
they create is alleged to outstrip the capacity of single professions
to administer complex problem domains. Instead, sllch domains
become the object of a valorized discipline of 1Ilmlfl,gement, in
which the integration and flexible deployment ofthe variolls tools
within its ambit becomes the key. In tIlis way the professions are
transformed from being autonomous, self+cegulating entities, and
become answerable to management as tools of management.
Further the political discourses of advanced liberalism accompanying
the logic of the market articulate problems and their
solutions in new ways. This, as Fournier (2000) indicates, is
particularly pertinent to professions such as social work, as increasingly,
social problems become problems for 'communities' to
fix, and thereby open to rectification by lay persons as opposed
to professional social workers. It is in all of these ways and in
all of these sorts of statements and claims that the professional
project of social work is destabilized on a day-to-day basis and
at the concrete level of service delivery. While Chapters 3 and 4
outlined the foundational processes creating the conditions for
the unmaking of the professional project, in this chapter we
address how those processes play out. While for the most part, the
effects of the sorts of phenomena identified in the earlier chapters
are often the most visible, particularly in the professional titcrature
and in the daily experiences of practitioners, it is important
to underscore that they are effects. In other words, if social work
wants to have some impact on how these play out, then social
workers need, at a minimum, to understand their genesis.
Managing social work
I suggested earlier that managed care in the USA, care
management in Britain and to a lesser extent, a model of case
management currently deployed in Australia represent variations
of a common tlleme. That theme is ' the desire to re-organize
service delivery in certain domains in which social work is practiced
for the purposes of promoting the twinned goals of efficiency
and effectiveness. While there are significant differences
across (and witllin) jurisdictions, these examples are instructive
beyond the specific context in which they are manifest in that each
illustrates trends which, while articulated differently, have similar
•
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 103
effects. And as we wiUsee, each example represents a version of
NPM in healtll and social welfare domains, driven by a dominant
rationality of (economic) efficiency fundamentally at odds with
the rationality of professionalism.
Managed care is largely a response to escalating health care
costS in the USA driven by sllch factors as an aging population,
changing disease patterns and expensive technological advances
in a context of reduced government support for public health
care (Scheid, 2003 ). In 1995, Shapiro described managed care
as 'any kind of health care services which are paid for, all or
in part, by a third party, including any government entity, and
for which the locus of any part of the cLinical decision+making
is other than between the practitioner and the client or patient'
(p. 441 ). In the USA managed care is fiscal ma1lagemmt, driven
by over twO hundred profit-driven companies serving around
halfofthe American population (Cohen, 2003). Under managed
care the financing and delivery of services are integrated in ways
quite unlike preceding models ofservice organization and delivery
where, for example, professional clinical judgment was organizationally
and conceptuaUy independent of payment. That is, in
the old model providers billed patients or insurance companies
retrospectively. Insurance companies (or in the case of certain
populations - governments through Medicare) played a peripheral
role (Gorin, 2003) and decision-making was driven by clinical
concerns.
During the I980s and the I990s, managed care dominated
health care provision in the USA. Managed care systems operate
by contracting with 'preferred' service providers to provide a
set of services to enrolled members (usually enrolled through
employer-provided health care benefits) for a pre-determined
monthly premium. Managed care uses compulsory quality assurance
systems to control service provision and create financial
incentives for people to use preferred providers and facilities.
lmportantly, managed care companies assume some oftlle fUlan cial
risk for practitioners, and in doing so, encourage practitioners
to balance patient need against the need for cost control.
Managed care companies take on control for service delivery decisions
through, for example, implementing gatekeeping devices
to determine when a person has a 'real' need for treatment.
They limit expenditure to those services the gatekeepers deem
104 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
necessary and appropriate, to be delivered in the least intrusive
(and least expensive) treatment setting, and only by designated
practitioners. Managed care employs a strategy known as utilization
management, in which a managed care company (or its agent)
assesses each case before service provision. Service providers must
have services authorized before delivery in order for payment to be
made. As Cohen (2003, p. 35) indicates 'once treatment is authorized,
individuals in the managed care organization determine
which professionals the patient may see, what type of treatment
he or she may receive, how frequently the patient may be seen,
and for how long'. In this way, company officials make decisions
once made by health practitioners and patients. Tn other words
. 'professional autonomy is significantly reduced.
Clearly, there are a range of issues associated with the growth
of managed care, most ofwhich revolve around quality and access
to care, particularly by certain populations (Gorin, 2003). Nevertheless,
managed care has had major (and paradoxical) consti·
rutive effects on social work. In mental health (which is the
major site of interest for social workers where ever they are
located), managed care organizations are increasingly mrning
to clinical social workers as preferred providers of non-medical
treatment, largely because they are cheaper than psychologists
and psychiatrists (Cohen, 2003). In response, social workers are
moving into private, often group practices with other mental
health professions. Further, the managed care environment has
significandy influt:nced modes of intervention, with brief therapies
and group therapies based on behavioral and cognitive
theories now the preferred modes. Cohen (ibid ) also indicates
that managed care has created imperatives for providers,
including social workers, to incorporate outcome measuremcnt
and ongoing assessment so as to produce performance-related
data. Practitioners who fail to do so are gready disadvantaged.
The role of clinical case manager (often a social worker) has
escalated in importance. The case manager oversees benefits,
coordinates d1e various service providers involved in a patient's
care, stands at the interface between the service delivery system
and the managed care company (albeit often as employee of the
company). Finally, social work educators are urged to incorporate
knowledge and skills for working in managed care environments
in MSW programs - for example, knowledge and skills in
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 105
management, appeals, clinical djagnosis, brief problem-focused
interventions, performance assessment and case management.
Not surprisingly, these bodies ofknowledge increasingly compete
with and supplant others) such as advocacy and community development,
in crowded curricula.
Social work and social workers are, not surprisingly, ambivalent
abollt managed care. Some see it as an opportunity to expand d1e
profession's role in the American mental health system and recommend
active engagement (Dziegielewski and Holliman, 2001).
Similarly, od1ers claim that managed care provides opportunities
for new forms of community-based practice in networked and
multi-disciplina,y teams (Berger and Ai, 2000). Other commentators
raise concerns. Neuman and Ptak (2003) for example,
argue that the philosophy and practices ofmanaged care chaLlenge
fundamental social work values; for example the client's right
to self-determination and confidentiality, and most centrally, the
social work duty to put the client's interests first. Social workers
d1emselves seem disheartened by managed care. Surveying attitudes
towards it, Scheid (2003) and Kane, Hamlin and Hawkins
(2003), for example, found largely negative attitudes. As Kane
et al (ibid, p. llS) state: 'Consistent with social work and
other professional literature, most of this sample .... believed
that managcd care was more concerned widl cost and fU1ances
than clients, restricts client access to services, is an enduring tonn
of service delivelY, and has lowered the quality of health and
mental health services'. While legal challenges to d1e operations of
managed care companies begin to temper their practices (Gorin ,
2003) the model of selvice delivery that managed care represents
has not been signjficantly de-stabilized. Within that, the imperatives
shaping social work practice in dle fields where it dominates
bear down unabated, and while dlere is resistance, there is also
acceptance and accommodation. Of interest, of course, are the
consequences for the profession of such adaptation. H ere, it is
instructive for a reader to think back to Chapter 2 where 1outlined
the idea that such developments in the various contexts where
social workers' work can be conceived as institutional change.
I also cited an important study on the impact of managed care as
institutional change on the medical profession (Scott et ai, 2000).
Here, I suggest that no lesser changes confront American social
work as a consequence of its engagement with managed care.
106 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
It is important for Ollr purposes to grasp that managed care
in the United States is an example of the introduction of market
principles to health carc. It is not about developing effective
responses to need. As such, its underlying rationality stands vcrv
much at odds with those traditionally associated with social work.
In Britain the same imperatives have created a seemingly different
but eerily similar series of developments. Instead of health and
mental health being the primary field, in Britain it is the personal
social services (services to children, people with disabilities and
older people). While the search for efficiency in the USA has
produced managed carc, in Britain these same processes have
created another phenomenon highly influential in shaping social
work; C(H'e mawr-gement,
Care rnanagement is an integral part of a wide-ranging strategy
in Britain to implement a mixed economy in social care. Since
the re-organization of the social services in the 19605, care of
various dependent populations was provided by local social service
departments. Part ofthe Thatcher revolution was a form ofdevolution,
or more accurately outsourcing, wherein local authorities
were required to commission the purchase of most of their
senrices, particularly their supportive or personal social services
from a varicty of non-profit and for-profit organizations. The role
of local authority social service personnel became one of assessment,
purchasing and budget-holding of a range of services from
different providers (Pinkney, 1998).
Care management in Britain has transformed prior understandings
of the role and purpose of social work (Carey, 2003;
Harris, 2003, 1998). In an ethnography of care managers' practice
in local authorities, Carey (ibid) identifies four primary
dimensions of interest. First, the majority of practice involved
responding to formal paperwork and other bureaucratic processes
within a rigid and highly formalized information technologydriven
system. Second, the style of management provided by
social work middle managers has shifted away from the developmental
and supportive focus of professional supen'ision towards
a more traditional business style emphasizing authoritarianism,
compliance and disciplinc. Third, the actual practices of care
managers were 'budget led', as every intervention is defined
by the (un)availability of finances. Finally, the adoption of care
management in a context of constrained resources produces
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 107
an increasingly de-professionalized and impoverished service to
vulnerable groups.
British social workers are now 'numing the business' (Harris,
2003, p. 66) within a 'quasi-capitalist rationality' (ibid), in which
social workers are 'care managers, putting together packages of
care from the quasi-market for individual customers' (p. 67, italics
in original). Here, the language of 'business' used by Harris illustrates
my point abollt how the rationalities of such developments
contrast with those usually associated with the traditional professional
project of social work. In this case, two processes stand
out: first, the intensification of work as middle managers exert
pressure to extract the maximum amolLnt of effort; and second,
a narrowing and standardization of the work processes along
with increased scrutiny and control of performance, particularly
through the use of standardized software packages and information
technology. So great has been the transformation of social
work under care management that many regard the profession
to be in a condition of almost terminal crisis (Lymbery, 2001 ,
2000; May and Buck, 2000). Professional judgment has given way
to the following of nllcs, and social workers currently function
more as technical operators 'without any pretence ofautonomous
professionalism' (Lymbery, 2000, p. 131).
The outcomcs of the application of the logic of the market in
Britain are superficially quite different from the sinlation in the
United States. In the US, for example, social workers are constituted
both as case managers in managed care companies and as
therapists in the mental health service provider organizations. In
the British context, social workers in local social service departments
purchase personal social senrices from non-state providers,
most of who have different or fewer qualifications. There are,
however, clear similarities in that in both systems the organization
of service delivery and the service delivety system constrains the
roles social workers may take up, limits their professional discretion
and autonomy, constrains the types of knowledge tlley lise in
practice and renders their work accountable as specific outcomes.
In other words, they destabilize tile professional project.
Similar processes, albeit to a lesser extent and in a morc fragmented
manner, can be observed in the other Anglo countries.
The most commodified and marketized service delivery system
in Australia, for example, is employment services provided to
108 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
the unemployed and to disabled people. Here, and in related
systems which interact with it, a version of care management
as case management exists which is virtually analogous to the
British experience in intent and in terms of its impact on the case
managers. This is a system wherein case managers (located in
non-state agencies but acting as contracted agents of the state)
purchase services frol11 other sources within a strict budget,
and tied to pre-specified performance goals. Like the British and
American examples, information technology plays a significant
role, not only in determining costs ofservices, but also in traclcing
and monitoring the case managers and their clients. In the case
of the Australian Job Network for unemployed people, single
parents and the disabled, the primary rationale is twotold: the
management of 'risky' populations and (like managed care and
care management) the containment of the financial costs of delivering
social welfare services.
Despite these developments and their undoubted impact, it
should be remembered that not all jurisdictions are the same
(McDonald, Harris and Winterstein, 2003), and that there
are variations within nations between diverse service delivery
systems. While care management in Britain is hugely influential in
re-shaping social work, this is largely a result of the profession's
dominance of social service delivery in the extensive British postwar
welfare state. In Australia on the other hand, social work roles
are considerably more diverse and social workers arc located in a
much wider spread oforganizational contexts and service delivery
systems. As a consequence the impact of the market logics of
efficiency and effectiveness, while nevertheless felt, are somewhat
muted. With that caveat in mind, I now turn to a set of seemingly
ubiquitous processes and notions which are also increasingly
influential in shaping the organizational contexts in which we
practice and, in certain domains or fields, the manner in which
we practice.
Audit, risk and quality
These three themes - audit, risk and quality - constitute el~mcnts
of a discursive fonnation. In Chapter 5, I suggested that contemporary
theOl), would propose, that at any given time, certain
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTIT10NERS 109
discourses (as ideas and as social practices) would take on a truthlike
and taken-for-granted status. As such, they appear reasonable,
logical and inevitable. This is how audit~ risk and qu.ali~ are
currently employed, as a discursive formatlon nested wlthm the
broader assemblage of NPM in advanced liberalism. My goal in
this section ofthe chapter is to de-stabilize their taken-far-granted
nature, and to identify tl1e implications of their deployment for
social work.
In the introduction to this chapter, I suggested that one profession
is doing rather better than the others in terms of its influence
and status. That profession is accountancy. Accountants undertake
attdits, and audit has become the key technology of New
Public Management (Power, 1997). Accountants developed audit
for a purpose; that is, to promote accountability, particularly in
situations of mistrust and imperfect knowledge. Here we see a
continuation of the theme which underpinned tI1e development
and promotion of managed care and care managcIllent - but
with a slightly different spin. The rise of audit as a mode of
promoting accountability represents the 'financialization' of relationships
which were once bureaucratic or professional. By this
I mean the financial logic ofaudit; the calculation of costs, ratios,
surpluses, deficits, appreciation, depreciation, profits and losses in
pursuit of financial accountability and efficiencies, has become the
core rationality of 'public' service delivery, irrespective of the site
of production. The rise of audit has thrown an all-encompassing
cloak of fi nancial rationality over the range of institutions and
their organizational representations. Through its inexorable insistence
on inspection and evaluation and its demands tor procedural
conformity audit is, as Rose (1999, p. 152) suggests, a
powerful technology for 'acting at a distance on the actions of
others' .
Power (1997) proposes that contemporary sociery is an audit
society, in which programs ofcontrol and tile mechanisms ofaudit
arc one and the same. Audit as a process is ubiquitous, spreading
to domains beyond tile financial and rendering them ca1culable
within the logic of tlnance. In social work we hear, for example,
of ethics audits and skilJs audits in which the competence of
social workers and the ethicality of their practice is calculated by
the 'presence' or 'absence' of a particular observable 'skill' or a
specific administrative procedure. Qualities or capacities which
110 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
£:1.11 olltside of the observational range of the audit recede in
significance, and desirable attributes slIch as critical reflexivity Or
internalized commitment to professional values and ethics are
dismissed. The spread of audit as the defining rationality has
widespread effects, especially in terms of what actions are undertaken,
by whom and when. Professionals, academics, managers any
olle operating in a site governed by NPM - aUare drawn into
its calculations. In the process, the technical requirements and the
logic of audit replaces professional expertise and other specialist
activities. As Power (1997) suggests, the rise of audit represents
the triumph ofdistnlst, and in our case, escalation of suspicion of
professional social workers and organizations providing welfare
services - actors and settings once representative of hope and
optimism.
Walking hand-in-lund with audit is its discursive cousin - fish.
Where audit reigns as the primary logic of governance, society
increasingly understands itself in terms of risk. This takes several
forms, all of which are relevant to social work. On one hand,
the welfare state (which once collectivised risk) has given way
to the new state in which risk is increasingly privatized, and in
which the responsibility for managing risk is re-Iocated away fj-om
the state and into commun.ities, families and individuals. Good
citizens, good families and good communities are those that
exercise responsibility for their own security. At the same time,
those that do not or cannot manage themselves are separated
out, dispersed into fragmented and hierarchically-ordered zones
of 'riskiness' . In the process) the older approaches to risk which
emphasized social solidarity and collective responsibility for aU
citizens within a society recede, and different classes of citizens,
determined according to their adjudged degree of 'riskiness" are
created exhibiting qualitatively different relations with the state.
As perceptions of riskiness increase, for example, so too docs
the authority of the state through its agents to intervene. Social
workers, along with other actors such as psychiatrists, psychologists
and the police connect up with one another in 'circuits
of sunreillance' (Rose, 1999, p. 260) designed to 'minimise the
riskiness of the most risJ.,.··i. Social workers as case managers in
AustraHa's Job Network, for example, are authorized to transform
unemployed and disabled Australians into good citizens who
manage themselves or show themselves willing to try and manage
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS 111
themselves through engagement in the labor market (Marston
and McDonald, 2003; Dean, 1999).
Risk management - the identification, assessment and management
of risk - has become a key professional task in certain
domains or fields ofpractice, albeit with different orientations. In
aged care and in the disability field, for example, 'risk' becomes a
technology which is primarily deployed in the rationing of scarce
resources such as respite care and home help. In other words, the
task of determining who receives home help or meals on wheels
is managed by social workers determining who is at most 'risk' of
admission to a nursing home or other form of accommodation
should the service not be provided. In child protection, on dle
other hand, the goal is risk containment and reduction. It is also a
'forensic tool' (Kemshall, 2002, p. 81-2) for investigating alJegations,
formalizing and proceduralizing those investigations, and
in the process, rendering workers accountable to their managers.
Increasingly, social workers in settings dominated by risk as the
key rationality find their practice hedged by highly prescriptive
guidelines and formalized assessment tools.
In dlese domains ofsocial work practice, risk has replaced need
as the primary discursive formation - with all of its attendant
effects. It represents a new form of ordlodoxy which both constitutes
and frames professional practice (Kemshall, 2002). 'Their
professional world' Kemshall says (ibid, p. 128) 'is characterized
by key themes: fiscal prudeiKe, rationing, risk assessment,
targeting and reponsibilization of service users'. Risk creates a
new morality,'and constitutes social work as a new form of moral
enterprise. The new morality distinguishes between good citizens
who manage their own risk, and risky citizens requiring
moral tutelage (Dean, 1999; Rose, 1999). Social workers, along
with the enactment of other 'psy-based' professions (Rose, 1999)
become key actors in the new moral enterprise.
The tinal branch of d,e troika constituting the new discursive
formation in which social work is currently constituted is quality.
In recent times, quality has been lifted out of its conceptual birth
place in engineering and transformed into what may well be one
of the most influential management discourses of the late 20th
century and early 21 st century (Power, 1997). Carried in such
programs as Total Quality Management (TQM), Quality Control
(QC) and Quality Assurance (QA), quality has become a central
112 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
issue for social welfare services over dle past decade (Watson
2002). In Britain, for example, quality has been used as a key tool
of~anagement control over social work and social service organizatIons,
borne by such standard bearers as the Audit Commission
and the Social Services Inspectorate in the 1980s (Adams, 1998).
It has c~ntin ued to s.hape the 'business' of social service delivery
and sOClal work practlce under New Labor (Harris, 2003), particularly
in the development ofperformance standards and measures.
In Australia, the key Federal government authority charged with
reforming both government and industry, advocated the use of
gencric ISO 9000 quality standards to regulate sCIyice delivery in
the Australian mixed economy of wcl£1re (Productivity Commission,
1996). In doing so, the Productivity Commission argued
tl~at the delivery of social welfare services are conceptually no
dIfferent from other productive processes, an assumption which
is held more widely (see Donimelli and H oogvelt, 1996).
In a review of the literature about the quality agenda in
respect of the British social services, Watson (2002) argues that,
d~spite the promjse ofquality, it has been a top-down, manageriahst
process, intimately lin ked with benchmarking, performance
measurement and assessment. As sllch, he argues, the quality
agenda has not lead to an improvement in services to users but
has instead lead to a more constrained, inflexible, proced~ralized
and commoditled service. T his is particularly the case for
socj~1 work services which are, it is claimed, so caught up in the
qualIty-related pelformance mcasurement processes, that what is
measured (and hence what is done) bears litde resemblancc to
the social work task itself. Nevertheless, quality combined with
risk and audit, have become a key discursive complex constituting
the parameters of practice, largely through holding social welf.1rc
service delivery processes (and social workers) to account.
Finally, any discussion about factors and processes shaping
practice in the contemporary era is not complete if it does not
acknowledge the impact ofinformation and communication technologies
(ICTs). All of the processes I have discussed in this
chapter arc made possible and intensified by the proliferation
of leTs, revealing the productive capacities of practical objects
(Henman and Adler, 2003 ). The calculation of risk, the proceduralizarion
of service delivery, the development of performance
measurement, all of the processes of the 'conduct of the conduct'
RE-CONSTRUCTING PRACTITIONERS '13
of service delivery are immeasurably assisted by the use of technologies
that can work dlcir way into that space of practice the
space of dle street-level bureaucrat - hitherto concealed from
managerial oversight. Management information systems and decision
making systems operated via electronic platforms can be
thought of as new purpose-built domains of practice in which
user (social worker) discretion is purposefuUy designed away, and
in which critical or moral reflection on (and choice of) system
options is simply not possible (van den Hoven, 1998). Further, as
Bovens and Zourdis (2002) suggest, thc new street-level bureaucrats
in social welt:"1fe service delivery agencies may no longer be
the social workers; they may well be the ICT software designers.
With the development and use of ICTs in the managing of
service delivery, we sce the integration ofsoft and hard technology
which, taken together, have already and will continue to shape
dlC conditions of possibility for practice. l CTs reshape the nature
of the relationships between social welfare organizations and their
users, and between social workers and their clients. The escalating
use of caUcentres, for example, bringing together telephonic and
computer technologies, utterly changes dle nature of the userorganization
interaction (Henman and Adler, 2003), a development
which also creates possibilities for new forms ofsocial work
practice (see, for example, Humphrics and Camilleri, 2002 ).
The vulnerability of social work to technology-driven change
largely stems frol11 its nature as a bureau-profession. Further, as
lCT continues to propel new forms of 'networked governance'
(Skelcher, 2000), the 'bureau' need no longer be a bureaucracy. It
can, as is the case in Australia, the USA and Britain, be any sen/ice
delivery agency operating under any auspice in a contractual relationship
with the state. Earlier in the chapter, I suggested that
the (ul1)making of the profession (Fournier, 2000) is contextually
contingent (McDonald, Harris and Winterstein, 2003). While
this is cenainly the case, it is also true that dlC processes described
in dlis chapter re-constitute what social work is and what it does.
The task for readers is to recognize examples ofwhat I have identified
here and consider the implications for their practice in dlcir
own locale. But our analysis of the contemporal)' environment
and its effects is not yet complete. In the next chapter we consider
the impact ofthe same deep and intermediate processes of change
On the people who use our services.
,
7 Re-constructing
Service Users
Along with social work practitioners, service users have also been
significantly affected by ti,e developments charted in Chapters 2
to 5. The processes by which change has been wrought and ti,e
impact on sen 'ice users can be captured through an analysis of
their status. The various descriptive labels that have attached to
people who use welfare services are particularly illustrative in that
these labels conjure up specific identities, each of which have
consequences. At one time (albeit quite a long time ago), a social
worker, even one who was not necessarily working in a ht:althrelated
setting, might have unselfconsciously referred to service
lIsers as 'patients'. More latterly, the words 'client' or 'service
user' predominate. Most recently and in many domains (but by
no means aU) another pair oflabels or identities has been brought
into play - that of consumer and customer. These developments
signifY an interesting and disturbing outcome, particularly of the
political developments we discussed in Chapter 4. T hey suggest
that the 20th century relations of citizenship - that is) relationships
between individuals/groups and the state - are undergoing
a transformation in ways that intimately involve people who use
welfare services.
There is considerable disquiet being expressed, particularly in
the academic literature, that shifts in the way we conceptualize
and deliver services is having an insidious and destructive impact
on the standi11i1 of these people as citizens ofliberal democracies.
As an issue, however, it is not altogether new. The words we use
to describe those who use our services arc, at one level, metaphors
that indicate how we conceive them . At another level such labels
operate discursively, constructing both the relationships and the
attendant identities of people participating in the relationships,
inducing very practical and material outcomes. The word "client'
for example) was and may well still be the most common in
the broad field of social welfare internationally. As part of its
115 ~
116 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
modernist protessional project, social workers adopted the term
'client' from psychoanalysts (Healy, 1998), but 'client' is also
lIsed by other professional groups slich as engineers and lawyers.
Unlike the clients of engineers and lawyers (who can leave the
relationship if they wish, or in the language of NPM, exercise
'exit'), many, if not nearly all of the clients of social workers are
1110rc or less captive. They have little choice in the act ofconsumption.
While client may nevertheless be the term most frequently
employed, increasingly C01lSlt'HJ,cr and clIstmncl' are creeping into
the discourses of service delivery.
The Llsual rcasons arc nominated as causal factors in the adoption
of new metaphors for naming and positioning people who
use welfare services, all of which we have discussed in previous
chapters. Re·stated in summary form, these are: the hegemonic
position ofneoliberalism in shaping policy, the re·construction of
the state and models ofgovernance, the introduction ofcontestability
and competition in service delivery, and increasingly, developments
in the policy regime associated with welfare reform.
Service user identities are actually inscribed and embedded
within specific policy regimes, which in turn are brought to life
in everyday encounters, for example between users and social
workers ('Nearing, 1998). In essence processes such as these, ones
associated with the neoliberal-poUcy regime, are re-constructing
people who lise welfare services from rights-bearing citizens to
consumers or customers ofa market-produced product or service
(Barnes, 1999).
The 'consumer' rhetoric has a sub-text in that it creates a division
between an ideal active consumer-citizen, and that object of
institutionalized disapproval, the welfare dependent. Before we
discuss that issue, there are other matters which logically precede
it and which further inform our developing analysis. In the first
instance, I take us back briefly to the realm of social theory
(informed by contemporalY theOlY discussed in Chapter 5).
I discuss how theories of discottrse help us to appreciate just how
powerful and important the constitutive eRects oflanguage are, in
this case labels or descriptive categories applied to human beings
using social work services. Having established the significance of
these terms to describe service Llsers, we turn to another related
level ofexplanation and effect; that is, the re-working ofthe nature
of citizenship in the emerging workfare states. We very briefly
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 117
examine the actual operations where these processes are acted out
(largely because they have been comprehensively described elsewhere),
and their c011sequences in terms of the identities created.
The discussion concludes by identif)/ing some of the problems
with and limits to the new mode of consumer-citizenship, and
wid1 counter-developments arising in the service user movements.
Discourse and identity
By turning to the notion ofdiscourse, I am signaling that the type
of shift we are witnessing to the status of service users operates
ontologically. Put simply, the new modes of social welfare arising
out of workfare states shape people in fundamentally difterent
ways than the preceding welfare states. The invocation of new
identities in the form of consumer or customer, for example,
changes how we actually think about service users, which in
turn shapes their material experiences. In Australia, for example,
workfare programs encourage social workers in those organizational
contexts involved to think about service users not as rightsbearing
citizens hit upon hard times, but as unmotivated and
possibly lazy people who should be forced to engage in whatever
program deemed appropriate (McDonald and Marston, 2005).
While I cannot here do justice to the complexity of discourse
theory and associated analytic methods, we can nevertheless take
some of the ideas generated within that body of work to assist
appreciation of the constitutive effects of language.
Discourse is language-in-use, in either spoken or written
forms. It is talking and writing which, in both instances, acts
upon the world and both constructs and is constructed by it
(Candlin, 1997). For our purposes, the words used to dcscribe
people who use social work and welfare services act as signs. Signs
stand between the object (in this case the service user) and the
interpreter (for example, a social worker). When a sign is afl'"ixed
to a service user, the user is known 'through the sign and not
by an)' other means' (Boden, 1994, p. 55, italics in original).
The signing process, in this case the affL'.:ing of labels or terms
such as 'patient', 'client', 'consumer' or 'customer', is achieved
through language. It is a process which is, paradoxically, so transparent
that it is invisible, and hence taken for granted. In a social
118 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
work intervention process, the sign 'social worker' and 'client'
are brought to life, with actual, material consequences for both.
The social worker, for example, is the one who is the bearer of
knowledge and has access to resources. The client, by definition,
has neither or at least, is deficient in some way so much so as to
warrant 'assistance'.
The labels affixed to service users are categorization devices that
is, they are means of determining who is who, and what
characteristics adhere to the various categories. Discourses which
employ such signs reproduce and reinforce ideologies (Van Dijk,
1998). Ideology operates at conceptually distinct levels (although
in practice, the levels are interwoven) - for example at an intellectual
level (an overall, coherent system of thought), and at a
lived level ofpresentation ofsclfand 'other' (Jaworski and Coupland,
1999». When service users are categorized as consumers
and customers, a specific ideology is promoted at the various
levels. The notion of customer, for example, promotes the overarching
ideological formation of neoliberalism, but when invoked
in social practices (such as in instances of social work practice, or
in almost any encounter in a social welfare organization), creates
a particular identity (or formation of identities).
As we will see later in the chapter, in the contemporary era
the actual identity formation discursively offered and accepted
depends on the type of customer or consumer one actually is.
'Consumer' and 'customer' is a mode of representation which can
be (and is) politically contested, because it is an attempt (usually
but not always successful) to position some people or groups with
less than desirable identities. The classic examples are the welfare
dependent mother or the long-term unemployed person. When
applied, each mode of representation defines both the person
making the representation and the individual or group so constituted.
In addition, it conditions interaction. The label 'illegal
alien', for example, operates in much the same way as 'welfare
consumer'. In both instances, the identity authorizes specific
types of intervention. In Australia, for instance, 'illegal aliens' are
forcibly detained for long periods of time in maximum-security
detention centers in remote, inaccessible and climactically unforgiving
places. The identity of 'welfare consumer' similarly authorizes
a range ofactions, depending on the service field and type. As
Hugman (1998) notes, the consumer identities of contemporary
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 119
welfare regimes range along a continuum from active (doing) to
passive (being done to). In summa~, \:rhat we call p.eo?le wh?
use our services clearly has greater slgl11ficance than IS ImmedIately
apparent. Further, the re-construction of service users over
time reflects shifts in the overarching ideological formation at play
with quite specific consequences.
Discourses of welfare
Ife (1997, p. 56) identifies four discourses of welfare. He places
these on two axes, horizontal and vertical, for the purpose of
analyzing each in terms ofpower and values. Here, I take the four
he identifies and add another. I examine them along one chronological
dimension to illustrate developments over time (albeit in
an oversimplified way) and to position them in relation to service
delivery modalities. Clearly such a process understates complex
social, historical and political contingencies iJl different contexts,
but it is nevertheless useful analytically. Further, by separating and
positioning them in this way, I do not mean to imply that they
operate distinctly. They do not as indeed all may exist contemporaneously
within anyone welfare regime and in anyone period of
time. The first ofthese is tlle charitable discourse, in which welfare
or service delivery is a gift or donation directed towards a needy
supplicant (usually a member of the deserving poor). The worker
in this case is a philanthropist accountable to charitable donor.
The welfare as charity discourse dominated in the 19th century,
but clearly still remains in many parts of the non-profit welfare
sector, particularly in those areas where state provision is limited.
The second is the professional discourse, clearly associated with the
social work professional project. As suggested earlier, welfare is
a service for the client. The worker is a professional accountable
to the client, to the profession, and finally to the organization. Its
period of dominance was clearly the post-World War II wclfare
states, deployed in the many state agencies providing services. The
third and more contemporary discourse is that of NPM in which
welfare is a product for the consltt1'ter - citizen. Here, the worker is
a case or care manager, primarily accountable to the state, and to
manage1nent as opposed to the profession or the service user. The
fourth (also contemporary) discourse is that of the llwrket which
120 CHAllENGING SOCIAL WORK
promotes welfare as a commodity for the customer, wherein the
worker is a broker or entrepreneur again accountable to management,
and as in the case of large US firms involved in welf..lre
service delivery such as Maximus Inc and Lockheed Martin , to
shareholders. The final discursive formation of welfare I identify is
that of c011ummit)!, a contradictory and confusing set ofdiscourses
in which welfare promotes participatioH for the citizen-user, and
the worker as comm1mity eHabler. Depending on the version, the
worker is accollntable to different stakeholders. Variants of this
latter discourse are promoted by Third Way Jdhercnts, communitarians
and in other social movements.
No one discursive formation dominates completely, but it is
clear that the market and mrtnrtge1'irtl discourses are increasingly
influential, and are displacing other discourses, particularly that
of the p,·oftssiollal. The charitable discourse has a much more
variable fate . If operating in organizations funded by the state,
then it is to a greater or lesser degree supplanted by the managerial
and market discourse or a hybrid ofthe two. All ofthese discourses
have an underlying feature in common; that is each positions
people who use services within a relationship with those who
produce services.
Within each, people who use services are constructed a
tittle ditlerently. Witllin the charitable discourse, the user
was/ is predominantly someone who is dependent (physically
and/or economically). Good dependency (the deserving poor)
is supported; bad dependency (undeserving poor) is punished.
AU those who are dependent are subjected to strict surveillance
by those with the moral legitimacy to do so. Within the professional
discOtt1'se tile person is constructed as someone in need
of assistance or intervention, someone who docs not have the
necessary knowledge/ ability/capacity to help him or herself, and
who is relatively passive. The profession itself makes claims to
special knowledge or ways of knowing. The disciplines, or ways
of knowing, position tllC subjcct/client in different ways. At the
core of each, however, is a variation of dependency, knowledge
deficit or inadequacy. The managerial disco1t1'Se positions people
who use services as types of consumer-citizen. The consumercitizen
has rights (to a certain extent and f.:lirly constrained), such
as the right to access service and tile right to minimum standards
in service delivery. The consumer-citizen is constructed largely
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 121
within his or her relationship witll tile state as opposed to a
rofessional. The state ' manages' service delivery on behalf of tile
~onSl1mer-citizen, controlling tile activities of professionals and
circLimscribing their professional autonomy. Professionals have a
largely instrun1ental value to managers acting as key agents of
the state. The market discourse constructs the service user as a
customer. Welfare services are a commodity to be purchased in
some form of market-place. The user as customer is constructed
as a more active and powerful participant than the consumer.
In this conception, it is tile customer who detennines what will
be provided and how. The customer's power of choice renders
services and professionals more accountable and more responsive.
This powerful customer stands in contrast to others, for example
rhe unemployed)who because tlley are not customers purchasing
services, cannot choose and can then be directed into specified
modes of intervention. Finally, the various community discourses
create a range of welfare identities - for example, tile engaged
citizen constituting herself by participating in mutually constitutive
and supportive relations, enacted within organic communities.
This latter discourse or more accurately group of discourses,
while very fractured and diverse, also accounts for a range ofalternate
and resistant identities, for example, those promoted by the
variOlls service user movements.
While each of these discourses operates in an assortment
of permutations in most welfare regimes, it is the rise of the
neolibcral 'market' and 'managerial' discourse and the associated
consumer-customer identity currently constituting service users
which is of most interest when tlunking about the future. The
emergent identity of the consumer-customer signals an entirely
new relation ofwelfare markedly different from what went before.
As I suggested at d,e beginning ofdtis chapter (and discussed at
Some length in Chapter 4), tltis development is deeply disturbing
because it signals a fundamental reconstruction ofthe relationship
between the state and its citizens. It is, in effect, a cultural shift
(Taylor-Gooby, 1998).
The types of developments identified in earl.ier chapters and
here reflected in the rise of the consumer-customer identity, have
had profound implications for the models of governance and
politics of welf..1re embedded in the liberal democracies. During
the rise of the 20th century welfare states, the approach to
122 CHAllENGING SOCIAL WORK
citizenship incorporated sorne commitment to social citizenship
rights (Delanry, 2000). Under the post-World War II settlements,
the citizen was constructed as a member ofa unified, national and
coherent political community, whose interests were collectively
expressed through institutionalized means, within an apparently
stable system of governance. It was a model in which the deploy.
ment of professional and public service ethics plus a willingness
to fmance services to needy members of the polity were seen
as contributing to and guaranteeing the common interest. As
we now know, the expansion of social citizenship rights led to
the creation of a form of welfare in which states, to differing
degrees, assumed responsibility for the well·being of the citizens.
Now, a new form ofwelfare (workfare) has emerged, representing
an abrupt break with the past both in terms of the political
settlement and in terms of the model of citizenship. Citizens
arc now active, not passive - they are customer-consumers of
marketized services, not clients of a bureau·professional based in
a state agency. Currently, welfare is a matter of individual needs
and wants, and commitment to any public or collective din1ensian
to welfare is dwindling (Harris, 2003; Clarke, 1998). But
as we will see, in this brave new world there are hierarchies of
consumer-customer identities in terms ofdesirability, and in terms
ofthe mode ofinteraction with the state and with state-sponsored
welfare services.
The retreat from the post-war welfare states and the re-working
of citizenship is, of course, the focus of welfare reform. Developments
in policy have, for example and most centrally, disarticulated
access to income support from any notion of social rights,
and re-articulated it within a new form of contractualism emphasizing
claimant obligation. This obligation is one to participate,
principally in the labor market, but if that is not available or
possible, in various modes ofstate-sponsored and state-generated
'activity'. vVhilc welfare reform remains the dominant site in which
contemporalY envisioning of citizenship through the customerconsumer
identity is occurring, other modes of welfare service
delivery are also involved. This is particularly so when we acknowledge
dut operationally, reforms in income support and other
forms of welfare services are each implicated in the other. Models
of welfare reform promoted in the various new regimes largely
depend upon deployment of a range of welfare services; from
AE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 123
child and family welf.:·ue sClv ices to substance abuse programs. It
is in many of these various locations that the new identities of
service users as consumer-customers are discursively cons!ituted
and social workers, by virtue of practicing in these locations, are
clearly involved (Frame and Duerr Berrick, 2003 ).
Constituting the consumer-customer
The carriers of tIlis new identity are a range of 'reforms' designed
to re-fashion service delivery within the rationality of the market.
A new model of service delivery has emerged which assumes
that market forms of deLivelY informed by management models
and principles drawn from business can deliver services more
efficiently and effectively. The model asserts advantages to the
people who use services: for example less cost, greater diversity,
increased choice. The marketization ofwelfare has essentially
meant the implementation of purchaser/ provider splits (government
as purchaser, non -state bodies as providers); tile creation of
quasi-markets and the introduction of the principle of contestability
in service delivery; the expansion of service delivery by
the for-profit sector, the re-orientation ofservice delivery and tile
introduction of increased scope for user-pays arrangements.
One of tile driving forces articulated as a reason for these
developments in service delivery reform is to maximize responsiveness
to the interests and needs of people who use services,
and to develop a 'customer-oriented' approach to service delivery
(Vardon, 2000). Previous models of delivery were positioned
as limited in their capacity to respond to service user interests
(Harris, 2003). In Chapter 6, I briefly discussed tl,e introduction
of the Quality agenda in the production of welfare services,
a development which is an important plank in the new model
of service delivery. Comprehensively discussed elsewhere, it is
developments like this witIlin an overall framework of customeroriented
management derived from the private sector which form
the COntexts in which the consumer-customer is constituted (see
fat example, Harris, 2003; Clarke, 1998; H ealy, 1998; Hugman,
1998; Butcher, 1995 for in-depth discussions of these processes).
Conceptually, consuming welfare services is treated as much the
same as consllming any other commodity. Even though
the differences between goods and services arc acknowledged, the
124 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
perspective assumes that the exercise of choice grants power
to the chooser, and it is this exercise of choice that is crucial.
Consumer choice is not only a desirable design principle, it is also
thought to discipline service providers through the exercise of
'voice' (consumers' influencing service delivCI)', usually by collective
action) and 'exit' (consumers exercising their choice to take
their business elsewhere) (Hirschman, 1970). There arc, however,
a few problems with this position when applied to welfare services
(Hudson, 1998). First, the capacity for 'exit' (that is, the capacity
to leave a service and go to another) is clearly limited in welf.:1re
service delivery, particularly in service delivery systems increasingly
stretched by ongoing resource constraints. Further, 'exit' is
not an option available to involuntary service users, and is rarely
an option for service users who experience significant illfo1"1llrttion
aspmnetry (that is, who do not know what is available) and
who do not know of or cannot access alternatives. Second, the
capacity for cl'oice) (in which customers argue for what they want
and, importandy, are listened to) barely exists in most domains
of social welfare practice. If it docs, it is usually limited to the
development ofvarious forms ofcustomer or citizenship charters.
These, while setting standards ofservice delivery and by providing
various modes of customer complaint and redress, do not serve
to promote service lIsers as bearers ofsocial rights. Crane (2004)
for example, clearly demonstrates how such consumer-customer
oriented developments promoted by the NPM reform agenda
in Australia had limited impact, foundering on the front-line of
service delivery in non-profit youth agencies, where they were
taken up in name only but wid1 little real impact on how services
were delivered. Taking anotl1er Australian example, consumer
activist groups which once vigorously exercised 'voice' have been
systematically stripped of their state funding or have been otherwise
muzzled. Instead, 'voice' is increasingly reconfigured as the
conduct of consumer focus groups by service delivery organizations
(Vardon, 2000).
While these limitations expose the limited capacity to exercise
voice and exit, and in doing so, illustrate the weakness of
choice as a mechanism for the promotion of 'good' consumercustomer
olltcomes, it allows us to further appreciate the Limits to
the new mode of citizenship inherent in contemporary modes of
service delivery. In the ncw regimc, citizenship rights are replaced
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 125
by a series of ~sser?ons about what constitutes best p,.-actice in
consumer relatIons In a market. Instead ofcustomer pledges from
d1e company, we see the emergence of charters, statements of
what a consumer-cllstomer can expect in terms of best prac·ce
service delivery. Any legally enforceable guarantee tl1at the
~rjtcria will be met is missing, and in effect, citizenship rights
accruing to the ncw identity of customer-consumer are aCUlaLiy
reduced. Furthermore, as previously indicated, the consumercustomer
identity is actually plural, and is, in tl1C new conditions of
welfare, hierarchically ordered. In other words, some consumercustomers
are held in higher regard by thc state than others.
To a certain extent this was always the case in that all societies
are stratified and the various forms of welfare have contributed
to tl1at. Nevertheless, the post-war welfare states attempted to
undercut such stratification processes by constituting the social
rights-bearing citizen and holding that identity out to all political
citizcns ofthe various liberal democracies. In tl1e new conditions,
the consumer-cllstomer 'citizen' is a differentiated category.
The good citizen
The most desirable status is that of the respollsible C01lS1t11lercustomer.
This status is that of the sovereign consumer - one
with sufficient resources to purchase goods and services, with
the ability and knowledge to choose between the various options
provided by the market, the capacity to evaluate the product,
and to seek redress (Harris, 2003). The good citizen is the active
citizen - active in the labor force and active in the market. The
good citizen manages her own life risks by taking out insurance,
and by adopting life-long habits to (theoretically) reduce
healtl1 risks. The good citizen actively engages in the consumption
of welfare; chosen by herself and tailored to her preferences.
Thc good citizen purchases what were once collectively-provided
goods from the new 'markets'. She financcs her own retirement,
buys health insurance and attends a private hospital; she places
hcr children in a for-profit child care center and her mother in a
for-profit nursing home.
In terms of contemporary theory discussed in Chapter 5)
the responsible consumer is one that engages in the activity of
self-surveillance. As such, the person is engaging in the most
126 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
cost-effective (for the state) mechanism ofachieving social control
in that the consumcr-customer attends to the managing her own
life and its risks, coincidentally congrucnt with the objectives of
the market. How does she achieve it and what does she achieve~
Lconard (1997) identifies several key processes. There is, for
example, a type of self-surveillance operative within the regimen
of treatment offered by expert professionals:
Medicines must be consumed, exercise engaged in, dreams noted
down, anger monitored, written work undertaken, roles practiced, all
of these activities undertaken outside of the direct gaze of the expert,
but nevertheless guided by the expert's discipline (in both senses)
(Leonard, 1997, p. 561.
In other words, the good consumer-customer citizen engages
in a form of self-generated self-regulation in which she reflects
upon and regulates her conduct as an ethical subject, improving
her 'self by using 'tedlllologies of the self (Rose, 1998). This
form ofsurveillance is constructed as a form ofmoral virtue often
exhibited by forms ofself-denial and self-discipline: our con'sumer
diets, exercises, abstains from smoking, drinks alcohol in small
quantities (with at least two abstemious nights a week), and
engages in safe sex. Those who engage in sllCh self-surveillance
are deemed 'good', while those who do not arc morally questionable.
In this way, our 'new' citizen manages her own risks, and
does so as part of the moral project of attaining independence,
a status that carries with it ascriptions of maturity. Her social
worth and the desirability of the identity she projects is constantly
reinforced by the constant invocation of its opposite; the immature,
dependent, incompetent, ignorant, and ill-disciplined. In
this way, hierarchies of identities arc established. For example:
... it is wrong - morally mischievous as well as silly - to be satisfied
w ith what one has already got and so to settle for less rather than
more; that it is unworthy and unreasonable to stop stretching and
straining oneself once what one has seems to be satisfying; that it is
undignified to rest, unless one rests in order to gather force for more
work. In other words working is a value in its own right, a noble and
ennobling act. The commandment follows: you shou ld go on working
even if you do not see what that could bring you which you do not
have already or don't think you need. To work is good, not to work is
evil (Bauman 1998: 5).
Bauman further notes that we have moved beyond the work
ethic, or more accurately, have linked the work ethic witil what
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 127
he caUs the aesthetic of consumption, in which the puritanism
ofearlier moralities of work have been replaced by the excesses .of
onsumer society. In this new society, a new form of morality
a c ~rges based on continuous consumption, in which people
e!11t: .
endlessly engage, and in doing so, continuously create or. strive
to create desirable identities. The irony of this, of course, IS ~at
t1lOS
e very identities are constructions ofa market, and that which
is desired, is almost certainly manufactured and promoted by
otllcrs. It is also ironic that the identity is always in the process of
becoming; as it is constituted by the consumption of 'products'
continuously superceded in a relentless, restless and constantly
'innovative' consumer society characterized by built-in obsolescence.
Again, from Bauman (1998: 28):
Cultural fashions dynamite their entry into the public vanity fair, but
they also grow obsolete and ludicrously old-fashioned even faster than
it takes to grasp public attention. It is therefore better to keep each
current identity temporary, to embrace it lightly, to make sure it will
fall away once the arms are open to embrace its new, brighter, or just
untested replacement.
The good citizen is one who wholeheartedly engages in
an ongoing project of the personality defined by continuolls
consumption. 'Personality' is assembled and re-assembled; a
quixotic quest which becomes the primary ethics and duty of
citizcnship (Ellison, 2000; White and Hunt, 2000). 'Freedom'
is freedom to create personality and identity through the act of
consumption. Nevertheless, both the manufacture of desire, its
consumption. and the construction of identity creates binding
dependencies on work, and the responsible consumer is one who
funds their (highly constructed and regulated ) consumption by
work, while at the same time, managing risks associated with
living by the exercise of both prudence and self-discipline. But
what of her alter-ego? What are the characteristics of the other
consumer-customer, the customer ofwclfare?
The disciplined welfare consumer-customer
The 'consumer' subject identity promoted by contemporary
developments in social policy has, as indicated, two elements.
Both involve a re-positioning of human agency, from passive to
128 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
active, while invoking a particular morality. As described abO\'e,
the first of these is the 1'csponsible consumer. The second identity
is a residual categOLY, a not-sa-new social space which acts
as the repositOlY for the new poor, the socially excluded, the
stigmatized - in other words that ubiquitous group, the 'underclass'.
This identity I dub the moral defective. This alternative
identity being constructed within contemporary social policy is
one that positions certain groups of people as manifestations
of negative attributes, dispositions and moralities. It is, as indicated
above, oppositional in that it is constructed in opposition
to or in contrast to the responsible consumer. As the responsible
consumer is positioned as the new moral actor, her alternatives
are positioned as moral defectives, incapable of or unwilling to
take up the challenges embedded in the new world.
Invoking the notion of social exclusio1l, critical commentators
such as Nikolas Rose (1999) and Zygmunt Bauman (1998)
illustrate how various groups of people (the poor, the disabled)
are not only excluded from the labor market, but also from all
aspects of social life. Because they are unable to adopt/employ
the responsible consumer identity, they are further excluded from
what is increasingly defined as the Llniverse of moral obligation.
The exercise of morality is possible in one domain, but
not in the other. The alternative dmnain - that of the socially
excluded - becomes the object of the new moralizing discourses
but as counter-constructions to the desired and virtuous identity.
This new morality is asserted over the welfare dependent.
It acts on them but does not include them. The inability of
identities constructed and located within alternative domains to
assert themselves as active agents in the new morality authorizes
and legitimizes the correctness of acting on them in much
the same way as the immaturity of children legitimizes the adult
parent's right to 'act' upon them. And in the new regime ofworkfare,
social workers are increasingly asked to do the 'acting'. The
moral rectitude of this entire orientation to dependent people
is clear. Read, for example, these extracts from Lawrence Mead
(1986):
The issue hinges on whether the needy can be responsible for themselves
and, above all, on whether they have the competence to manage
their lives. . (p. x)
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 129
Whatever outward causes one cites, a mystery in the heart of
nowork [neologism in the original] remains - the passivity of the
seriously poor in seizing the opportunities that apparently exist
for them. .. To explain nowork, I see no avoiding some appeal to
psychology or culture. Mostly, seriously poor adults appear to avoid
work, not because of their economic situation, but because of what
they believe (p. 12).
In the absence of prohibitive barriers to employment, the question
of the personality of the poor emerges as the key to understanding
and overcoming poverty. Psychology is the last frontier in the search
for the causes of low work effort ... Why do the poor not seize [the
opportunities] as assiduously as the culture assumes they will ? Who
exactly are they? (p. 133)
The core of the culture of poverty seems to be inability to control one's
life - what psycholog ists ca ll inefficacy (p. 144).
In Bauman's terms (1998, p. 72), such identities serve the
purpose of positioning the poor as 'the enemy inside the walls,
destined to replace the external enemy as a drug crucial to collective
sanity; a safety valve for collective tensions born of individual
insecurity'. Thus marginalized, excluded and often criminalized,
the capacity of people burdened with these identities to act as
moral agents in the new moral order is increasingly circumscribed.
Positioned as the carriers of destructive morality, the legitimacy
for exclusion and objectification of the moral defective becomes
(tautologically) logical. In this way, the alternative identity of
the discipl.ined welfare subject is created and maintained. Subsequent
to and as a consequence of dlC attainment of such an
identity, dle<disciplincd welfare subject is subject to, among odler
things, a shaming culture in welfare service delivery contexts. As
Wearing (1998, p. 104) demonstrates empirically in his qualitative
research in non-profit social welfare organisations, this shaming
culture acts as 'punjshments imposed on the mind and body
[which] operate, often beneath consciousncss, in routine and ritualized
forms. This is corporeal punishment, the subjugation of
and exploitation of bodies under the monitoring of the [welfare
agency's] administration'. Such outcomes or consequences for
wclfare service users are, of course, not new. But the very fact
that they are not new indicates that there are plenty of reasons to
remain skeptical about dle neoliberal-inspired reformist agenda
which has re-configured welfare states and re-constructed welfare
service delivery.
130 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
On a different note, while discussing the implications of
the customer-consumer identity for public administration, Ryan
(2001 ) nominates a number of other problems - two of which
have significant bearing for us and our service users, particularly
the disciplined welf.:ue consumer-customer. First, reducing th~
interaction between the state and the public to passive commercial
transactions reduces active political participation ofcitizens in
governance. Consumer complaint mechanisms and the (limited)
consumer rights embedded in customer charters, for example, are
substituted for notions of public duty and citizen responsibility.
Further, separating policy making from service delivery (as has
happened in both Britain and Australia) promotes circumstances
in which government is insulated and protected from the day-today
political demands of society, often expressed as demands for
welfare. As a consequence of this, government need listen only to
those it desires; and those who are so desired arc rarely the same
people who are users of welfare services.
Second, the whole (albeit for the disciplined welfare consumercustomer
- fictional) notion of consumer sovereignty constrains
the capacity ofgovernment to act in the public interest. Collective
interests that might (and often do) cut across individual interests
arc increasingly unlikely to be upheld in contexts where the facilitation
of individual interests becomes a core principle of government.
Rather than subsidize public goods that meet the needs of
evelyone (especially the poor), the new mode of governing which
prioritizes the consumer-customer mode of citizenship faciLitates
the capacity for individual customer citizens to buy what they
need and want in individualized transactions.
Finally, we should not forget that throughout the 1990s there
has been another development of some consequence; the emergence
of service user movements. At its most basic, this development
represents a strong collective reaction from people trapped
in unwelcome user identities to their damaging experiences of
welfare and professional services. It is also related to a number
of other broader social and political changes which have their
roots in the emancipato!)' political movements of the 1960s and
1970s (Longmore and Umansky, 200]). The disabled people's
movement is perhaps the most strongly established of these,
with an intellectually sophisticated, highly plausible and coherent
social critique (Oliver and Barnes, 1998; Barnes, Mercer and
RE-CONSTRUCTING SERVICE USERS 131
Shakespeare, 1999). But this should not divert attention from
other movements, for example, of psychlatnc system surVivors,
or of people living with HIV/ AIDS (Beresford, 1999). What
distinguishes these movements is that they are. based on selfidentification,
for example, as movements of dIsabled people,
mental health service users/psychiatric system survivors or older
eople. They are self-organized and self-run; organized into local,
P h · ·d·national and international groups based on t elr own 1 entIties
which they themselves control and in which they develop
their own ways of working, philosophies and objectives. Finally,
they are committed to both parliamentary and direct action. The
service user consumer movement, through its existence, offers a
counter-discourse to that of the market (and it should be noted,
to the professional project). It is a series of movements which
provide alternate identities with quite different material consequences.
It is a discourse to which, I suggest, social work should
attend, but to do so, it would need to listen through cars critically
attuned to the elitist elements of the traditional professional
project - clements which service user movements have little
time for.
We have now completed the analysis of the complex processes
driving change and have drawn out the implications and consequences
for social workers and service users. We have attended
to the unraveling of the 20th century welfare state and its
reconstruction into somedling entirely new. We have explored
the economic, political and theoretical processes and challenges
that have contributed to the contemporary circumstances of the
21st century. Throughout Part 1 I have suggested that the utility
of the modernist social work professional project is also significantly
destabilized, and that social work of necessity needs to
envisage ways forward if it is to survive as a collective enterprise
with any sense of its original purpose intact. I have also,
at several points, shown how the new rationalities of the market
and the state, carried by NPM, by audit, risk and quality directly
confront the traditional rationalities of welfare and social work.
These propel the analysis presented in Part 2. For that reason,
I turn to the four principal strategic options for the future articulated
by tlle profession. Before launching into this next state
of the journey and at the beginning of Part 2, I draw out holV
I engage with the various options, and the reason lvhy I have
132 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
chosen this approach. As will become clear, those reasons are as
mllch drawn from developments in knowledge about how the
world of organizations and institutions work, as they are from
any personal orientation of my own.
Part 2
Options for Social Work
Preface to Part 2
The various processes and developments described in Part 1
appear quite ovenvhclming and readers can be forgiven for feeling
rather depressed! Not only arc the pressures coming £i'om all
around, the driving processes arc, as I have pointed out on several
occasions, resulting in and from institutional-level ella'nge. Adjustments
at this level can make social workers, who for the most part
don't have (or don't think they have) the capacities to practice
at this stratum feel as if they are feeble creaUIres tossing in a very
turbulent ocean. There are three responses 1 make to this.
First, I indicated in the preface to Part 1 that in contexts ofinstitutional
instability (which is certainly the conditions of contemporary
workfare) the likely outcomes are highly indeterminate.
As a consequence and as I have also suggested previollsly, many
voices and positions arc jockeying for dominance. Second and as
I show subsequently again drawing on neoinstitutional theory,
there are sound reasons theoretically why social workers should add
their opinions and positions, however expressed, to the general
clamour. H uman agency actively contributes to and is important
in institutional-level processes which after all arc, for the
most part, hlt1'Han processes, and the agency of social workers
is no exception. Third, social workers arc already contributing
with proposals being made, suggestions put forward, and arguments
developed about how social work should be undertaken
in the contemporary environment. My purpose in this part is to
review four general clusters 'of thesc. r wish to think about each
option in terms ofthc two analytical devices introduced in Part 1 first,
the notion of the profession as a professional project and its
continued strategic utility in conditions ofinstitutional instability.
Second, 1return to this idea ofinstitutional change and the extent
to which workfare produces and promotes alternative rationalities
which have the capacityto threaten the identityofsocialwork. Here,
I ask the extent to which the options identified can acknowledge)
accommodate and/or resist such rationalities. While no means
135~
136 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
a certainty (because, after all, it is a work-ill-progress), this analysis
gives LIS an illldi1Jg of the potential consequences.
Prior to outlining the way forward, I return to the second
point made in the previous paragraph. I suggested that human
agency, in this instance the agency of social workers, is salient in
institutional processes - be they creating institutions or changing
institutions. The literature on agency in organizations and in
institutions is, not surprisingly, extremely complex and highly
contested. It also contains real differences of opinions abollt the
nature ofhllman agency - that is, whether rational change agents
operating strategically can possibly influence change, or whether
human agents are more or less determined by (constructed by) the
contexts where they act, plus all points of theoretical possibility
in between (Caldwell, 2005).
Here I take up suggestions about the role of agency suggested
in recent developments in neoinstitutional theaty, acknowledging
that it is one literature among many. My justification for using
it here is that I focus on institutio1J,al change as the primary
meta-process influencing social work and welfare. I suggest
that there are significant possibilities for social workers' agency
within social welfare organizations and in the social welfare field,
even under the emerging conditions of workfare. Early neainstitutional
accounts nominated a core role for human agency
(see for example Zucker, 1977, 1986; DiMaggio and Powell,
1983; Tolbert, 1985). More recently r(conceptualizing agency
in institutional processes, particularly institutional change, has
re-emerged as key goal of contemporary work. As a result calls
have been made for neoinstitutionally informed studies to specifY
the various processes by which different aspects of humall agency
enact or change institutional orders, and the various conditions
under which different forms of agency operate (Barley and
Tolbert, 1997; Hirsch and LounsbUlY, 1997).
In these instances agency is re-instated in institutional processes
but in a form somewhere in the rnid-point between twO
distinct modes identified above. The first positions individuals as
'sovereign agcnts' (Willmott, 1987) or 'rational actors' (Tolbert
and Zucker, 1996), engaged in constant calculation of costs and
benefits (for example, how individual social workers or a group
of social workers in a social welfare organization will sun'ive the
chilly conditions). Standing in contrast is what has been described
OPTIONS FOR SOCIAL WORK 137
as an over-socialized conception of agency in which individuals
rOLitinely and unquestioningly accept, follow and reproduce social
norms (for example, social workers uncritically accepting workfare
rationalities, processes and practices). Within the genre, both the
rational actor and its alternative are rejected in favor of a conception
of agency operating with.in a model of bounded 1"ntio1'lality
(Perrow, 2000), in which agents deliberately work out how to
'go on' on a moment-by-moment, day-by-day basis. In other
words, social workers are knowing act01's - but their awareness
and the span of action is bounded, limited, and circumscri bed to
the context and time-frame in which they are located.
Positioning social workers this way, as institutional agents operating
in a bounded way, constnlcting (perhaps de-constructing)
the institutional order of the field of welfare cum workf.'lrc, we
can take the suggestions made in the next four chapters seriously.
Coupled with emerging appreciation of the role of leaders
in institutional change (Beckert, 1999; Fligstein, 1997), it is
entirely possible that professional leaders, perhaps championing
the various options canvassed subsequently, have the capacity to
really influence social work - albeit in bounded, localized ways.
In Part 2 I focus particularly on four major orientations
canvassed in the social work and related literature. I do not mean
to suggest that these are the only ways forward being promoted.
Rather I wish to emphasize that options do exist and futures are
actively being imagined and practiced by both academics and practitioners.
Chapter 8 identifies and discusses the entrepreneurial
profession (after Jones, 2000). Here, the different often adaptive
and strategic responses by social workers to the realities of
their experience in the contemporary environment take centre
stage. In Chapter 9, I discuss evidence-based 01' scientific p1'f~ctice;
its background and what it has to offer social work at this
juncture, especially in the managerial conditions of advanced
liberalism. In Chapter 10, we examine the emergent possibilities
of critical social J11ork, especially at its capacity to speak
to and work constructivcly within the advanced liberal welfare
states. We foclls here on the ability of this mode of social work
to re-invigorate the radical and progressive historical heritage
of social work. Finally, in Chapter 11, another quite different
direction is identified and discussed; in thjs case, global social
Tvork. This chapter explores developrnents in international social
138 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
work and various forms of social development practice. Here,
we begin to appreciate how aspects of social work continue to
demonstrate the possibilities of transcending the bOlU1daries of
nation states, engaging with the realities of globalization, and
bridging the North-South/developed-devcloping country binalY
divide. In other words, these developments illustrate a global
future for social work, and one which is, 1110re importantly, n Ot
wholly dependent on the institutions of advanced welfare states.
In the final chapter (Chapter 12) I briefly re-state the major
themes of change whicb were the subject of Part 1, and equally
briefly fe-iterate the strategic strengths and weaknesses of the
options canvassed by the profession in Part 2. To ground
the discussion into empirical reality, I draw on several studies of
institutional change relevant to social work and draw out their
implications, particularly the consequences of conflicting institutional
rationalities. Finally, I return to the issue of leadership,
again drawing out notions and examples from neoinstitutionaUyinformed
theoretica1 and empirical accounts. 'r do this to sketch
what model or models of leadership may be appropriate in conditions
of institutional instability, and what social workers can
potentially learn. I do this to underscore that we can act, and
what we do can usefully be informed by knowledge developed
outside of our own professional corpus.
8 Entrepreneurial
Social Work
Fortunately, social workers are not passive victims waiting to be
swamped by the successive waves of change iden.tified. and .elaborated
in Part 1. Rather, in different arenas and 111 qulte dIv~rse
ways social workers are articulating, d~veloping and promotmg
modes of practice wbich represent pOSSible futures. Jones (2000)
advances a specific program for the future of SOCIal work (which
we wiU examine later), and his intent) as is mine) is to focus
on all of the many developments in the profession which are
attempting to adapt (either wittingly or unwittingly) to the developments
in the contemporary environment. These ~ttempts ~re,
for the most part, a fe-tooled version of the profeSSIOnal proJect
attempting to create a better 'fit' between what so~ial wor~ers do
and the emerging conditions of practice. The dnve behind the
various strands within this overall category of the entrepreneunal
profession is essentially one of hard-nosed pra.g~llatism :md .all
variants hold out the message of 'adapt or die - albeIt WIth
differing degrees ofemphasis. In this chapter I focus on fou~ m~l
emphases, all of which to a greater or lesser degree are implIcated
in each other. The first of these is that which promotes the
currently popular notions of social entreprencurialism and s~ci~1
capital. The second version endorses a vigorous an~ opportu~llstJ.C
embracing of the new conditions of practice, while the thir~ IS
inventing and engaging in new spaces and new mo~es ofpractiC~.
Finally, the fourtl1 version of entrepreneurial SOCial work POSItions
politically-inspired strategic engagement as the key mode of
responding to change in the external environment.
Riding the new rhetoric
In tlle contemporary environment a phenomenon which a
colleague and I have dubbed the matrix of ideas bas emerged;
140 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
a dense, interwoven set ofnotions, concepts and arguments which
serves the purpose of providing legitimacy for the new modes of
welfare developing under conditions of neoliberalism (McDonald
and Marston, 2002). Taken up and used by a variety of actors
from seemingly different political persuasions (for example, bv
both Britain's New Labour and Australia's neoliberaI Coalitiol~
gov.ernment), the matrix of ideas consists of evocative yet slippery
notions such as community, participation, partnership, engagement,
social inclusion, social exclusion, social capital and social
entrepreneurialism - notions increasingly applied in the domains
of we1£1re. Social workers, it should be noted, are one group
among a much broader movement which has adopted this new
rhetoric, often with remarkable enthusiasm. While social work
has, :or exan:ple, a history of engagement with social enterprise
(particularly III community development in impoverished nonwestern
contexts, see Gray, 1997 and Midgely, 1996), this current
deployrncnt draws on and promotes an entirely different politics.
Whether acknowledged or not by its champions, this iteration
of social .enterprise draws its institutional legitimacy largely from
the neohberal workfare state. This is especially the case when
w~ ~U1?~rsta~ld that it is the neoliberal state which has, through
mlI1lmlzll1g Its Own role, opened up the space for the contemporary
versions of social enterprise or social entrepreneuriaJisl11 to
emerge and engage with the business of welfare.
In its current form, social entrepreneuriaJism in particular
proposes that the dispositions ofpeople (both workers and clients)
who engage in dle new spaces ofwelfare can be remade and new
cadres of actors (again, both workers and clients) can emerge.
It is suggested that dle characteristics of, for example, sllccessful
business people can be grafted onto actors in welf.:"1re contexts
to promote the social and economic weUbcing of disadvantaged
g~o~ps. Energy, initiative, enthusiasm, openness to challenges,
wIllingness to engage, to take risks, and to forge new partnerships
are held up as not only advantageous, but also necessary for
success (Bent-Goodley, 2002). A new approach to social work
pr~ctice ~merges, one which holds Out the promise of a complete
rC-lI1ventton of dle way social workers go about dleir business
and in which their legitimacy to engage in the contemporary and
emerging sites of practice is enhanced (Gray, Healy and Crofts,
2003 ).
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIA L WORK 141
The matrL'X of ideas is, in many instances, clearly influenced by
forms of Communitarianisl11, which is itself a body of thought
shot through with political differences; with conservative, neoliberal
feminist and radical variants. The contemporary forms of, . . .
Communitarianism influencing the busll1ess of welfare and SOCIal
work (which at times, seems a confusing mix of all of the variants
identified above) represents attempts to re-Iocate the articulation
of citizenship away from the domain of the state and into
non-state locations. In doing so it decisively rejects inertia and
passivity on the part of the service users held to be produced
by Marshall's version of welfare as social rights, institutionaJjzed
in what is (pejoratively) characterized as 'old welfare' provided
by the state. Equating civil society with 'community', accounts
drawn from dlis tradition arguc that citizenship is attained not
through the excrcise of rights and responsibilities, but through
active participation in contexts, settings and activities created by
social workers as social entrepreneurs.
A highly influential form of Communitarianism has recently
emerged in the political rhetoric surrounding welfare reform in,
for example, Britain and Australia (Everingham, 2001 ; Lund,
1999). It asserts a strongly moral version ofcitizenship as responsibility
and participation in a web of mutual expectations. Reform
of income security in both countries reflects aspects of dlis,
in which the notion of enforced obligation by income security
recipients to participate in various social programs is promoted.
There are also significant efforts to articulate and embed social
entrepreneurs in welfare service delivery, operating for the most
part in the 'dlird' or non-profit sector, creating 'social capital'
alongside and sometimes through delivering services (Kendall,
2000; Lyons, 2000).
This group of developments illustrate attempts by various
players (for example social workers as social entrepreneurs) to
position themselves as important in the emerging politics of
welf.:"1re in dle (as yet) fluid institutional arrangements of tllC
new regime of welfarc. In such visions, conventional poverty
relief programs are replaced by wide-ranging and often innovative
community-focused approaches, emphasizing the development
of 'support nctworks, self-help and the cultivation of
social capital as a means to generate economic renewal in lowincome
neighborhoods' (Giddens, 1998: 10). While Giddens
142 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
refers to developments in Britain, the same processes are evident
elsewhere, and have until very recently not only been largely
uncontested, but actively celebrated (Botsman and Latham
2001). '
.This forms the substance of the first version of entrepreneuri_
al~sm as a stra~egy ~or the re-making of social work. By engaging
WIth the matrIX of Ideas and by engaging in activities and developmental
projects designed to promote the objectives embedded
within it, social work in effect inserts itself within one of the
most widespread attempts to proactively engage Witll the neoliberal
regime of welf.:'lre. Social entrepreneurialism, as its name
flags, is a quite bold strategy. It is an approach which promotes
a clear values position - certainly one that is attractive to
many. Importantly, it appears to circumvent what many social
workers and others have fclt to be an insuperable barrier to
eng~~ement with contemporary welf.:'lre. It does this by giving
partiCIpants what appears to be an alternative moral vision to
~hat. of neoliberalism. In its strategy of forming partnerships
It dIssolves pre-existing institutional barriers between business
and wel£1.re (in tllis case, between the business and nonprofit
~ectors) Witllin a values framework which appears similar to (but
IS not the same) as traditional social work values. Further, it
provides an active program (for example, working developmentally
with disadvantaged communities) in a re-worked institutional
site, both practically and politically, which people can
pursue.
In a context where the capacities for social workers to practice
as autonomous professionals within the traditional confines of
state agencies are rapidly diminishing, the route offered by social
entrepreneurialism is promising and is attractive to social work.
For that reason, in the concluding chapter on his valuable book
on the future ofthe profession, Powell (2001, p. 159) argucs that
social workers should take up 'opportunities in the not-for-profit
voluntalY sector to provide social services within a market context.
Social workers can harness the innovative potential arising from
such private-public partnerships in a manner that seeks to blend
market realities witl1 humanistic values'. Social workers should
embrace the strategic option embedded in and carried by the
matrix of ideas. Social workers should, in other words, become
social entrepreneurs.
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 143
Grasping the opportunities
The second variant of this strategic option is widespread as .\:ell
as diverse. Here, the key suggestion is that, rather than retlnng
in horror, social workers should enthusiastically e~brace the new
conditions created by developments in the neohbera~ w~rkfare
te It is a position which finds its clearest expresslOn 111 the
~·l
American professional literature, identif)ring actual and potenua
roles for social work witllin the various welfare reform-related
platforms of practice and also in managed carc. While the suggcstions
may seem odd to British or Australian .readers, ~ley do
nevertheless provide examples ofwhere, strategIcally, sOCIal work
could attempt to expand. . .
Addressing a long-term aversion on the part ofAmencan sOCIal
work to public welfare, Banerjce (2002, p. 326), for example,
claims that social workers should be hired for frontlme work 111
state-sponsored employment services. Subseque~lt to ~e d:lllise
of traditional public welfare and its substitunon WIth 1 ANF
(welfare reform), the framework of public we~fare has. beco~e
much more holistic and active in its span of mterventIon WIth
welfare recipients. A5 a result, the skills required for success
are closer to mainstream social work. Martinson and Holcomb
(2002) suggest that social workers arc ideally suited to provide
services to 'hard-to-employ' individuals facing multIple barners.
Social work, Grcen and Edwards (1998) argue is well placed to
work in and with state-based public welfare agencies to undertake
significant cultural change, re-orienting non-social work fro~1tline
staff to the challenges involved in shifting from a passive
benefits system to active welfare-to-work programs. Hasenfeld
(2000) claims that social work values and practice principles makc
it the most appropriate approach to achieving success 11l employment
services in public welfare departments. Anderson (2001 )
proposes that social work insights, particularly those employing
the strengths perspective, can enhance TANF-related casework.
Hagan and Owens-Manlcy (2002) declare that social work needs
to become involved in managing such programs as the TANF
Family Violence Option, as existing public welfare front- ~ine
workers are failing to correctly identify (and hence work w1th)
victims of domestic violence. Finally, Anderson and Gryzlack
(2002) and Lens and Gibelman (2000) emphasize an active
144 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
~ndividual -Ievel and system-level advocacy rok for social workers
IJ1 wel£1.re reform programs.
Green and Edwards (1998) suggest that there is a special 'fit'
betwccn SOClaJ work and contemporary workfare. Social work
k . il en
wor ' prImar y with clicnt attitudcs and perceptions, and are
tl~ereb'y'wcll -suited to a domain in which client motivation is a kev
disposltlon for success. Here, they also specifically position th~
strel~gths .perspective as a P?tentially useful and hence strategic
approach m the workfare mIlieu. Further, the capacities of social
worke~'s to build trusti.ng relations in difficult circumstances, their
commItments to helpmg fa milies bring about change and tIl .
. r ' , elr
capaCity ~o U1k families to community resources, are ideaJJy suited
to work 111 workf.1re programs.
.Hagan (1992) identifies six distinct roles for social workers
wIt~un workfare: case managers, agency managers, policy analysts,
poltcy .a~vocates~ staff development and training, and research.
In a different velll, Iverson (2000, 1998) suggests that welfare
reform provides opportunities for the re-invigoration of what is
~lown as oc~upation~l social work as a distinct ficld of prac~ce.
Occupational SOCial work in Amcrica (and to a small extent
III ~ustralia) is a specialized field which provides a social work
servICe to employed people in various corporate settings. Welf.:1re
reform however, opens up the possibility for occupational social
workers to have a significant impact on the occupational needs of
welf.:1re-dependent populations. She identifies four broad roles for
occupational social workers in welf-1.re reform programs _ assessment,
advocacy, program development and social activism. Like
Hagan, Iverson also argues that occupational social workers can
provide an advocacy role, but with a bit ofa twist on the standard
advocacy rol~ adopted by social workers. They can, for example,
collaborat~ WIth corporate occupational social workers to open lip
pathways I~t~ employment; they can evaluate corporate reCfuitI~~e~1t
aJ~d hlrm,g p~ocedllres and advocate for £1mily-friendly poliCIes
designed fOl: smgle parcnts as potential employees. They can
also educate busl11esses about the business potential attendant to
engagement with work£1re.
, In .Iike vein, o~portllnitics are seen in the spread of managed
lare.:=.. In the AmerIcan health, particularly mental health system.
As far back as 1993, Strom and Gingerich argued that clinical
social workers operating within a psycho-social framework
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 145
need to engage with those forms of practice (assessment, diagnosis,
brief therapies, group work) favored by a managed care
environment. Ten years later Cohen (2003) claims that clinical
social workers have performed the largest portion of psychotherapeutic
intervention in the United States, and. that this, .in tlln~, is
providing opportunities for solo and group pnvatc prac~IC~. USII1~
a metaphor drawn from the physical environment, DZIegIe1ewski
and Holliman (2001 ) argue that all allied health professionals,
including social workers, will be forced to continue to compete
and forge a niche in the managed carc market. To survive and
thrive in this new ecology of we1f.:lre social workers need to work
to\vards behaviorally-based client outcomes, present themselves as
integral to the functioning of interdisciplinary health care teams,
and promote social work as a key to the achievement of quality
care within a cost-effective framework.
In both cases, that is, in relation to welfare reform and to
managed care, much of the commentary is enthusiastic about the
roles social workers can play, and about the capacity for welfare
reform in particular to re-invigorate the profession in the 21st
centUI),. It is a literature which, in large part, is quite unabashed
in its calls for engagement and is, accordingly, quite clear in its
strategic orientation. Furthermore, on the face of it, it appears
to be a productive strategy in that in regards to managed care
in particular, social work has becn quite successful in carving out
a role.
In f.:1.irness, this enthusiasm is hotly contested and many
argue for a.. more critical engagement to (at a minimum)
moderate the negative context-derived implications ofboth work·
fare and managed care for social workers and their clients
(Anderson and Gryzlak, 2002; Gorin, 2003). Nevertheless, social
work participation in both program areas is treated as an uncontrovertible
'fact' and an environmental reality which cannot be
wished away. Indeed, to the extent to which the many processes
described in Part 1 have contributed to the development of welfare
reform and managed care in the USA, then both programs and
si_milar developments in other national jurisdictions arc real and do
constitute the context of practice. At issue are the costs (or in less
emotive language, the implications) of engagement. At its heart,
we1£.'1re reform in particular is a moral project with a very specific
rationality which is quite difterent to the humanist rationality
146 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
promoted by social work. As such involvement in welfare ,'ef'l - orm
a.nd managed.care has the capacity and authority to displace traditlollal
professional social work rationalities.
New spaces of practice
~he .th~rd. variant of social work as an entrepreneurial profession
IS UltImately linked with the developments described in th
prece.d.ing section. Again, it represents engagement with the ne,~
cOIl~mons of practice but instead of promoting the fitness of
s~eCific ~ppro~che~ to social work (such as the strengths perspectJve),
tlllS vanant IS represented by those instances where social
work is carving out a new practice niche in the evolving 'ecology'
ofwelfare. There are many examples ofthis strategic option. Here
I examine four, sufficient to represent tlle case. The first two come
from tlle American experience, again clearly driven by welfare
reform and managed carc. The third case, while specificaJly taken
from Australia, is increasingly representative of the conditions
experienced in most advanced welfare states. The fourth and final
case is global in applieation,
In response to managed care new roles and spaces for social
workers are being promoted, for example as organizational
consultants and organizational change agents, and as partners
?r company owners of firms providing third party-funded clinK.al
and other.scrvic~s to purchasers such as insurance compal1Ies
~and also mcreasll1gly, by governments) (Dziegielewski and
Holhman, 2001 ), Clearly, this development falls within the fairly
long-standing (largely American) tradition ofprivate practice, but
m~naged.care has provided an institutional impetus which is qualitatively
dlfferent from the conditions adhering to tlle 'old' welfare
state, Strom (1996) and Berger and Ai (2000) claim that the new
c.on~itions are also re-shaping the manner in which private practice
IS undertaken; from an old 'dinosaur-like' model of the solo
pract~~oner hanging OLit her solitary shingle, to a new 'adaptive'
practJtJ?ner w?r~ing in multi-speciality group models of practice
aggrcssl\rely blddll1g for service contracts. This is in addition to
the rise oflarge commercial firms such as Lockhead Martin Electronic
Data Systems, Maximus Inc, America Works, Curtis and
Associates and Anderson Consulting in the business of welf.:lre.
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 147
These firms, according to Frumkin and Andre-Clarke (1999) have
shown a marked tendency to employ social workers with highprofile
wel£lre expe~tise, and in dO~lg so, open up entirely new
career paths for SOCIal workers. While these examples are drawn
from America, it should be noted that the same institutional
impetuS exists wherever a wel£lre market or quasi-market ~xists.
Second (and similarly), Ainerican welfare reform has directly
led to the development of a new 'space' of practice in faith based
welfare (Cn••n and Boddie, 2002), While social workers
have always practiced in religious non-profit organizations, a
specific provision oftile act which authorized TANF (called Charitable
Choice) significantly widened tlle scope of that sector.
Whereas previously, most non-profit church-based provision was
undertaken by large, old, formal and for the most part bureaucratically
organized organizations which, over the 20th century,
increasingly drew their organizing frameworks and rationalities
from the welfare state, Charitable Choice allows for services to
be provided by local congregations. Under previoLLs conditions,
the service delivery or pastoral arms of the churches were, in
the main, functionally separate from the devotional arms of the
congregations and parishes. The principles ofselvice delivery were
increasingly dominated by the rationalities of bureaucracy which
shaped service delivery in human selvice organizations, irrespective
of auspice. What is so interesting about tllis development is
that the statutory provision encouraging charitable choice specif.
icaUy protects the religious freedom ofparticipating entities. HoJl'
services are conceived and delivered is relocated more Witllin the
private domain ofthe religious entity as an expression offaith , and
less from an cthics of pastoral care contained within the domain
oftlle state. In tllis context, what social workers do will be shaped
more by religious beliefs and devotional activities of congregations
than by professional and administrative rationalities of the
modern welfare state.
Third, developments in information technology accompanied
by the application of New Public Management and tile subsequent
corporatization ofsignificant welfare functions have opened
new 'spaces' which social workers have been able to exploit.
In the case of Australia, for example, the re-engineering of the
main Commonwealth gover11l1'lcnt service provider (Centrelink)
coupled with the development of call-centre technology has
,
148 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
opened lip a new and quite innovative niche for social work in
the provision of telephone counselling (Humphries and Camil.
leri, 2002). In a call-centre culture of answering calls quickly and
maximizing 'customer throughput') the social workers have had
significant success in demonstrating the utility and contribution
to both the clients and the organization of in depth, on average,
45 minute calls (piLLS follow-up), as opposed to the average call
centre-operative 4 minute call. Developments such as this and
also in the various modes of on-li ne counselling (Hunt, 2002)
or information and communication technology-mediated COUIlselling
such as telehealth (McCarty and Clanc)" 2002) indicate
that the significant opportunities exist.
There arc both potential opportunities and costs in these
strategic developments. The emerging roles and spaces provided
by the rise of the corporate social worker in medium sized and
large firms, while clearly opening up a (lucrative) career path for
social workers, pose the same type of dangers as engagement with
the seemingly contradictory and perhaps destabilizing rationality
ofwelfare reform. As I indicated earlier, the outcomes ofengagement
are largely assumed as opposed to empirically verified. In
other words, we don't really know what the implications are for
the future of social work, particularly in terms of social work's
identity. The same caveat applies to the context ofengaging in the
newer forms of faith-based sen'ice delivery. Will the rationalities
of the participating religions overtake those of social work? H ow
will service users and their presenting issues be constituted in the
discursive practices of the congregations? In other words, these
developments may challenge assumptions about service users and
social workers made by the modernist professional project. Finally,
while the spaces opened up by communication and information
technology are exciting they do point to a new (yet logically
similar) pit£1.ll. As I indicated earlier, inserting practice into the
domain of information technology inevitably means constructing
practice within the logic of hardware and particularly, software
designers. As Bovens and Zouridis (2002 ) point out, in the neW
world of welfare, it is software designers not social workers who
are the new street-level bureaucrats. This point is readily demonstrated
by examining the impact of computer-mediated assessment
tools at the front line ofpubLic welfare. McDonald, Marston
and Buckley (2003), for example, demonstrate empiricaUy how
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 149
dle identity of unemployed Australians is negatively constituted,
as passive bodies to be acted upon by state-authorized agents
(social workcrs) through thc application of ~ scre.en-based assessment
tool known as the Job Seeker Classlficanon [nstrument.
As with the other suggestions canvassed here, engagement with
computer-mediated technologies may carry a significant sting in
the tail, particularly for the unwary.
A strategic profession?
The final entrepreneurial option canvassed in this chapter is
presented by a variety of authors who are acutely conscious of
the trickiness of the contemporary context. This group suggests
deliberately working strategically, suggesting that social work is
at a critical juncture. Each offers a road forward. I draw on three
examples, two from Australia and one from the United Kingdom,
as each represents a different political orientation social workers
might adopt.
The fIrst of these, provided by Jones (2000), suggests that
social work re-make itself as an enterprising profession, a pragmatic
and essentially strategic approach to the future which seeks
to capitalize on contextual developments. It is an approach which
rejects the 'aspirant' model of the modernist professional project
(but which, in some ways, re-affirms it). It suggests that social
workers develop different characteristics - those ofsuccessful business
and political leaders. As the reader will recall, the professional
project was essentially designed to achieve characteristics exemplified
by the established professions, documented as 'traits' of
professionalism in the occupational sociological literature. Within
this model, social work's progress towards full professional status
was explicitly measured against such criteria as societal recognition,
common purpose, distinctive technique based on scientific
knowledge, an etllical code, and a sense of public responsibility.
This strategy, Jones argues, while reasonably successful during
the benign period of the welf-'ue state, has become increasingly
inappropriate for all the reasons canvassed in Part 1 of this book,
particularly the effects of New Public Management discllssed in
Chapter 4. In its place, Jones proposes the development of a new
form of professionalism) a renewal which has several dimensions.
150 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Social work must become an engaged profession, participaf
1·· 11 . ' f i ' 109 aspo 1tIca y slgm cant actors 111 the social institutions shapin th
. I g e
contemporary envJronme~lt. t cannot (and must not) sit OUtside
the arenas of power. So.clal workers may also work towards the
development of alternatIves, but not as a substitute for en
. gagement
111 the. contexts and processes shaping contemporary and
future practtce. It m.ust become a sustainable p1'ofessio1t. Social
work must pay attention to such time-honored concerns of trad'.
tional professional~sm in attempting to protect the conditions ~f
autonomous practice, favorable public opinion, commitment t. . 0
COmmUlllty serVICe, creation of new opportunities for practice
and promoting the general interests of its clients. However, i;
must take a proactive stance in that it must continually look to
new and emerging opportunities for professional practice. Here
Jones notes that the rapid re-construction of the service delivef);
system opens up as many opportunities as it closes down. These
need to be identified, and social work needs to recognize and
build on its strengths as a multi-faceted and versatile profession.
He would, for example, approve of the activities of American
social workers in seeking new contexts and modes of practice in
the advent of welfare reform and managed care.
Social work must also develop pe1'1neable boundaries; it must
foster a capacity to reshape professional boundaries to make the
category of 'social worker' open to other categories of human
service worker. Social work needs to become an omnibus term
for much broader range of occupational identities, partially by
being less wedded to the sanctity and inviolability of the identity
promoted by the professional project. Rather, social work needs
to become a diverse profession in which difference is tolerated
and promoted. Because social work needs to develop and sustain
new identities and roles in increasingly diverse contexts, it also
needs to acknowledge that there is no such thing as 'real social
work'. Finally, 1tewforms ofcollaboration a1td cooperatio1t need to
be actively explored: joint ventures, consortiums, strategic partnerships,
networks and linkages of many kinds. It needs to find
new ways of marketing and presenting the services it offers.
By adopting an explicitly strategic approach, Jones is clearly
indicating that the political dimension must not be ignored. ]t is
also a response which adopts an approach to strategic activity in
that it presumes the existence of an influential organizing body
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 151
. h vill at a minimum, provide astute leadership cognizant of
whK \ , . . f d' fl
d 11 versed in the operations and strategies 0 power an 111 1I an
we
Soc,·.1 work in other words needs to be led to a new futurecnce. " ,
trepreneurial and politically engaged leaders unabashed by~~ . .
the cut and thrust of the top end of town, unfazed by potential
moral hazards of engagement, and unafraid of what the future
has to offer. . .
The strategy of fostering strategic partllershlps IS also taken up
b Healy and Meagher (2004), but in this case, the partners of
h
y
'ce occupy a different position politically in the institutional
c m . f'
arrangements of modern societies. Eschewing the orientation 0
the modernist (classical) professional project, these authors call
for a new form of professionalism. Classical professionalism, they
argue, has not served social work ~ar~cul.arly weU, even.in relatively
untroubled times. Not only did ,t tilll to enable SOCIal work
to achieve occupational closure, the relatlonal nature of dIrect
social work practice as well as the diversity of practice contexts
were and are incompatible with the technical and rational framcwork
of conventional professionalism.
Thcy contrast classical professionalism as a mode of collective
organization to achieve occupational recognition with that
of classical unionism. In the case of unionism, coherence was
derived not fro111 a professional identity but from the imperative
to negotiate and shape relationships, particularly those between
members of occupational groups and employers. "Vhile successful
within a range of industries (albeit for a period which appears
to have reached an end), for a number of reasons classical
unionism proved less useful in the domain of social services.
Both classical professionalism and classical unionism should, these
authors argue, be replaced by a new form of professionalism
which represents a strategic convergence of new unionism and
new professionalism. New professionalism, they argue, is that
which acknowledges professional expertise while promoting active
collaboration with other groups of service providers and with
service users. Ncw unionism, on the other hand, concerns itself
not only with wage negotiations, but also with the promotion
of career paths through facilitating acquisition of formal
qualifications by non-qualified or lesser qualified social service
employees. In other words, these authors explicitly nominate a
strategic alliance between the unions and social work in a way
152 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
that privileges neither, but which provides increased strength
through a wider representation of interests and an active political
and developmental agenda. vVhile attractive, it is a strategy that
downplays the role of the state which is increasingly hOstile to
both professions and unions. It is also underplays the types of
economic developments discussed in Chapter 3 which have and
will continue to undermine the capacity for labor to organize
in re-structured markets. Because of this oversight, its strategic
intent is somewhat compromised.
The fi nal strategic option I canvass here is one which (like
Jones) suggests engagement with the political and economic real ~
ities of the contemporary context, but which (like Healy and
Meagher) docs so from within a clear critical (left) politics. This
position is well illustrated by Jordan (2004, 200],2000). Drawn
within a critique of the individualizing tendencies of much of
the modernist professional project ofsocial work, and adopting a
stance which is wary of the Third Way agenda in Britain, Jordan
nevertheless suggests that social work needs to proactively engage.
Specifically, social work needs to articulate how the expertise
and capacities of social workers are particularly well suited to
reforming what he considers to be an unworkable Third "Vay
policy framework. If it acts with imagination and daring social
work has, argues Jordan (2001 ), the capacity to re-configure
the 'T'hird Way into a more progressive program at the level of
intervention. Social work needs to position itself in the spaces
of practice dcveloping under the Third "Vay auspicc outside of
the destructive environments of the social service bureaucracies for
example, working developmentally in disadvantaged locations
(the Employment Zones), working with communities to hold
their local scrvices (health, education and welfarc) morc rcspon~
sive and accountable, and in developing cross-sectoriaJ partnerships.
In these spaces, it needs to promote its capacity to work with
diversity, appreciate interdependence, power and conflict, and
value and promote cooperation. But it needs to engagc within a
framework of mutuality and democratic solidarity (Jordan, 2004).
If social work is successful, it can create a win-win situation - both
in terms of occupational futures and in terms of social outcomes.
Looking across these three examples suggesting a deliberate
strategic engagement in response to the exigencies ofthe contemporary
contexts of practice, it is clear that thcir major ditlcrence
ENTREPRENEURIAL SOCIAL WORK 153
lics in the politics promoted and in the institutional arcnas which
constitute the target systems. \Nhat they have i': comm~n (and
what they also have in common with the prevIOus vanants of
enrrepreneurialism presented in ~is chapte:) is a willi.ngncss .to
engage. Each is intent on occupa~OI:al sl~r,llval and offers a clear
way forward. But as indicated earlier 10 dus chapter the key question
is not whethcr social work will survive, but rather what
will social work become if it follows the strategic directions put
forward in the spirit of entrepreneurialism. As we will see, this
question can also be asked of the next major .option canvassed in
Chapter 9 - the caUfor evidence-based practice.
9 Evidence-Based Practice
The various strategies representing the promotion of social work
as an entrepreneurial profession attempting to fe-make itself in
the contemporary conditions do not, of course, represent the
only option. The second strategic response we will examine
i.§....!be contemporat), resurgence of a long-standing orientation
to\V~rds social work practice - variously called scientific practice,
empirical clinical practice, research-based practice, or evidencebased
practice (Trinder, 2000a). Occurring on a broadcr scale
than social work, the renaissance of evidence or more partiClllady
of a specific form of 'evidence' in the contemporary regime
of welfare is entirely congruent with the times. As we will sec,
discllssions about the delivcl), of social welfare as well as contemporary
approaches to social policy in the advanced welfare states
increasingly make reference to the proactive use of evidence.
Evidence-based practice is, according to Munro (1998, p. 23)
an approach to social work which 'encourages social workers
to use empirically tested methods of helping [0 formulate their
reasoning and to evaluate their -own work rigorously'. Marking
social work 'as a quintessentially modernist project, the positivist
orientation embodied by evidence-based practice has been articulated
and debated within the formal social work literature virtually
since the profession's inception (for example, Richmond,
1917). Over the last decade evidence-based practice has experienced
a revitalization, mooted by some social work scholars
and practitioners as the most productive development seen in
some time. Its contemporary emergence has been spurred by
a range of objectives, the most intuitively compelling of which
are ethical in intent. The (desirable) promotion of practitioner
accountability to people who use social work services and [0 other
relevant bodies is vigorously advanced as a key reason why social
workers should embrace evidence-based practice (see Gambrill,
2003,2001,1999; Rosen, 1999). An important (although not
155..
156 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
as clearly acknowledged) impetlls also arises fi'om the d .
- t- I · . ~ ~
to COllll CJ t lC lI1creaslI1gly precarious image of so . I
I ( . cia work
In t 1e unfi-Iendly) New Public Managcment (NPM). .
state (Foster and Wilding 2000· T~inder ?OOOb) E -")Spired
,'d . ) ) ...., . ssentlally
C\ I enee-based practICe proposes that social work inter\'enti~ )
knowledge should be developed through the application of (Ii n
~ m = ) ... m
. . . par~ POSJtlVlst rcs~~rch methods, and that social work
~lal:nce) parnell,lady the ~eclSlons that social workers make in the
(o,nduct ofcase 1I1tcrvent.J.ol1, should be based on the best availabl
eVidence. e
. On~ ~~'ay of critical~y engaging with evidcncc·based practice
IS to l~\ lew the .techillcal and epistemological debates fOllnd in
the SOCIal work literature (for example Goldstein 1992· T· j
2000b; Witkin and Harrison ·2001 ·'Webb 20'01) T'I·nncer,
. , ) , . liS IS an
Important and informative debate with whkh social workers
sho~ld ~l1gag~ because it speaks to the heart ofthe uncertainty and
ambl~ulty whIch bedevils social work. As sllch, it will be reviewed
!ater ~ the chapter. Irrespective of the validity and intellectual
mtegnty ofthe claims and counter claims made, it should be noted
that SUC~1 accounts employ distinct pOsitions. Specifically, their
assumptions about what constitutes knowledge are very difTerent
and are unable to account for the assumptions embedded in each
other, ml~ch .less engage with each other in some sort of mutual~y
con.Stltutlve dialogue ?ver the ' best' way forward. I engage
WIth eVldence-based practice by proposing another approach _
one tI~at decenters ~ssLLm~tions about the nature of knowledge as
~he plll:1ary evalua~lve a~ls. My purpose for taking this approach
IS to shift o~lr conslderanon ofevidence-based practice out of the
{food-bad .blHary di~ide in whkh it is often located, particularly
1~1 the social work IJterature. It is more important to fOCllS attelltt~n
not only on dle contested intellectual and practice merits of
e~'l~ence-based practice, but to locate it within a broader appreCIation
of the range of developments in social work attempting
to res~ond t~ contemporary conditions. Again, I focus on the
strategic mertts. I do so by advancing the proposition that develo~men.ts
such as evidence-based practice can also be understood,
Stlategl~ally, as a response articulated by sections ofa de-stabilized
occ~l~atl?nal .group in a context of institutional upheaval. Mv
poslt~on.111 thiS book) is that it is at this level, that evidence-based
practice IS worthy of serious consideration.
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 157
Developing evidence-based practice
Professional social workers should systematically employ di~ciJinary
knowledge expressed in the social. and psyc~ologlCal
~ciences; applying their insights and explanatIons t~ SOCial problems
and to problematic people. This is a 10ng-st~ndl11g approa~h)
originally developed by Mary Richmond (1917) 1!1 her conception
of social diagnosis and developed further by sLlch semmal s~Clal
work theorists as Florence Hollis (1966) who promoted the Idea
ofcasework as science. Since then) there have been many attempts
to establish a scientific foundation for practice (Reid, 2002) as
art ofthe ongoing progression ofthe professional project. While
~'riterS such as Richmond and Hollis provided tile foundations,
it was not until the 19505 and 1960s that the practice-as-scicnce
movement achieved any significant purchase in the profession.
Unfortunately, limited success in establishing the effectiveness of
social work interventions through contI'olled experiments bedevilled
early attempts to establish and entrench the empirical practice
movement (Reid, 2002; Kirk and Reid, 2002) .
Clearly informed by developments in psychological behavioural
theory, some social workers (particularly academic social workers)
began in tile 1960s and 1970s to promote practice as instances
of research through what became known as the single-subject or
single-system design (55D). Actively taught in the (American)
wliversities, practitioners using SSDs employed sllch methods
as structured observation) standardized tests and d ient reports
to establish -a base line of data about a client's functioning.
This base line is then augmented in successive stages postintervention,
and client progress evaluated. Despite determined
advocacy, the SSD approach to practice did not become a core
feature of social work (or even particularly influential with practitioners).
AltI10ugh their lack of engagement with research was
repeatedly 'blamed" the relative failure was, in part, caused by
differences between its supporters and detractors, its inability
to demonstrate itself as applicable to many domains of social
work practice, as well as technical difliculties in the SSD design
itself which severely limited the knowledge claims that could
be made.
Subsequently (and primarily in American social workL several
influential social work academics began to develop an approach to
158 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
practice modeled on research and development projects of Other
industries. This culminated in what Kirk and Reid (2002) call
the design and development approach to practice research or the
interpelltion research approach (Rothman and Thomas, 1994)
designed to develop empirical1y tested intervention methods i~
social work, More recently, evidence-based practice in social work
has begun to employ the tools of experimental design (randomized
controlled trials), review (wherein a number of studies are
examined for what they can offer) and meta-analysis (in which
results of a series of studies are pooled and tested) (Reid, 2002 ).
Kirk and Reid (2002, p. 153) claim to have identified good
examples of tlle use of randomized designs in many areas of
social work practice - in mental health, chUd and YOUtll behavior,
substance abuse, aging, health, domestic violence, mental health
and child abuse.
Both simultaneously and subsequently, developments such as
these have transformed into the contemporaty evidence-based
practice movement in both the USA and Britain (but to a
lesser extent in Australia) (Sheldon, 1986; Kirk and Reid, 2002).
Evidence-based practice in social work draws on developments
in the health field (Trinder, 2000b). Evidence-based practice is
clearly one of the dominant paradigms in health care, and from
tllere, it spread into social work.
vVith several variations, evidence-based practice has risen to
considerable prominence, particularly in the United States and
Britain. Some proponents advocate a rather narrow form (for
example, Thyer, 2001), in which interventions or treatments
are chosen on the basis of tlle scientific support for thcm
and which are simultaneously subjcct to ongoing evaluation of
outcomes through tlle application of single system and other
more rigorous research designs. Others such as Gambrill (2003)
and Sheldon (2001 ) promote a broader form of evidence-based
practice. While still advocating quite specific metllods of drawing
evidence into practice (for example, reviews and meta-analysis),
this latter approach is less strictly confined to practice as empirical
research and is more an overall approach to how practice
should be undertaken. For Gambrill for example, evidence-based
practice is as much a philosophy of practice as well as a concrete
mode of engagement. Still others (such as Rosen 2003 and
Rosen and Procter, 2003) have promoted the noti01~ of car~fully
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 159
developed empirically-validated practice guidelines applied along
witll systematic planned practice and siJ1gle-syste~ll deSign,s.
One of the major justifications for the promotIon of eVldencebased
practice is the desire by its propone~lts ~o li~ social wo~k
out of what is presented as a quagmire of uratIonality. Gambrill
(2003), Rosen (2003) and Sheldon (2.001), for example, all argue
that social work in general fails to Justify Its actIOns b~ ,reference
to any discernable (and hence testable, or at a tnllUmum
contestable) logic. Social work, as Gambrill (1999) famously
asserted in a seminal article on evidence based pra~t1Ce, IS an
'authority-based profession' and its claims to 'aut~lor~t)I' are, for
the most part, spurious, In one of her many publications ,on the
topic (2001, p. 170), she argues that social work praw ce not
informed by evidence is a 'recipe for bamboozlement' characterized
by such factors as a fine-sounding but unimplemented code
ofethics, reliance on methods of investigation that obscure rather
tl13n reveal what social workers do and to what effect, advoc~cy
of a relativistic view of knowledge in which all modes of knowlI1g
are equal, propagandistic strategies and hyperbole. .
Apart from the purely ethical impulse to render SOClal workers
more accountable for what they do, there are several reasons
why evidence-based practice has re-emerged in the contemporary
environment. Articulated differently in different contexts
but reflective of the same theme, these involve first, the current
misgivings about social work, particularly as articulated ~Y less
than friendly governments, and second, the re-construc~on of
the institutional framework ofpractice with its subsequent Impact
on the profession (as extensively discussed in Chapter 6). In the
former instance, in Britain for example, social work's apparent
'failures' have lead to the widespread introduction ofcare management
in social services and the removal of social work out of the
field of corrections.
While Sheldon and Macdonald (1999, p. 1) clcarly locate
evidence~based practice as part ofthatidentifiable tradition ofscie~tific
research and evaluation, they also acknowledge the strategIC
objectives of scientific approaches to social work. In the United
States, the rise of managed care has created circumstances in
which social workers must demonstrate effectiveness (or at least
attempt to do so) to eftectively compete for survivaL As indicated
earlier and notwithstanding these contemporary developments,
160 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
the impulse to engage with social work as a form of scientitlcally
informed practice has a long heritage, in part due to a core
feature of the profession. Social work has continuously artiClIIated
its objective to stand on the side of those who are/were the
objects of their inten1cntions, committed to 'working with and
enabling people to achieve the best possible levels of personal
and social well-being' (Australian Association of Social Work
1999, p. 1). This essentially humanist orientation often stood
(and still stands) at odds with those aspects of social work that
are intrusive and controlling, illustrating the moral ambiguity and
contradictory nature of many social work roles (for example, in
child protection, mental health, juvenile and adult corrections
and increasingly in forms of practice associated with workfare),
The professional literature is replete with discussions and suggestions
about ways of managing this potentially disabling ambiguity
which, in one form or other, constitutes a core struggle within the
profession.
For some, resolution of the dilemma involved developing alternative
'radical' forms ofpractice that recommended shifting social
work out of the contexts that induce ambiguity in the first place.
For others, resolution to the dilemma was sought in different
ways that involved proactively engaging in ambiguous contexts
of practice to better understand how effective social work intervention
may be developed. These modes of responding rested
on the assumption that social workers can retain their commitments
to client well-being through, for example, the judicious use
of valid knowledge rigorously developed, applied and evaluated
within the framework of professional values and commitments.
In fact, the overall approach was and is argued to rep,,-escnt those
commitments, and is illustrative ofthe morali0' ofevidence-based
practice.
This tradition or way of responding to morally ambiguous
contexts has, for quite some considerable time, promoted empirical
research in clinical social work practice, particularly as a
means ofadvancing client well-being (and professional ethicality).
The adoption of evidence-based practice can be understood as
the latest manifestation of this response; that is, a continuation
of attempts to deal with moral ambiguity and uncertainty.
I also suggest (in company with Witkin and Harrison, 2001) that
the current engagement with scientific research in the form of
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 161
I
"dence*based practice by its proponents represents, in part, a
ev c· I . I
contemporary enactment of the long-standing prolesslona socia
work project. This is exactly what Rosen ( 2003,p. 198) means
when he claims that evidence-based practice SIgmfies the profession's
commitment to a scientific knowledge bas: as one of
the basic premises of professional social work practlC:. A recel:t
ublication by the Centre for Evidence-Based SOCial Care 111
~ritain for example, states that 'it is important that professi.onaUy
alified social workers base their practice on the best eVIdence
gu . I k'
of what works' (Newman, 2002, p. 2), and that a socia wor rer S
claim to authority resides in her clairn to 'expert knowledge'
(ibid, p. 3). In this manner, the deployment of evidence-ba~e~
racticc 'can be considered as an enactment of cultural behefs
~bout what a profession should do and be' (Witkin and Harrison,
2001, p. 294).
Undoubtedly, a range of motivations encourage the pr~m~tion
of evidence-based practice in social work, and as ll1dIcated
the most often expressed are those relating to fostering
client'weU-being and prof~ssional accountabi.lity- It is also imp~rtant
to acknowledge that it is being promoted within a parncular
institutional, econol11ic and organizational context shaped
by the processes discussed in Chapters 3, 4 and 5.. These
processes as they relate to the profession.s have be.en dIscussed
in the social sciences literature for some tllne (and In Chapter 6
I tied thel~ down to social work in particular), variously nominated
as de-professionalization, proletarianization, or de-skilling
(Fournier, 2000; Hugman, 1998, p. 117). And as discussed
in Chapter 6, in regards to professions such as SOClal wO.rk
such processes translate into developments such as ~he wl~tding
away of professional privilege and autonomy, the tlgh~el1lng
of professional accountability to manag~rs, and ~1e r.elaxatlon of
professional boundaries. In human serVICe orgaJ11~atlons a focus
on outcomes has emerged, in which organizationaltnputs (such as
social work interventions) must demonstrate desirable outcomes.
It is in this context that evidence-based practice has re-emerged.
Its proponents position it as one of, if not th~ most ~ppropriate
strategic option to re-invigorate the professIOI:al pro!ect at
a time when professions generally (and social work 111 parocular)
are viewed sceptically by managers. And in the ambiguous. and
morally contested fields of child protection, juvenile correCtions,
162 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
and mental health for example, that e.vidence-based practice has
~een promoted as the best response to manage what is increasmgly
characterized as risks to the populations in question and
to the general community (Powell, 2001; Power, 1997). In this
\:ray, evidence-~ased practice as a key contemporary manifesta?on
of the social work professional project is positioned as an
Important strategy for managing contemporary environmental
conditions.
. Som~ c1ai I~1 t~at the current popularity ofevidence-based pracnee
resides In Its apparent capacity to respond to the NPM.
inspired agendas of contemporary governments concerned with
such issues as effectiveness and accountability (Harris, 2003Webb,
2001 ). In Britain, thc primary pressure prompting it;
ado~tIon has been one of rescuing social work's reputation and
role 111 the personal social services, particularly child protection, in
a c?ntext highly critical afits past fai lures and seeming ineptitude.
EVIdence-based practice also dominates in the United States
reflecting the desire by the profession there to continue to exhibi~
clinical effectiveness in the context of managed carc. A recent
policy document produced by the National Association of Social
Work, for example, called for 25% of all physical health, mental
health and substance abuse dollars be spent on research-based
prevention and intervention services (Proctor, 2002). Promoted
by the health insurance companies, the ubiquity of the case
management model in that country has prompted the profession
to urgently and seriollsly engage with evidence-based practice in
an attempt to retain its significant role and labor market share,
particularly in mental health. In Australia, the pressures are not
as dear-cut, largely due to institutional differences in the delivery
ofhealth and welfare services and the differently articulated role of
~ocial work in those systems. Nevertheless, escalating competition
111 the human services labor market (McDonald, 1999), expanSIon
of eVIdence-based practice in medicine and the allied health
field, and increased political pressure for effective intervention in
child ~rotection - all provide the impetlls for active engagement.
So, eVlden~e- based practice is poised as one of the key options
for propclhng the future of the profession, a niture which clearly
~ro!ects the rradlt.l?n. of the modernist professional project. As
mdlCated above, this IS not uncontested, and it is to this contest
that I turn.
EVIDENCE·BASED PRACTICE 163
Arguing about evidence-based practice
Obviously evidence-based practice has its critics. These an: essentially
of twO types - one critical of it from wid1in the same
paradigm or sets of assumptions about what. ~onstitu~es knowledge
(within-paradigm), and the other cnucal of it from a
different paradigm (outside-of-paradigm). The first group, 111 the
main, has become known as post-positivist (a group which while
upholding positivist scientific approaches, incre~sin~ly. acknow~edges
the contribution of qualitative data, but still Wlthll1 a traditional
scientific framework). The second group is drawn from
either a critical and/or constructivist approach, with some criticism
posed in the spirit of contemporary thcolY (see Chapter 5).
Perhaps the most cogent within-paradigm critique was made in
an influential article by Wakefield and Kirk (1996) in which they
claim, damningly, du t there is no evidence for the effectiveness
of evidence-based practice, and what are held out as 'evidence'
of effectiveness are, in fact, clinical anecdotes. (AJso widlinparadigm,
Trindcr (2000b) and Kirk and Reid (2002) make the
same point.) In fact, a review by Falll, McMurtry and Hudson
(2001 ) found only two studies which addressed the effectiveness
of evidence-based practice. Wakefield and Kirk (1996) have other
criticisms. First, they make the point that the single-system design
is unable to generate knowledge about causal relationships. The
very design proposed by advocates of evidence-based practice
cannot provide insight into whether a social work intervention
caused any observable effect. Second, they note that evidencebased
practice promotes the use of rapid assessment instruments
(standardized assessment instruments - sec, for example, Fischer
and Corcoran, 1994), which, thcy argue, have not been shown to
be any more valid, reliable and effective than finely-honed practitioner
critical reflexivity. Accordingly, evidence-based practice
claims to accountability are, they argue, flawed. Taking a slightly
different tack Wakefield and Kirk are also affronted by what
they argue is the overly narrow focus on behavioral theories (for
example, cognitive behavioral therapy). Such a focus, they claim,
is unable to account for other theoretical approaches commonly
employed in social work which are relationship-based. Finally,
these authors reject the tendency for proponents of evidencebased
practice to 'blame the practitioners'; a stance they argue
164 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
which fai ls to account for the complexities of everyday practice
outside of the clinical trial.
Others follow in a similar vein. Trinder (2000b) argues that
social work at the every-day level of practice is roo messy, too
contingent, and too morally and politically ambiguous to be
adequately captured by the classic formulations or models of
evidence-based practice. This general point is acknowledged by
Rosen (2003) when he notes that evidence-based practice downplays
the reality of the constraints placed on every-day practice
by policy (and I would add, organizational ideology). Echoing
Wakefield and Kirk, Trinder also raises the general impracticality
of using randomized controlled trials in every-day practice.
(Wakefield and Kirk (1996) prophesied that there would be howls
of outrage from clients if they learnt that they were randomly
selected into a non-treatment group when treatment was available.)
In similar vein Kirk and Reid (2002) question the soundness
of the evidence base, as does Smith (2000), a point acknowledged
by Gambrill when she notes that much research done under
the auspice of evidence-based practice is, in fact, poor research
which tends to overstate the claims made (Gambrill, 2003, p. 5).
These criticisms notwithstanding, Illany of the issues raised are
within the realm of the addressable. That is, with sufficient care
and resources, these isslIes could be managed and their effects
ameliorated. The same cannot be said about the criticisms made
ofevidence-based practice from outside of the paradigm in which
it is located.
This latter debate between the advocates and critics ofevidencebased
practice is, at its essence, a debate about meaning. It is also
a debate about the essence of social work - of social workers,
of clients, and of the interactions between the two. An important
voice critical of evidence-based practice is that of American
Stanley Witkin (1995; Witkin and Harrison, 2001). He notcs
that evidence-based practice is grounded in a very western and
modernist ideal of individualism, one which positions the individual
a rational actor separate from dle social worker) capablc
of acting and being acted upon. As such, it is a conception
which stands in start contrast to one drawn from a constructivist
perspective which would understand the person (client and social
worker) to be a result of a series of interactions between people,
located within and conditioned by other sets of constitutive
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 165
relationships, institutions and structures. Recall the discussion
in Chapter 7 about discourse and identity - about how social
workers and welfare organizations promote certain identities to
be taken Lip service users. That discussion lIsed a constructivist
perspective of the type advocated by vVitkin in his consideration
of evidence-based practice. He (1995, p. 72) suggests
that evidence-based practice adopts a f.:1lse notion of an independent
knowable reality, as opposed to his preferred position
that reality is created through social processes. He also argues that
evidence-based practice promotes an ideology of individualism as
opposed to one of collectivism. In other words, social workers
when adopting evidence-based practice forms ofsocial work focus
predominantly on individualized work and individualized solutions
to clients problems, when collective work and coUective
solutions might be more appropriate. Finally, Witkin takes offence
at the notion that social work practice is a method of experiment
(on cLients as passive bodies), as opposed to a democratic
process of discourse and clialogue between equally valued people.
Certainly, Witkin illustrates the ncar impossibility of rapprochement
between his position (and positions like his) and that of
evidence-based practice supporters.
His is not a lone voice! His emphasis on the immediacy
and importance ofcontext in shaping social work encounters (and
their outcomcs) has been taken up by others (Healy, 2005; Smith,
2000). For Smith, the evidence-based practice assumptions about
reality are unable to account for the complexity of context continuously
changing with time and space. The evidence-based
practice is preoccupied with outcomes, but in a de-contextualized
manner which inevitably results in research and practices which
are non-significant and inconclusive (or at a minimum, hard to
translate into other contexts). From Smith's perspective, the real
imperative for good social work practice is to work out what is
contextually useful, while remaining aware that the context itself
is unstable. Of course, Witkin and Smith are bod1 influenced
by the constructivist critique of positivism. As such, they would
argue that the claims made by evidence-based practitioners (that
is that we could ever know what works, or even what constitutes
'real' practice contexts or social work interventions), are little
more than pious hopes, and are more likely to be fundamental
misrepresentations.
166 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Another critic, Webb (2001 ) picks up the point I made earlier
in the chapter when he aligns evidence-based practice politicallv
with NPM, thereby positioning it as a tool for managillg ~
potentially unruly group ofpeapie (social workers and the people
who use their services) in times of the neoliberal re-make of
the welfare state. In all fairness though, it should be noted that
both sides of the evidence-based practice debate usc a particular
notion of morality and ethicality to stake their claim. In
such circumstances, resolution or rapprochement between the two
camps retreats ultimately to the murky (and in many ways, very
private) realm of values and beliefs.
The strategic viability of evidence-based practice
But what of the daily realities of social work in the contemporary
conditions? Will evidence-based practice result in the sorts
of outcomes claimed for it? Will evidence-based practice create
a rnore responsive, effective and accountable profession? Ultimately,
will evidence-based practice provide a solid foundation
for the future of social work? In some contexts of practice,
particularly those where the presenting client conditions can be
tightly defined and environmental contingencies can be somewhat
moderated, it probably will be quite effective in assisting
social workers to make decisions in informed ways. Such contexts
might be residential treatment facilities for young people in
conflict with the law or education programs for parents struggling
with their roles. As such, it will help secure a future tor
social work practice in such areas, and is, accordingly a significant
contribution.
Without a doubt, evidence-based practice is conceptuaUy
congruent with the sorts of developments re-structuring the
contexts of practice discussed in Chapters 2, 3 and 4, as is clearly
demonstrated in managed care-funded mental health services in
the United States. The actual reach of evidence-based practice
across the broad field ofsocial work internationally really depends
on the extent to which similar conditions are recreated elsewhere,
and it is here that at least one caveat can be noted. As indicated,
evidence-based practice is highly suited to some practice
contexts. The extent to which such contexts dominate in any
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 167
one country (and the extent to which social work practice itself
is constrained to a few contexts and roles), the more likely it
is that the orientation of evidence-based practice will flourish.
This explains, to a large extent, why evidence-based practice is
emerging so strongly in Britain. In Australia, on the other hand,
the sites of practice are highly diverse and there is nothing like
the institutional imperatives (such as those emanating from the
US health insurance companies or from the UK Home Office)
bearing down in any comprehensive way. For these reasons, it is
unlikely that evidence-based practice will have significant impact
on the breadth of Australian social work.
Finally, (and picking up the ideas presented by contempora,y
theory in Chapter 5) it should be ackil0wledged that all social
science knowledge is partial, both in terms of what it is able to
'know' and how it is able to do so. Social work is a range of,
activities mediating an ever-shifting and often-contested relationship
between the state and its citizens. It is also a set of activities
attempting to promote individual and social well-being which,
given the state of social science knowledge, is inevitably l.imited
and inexorably partial. In such conditions, placing boundaries
around what can be known and how knowing is done is probably
counter-productive. Rather, if social workers in all of their
many guises arc to be in any way successful in promoting the
undeniably optimistic goals of the profession, then all forms of
knowledge and ways of knowing need to be available and, as far
as is humanly possible, taken up.
Cognizant of the evidence-based practice impatience with the
'knowledge is relative' position (and with their rejection of
the 'irrationality' ofcontemporary theory (see Wakefield and Kirk,
1996» it is nevertheless the case that an evidence-based practice
framework does not reflect the sometimes contested and divergent
knowledge brought into play in the many places and ways
social work is practiced. Even though positioned as a 'flight
from reason' (ibid, p. 94), the sorts of insights provided by
contemporary theary (Chapter 5) for example, weaken the the
knowledge-claims made by proponents of evidence-based practice.
For example, contemporary ways of understanding young
women with eating disorders swing between the polar opposites
of a psycho-medical approach to one informed by various
bodies offcminist theory and other developments in contemporary
168 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
theory. Similarly, social workers working with people with disabil.
ities need to 'know' abollt impairment and its effects from
the evidence available, but they also need to 'know' about the
social and political experience of living in a disabling world
and how interactions between sen'ice providers and sen/ice user~
discursively create disability. Evidence-based practice frameworks
limit the capacity of practitioners to draw, in the first instance
on contested and oppositional knowledge (feminist and other
contcmporaty approaches to eating disorders), and in the second
instance, on 'knowledge' developed by and with people with
disabilities. In the case of the laner, it is not so much that
this knowledge is rejected. Radler, (and despite claims made
that users' insights arc included) the modes by which what is
judged as 'evidence' tend not to be sympathetic or grant legiti.
macy to the views of such groups. Instead, evidence-based practice
ways of knowing render sen'ice users as passive recipients
who pass judgement on pre-determined protessionally-prescribed
interventions.
Evidence-based practice attempts to overlay a particular and
bounded template on the diverse and extremely complex conditions
of social work practice that may well be shaped by difterent
sets of assumptions. Accordingly, it cannot always 'see' what is
going on or 'hear' the noise generated on the ground (Trinder,
2000b). In many contexts, such as working with indigenous
people or engaging in community development, evidence-based
practice probably asks the wrong questions. In working with
indigenous people in an acute health care setting, for example,
a social worker en1ploying an evidence-based practice framework
would not, in all likelihood, consider the impact of dispossession
or alienation. Similarly, an evidence·based practice framework
would not assist a practitioner to attend to the importance and
impact ofculture in groups ofpeople such as the profoundly deaf.
In these forms of practice, evidence-based practice would fail ,
and more importantly, it would fail in terms of its own indicators
of success. What I mean by this is that by not encouraging atten·
tion to such defining factors as culture or power, interventions
designed within an evidence-based practice fl'amcwork would not
achieve the sorts of measurable outcomes desired, and in fact,
may exacerbate the presenting 'problem'. For these reasons (and
for the technical reasons discussed in the previous section), doubt
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE 169
must be held about the cap3city for evidence-based practice to
successfully propel either the narrowly defmed professional project
or the broader collection ofactivities ofsocial work into the future
alone. If social work is to continue doing what it does in all its
diversity and if it is to engage in new arenas and in new ways
of delivering wclf.:lre, it probably needs to look beyond evidencebased
practice for direction. This does not mean, however, that
social work should abandon the impulse carried by evidence-based
practice. The ethics of evidence-based practice - that is, its wish
to promote a more efTective and accountable social work - is a
worthy ambition and one which social work should retain. How
this is done with maximum impact is the real question of interest.
As Kirk and Reid state (2002, p. 165), science (read 'knowledge')
for practice needs to be disentangled from scientific practice.
There are many ways to do this, but the recent suggestions by
Rosen (2003) and Rosen and Proctor (2003) about the development
and use of practice guidelines seem eminently suited to a
profession which has long displayed difficulties in engaging with
research-based knowledge. Indeed, recent research by Mullen and
Bacon (l999) suggests that practice guidelines used in professional
supervision would be an effective route of promoting the
underlying objectives of evidence-based practice of effectiveness
and accolmtability.
Evidence-based practice clearly has something to offer. But
if the 'one-size fits all' approach prevails (as some proponents
of evidence-based seem to propose) they do the profession few
favours. While the strategic merits of evidence-based practice are
apparent, as merits they are also bounded. Clearly, in terms of
the three major challenges posed to the profession outlined in
Part 1 - the economics, politics and ideas of change - evidcncebased
practice responds to some and not others. As a strategy,
it is congruent with the economics of change and with the politics
of change. The ideas of change represented by me challenge
ofcontemporary theory would at the same time, undermine
any capacity to make the sorts of truth claims that evidencebased
practice needs to make to have legitimacy. In consequence,
far from providing the guaranteed and fool-proof way
forward, evidence-based practice is reduced to being one, relatively
limited (and even limiting) option. In the next chapter
I turn to anotl1er strategic option, but in this case (and in the
170 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
case of the final option we will canvass in Chapter I I )~
the orientation, foundations and even the purpose suggested
radically depart from those proposed by both the
entrepreneurial profession and the evidence-based practice
informed scientific profession.
10 Critical Practice
Entrepreneurial social work and evidence-based practice can be
tmderstood as attempts on the part of their advocates to respond
to both the economics and the politics of change. In this chapter
we turn to another complex stream of social work theory and
practice which, in some recently developed forms, claims to have
also engaged with the ideas of change, presented in Chapter 5
as the challenges posed by contemporary theolY. My use of the
omnibus term critical practice refers to the many and varied
heirs of a long tradition of radical social work. According to
Powell (2001 ), critical practice has had an astonishing impact on
the profession's consciousness somewhat at odds with the actual
numbers of people adopting it as their referred mode ofpractice.
Critical practice has developed through several iterations
throughout the twentieth century, with present forms drawing
their impetus largely from developments in social work accompanying
the social movements of the 1960s and 1970s. In the
United States, Britain, Australia and Canada, a movement grew
up in and around social work, informed by a flourishing literature
(Baile)' and Brake, 1975; Corrigan and Leonard, 1978; Galper,
1975; Moreau, 1979; Specht, 1969; Throsell, 1975). This group
contested many ofthe assumptions ofthe mainstream professional
social work project, for example the nature of social work knowledge
and the limitations of relying solely on positivist paradigms.
The overall oeuvre ofcritical practice has several variants which are
not all congruent with each other. Given space Hmitations, this
chapter focuses on the most recent (and if publications arc any
indication), the most influential developments. I discuss stnlCtural
social work, human rights practice, anti-oppressive practice
and critical social work. While the early formulations were unarguably
grounded in Marxist theory, the key development in the
past ten years has been an increasing engagement with critical
171
-
172 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
social theory - a contemporary form ofnco-Marxism that emphasizes
the interconnectedness of the economic, social, political
and cultural realms in the ongoing maintenance of a capitalist
regime of accumulation, and which in some instances, attempts
a limited rapprochement with constructivism. The post-Fordistinspired
analysis presented in Chapter 3, for example, presents
one variation of this extensive theoretical corpus. Some versions
of critical social theory attempt to link the structuralism of neoMarxist
theory with the concern for subjectivism or a constructivist
perspective (Fairclough, 2000). It asks, for example, how is
it that people in their everyday actions and relationships constitute
and reconstitute social structures?
In certain instances critical social work (but less so critical social
theaI)') engages with contemporary theol)' (Chapter 5). Despite
purposeful linkages to these genres of (extremely complex) social
theory, contemporary critical practice is nevertheless just that - it
is a set ofpractices and prescriptions for action - couched within a
particular world view. In this way, critical social work carries the
intent or the politics ofcritical social theory into the realm ofsocial
work practice. As with the previous chapters, my purpose here is
to explore the 'fit' between critical practice and the contemporary
conditions in which it is proposed - conditions shaped by the
economics, politics and ideas of change. By engaging with the
genre in this way, readers are better placed to assess the strategic
merits of adopting critical social work in their own contexts of
practice. Before this can be done though, the variegated contours
of contemporary critical practice must be drawn. We begin with
structural social work
Structural social work
Developed in the late 1970s and early J980s by Moreau ( 1979),
contemporary structural social work is most clearly represented
by the work of Mullaley (2002; 1997). In his most recent book
Mullaley (2002) adopts the conflict (Marxist) perspective which
he explicitly contrasts with the classic sociology of Durkheim,
Weber and Parsons. He argues that the various forms of psychosocial
and systems social work largely adopt the latter (read conservative)
paradigm, whereas structural social work adopts the former
CRITICAL PRACTICE 173
(read radical) approach. He also claims that his approach incorporates
most if not all of the significant developn?ents 111 the
conflict perspective over the 20th century. Accordmgly, structural
social work purposefully adopts a theoretical perspective
informed by aspects of the range of what he calls the recent
and contemporary critical social theories, incorporating classic
and contemporary Marxism, fe minism, Marxist-inspired political
economy, the work of the so-called Frankfurt School, neocolonialism
and aspects of contemporary theory. In application,
this undeniably complex theoretical framework supports a wideranging
analysis, and different levels and modes of intervention
which attend to the multiple levels and dimensions of social
experience.
As its name implies, structural social work is primarily
concerned with understanding and overcoming the oppressive
effects of social structures. Oppression in its various forms is a
central organizing theme. In particular, structural social work.
is concerned with the many ways in which domination of
some groups in society by other groups is sustained by stru.ctural
processes. The central plank of its practice is to assl~t
people, particularly oppressed people, to understand h~w t~elr
specific and local circumstances - their experiences, reiatlOnshlps,
feelings - are shaped by dominant economic, political, social and
cultural institutions. Since it is firmly committed to change, a
second key objective is to assist people to develop alternative
systems and processes which challenge the dominant structures.
Drawing "on the insights of critical social theory which, as
indicated earlier, charts the interconnectedness of the various
institutions and levels ofsocial and economic reproduction, structural
social work also organises its interventions on different
'levels' so to speak. It does this largely to attempt to attend in
practice to the complexities of social regulation and reproducti~n
illustrated by critical social theory. In other words, structural SOCIal
work models its practice on the multi-layered analyses of critical
social theoty. The first level is that ofthe personal. Here, Mullaley
argues that structural social work needs to focus, through a range
of fairly standard intervention methods, on the personal problems
attendant to oppression - be they environmental (such as
inadequate income or poor housing), interpersonal (such as poor
personal relations or domestic violence) or intra-psychic (such as
,
174 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
poor self-esteem, guilt, ambivalence). In doing so, the work is
guided by and grounded in the irnperative to make the personal
politica1. In other words, the aim is to ensure that the private
problems people experience are understood by them as political
problems imposed by an oppressive social system. Nevertheless
by attending to this level of the personal, Mulla1ey is groundin~
structural social work practice in the classic domain ofsocial work
practice morc broadly - the person in environment. Second, and
again, clearly picking up the analysis of critical social theon'
Mullalcy nominates the rcalm of the cultural as an importal~;
field or domain of practice. Here he suggests engagement in
and with alternative and counter-cultural activities, the deliberate
enactment of creative acts of resistance. He recommends that
social workers work with people in the creation of alternative
discourses (music, art, poetry, drama) about, for example, the
causes of welfare dependency or the effects of disabling social
policies. Finally, as the name would suggest, one very important
domain of practice is the structural, or in practice, the institutional
level - the development of alternative services and sen/ice
structures, engagement in critical social policy practice and the
revitalization of political life through active political engagement.
One of the considerable strengths of Mullaley's model of
structural social work is its explicit nomination of a psychology
of oppression. Drawing on a number of liberationist authors
(such as Franz Fanon, 1966) he provides a clear alternative
framework for thinking about why people develop personal problems,
plus proposes a means for addressing them. More importantly,
adopting such a psychology provides a eloquent reason for
engaging at tlle intra-psychic and interpersonal level - a justification
which was to a large degree missing fro111 earlier accounts of
radical social work. It is also an approach frol11 which an analysis
cfthe operations and consequences ofthe economics and politics
of change (that is, of neoclassical economics, economic globalization,
and neoliberalism) can be drawn. T his, in turn, provides
a rationale for why social workers should continue to practice in
the contemporary conditions.
While Mullaley claims to incorporate the insights of contemporary
tlleory, he does so in a quite minimalist way which
doesn't really engage with the ideas of change discussed in
Chaptc:r 5. Finally, and to a certain extent in cOl11mon with
CRITICAL PRACTICE 175
the other modes of critical practice to be canvassed here, the
other limitation of structural social work lies in its general failure
to address the realities of the existing and emerging institutional
and organizational contexts ofpractice experienced by most
social workers - contexts shaped by the dictates of New Public
Management (NPM). In other words, other than to recommend
the development of 'alternatives', the ongoing and widespread
re-organization of the majority of sites of practice inspired by
public choice and agency theory is not fundamentally acknowledged.
Accordingly, it wOLLid be very diffiw lt to practice structufal
social work in the bulk of sites where social workers actually
engage.
Human rights-based practice
Another version of critical practice is informed by a human rights
perspective. While proposed by such prominent American authors
such as Stanley Witkin (1998), and recently expanded by Reichert
(2003), the most important contemporary advocate of human
rights practice is Ife (1997, 200] ). Formally codified in the
variolls United Nations Declarations and Covenants, it is a mode
of practice which is most comfortably located witllin a modernist
framework, but it makes some cautious gestures towards contemporary
theory. In many ways, human rights-based practice is
ideally suited to the times because it provides an intuitively attrac~
tive and hence galvanizing moral flavor to social work practice. As
such, it provides a strong platform for social workers to articulate
an alternative discourse to neoliberalism.
For Ifc, human rights are not some abstract political formulation.
Rather, tllCY are grounded in practice in that it is 'the
relationship between the discursive construction of human rights
and tl,C practice of human rights' which is crucial (Ife, 2001 ,
p. 133). He suggests that tllere are two ways that a social workef
might go about promoting human rights-based practicc. The first
is deductive - in which a social worker asks what the meaning
of and application of an articulated human right might be in
different contexts of practice. Answering this question provides,
in turn, practice goals and informs practice processes. The United
Nations International Convention on the Rights of the Child,
176 CHAllENGING SOCIAL WORK
for example, can be used to assess the functioning of an alternate
care service in terms of whether or not the service promotes
or re~ards children's rights. The alternative approach (to be
u~ed 111 a c~mplementary £1shion) is inductive in that is begi.ns
with a practlCe context or problem and asks what rights should
be upheld.
Ife (2001 ) uses a template drawn from three generations of
human rights to locate modes ofpractice. The first generation are
civil and political rights. The dominant interventions were and
arc advocacy, work with refiJgees and asylu m seekers and prison
reform. The dominant profession and the dominant fi'amework is
that of the law. The second generation are the economic, social
and cult.ural rights characteristic ofa mature social democracy and
moderl1lst wcl£'1re state. Here, traditional modes of social work
sllch as direct service, policy development and advocacy research
don~inate. The third generation of rights are the collective rights
(whIch have as yet little institutional legitimacy but plenty of
global support from, for example, social movements and nongovernment
development agencies). This tranche ofrights is morc
closely aligned with community development and as we shall see
in Chapter l I, a more fully-fledged model ofsocial work as social
development.
In 1997, lie d~scussed how human rights could be employed
a.s a concepnlal ~ramework for underpinning social work practice.
He developmg an argument that social work practice can
be conceived as promoting a universalist vicw of social justice
balanced by and expressed through a relativist view of human
needs, varying from person to person and from context to context.
It is in this rcJativizing process that this form of critical social
work recognizes the complexities and diversities of people's lives
and needs accentuated by contemporary theory. Further, the
meeting of people's needs is lifted out of the long-standing
c~nce~tual quagmire of need versus merit through its linkage
WIth rights. Needs claims when linked to rights claims become,
Ife asserts, unambiguously legitimate. Adopting a human rights~ased
pers.pect!ve ofp~actice also chaJlenges the modernist professIOnal
project II1 that It provides a critical framework to examine
distancing and discmpowel'ing processes that social workers might
employ. The language of social work, such as 'client', 'intervention'
and 'supervision' are essentially metaphors which, when
CRITICAL PRACTICE 177
examined with a human rights lens, position clients in a less than
equal position to be acted upon by the professional social worker.
Ife is similarly critical of the ongoing operations of the professional
project through the professional structures and education
of social workers, all of which are, from his perspective, little
morc than an employment of inappropriate power, subsequently
de-stabilized by a human rights perspective. In a similar vein
Witkin (1998), in an editorial in the American journal Social
W01·!t, argues that human rights can usefully serve as a framework
for social work research, evaluation, practice and pedagogy. (It
should be noted that some versions of human rights practice are
entirely uncritical of the professional project and locate rightsbased
practice as good p1'ofessional practice - for example, see
Reichert, 2003. )
The strategic value of human rights-based practice in the
contemporary conditions is clear. First, as indicated above, it
provides a unambiguous and inspiring morality and politics for
practitioners made despondent by the harshness and intractability
of the contt:mporary workfare statt:. For this reason alone, human
rights-based practice provides a viable platform for the future of
sociaJ work. Second, it provides a framework for making conceptual
linkagcs across the private-public divide and articulating arguments
for constluctive public engagement in what is increasingly
cast as ptivate domains. In otht:r words, the goal of upholding
human rights gives social workers the legitimacy to suggest that
the state should not abandon disadvantaged individuals, families
and communities. Finally, it provides a clear set of foundational
documents in the form of the Universal Declaration of H uman
Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights. In a context in which the legitilTlacy ofgovernment investment
in social infrastructure is increasingly weakened, such documellts
provide a basis for arguing the opposite. They also, as
suggested previously, provide the foundations of an evaluative
template which may be applied to social welfare organizations,
senrices and social work practices. In summary, human rightsbased
practice both confronts and responds to the economics and
the politics of change. Ultimately, fearing de-stabilizing tendencies
particularly in relation to such universalist ideas as human
rights, this fOflTI of critical practice does not (and its advocates
178 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
in all probability would not) want to fully engage with the ideas
of change.
Anti-oppressive practice
The next variant of critical social work to be considered here is
anti-oppressive practice (Dominelli, 1998; Dalrymple and Burke
1995), an increasingly influential approach in social work, partic:
ularly in Britain. Contemporary articulations have arisen OUt of
a range of developments in the broad genre of radical or critical
social work of which feminist practice, anti-racist and antidiscriminatory
practice are the most influential. All address the
d~versities and multiplicities of inequalities, marginalization and
dlsadvantage, and in doing so, inform the development ofa more
generic anti-oppressive practice. Black femi nism (Hill-Collins
1990) in particular has been a driving force behind the devel '
opment of anti-oppressive social work practice. Anti-racist and
more latterly anti-oppressive practice considers the interconnections
between the major social stnlCtllres and divisions of race,
class, gender, disability, sexuality and age. As with structural
social work, anti-oppressive practice is concerned with how it is
th.a~ personal issues are reflections of broader structural processes
ansmg from social divisions.
Ant~-op~ressive practice has a number of key principles
(DoI111I1elb, 1998; Burke and Harrison, 1998, p. 231). The first
of these is recognizing social difference arising from race, gender,
class, sexual preference, disability, and age plus those arising
around religion, region, mental healdl and so fordl. The second
is linking the personal and political in which personal biographies
and personal experiences are placed in a wider social context.
Third, anti-oppressive practice has a specific understanding of
power as a social process (or more accurately series of processes)
d13t operate in all spheres; the public and the private, at personal
and at structural levels. The fourth principle is that of appreci~ting
the contingent effects of historical andgeographicallocatioll
III which individual life experiences and events are considered
as constituted within a specific time and place and as such arc. , . ,
gIven meaning within the context of prevailing ideas) social f.Kts
and cultural differences. Fifth, anti-oppressive practice is centrally
CRITICAL PRACTICE 179
O
ncerned with rejlexiJJity/ mutual inJJoll'ement where reflexivity
C . I
. understood as dle constant consideration of how values, sOCIa
g . d· ·d
difference and power affect the interactions between III IVl uals.
These interactions (for example, between social worker and
service user) are to be understood not only in psychological terms,
but also as a matter of sociology, history, edlics and politics. ~he
driving force of anti-oppressive practice is the act of challmgmg
and opportunities for change are created by the process of the
challenge. A challenge invokes changes at micro and macro lev~ls.
The dynamic link. between theory and practice is the case scenano,
the autobiography, the narrative, or the tale.
Anti-oppressive practice is, claim Wilson and Beresford (2000)
and Williams (1999), currently very influential in social work,
particularly academic social work in Britain, so much s~ that it
has taken on the characteristics of a contemporary socIal work
canon! By positioning itself as against the manifest and manifold
wrongs ofoppression (and therefore explicitly on the vin:uou.s side
of a good-bad binary divide) it also positions itself as rnevltably
'correct' - a point also noted by Healy (2005, p. 190). From
Wilson and Beresford's rather robust perspective, anti-oppressive
practice is somewhat problematic. It is, they clai~l1, an appr?~ch
which has failed to engage in critical reflexivity ofltS own posmon
and its own practices. For Wilson and Beresford) this manifests
itself in its incapacity to engage with the service user movement
in genuinely anti-oppressive ways. To be more precise, antioppressive
social work has taken on an authority to determine
what is knowledge and what is 'good' practice; it promotes a set
of truth claims which both appropriate service users knowledge,
experiences and ideas 'whilst retaining the power to determine
just what counts as anti-oppressive' (ibid) p. 566; H.ealy, 20~5.
p. 190). For Wilson and Beresford this means that anti-oppresSIve
practice is, from their perspective, just the latest of a sencs of
attempts by tile social work professional project to positio~ its.elf
as a legitimate and hence powerful purveyor of truth, Justl~e
and liberation. In terms of the analytical framework adopted 111
this book, Wilson and Beresford's claims are pertinent in that
they illustrate what may well be an outcome ofthe lack ofengagement
by the sponsorsofanti-oppressive practice with contemporary
theory. In other words, despite its inclusive intent and its structural
political analysis, anti-oppressive social work, from a contemporary
180 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
theOlY point ofview, is little different from other more traditional
modernist fOfms of social work as a professional project. That
said, anti-oppressive practice, like human rights-based practice
and structural social work explicitly engage with the effects of the
economics and the politics ofchange in the lives of disadvantaged
people.
Clearly, proactive engagement with contemporary theory is not
a key feature of the three variants of critical social work examined
to this point. I have argued that in slightly different ways,
all bear significant likeness to the modernist social work project
and can even be considered to be variations of these within a
similar modernist structural fi'amcwork. The next group unambi1?uously
~l~ims to be different and its proponents, to varying
effect, explicitly locate themselves within the framework ofcritical
social theory and contemporary theory.
Critical social work
Emerging out of the tradition of radical and structural social
work, some of the most reCent developments in social work practice
theory are found in a growing body of work informed by
both critical social theory and by contemporary theory. The mix
or theoretical emphasis does, however, vary. Some authors in
the genre draw more on critical social theory; others attempt to
incorporate the insights of contemporary theory. In this way, Ife
(1997) for example, would position his work within the critical
social work tradition, but his actual engagement with contemporary
theory is both limited and quite critical. Those that do
engage mare directly with contemporary tlleOf)Trepresent what
is promoted as a qualitatively different and significant advance, in
tllat the dual theoretical engagement claims to shift the founda tions
ofsocial work practice sufficiently to challenge the modernist
professional project. Here I discuss key proponents whose work
falls direcdy into the category of social work practice theory _
for example Fook (2002), Pease (2002), Pease and Fook (1999),
Healy (2000), and Parton and O'Byrne (2000). I fOCllS specifically
on practice theorists because, although other social work authors
have applied the thcorctical insights of contemporalY theory to
social work (Chambon, Irving and Epstein 1999· Leonard 1997·
" "
CRITICAL PRACTICE 181
Howe, 1994), tllC work of the practice theorists listed above
represents a maturation of the gcnrc in tllat it applies contemporary
theory dcvelopmentally to practice. By this I mean that these
authors arguc an alternative mode of doing social work, and as
such, present an alternative strategic option.
Jan Fook (2002 ) represents an important example of an
author who is attempting to incorporate critical social theory and
contemporary theory into everyday practice. She suggests that
both bodies of theory arc relevant for strengthening social work
practice for a range of reasons (see Fook 2002, pages 13 and 14
for the fuIJ list). Overall, her position is that a positive reading
of contcmporary theory in conjunction with critical social theOlY
allows for a more nuanccd and liberated approach to practice with
marginalized people, one which, through its critique of mainstream
practices, opcns up thc potentiaJ for new ways ofengaging.
In other words, her central claim is that contemporary theory
augments strucnlral approaches to social work.
One of tl1e major ways by which this occurs is through the
re-conceptualization of power (and hence empowerment) that is
possible dlrollgh d,C application of contemporary theory. This,
of course, is central to social work practice in that power is a
core dynamic in practice and cmpowerment a primary goaJ. It is
here that tl1e attraction of these developments for social workers
starts ro become clear. Fook (2002, p. 48) notes that modernist
conceptions of power are inadequate for five reasons. First, powcr
is conceived as a finite commodity which can be transferred (via
cmpowerment for example) only at the expcnse ofothers. Second,
modernist conceptions ofpower split the world into two mutually
exclusive groups - the powerful and the powerless. Such a characterization,
for example) does not aJlow for the excrcise of power
by the powerless - such as the power cxercised by otherwise disadvantaged
men in relationships characterized by domestic violencc.
Third, power (or empowerment) from a modernist perspcctive
implies that cveryone should bc treated the same - a conception
which does not encourage responsivcness to difference. Fourth,
accounting for why some people appear to willingly comply with
their own disempowennent is difficult from a modernist pcrspective.
Finally, engagement in processes of 'empowerment' may
paradoxically be experienccd as disempowcring by the very people
they are mcant to empower.
182 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
Drawing on the work of Foucault, Fook notes that from
the perspective of contemporary theory, power is exercised not
possessed; power can be both repressive and productive; and
power is multi ~dil11ensional and ubiquitous. Power becomes
both a core f.:'lCtor in and a key tool in ail social work practices.
In a significant article Pease (2002 ) expands on the importance
of this way of thinking about power, particularly in terms of
the social work goal of empowerment. His premise is that critical
social work should engage with contemporary theory because it
allows us to think about and develop new strategies more relevant
to the contemporalY era, and ones which directly counter
those ofneoliberal politics and policies. Acknowledging that traditional
'empowerment' by a social worker is essentially the exercise
of power, Pease suggests that instead, we should think. about
empowerment as attending to and encouraging the expression
(insurrection) of 'subjugated knowledges'. At the same time wc
should be chaUcnging the status of our own professional knowledge.
In this way, the key stratcgy nominatcd is one which
involves a particular way ofworking with disempowcrcd (silenced)
groups. It largely involvcs creating real alLiances betwccn practitioners
and 'clients' (both temporary and permanent) in which
alternative stories can be told and in which alternative strategies
can be both imagined and developed.
Interestingly, Pease grounds this approach in a practice example
drawn from the work of the Dulwich Centre with a group of
Indigenous Australians whose relatives had died in custody. The
Dulwich Centre is a private family therapy agency devoted to
developing and promoting narrative thcrapy - a form of intervention
which claims to be underpinned by contemporary theory
(White and Epston, 1990). As we will see, it is an approach
which another of our exemplars of critical social work) Nigel
Parton, draws on extensively. The third example of influential
authors in developing and promoting contemporary critical social
work which draws on both critical social theory and contemporary
theory is Healy (200 1, 2000). Healy'S work is intellectually
very sophisticated and the linkages between critical social theory
and contemporary theory are more convincing than many in the
genre. Her specific intent is to revive the critical social work
tradition by demonstrating how to overcome the split between
theory and practice) a split which has seriously undcrmined critical
L
CRITICAL PRACTICE 183
practice. Further, her other core objectives ar~ to understand the
importance of context in social work practlce, to understand
the role of power and to address the challenges posed by the
NPM-inspired developments in public administration. Here, she
argueS, but to a lesser extent demonstrates, that the cont~mpOl·.alY
context of practice provides potential sites for the rC-Ulventlon
and re-invigoration of critical social work practice theory.
Healy's work has significant strengths, particularly in re~ards
to the contemporary environment. First, she addresses what IS an
important problem for radieal and critical social work. Through
her intent to develop a means of overcoming the split between
theory and practice, she confronts head on the phenomenon
of parallel universes, onc occupied by critical (academic) social
workers and one occupied by practitioners in the field. To the
extent that she is successful in doing this, her work provides an
invaluable example of how critical practitioners can confront the
developments in the field outlined in Part 1. Shc also confronts
another key problem for critical social work wherein she exposes
the inherently irrational 'truth claims' of those forms of critical
practice which marginalise dissent. Further, she demonstrates how
practice can be undertaken by drawing on real examples of practice
with young mothers. This last point is the major strength
of what Healy offers in that she shows that critical social work
informed by contemporary theory is actually possible. Similarly
grounded in the real world of practice (in mental health, child
protection and income security, for example) an edited volume by
Napier and Fook (2000) illustrate how the ideas ofcontemporary
dleory can be applied to social work practice.
The final example of influential exponents of critical social
work deliberately employing contemporary theory is provided by
Parton (1998, 1994) and Parton and O'Byrne (2000). Here,
the need to engage with the contemporary conditions of practice
is proposed as a core reason about why alternative modes of
practice need to be developed. In particular, Parton (1998) and
Parton and O'Byrne (2000) argue that the contemporary conditions,
especially those experienced in the British social service
departments, make the development of alternative ways of practice
urgent. Furdler they (Parton and O'Byrne, p. 7) note that
contemporary polky discourse in Britain explicitly nominates
that state-provided services should be user-centerd .In doing so, tlle
184 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
policy context actually provides both the opportunity and the
legitimacy for different forms of practice. Parton and O'Byrne
are arguably the most strategic-minded of the critical social work
authors discussed in this chapter. Importantly, they (like Healy)
also argue that their work is designed specifically for the 'hard'
sites of practice - that is, child protection and other forms of
statutory work.
They developed what they call 'constructive social work'.
Drawing extensively on the narrative work of Michael vVhite
(White and Epston, 1990), constructive social work emphasises
process and the plurality of both knowledge and voice. They
use the term 'constructive' deliberately - to indicate a particular
theoretical orientation (that is drawing on constructionist and
narrative approaches) and metaphorically (to indicate that this is
an approach which draws on the distinctive nature of social work
in a positive manner).
They outline the key theoretical tl1emes of constructive social
work which clearly illustrate their engagement with constructivism
and contemporary theory. The fi rst of these is the dynamic
and constitutive notions of narrative and 'spin' - that is, encouraging
the telling of and listening to people's stories and listening
to the contingent context and nature of each story. Second, like
Fook, Pease and Healy, constructive social work lIses a conception
of power drawn from contemporary theory. Third, constructive
social work interprets users' life stories in a way that is similar to
the reading of texts, and each reading opens up the possibility
for a new reading or new text. Fourth, instead of assuming that
we (social workers) have some privileged ways of understanding,
constructive social workers assume that they have misunder~
stood) and work constructively with people to minimize misunderstanding.
Fifth, keeping the focus squarely on language (and
hence discourse) constructive social work is continuously aware
of its constiUltive effects. Accordingly, one of the key principles
of practice is to 'mind your language'. Sixth, constructive
social workers hold conversations with people, conversations that
are designed to work towards the co-authorship of a new story.
Seventh) constructive social work aims to activate constructive
agency. Eighth, constructive social work promotes a view of the
past as past. That is, while it acknowledges the destnlctive or
restrictive impact of past events, for example, it asks that we focus
CRITICAL PRACTICE 185
instead on successes or exceptions. Finally, in constructive social
work practice, resistance is re-defmed not as a problem or isslle
for the service user, but as worker error in not listening properly
to the user's goals.
Like Fook (2002) Parton and O'Byrne (2000) go on to
develop quite detailed orientations to practice as well as guideli~1es
for undertaking constructive assessment. Finally, acknowledgmg
the contemporary fixation with demonstrating efiectiveness and
practice-related outcomes, Parton and O'Byrne include a chapter
on whether constructive social work actually works. As they have
no studies of effectiveness of their model to report, they instead
drawn on effectiveness studies ofother related constructive modes
of practice such as solLltion-focused and narrative interventions
undertaken in a range ofsettings. These, they argue, demonstrate
sufficient effectiveness to warrant similar faith in constrllctive
social work. Nevertheless, they are not constructive social work
and as such, Parton and O'Byrne's claims should be treated for
what they are - claims. T hat said, it must be acknowledged tl1at
Parton and O'Byrnc's work focuses most pointedly on the politics
of change and tl1e contemporary re-working ofthe organizational
contexts of social work practice.
Overall can critical social work find or create space in the
contemporary institutional contexts of practice? Does it represent
a real option for social work? Here, I link back to my
introductory comments to this chapter where I suggested that
critical social work was never at the center of social work practice
broadly conceived and (despite ambitious claims) is still is at
the margins. In reality, the institutional 'spaces' for practice as
conceived within the genre are increasingly constrained by the
developments within the environment. Earlier forms ofradicalpractice
did fll1d institutional homes, paradoxically authorized by the
state (for example in the British Community Deveiopment Projects,
the American Model Cities program and the Australian Assistance
Plan in the 1960s and early 19705). But no such state-sponsored
habitat exists today. Rather, the spaces for practice arc small, nOllstate
and marginal. That said, if we think about critical practice
broadly defined as an expression of morality and politics, it will, in
all likelihood, continue to occupy a larger position in the collective
professional imagination than the realities of contemporary practice
actually dictate. As Healy (2000) so aptly notes, critical social
186 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
work ~ke other ~lo.derllist forms ofpractice, awards itself a 'truth
stat~s and a UlllfYlI1g orientation in which is it positioned as a
posslble (read 'best') fO~'m ofpractice for everyone. This suggests
~hat underneath, th~re IS an enduring attachment to parr of the
l~ltent of the professlOnal project to shape social work. In concJuSI,?n,
I s.uggest that. most, of not all forms of critical practice
\\ ill cont1l1u~ to .be vlg~rollsly advocated if not necessarily undertaken
- but I~ will contmue on the margins of mainstream social
w~rk ~ or will be practiced in completely different spaces. This
POlIlt IS take~l up in Chapter 11 where I explore the contours
of ~lobaJ sOCial w~rk, and in particuJar, in a developing form of
sOCIal \~ork. as SOCIal de~~lopment, for it is here that, again, the
theoretlCalllll~lIlse ofCrItIcal social work is groundcd.in particular
forms of practice.
11 Global Social Work1
The final strategic option, global social work, is one of the most
interesting, and it is one which opens lip a range of possible sites
for practice. It is also an option which addresses the economics,
dle politics, and in some instances, the ideas of change. Paradoxically,
it is a genre of social work which was once heralded
to playa significant role in shaping the profession's emerging
identity in the 20th century. After World War II and llI1der the
allspice of the United Nations, social work was positioned as
a (if not the) key occupation to undertake social development
in the so called 'developing' nations. The paradox is that as
the modernist western welfare states developed in the nations
of what is known in development circles as tile global North
(Britain, Europe, dle USA, and Canada, but which includes white
Australia, white New Zealand and white SOllth Africa), social
work as a profession seemed to lose interest in (or at least failed to
convincingly articulate) its potential role in social development.
As those modernist welfare states weaken and are re-constituted
into workfare regimes, the possibility re-emerges for social work
to playa ·role in international social work and social development.
That said, it must still be acknowledged that the long
shadow of the welfare state remains. Organized along national
lines and promoted by modernist professionalized and bureaucratized
social welfare, the welfare state continues to inh ibit the
capacity of social work collectively and individually to think internationally
and to imagine the full range of possibilities for global
practice (for an example of this, see Webb, 2003).
In this chapter and under the rubric of global social work,
I explore what is more commonly known as international social
I Some of the ideas presented in this Chapter are informed by my collaboration
with my colleague, Ingrid Burkett (sec Burkett and McDonald, 2005 ); I acknow·
ledge my debt to her.
188 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
~vork a,~d social. development. As we will sec, some forms of
lIlternatlo nal social work and some forms of social development
arc essentially modernist in their orientation, and as such, are
c.ongrucnt. witl: the n:aintcnancc and projection of the professlol1al
project l11to this arena. In contrast, some of the recent
~dvances in social development have proactively engaged with
I~cas of change as expressed in contemporary theory, Iargelv
via post-modern development studies and critical geography. It
should also be noted that this is a genre of theoretical work
and ~ractice) and indeed social development more broadly, which
speCifically confi'onts the economics of change. Elsewhere a
colleague and I (Burkett and McDonald, 2005 ) have argued t!1at
co ntemp?rary social work can learn from these developments
and ca~l Inco rporate them into social work practice not only in
COuntnes of the South (the so-called developing countries for
example, in Africa, the Pacific and South America), but als~ in
contexts characteristic of the SOllth that exist within coulltries of
~he Nortl~ (for example, the experiences of indigeno us peoples
111 Austrah~, New Z~aJand) Canada, and the USA in particular).
~hen applied to SOCI a l work, the mode of development practice
ll1formed by contemporary theory stands very much in opposition
to the professional project. I have d ubbed both forms of development
practice social development wm'k, but nevertheless distinguish
between them. We begin though with the well-established
genre of intcrnational social work.
International social work
Internatio nal social work as an area of social work practice has
~een aro.U1~d for as long as social work itself. Recently, interest in
It as a dlstlllct field of practice has escalated partially as a result
of economic, social and cultural globalization, and partially as a
result of the destabilization of natio nal welfare regimes and the
sL~bs~quen t de-s~abiljzation ofthe social work professio nal project
Wlthll1 those regimes. As I noted earlier, the establishment of the
Uni te~ Nations post World War II exerted a powerfi.i1 influence
on SOCl~ work to engage in international activities and was largely
responSible for the spread of social work education programs
throughout the countries of the Soutll, establishing social work
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 189
within nation state regimes. Immediately after World War TI,
the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration was
formed with a specific role for social work in its social welfare
division. Over the 19 50s and 1960s, the UN strenuously engaged
in the promotion of social work as integral to its development
programs via a series of reports and conferences (H ealy, 2001 ).
More recently, there are calls emerging suggesting that there
should be a role for social workers at the global level (Powell and
Geoghegan, 2005), but there is less clarity abo ut the real dimensions
and practical activities of that role. So, what is international
social work?
Immediately, we land in controversy! A key advocate for social
work as social development, James Midgley, notes that the term
internatio nal social work is ' . .. widely (although imprecisely)
used to denote the exchanges that take place between social
workers from different societies and cultures' (1990, p. 295 ).
Clearly this is a definition that exhibits a high level of generality,
but it doesn't say much about what is actually done in the name
of internatio nal social work. In their revicw of literature on the
topic, Nagy and Falk (2000) have highlighted the lack of clear
terminology used by variolls authors. As a result, there appears
to be no consensus o n how the term is to be employed which,
in turn, has implications from both a practical and an educational
perspective.
Logically, any evaluation of the strategic merits of international
social work in the contemporary conditions should incorporate
an appreciation of the i'mperatives said to be propelling it.
Healy (2001) provides an excellent summary o rganized around
the notio n of escalating global interdependence. T he first form
is environmental interdependence thro ugh which environmental
issues such as pollution and resource depletion (mineral resources,
forests, water and soil) are understood as trans-national issues
affecting all peoples of the world. The second is Cltltu",,1 interdependence
produced by advancements in communication technologies,
inexpensive world travel (for some) and in ternational
movements of populations. All of us arc familiar with one major
form of cultural globalization, often called the 'Am ericanization"
'westernization') o r 'cultural imperialism' referring to what many
believe to be tlle homogenization of culture across the globe.
D riven by the largely North American mass media and the
190 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
relentless global marketization of iconic products (Coca Cola
blue jeans, McDonald's, rock music), cultural globalization i~
represented as a type ofuniversal solvent dissolving cultural differences
in its wake. Often understood as a primary mechanism of
neo or post-colonialism driven by first world economics, cultural
globalization is conceptualized as the new symbolic and psychological
means by which dominant economies can exert control
over emerging economies and facilitate their entry and location
in the emerging economic order.
The third form of interdependence nominated by Healy
(2001) is eeo1lolnie i1lterdepmdcnee. In Chapter 3 I discussed
the economic developments which have made all countries
and all national economics interdependent, or morc accurately,
dependent on and influenced by global economic activities and
processes. In addition to these three forms of dependence, there
is also the growing acknowledgement of interdependence around
security, particularly in relation to the threat of terrorism.
There are at least four forms that international social work
can take (Healy, 2001). The first of these is internationallyrelated
domestic practice and advocacy: for example, refugee
re-settlement, settlement and support work with otller international
populations (migrants - both legal and illegal) within
nation states, international adoption work, and social work in
border areas. The second is professional exchange which she
describes as the capacity and practices of exchanging knowledge
and experience relevant to domestic social work between different
nation states. The third area which we will cover in more detail
later is international practice - the preparation of some professional
social workers to contribute directly to social development
work either through employment or formal volunteer programs
in international development agencies. The fourth and final area
is international policy development and advocacy in which social
work as a world-wide movement formulates and promulgates
positions on important social issues and makes a contribution to
tile resolution of important global problems related to its sphere
of expertise.
International social work can lay a claim to expertise and potential
roles in each of the areas nominated above and some social
workers are engaging in activities in each category. Two issues
present themselves. First, for the most part the type of social
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 191
work proposed in each of the four arenas of practice is essentially
tllat of the professional project in which s~cial work is
positioned as having specific knowledge.and expertlse to engage.
Accordingly, it is a form of global practICe tllat does not address
the challenges posed by tl,e ideas of change. Nevertheless, some
roles (for example in international policy practice) respond to the
economics and politics of change, albeit still within the framework
of the professional project. The second issue, however,
illustrates that strategically, this form of global social work is a
little more ambiguous. As I have indicated previously, for social
work to exist there must be actual places or arenas of practice
where social workers are able to do what they do, whatever tlut
is. In other words, social work needs an auspice of some form.
Clearly, potential auspices exist in each ofthe four categories identified
above: in child welfare departments, in state and non-profit
agencies offering settlement services for refugees, in international
development agencies (such as the United Nations, Oxfam, Save
the Children, World Vision), and international policy and advocacy
agencies (for example, the International Council 011 Social
Welfare or Amnesty International). Except for the instance of
international adoptions, social work unfortunately has no institutionally
derived mandate to engage. To that end, it is one of
several occupations which might lay claim to the specific domains.
Indeed, Healy (2001 ) claims tllJt the profession's preoccupation
with the promotion of its own professional project witl1in
the United Nations context (as opposed to the promotion of the
goals of social development) ultimately lead the United Nations
to marginaiise social work in its own programs and projects.
It is for example the International Council on Social Welfare,, ,
not the International Federation of Social Work or the International
Association of Schools of Social Work, which has Category
1 status with the United Nations' Economic and Social
Council. This high degree ofrecognition allows the International
Council on Social Welfure to be influential in global social policy,
as witnessed by its involvement in setting the agenda for the
1995 United Nations Social Development Summit. Originally,
the International Council on Social Welfare was called the International
Conference on Social Work. In its current form however,
it has evolved to reach beyond social work to involve various
non-social work disciplines and groups (Healy, 2001 ). Successful
192 CHAl lENGING SOCIAL WORK
~s it has beel~ for promoting the interests ofdisadvantaged people
lJl glo,baJ fO I ~I11S, a development such as this is, for social work
more.lll.lIsrrauvc ofopportunities lost in the international domail;
than It IS of any strategic gain by the profession.
Social work and social development
~hc. concludi.ng sentiment in the previolls section would, in a1l
likeWlOod, be endorsed by James Midgley (1999b, 1997, 1996,
1995, and 1990) who, as I sllggested earlier, is one of the mOst
influentIal advocates for social work to engage in social dcvcIopn~e~lt.
~ we will,sec, ~id.gley's aCCOunt of social development,
\\ hlle suB essentIally wlthm the modernist tradition in that it
aSSlImes that p~ogrcs~ivc development is possible, is nevertheless
a fo~n~ ~fpra~tJce which soci~1 ,workers can engage. It is practice,
hO\~e\el, whICh d~es not pnvIlege the social work professional
proJect. Indeed, Mjdgley's work has similarities with social devclopment
theorists such as, tor example Parfitt (2002) Wll0 ' ·1
b' "1 ' ,W1Ie
eI.n~ cntlCa of 'top-down' approaches to development charac~enstI~
~ft.he United Nations and Western-dominated programs,
IS OptimIstIC about dle potential for 'bottom-up' Or participative
forms .of dc:elopment. It is easy to see why social work cngagcl1lent
In. s.oClal devcl.opment i.s not that great a leap conccptually
and polItIcally,. particularly gIven the profession 's long standing
enga~emcnt WIth community development as a Core mode of
practlce (Ahmadi, 2003). For Midgley (1997,1995) social work
as socIaJ de,:,elopment is.i_nformcd by a pcrspective which attempts
to h~rmoll1~c economiC and social development policies and
practices. It IS grounded in an appreciation that 'distorted devel-
0pl:1Cnt' (1995) Occurs when economic goals are prioritized ovcr
socIal goals. In such siUlations, the degree of maldistribLltion
escalatcs d~maticaUy within a context ofoverall economic growth
and expansion. vVhere there is distorted development, a tew
people become VCIY\:calthy but the majority remain in signHicant
p~vcrty. For st~at~gIC . purposes the developmental perspcctive
reJ~cts the .re-dlstnbutIve approach to traditional social welfarc
wh.ICh dommatcd, and to a large extent (particularly in terms of
p~lccnta~e of overall welfare. expenditure on income sccurity),
snli domll1ates the welfare regImes ofthe North. Instead, M.idgley
(1999b) argues that the sllccessful linkage ofeconomic stagnation
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 193
with high levcls of social welfare expenditure by neoclassical
economics Jnd neolibera1 politics in public discourse means d13t
an altcrnative strategy is imperative.
The strareb'Y proposed is social development, and it is a
strategy which can be employed both in thc nations of the
SOllth and the North. Midgley'S developmental strategy has
three overall components (1997). First, it establishes the institutional
and organizational mechanisms for d 1C integration of
economic and social policies. If the strategy wcre to be employed
in a Northern country, for example, this would mcan dlat the
central banks develop a clear and progressive social policy agenda
designed to promote social well-being, integrally linked with
their cconomic policy orientation . It would mean, for example,
that unlike current orientations, central bank policies designed to
prioritize the containment of inflation over employment growth
would nced significant re-adjustment. This relates to the second
principle of a developmental strategy - economic growth must
have a positive impact 011 people's welfare. Again using the above
example, a developmental strategy would not sanction an orientation
to macrocconomic potic)' which promoted overall economic
growth «tid sustained high unemployment. Accordingly, th is
strategic direction would i'l"lsist that there was significant public
expenditure on job creation and self-employmcnt opportunitiesan
approach currently rejected outright by neoclassically-informed
economic policies. Third, a developmental strategy would insist
on tlle introduction of a range of socia! programs which, rather
d1cn being ameliorative and remedial, actually constitute social
investment.
In 1999 Midgley (1999b) provided a range of examples of
what a social investment strategy might entail if applied in the
'advanced' welfare states of the global North. Onc of dlcse is
the development and implementation of social programs which
invest in human capital) an approach more commonly cmployed
in cQuntI-ies of the South but which could easily and productively
be employed in the North. Citing economic research undertaken
by the World Bank (1991) and an authoritative body of
early work linking education and economic development (for
example Becker, 1964; Harbison, 1973 and Schultz, 1981 ),
Midgley argues th at dle same ideas can be applied to social
wel£1rc. Investing developmentally in mothers and families in
194 CHA LLENGING SOCIAL WORK
community and preventative settings, for example, can produce
morc slIstainable and positive outcomes individually and collectively
than current high cost conventional and remedial child
welfare services.
He also suggests that social workers in community development
roles should broaden their ambit from social and political projects
to incorporate loeaJ economic development. In such projects, the
standard social work/community development objective of
creating what is increasingly called 'social capital' (inclusive social
networks and their associated social and individual by-products),
at the level of local communities is augmented with projects which
locally generate much needed economic wealth. Both of these
sllggestions form part ofa more comprehensive program. Ifactively
promoted as part of a concerted policy platform by governments
proactively engaged within overcoming spacial disadvantage in
develop~d countries (the Northern version of distorted development),
It could provide a multitude of opportunities for social
workers. Indeed, in the past it has done, for example in the British
Community Development Projects, the American Model Cities
program and the Australian Assistance Plan.
To a certain extent, policy initiatives along these lines have been
revived in the developed cOlUltries. In Britain, for cxample, the
depressed areas of Northern England have been designated Enterprise
Zones subject to local economic development programs as
part of Ncw Labour's Third Way policy program (Powell, 1999).
Conceptually similar programs, in this case explicitly linking social
and economic investment strategies, are being deployed with
extremely disadvantaged indigenous communities in Australia's
Cape York Peninsula in far north Queensland (Pearson and
Sanders, 1995 ). In South Mrica, the traditional social work role
of tending to the poor white population was and continues to be
challcngcd by new policy imperatives thrown up by that country's
tranSition to democracy and the related imperatives to engage
developmentally with the previously disenfranchized and economicaUy
marginalized population (Gray and Mazibuko, 2002). The
question raised for British, Australian and South African social
workers respectively is the extent to which they have been able to
forge connections between these initiatives and their traditional
a.ctivities and institutional roles to leverage a place in the emerging
SItes of practice. As similar policy developments play out across
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 195
the global North, thc challenge is clearly posed to social work to
assert itself as an occupation well suited to mltlate and support
social investment in a range of forms.
The form of social work as social development and investment
promoted by Midgley (1999b) manifestly confronts tlle economic
pressures bearing down on the adva~ced \: e1fare states discussed
in Chapter 3. It does tl,is because It specifically espouses a role
for social work to proactively engage with the consequences
of economic globalization. In other words, it unequivocally
focuses on distorted development in the global North; on
increased spatially-defmed poverty, disadvantage and inequa~ity
in economics characterized by soaring profits and escalatmg
wealth. Further, as Midgley (1997, p. 21) notes, a developmental
approach to social work is congruent with the traditional ~ocus
of social work in that it explicitly addresses poverty and disadvantage.
Social development work is, of necessity, less concc:ned
with psychological dysfunction and individual deficit.. It onents
itself away froll""! the tl""!erapeutic and towards the matenal and the
practical witllin a clear normative framework.of so~ial justice. .
While the political and normative onentatlon of SOCIal
development work might stand at odds with contemporary
conservative governments of the global North, those same
governments arc nevertheless often creating the programmatic
and institutional space where tllls form of social work could be
undcrtaken. While such policies and programs of locality dcvelopment
are often propelled by a neoliberally informed distastc
for ~\Velfare dependency', the programs that flow out from them
nevertheless provide obvious opportunity. In many instances, the
actual 'spaces' of practice emerging are not formally within state
bureaucracies, but are instead located in the semi-autonomous
sphere of the non-profit or tllird sectof, sometim.es also known .as
'civil society'. In all likelihood it is here that SOCIal work as SOCial
development may find its niche, rather than in the large but crumbling
welfare bureaucracies of the modernist we~fare states: And
it is here that social work as social development IS, paradOXIcally,
congruent with the politics of tlle contemporary ~ra. .
The assumptions and imperatives that underpm tillS form of
social development work are, as suggested earlier, essentially
modernist and as sllch are less sympathetic and responsive
to the intellectual challenges posed by contemporary theory.
,
196 CHAllENGING SOCIAL WORK
Nevertheless, social work as social development in no way privileges
social work as the 'best' profession to engage in social
development; in fact, it is highly critical of social work's remedial
tocus (see Midgley and Tang, 2001 ). That said, this form of
social development work upholds the professional project in
the sense that it assumes that social work can engage progressively
and developmentally without becoming enmeshed in and
compromised by, for example, the neoliberal political agenda
or neoclassical economic program. In othcr words, like the
traditional professional project conccption of social work, it
presents as a practice that, perhaps as a result of its materialist
focus, can resist the constitutive nature of the contexts in which
it may practiced, especially in the workfare state. In summary,
this form of social development work responds specifically to
the economics of change and to the politics of change in that it
takes up the opportunities to engage offered by the new institutional
arrangements of welfare in the global North. Further, it
retains an (albeit as yet small ) role in development practice more
broadly and it continues to invite social workers to engage in the
global SOLLth. Finally, it provides an interesting and potentially
expanding opportunity to engage with the South manifest in the
North, with for example indigenous communities in Australia,
North America, New Zealand and South Africa. Interestingly,
another body of more recently developed development theory
also offers a potential future for social work along similar lines.
Unlike the form of social work as social development proposed
in this section of the chapter, this newer mode attempts to move
beyond the material. 1t is also a form ofpractice which is explicitly
critical of the progressive and modernist assumptions embedded
in much development practice. It does this by engaging with (or,
depending on which author one reads), attempting to engage
with aspects of contemporary theory discllssed here in Chapter 5.
'Glocal' social development work
My use ofthe unusual neologism ~glocal' in rderence to this mode
of social development work is deliberate. It is a term increasingly
being used by development practitioners (and by those that wish
to infuse social work with these ideas) to indicate that they tOO
are concerned with addressing the impact of global processes
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 197
on local communities, but in new ways (Burkett, 200 1 ~ Burkett
and McDonald, 2005). What differentiates this mode from the
previous mode of social development work is the explicit en~a~ement
with critical theory and contemporary tlleory, and the 111S1Stence
that it is a form of practice that is relational and proccssual.
But what does 'relational' and 'processual' practice mean? To fully
appreciate what is being suggested, we need first to be consciolls
ofthe types oftheoretical insights being brought to bear on development
practice. Once thcy are understood, tlle implications of
notions like 'relational' and 'processual' as it applies to tlus form
of social development practice becomes clearer.
Much of the intellectual editlce of glocal social development
is drawn from contemporary theory, taken up and extended by
critical geography (Harvey, 2000), and then applied to forms of
development theory increasingly known as post development them)'
(Escobar, 1995). As indicated, the origins and the complex of
ideas employed arc conceptually similar to that of cnncal SOCial
work discussed in Chapter 10, but with a slightly different spin.
Developed witllin the genre ofcritical geography (a body ofgeography
influenced by Marxism and neo-Marxism, and inc~easingly
by contemporary tlleory), a corpus ofwork known as spattal theory
has developed which attempts to understand how, tllfough the
deployment of poLitical, economic, cultural and social processes,
people create spaces (localities, communities) (sec Benko and
Strolunayer, 1997 for an overview). Social space is understood
to be more tlun an inert vessel or container in which life in all
of its forms unfolds (Lefebvre, 1996, 1974). Rather, space is a
social product in its own right. This is something which is fairly
easy to appreciate as any systematic exploration of a contemporary
city would illustrate. It is obvious tllat we create the spac~s
in which we live, but it may be less obvious that those spaces 111
turn, discursively create us. To add to this insight and alert to the
understandings of critical tlleory (of the sort used in Chapter 3),
spatial theory argues that the practices associated with producing
space reflect the dominant mode of capital accumulation, and
the associated social modes of regulation and reproduction. In
otller words, we create space and it creates us at tlle micro level.
Simultaneously and continuously, we (through aU ofour complex
economic, political, social and cultural processes) create, through
space, tlle macro level mode ofaccumulation and regulation while
198 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
being created by it. Accordingly, the discursive production of
space is multi-dimensional. So, while having a local history which
impacts on the present, spaces (for example neighborhood spaces)
are continuously reinscribed by macroeconomic, political and
social practices attuned to the dominant accumulation regime. In
tIlis way, 'global' becomes a metaphor for macro processes, and
'local' for micro. The neologism 'glocal' is an attempt to capture
both. Glocal social development practitioners use the term, in
part, to signify that they act as interpreters of the global and
advocates of the local.
It is also an attempt to represent metaphorically the theorized
interconnections between the spatial and the social. Attending
also to the nuances of contemporary theory, this genre of writing
attempts to move beyond the strict structuralism ofcritical theory
and to develop an awareness of how every day consciousness is
discursively shaped through the micro operations of power at the
local leve!. AudlOrs such as Giroux (1992) and Dirtik (1996) have
sought to show how the complexities of the global play out and
are taken up and transformed at the local level in the context
of social relationships - in what is understood as the global-local
nexus. In doing so, they develop a theoretical justification for
engagement at the local level through relationships:, in that it
suggested that it is at this level that potential disruptions of d,e
dominant regime become possible. Further, Giroux (1992, p. 79)
suggests that 'cultural workers' (teachers, lawyers, social workers)
become 'transformative intellectuals' charged with the imperative
to link the global and the local in ways which encourage
the development of local critical consciousness, in the context of
relationships, as the basis for transformative action.
Contemporary theory has also been taken up extensively in an
influential bod)' of thought informing glocal social development
practice - post-development theory. This is a body of writing
which is highly critical of modernist forms of social development
such as those promoted by the United Nations and the World
Bank (and by many of the large non-government aid organizations).
Adopting an explicitly Foucauldian analysis, theorists such
as Escobar (1995) focus on development as discourse. Rather
than accepting its modernist assumptions about linear economic,
cultural and social progress, Escobar argues that development
is an historical construct and a discursive process which allows
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 199
countries of the South to be examined, analysed and acted upon
by agents of the North. In the same way tIut contemporary
theory illustrates how the discourses of modernist social welfare
allow social workers to act on the bodies of the poor, the sad
and so forth, when applied to the context of development, in ternational
aid organizations for example, become the therapeutic
agents of the North sent to remedy d,e ills of the ailing South.
But in doing so, these agents of the North and of 'development'
create and maintain the Soudl as the 'other', fundamentally
different from the North and very much in need of remedial
intervention. In the case of modernist development, institutional
support comes not from the welfare state, but frolll the United
Nations, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World
Bank. Through these organizations, and through the thousands
of organizations and networks that take their legitimacy from the
overall modernist project, an international undertaking of monumental
scope has shaped and continues to shape the countries
of d,e global South, intimately affecting the lives and d,e life
chances of d,eir populations. Escobar would, for example, dunk
about the infam ous structural adjustment programs of the IMF
(which forced Southern countries to cut expenditure on social
infrastructure) as discourses which, rather than promote development,
actively damage the social and economic fabric of the
societies where they are applied. Drawing on this form of critique
of (Northern) mainstream, modernist and 'progressive' development,
a growing body of influential (Southern) literature has
emerged, which re-writes development theory in ways that expose
dle many contradictions and harmful consequences of the project
(Cowan and Shenton, 1996; Rahnema and Bawtree, 1997:, Estcva
and Prakash, 1998).
Accompanying the post development critique are significant
attempts to re-construct development practice (K..1.plan, 2002,
1996), and it is from this body of work that new possibilities for
social work emerge. It is a set of practices which draws on a rich
tradition of liberationist and emancipatory literature, such as the
work of Paolo Freire (1972), Franz Fanon (1966) and Vaelav
Havel (1992). It describes modes of practice wherein people
are engaged as co-producers in endeavours to enhance their
welfare, rather than as recipients of welfare 'solutions' designed
by modernist professional development practitioners. Strategies
200 CHALLENGI NG SOCIAL WORK
slIch as, co~produ~tion, forms of mutual aid (particularly those
addressmg finanCIal exclusion), 'co-management' and endoge_
nous. de~'clopl:lel1t p~'ocesses are examples. These are modes of
practIce 111 whIch notions ofpower and power rclations are sc .. . fUt) Illzcd,
WIth much attention being paid to opening up 'rcal' spafi . . .ces
or partIClpatOlY ways of working and examination of what are
held to be colonizing agendas in practice.
, As indicated above, gloeal social development practitioners are
cultural, workers', Cultural workers place themselves in a position
~f crea:lI1g possibilities for social justice in the uncertain and
Ide~l~glcally fraught spaces where both mainstream and critical
traditions of understanding of development confront challen es
of ~he post development critique. Like critical social work, glo~al
sOCIal development practice is held to be transformative, reflexive
and culturally sensitive.
Ea~lier, I suggested that glocal social development practice was
relatIOnal and pl'ocessnal in nature. As well as being attempts to
addr~ss the theoretical complexities held to be informing glocal
pra~ttce, tl~ese \:ords also signal a position which suggests that
SOCial relatIonshIps form the building blocks of human existence.
In other words, it is in the COntext of relationships that people
come to apprehend, appreciate and work towards human well~ein¥,
both individ~ally and collectively. Furthermore, how pracnce
IS. undertaken IS as important, if not more important than
what IS actually done or the specific strategies adopted . In tlus
way, gloca! social work doesn't priviJege anyone strategy over
anoth.er but would suggest that engagement in good process wil!
contribute .t~ the Success of whatever strategy is locally devised
by the parnclpants. Gloeal social development practice builds on
three main fundamentals. As I have demonstrated, dle first is that
glocal practice acknowledges that it is undertaken not only within
d1e realm of the material, but also within the realm of the social.
Second, and as I have suggested, glocal practice Occurs within the
context of relationships. Third, glocal practice implies the development
of a particular sensibility as well as a set of ski.lls on the
part of practitioners (Kaplan, 2002).
This 'sen~ibility' will be both familiar and intuitively attractive
to many SOCial workers, for when examined, it consists ofan ethics
an~ a politics l1?t unlike those promoted, for example, by critical
SOCIal work. It IS an approach d1at values aud1Cntic participation,
GLOBAL SOCIAL WORK 201
empowerment, local capacity building, equity, social justice and
sustainable development (Tembo, 2003). It is a sensibil.iry which
also promotes a particular aesthetics - one which values creativity
and which appreciates and can attend to practice as process; as
a 'river of rhythm and form ... a pulsing movement ... both
progression and oscillation, a spiral flow' (K.:lplan, 2002, p. xvii).
The glocal practitioner is, in Kaplan's words 'an artist of the
invisible' .
In rejecting the modernist principles and assumptions of
progress embedded in traditional development practice, glocal
social development rejects the modenust orientation of development
practice. Likewise, if social workers choose to engage
in glocal social development, they would presumably be called
upon to reject the modernist professional social work project. (It
should also be noted, however, tllat the actual projects undertaken
and strategies adopted differ little from Midgley's mode of
social development practice.) That said, glocal practice nevertheless
provides a direction for practitioners who wish to 1110ve away
from traditional modernist social work practice, and who wish
to engage in an alternate way of practicing in non-welfare state
contexts. As such, it is a mode of practicc entirely suited to the
contexts shaped by the new social movements and civil society,
and overtly responsive to the issues generated by tlle economics
and politics of change. It does so, however, from outside of d1e
state. Importantly for social workers in Australia, New Zealand,
Canada and the USA, it is a form of practice more attuned
than most, to the issues and sensitivities of the global SOllth (the
experiences of indigenous peoples) located within countries of
the North.
As with the other strategic options canvassed in Chapters 8,
9 and 10, there are no easy answers or unambiguous relief to
be found in tJ1 C variolls forms of global social work. Rather,
we are left with a complex and often contradictory collection
of practices, each of which provide some direction and address
some ofdlC issues raised in Part 1, but dley do not provide clear
answers to the vcxed question of 'which way forward?' In the next
concluding chapter, I return to the notion of the professional
project in the context of institutional change and in light of the
challenges posed, oudine the broad parameters ofa possible future
(or as we will sec, futures) for social work.
12 Thinking Our Way
Forward
In Part 1 1 considered the forces and processes of change at
a pace and in a manner designed to create awareness on the
part of readers of the scaJe of what has occurred in the various
contexts where social workers find themselves. The message
was (I hope) clear - there is no going back. The conditions
under which social work was established, especially in the post~
World War Il modernist welfare regimes, have been utterly transformed.
Economic globalization has had significant consequences
and national economies (both North and South) have been reconstructed
with a range ofoften devastating (but at a minimum,
disturbing) costs. Similarly, the political consensus between
capital and labor which developed in the post-war decades has
broken down and the state has transformed itself, particularly
the liberal 'Anglo' states. In those conntries, the relationship
between the state and the people, encapsulated metaphorically
and practically in the notion of citizenship, has been fundamentally
re-constructed, so much so that contemporary 'citizens'
struggle to articulate, rnuch less activate social rights. Instead, the
'nco-citizens' of neoliberal states are a divided lot, increasingly
pitted against each other by governments more attuned to the
needs of capital. Finally, the intellectual edifice which supported
the project of modernity, of welfare and of social work has been
de-stabilized by the criticisms of contemporary theory. In the
eyes of its supporters, any comfort social workers tu ight have
drawn from the profession's alleged humanist and emancipatOIY
impulses is diminished in the face of its sceptical gaze.
Throughout Part 2 we canvassed four very different and ofthemselves
broad categories ofresponse articulated and promoted within
the professional literature. Each option has, as I demonstrated,
merit and therefore has something to offer. The entrepreneurial
profession in its various manifestations explicitly engages with
the politics of change by suggesting active engagement with the
203
-
204 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
new spaces of intervention emerging in the ncoliberal workfare
regime - for example, in care management, managed care and
wclf.;'lrc reform. Similarly, evidence-based practice promotes a mode
of engagement which unambiguously responds to the econonucs
and politics of change, particularly those developments propelled
under the auspices ofNew Public Management. Conversely, while
criticalpractice in its more recent manifestations attempts to engage
with the ideas of change in dle form of contemporary theory and
while it continues to propel the progressive intent of social work,
it does not engagc with the politics of change and thc consequent
shrinkage ofspaces where such practice can be undertaken in
the neoliberal work£lrc regime. Finally, we examined global social
work, a diverse range of practices which actively seeks to engage
with the human consequences of the economics of change. Like
critical practice some forms ofglobalsocial work attend to the ideas
ofchange. Further,globalsocialwork offers significant potential for
social work, ifnot the institutional auspice, outside the confines of
dle nation state.
Thinking about change
In this book 1 have deliberately employed two analytical themes,
albeit one more often than the other. The first of these is dle
notion ofthe professional project, developed initially in Chapter 1
and then employed extensively in Part 2 to provide a reference
point by which to assess the various options canvassed.
As indicated above, my intention in Part 1 was to illustrate
just how profound and wide reaching the forces ofchange are, and
how the assumptions a modernist professional project like social
work makes about its context (and about itself) arc increasingly
detached from reality. In Part 2, J showed how each of
the strategic options canvassed positions itself in respect of the
professional project. In doing so, we are able to appreciate in a
short-hand way how much each option represents real change,
or conversely, continuity. My over-arching argument is that the
social work professional project was and is a creature ofmodernity
and as such, is conceptually and temporally congruent with the
high point of the post-war 20th century modernist welfare state.
In terms of the body of theory I have used to support the analysis,
the boundaries and practices of the professional community
THINKING OUR WAY FORWARD 205
of social work was isomorphic with the modernist welfare state
(Greenwood, Suddaby and Hinings, 2002). By this, I mean that
social work and the modernist welfare state correspond with each
other. Currently, we have moved beyond that point of correspondence
and into what can as yet best be d~s~ribed as par?~Uy
chartered waters. As 1 discuss shortly, [etammg an uncntlcal
commitment to the unre-constructed professional project is not,
I suggest, a particularly constructive response to contemporary
conditions. This, ofcourse, is a position which needs to be argued
not merely asserted.
To do so I turn in a more substantial way to the second analytical
device ~ dle notion of institutions and institutional change.
In Chapter 2, I suggested tlut we can think about the wel~are
regime as an institution, and the entire edifice of welfare sent.lces
and practices as an institutional field. Further, we can conSider
social work to be a key institutional practice congruent widl
tile field; a set ofactivities designed to undertake the 'work' ofdle
overarching institution - in this case to pursue the modernist,
developmental and progressive impulses embedded in (advanced)
welfare states. As such (and as I argued in Chapter 2) social
work was congruent with the dominant institutional complex of
the welfare state - which gave the profession legitimacy to both
exist alld act, and in a small way (depending on the context) to
contribute to the ongoing stability and maintenance ofd1e overall
institutional order.
We can specify theoretically how this happened. First, in the
process ohnstitutionalization, specific modes of operating witllin
an institutional field take on a taken-far-granted quality and
becoming 'a means of ensuring the perpetuation of institutionalized
patterns' (Tolbert, 1988, pp. 101- 102) - for example, the
production of welfarc within modernist bureaucracies. Seco~d,
as an institutional field develops, participants develop a partICular
language and way of clunking about tile field over time,
generating among odlcr things particular interpretive frameworks,
logics and rationalities (Meyer and Rowan, 1991)
for example, social justice, social rights, human progress and
development. In using dlese language formations or discourses
(and inherent in the rationalities), institutional operatives such
as social workers 'create' dle institution (the welfare regime)
(Phillips, Lawrence and Hardy, 2004). Continued employment
206 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
of dominant rationalities both account for and recursively legit~
imize the actions and behavior of social workers within the social
welfare field. Third, institutionalization is promoted through the
achievement of a high degree of ideological consensus within any
given field. This occurs largely through processes of normatipe
isomorphism (that is, people holding similar values frameworks
and passing these onto others) generated through, for example, a
common professional education. As readers are no doubt aware,
professional social work education, wherever undertaken, largely
reLics on a generic core of professional knowledge and values.
Unfortunately - as has been amply demonstrated by the disassembling
and re~constitution of the welfare state discussed in
Part 1 - institutions and institutional fields are not stable. Some
theorists in the genre from where this analytical framework
is drawn have attempted to elaborate models of institutional
change. There are - theoretically - four phases in institution
building and transformation: institutional formation, institutional
development, dc-institutionalization and re-institutionalisation
(Jepperson, 1991 ). Of these, the latter two are of interest at this
point as they allow social workers to ask 'how does an institutionalized
field (for example, all of the organizations and operatives
which make up a modern welfare state) exit from one institutional
order and enter another (for example) a neoliberal workfare
regime)? As I illustrated in the preface to Part 1, Oliver (1992)
hypothetically enumerated a series of external pressures) and to a
lesser extent internal responses, that may prompt an institutional
field to erode as a function of dc-institutionalization. Broadly,
thesc are political, social and functional antecedents to change;
a series of phenomena and processes observable within an institutionalized
field such as mounting performance crisis) growth in
intra-sectorial criticism, increased pressure to innovate) changes
to external expectations of what constitutes procedural conformity,
shifting external dependencies, withdrawal of rewards for
institutionalized practices, increases in technical specificity or goal
clarity, changes in statutory environment, growth in intra-field
criticism, and conflicting intra-field interests. And as enumerated
at some length in Part 1, all of these are represented in the
complex of processes croding modernist welfare states.
In Chaptcr 2, I also suggested that different institutional orders
both promote and are legitimizcd by different institutional
THINKING OUR WAY FORWARD 207
logics. In doing so, [ posed the question of 'what happens
when institutional logics contradict onc another?' In othcr
words, the modernist welfare statc promoted one dominant rationality,
constructed within the broad complex ofsocial democracy
and represented in the edifice of a welfare statc nu.rturing and
protccting its citizens within a framework of social rights. The
neoliberal workfare regimc on thc othcr hand opcrates within
a completely different rationality - one which valorizes market
freedoms over social rights and promotes individualism over
collcctivism. It is a rationality which suggests that active states
(engagillg in service provision, for example) are more destructivc
than they are enabling. It is onc which prioritizcs citizens' obligations
to the state as opposed to the state's obligations to its
citizens. In other words, the cmerging rationality of the neoliberal
workfare regime stands in stark contrast that that which wcnt
before it.
1 also suggested in Chapter 2 that this poses a problem for
social work. 1f, as I have argued, social work is a key expression
of the welf.:lre state and if, as I have also claimed, it is
a key constitutive set of institutional practices in that institutional
order, what happens in contcxts of institutional changd
What happens when the institutional order representative of and
constituted by social work comcs into contact with the opposing
rationality of neoliberalism? At this stage I suggest that this is
still largely an empirical question in that we rcally do not knoll'.
Nevertheless, if the disquiet in the profcssionalliteranlrc about,
for example, the impact of welfare reform, managed care and
care management on the profession in Britain and the USA is
anything to go by, therc are numerous social workers who are
worried about the future. Ncvcrtheless, there are some indications
of the impact of such collision of rationalities drawn from
empirical studies in other contexts, two of which arc particularly
informative.
Learning from others
The first of these is a study undertaken by Townley (2002 )
who examined thc impact of Ncw Public Management-inspircd
rcforms on the functioning ofmuseums and the professional practices
of cu.rators. Not surprisingly, she found that the rationality
208 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
of NPM swamped that of the curators and as a consequence,
their professional identity was re~shaped. The implication of this
is clear - the rationality oftile neoliberal state (the 'stronger' force
in the field, driven by tile state which has control of resources) will
dominate that ofcile profession (the 'weaker' resource~depcndcnt
participants in the field).
Thc second study is closer to home, and is simiJarly instructive
(albeit in a counter-intuitivc way). In this case it is a study
of a rape crisis centre in Israel undertaken by Zilber (2002 ).
The centre in question had originally been established by a
group of volunteers and was grounded within a strongly anictllated
feminist framework. For some timc, it continued drawing
its operational principles and practices from within the guiding
rationality of feminism, largely due to the dominance of volunteers
committed to feminist principles. More recently, thc background
of volunteers has altered as social work students began
to volunteer, not as means of expressing their commitment to
feminism, but as a means of gaining counselling experience. As
a consequence of their involvement and at a time when they
became the primary source of volunteer labor, tile rationality
and the practices of the agency shifted from being femin ist,
to those drawn fi'om a version of a modernist profession, in
this case a logic and values orientation drawn from the social
work professional project. While tIlis latter case represents a
'triumph' of the professional project (depending on the perspective
adopted), the implications arc clear. If there arc sufficient
actors promoting an alternative rationality (and as in the first
case of the museums, those actors control access to resources)
that rationality will dominate the original. What is important
to note from both studies is that clashes of institutional rationalities,
particularly in contexts of resource dependency, results
in significant shifts in what constitutes good organizational and
professional practice.
If readers accept that the developments discussed in Part 1
constitute iJlstitutional change, and if readers accept tilat the
emerging institutional regime is promoting a different (and in
all Jjkelihood, conflicting) rationality to that of modernist social
work, tIlen it behoves social workers to ask questions about the
implications of pursuing tIle various options outIined in Pan 2.
What role will each play in promoting or resisting the institutional
THINKING OUR WAY FORWARD 209
logics of the workfare state? In Chapter 8, I suggested that the
entrepreneurial profession is, in the interests of sUIvival, encouraging
engagement with the new regime, and as a consequence,
accommodation with the accompanying rational.ity. Such engagement
will, in all likelihood, have a significant impact on the traditional
rationalities of modernist social work; perhaps displacing
or perhaps undermining the values orientation of the profession
(our substantive rationality - see page 40 for a reminder), the role
of practice theory in informing what social workers do (our theoretical
rationality, ditto above) and our commitments to practice
in professionalized state-based human sen'ice organizations (our
forma! rationality, again see page 41). Similarly, while admirable
in intent, evidence-based practice is also largely congruent with
and accommodating to the tileoretical and formal ratj.onalities
of the neoliberal state. Critical practice and most instances of
global practice, on the other hand, clearly articulate alternative
rationalities, and would fi nd it hard to engage with and accommodate
those of neoliberalism. In the absence of empirical evidence
it is hard to be definitive, but it would seem likely tilat the
different strategic options will lead to quite different outcomes
for social work.
Such an analysis suggests, for example, that tIle notion that
social work will continue to possess a common identity if all
fOllr options arc pursued becomes even less tenable than it has
been to date. It also suggests tI13t continuing promotion of the
professional project as the primary strategy will not prove particularly
useful for the totality of possible practices and spaces of
practice emergi.ng in the 2 1st century. While it is highly likely
that aspects of the professional project mode of social work will
continue to be promoted and will continue to exist, it is also
possible that the nature of the range of practices undertaken in
that mode will mutate through engagement \VitIl tIle new institutional
rationality of tIle neolibcral workfare regime. These new
modes of doing soc.ial work will in aUlikelihood become isomorphic
with the values of neoliberalislll, the practices of a New
Public Management-inspired state, and with the market. And if
some social workers take up the challenges posed, for example,
by global social work as social development, it is likely tI13t the
professional project as a mode oforganizing and oftIlinking about
practice will increasingly becomc of limited relevance in thosc
210 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
contexts. In these instances, it is more likely that promotion of
social development will take priority over the promotion of the
profession. In f:'lct, as I indicated in Chapter II, this has largely
already happened and it is one of the core reasons why social
work has lost its privileged status with the United Nations and
the development movement as a whole.
The role of leadership
Returning to the theme of social workers as knowing agents
in the context of institutional change (albeit it in limited or
bounded ways), I draw now on a selection of theoretically and
empirically informed suggestions of how the profession might
respond, particularly at the local level. Also using the notion
of entrepreneurship, neoinstitutional theory has for some time
thought about and explored the idea of and activities of i1l5titutional
entrepreneurs in promoting both institutionalization
and institutional change. In 1988, DiMaggio suggested that
some social actors are better than others in producing or influencing
desired outcomes. Institutional entrepreneurs are individuals
and groups who adopt leadership roles in episodes of
institution building and change (Colomy, 1998). Other theorists,
such as Fligstein (1997, p. 398) suggest that such people
have social skill, and as sllch, are able to 'size up' the condition
of the field and figure out what kinds of action 'make
sense'. Drawing on salient myths and potent symbols, skilled
social actors have the ability to motivate cooperation in other
actors by providing them with common meanings and identities
in which actions can be llndertaken and justified. He
also suggests that a key factor in this is that those actors arc
able to 'imaginatively identif)l' with the experiences and understandings
of others. He then goes on to list different tactics
that institutional entrepreneurs use, linking each to whether
the field in question is stable or unstable and to whether the
actors (in this case social workers) are in a strong or weak
position. In the contemporary conditions described in Part 1,
social work institutional entrepreneurs would, in all likelihood,
be trying to offer alternative accounts to those of the neoliberal
workfare state about, for example, society's responsiveness to
disadvantage.
THINKING OUR WAY FORWARD 211
Applying his generic insights to social work, some of the major
tactics he would suggest for social work institutional entrepreneurs
or leaders are (drawn from Fligstein, 1997, pp. 399-401 ):
1. Taking what the syste11J. gives - strategic social work leaders
understand the ambiguities and uncertainties of the social
welfare field and work off them. They have a good sense of
what is possible and what is not. They know where they stand.
They will grasp unexpected opportunities, even when uncer·
tain of the outcome. They know the system and take what it
will give at any moment.
2. Asking f01" m01"e, settling for less - strategic social work leaders
coml11only press for marc than they arc willing to accept, either
from other social workers or from those higher up the ladder.
3. Maintaining ambiguity - strategic social workers often keep
their strategic preferences to themselves. This makes it difficult
for other institutional actors to orient what they do in
response, which in turn, makes them either act first, or not act
at all.
4. T1)'ing fil'e things to get one. Strategic social work leade.rs
have multiple courses of action plotted simultaneously or 111
sequence. They expect that most will fail but a few will sllcceed,
and these successes are what are remembered by other actors.
5. Networking with other challengergrotfps who hape no other coalitions
- strategic social work leaders set themselves (and social
work) up as the node in a network of these other groups \\'ho
also challenge the status quo.
Fligstein (ibid, p. 403) also notes that in situations of crisis (or
under conditions of institutional transformation):
actors committed to the status quo will continue to use dominant
understandings to structure interaction for as long as they can. Skilled
strategic actors in challenger groups w ill offer new cultural frames and
rules to reorganize the field (italics added).
Put another way, strategic social work leaders should have the
capacity to take a reflective position towards cur~~nt practices. in
the profession, coupled with a capacity to enVISion alternatlve
modes of engaging in social work (Beckert, 1999). Such persons
stand in contrast to what Beckert calls 'managers' - actors who
adopt an unreflective stance towards the dominant rationality and
212 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
current practices. The latter, he suggests, orient their decisions
o n imitation and adaptation. And what is clear fi'ol11 this brief
discussion to date is that social workers who wish to act as strategic
leaders must understand the field in which they operate - an
imperative which requires an orientation to the contemporary
conditions slich as that adopted in this volume.
Finally, Greenwood, Suddaby and Hinings (2002 ) demonstrate
empirically how in the context of the profession of accounting (3
profession profoundly challenged by institutional transformation
albeit in different ways than social work), professional associations
can play an important role in responding to institutional change.
T heir work leads them to suggest that:
[Professiona l] associations can legitimate change by hosting a process
of discourse th rough w hich change is debated and endorsed: first by
negotiating and managing debate within the profession; and second,
by reframing professional identities' (ibid, p. 59).
In charting the profession's response to the rise ofwhat is k.nown
in accounting as the Big Five (large international accounting
firms), Greenwood et al show how, as a result of their entry
and eventual dominance of the field, accounting firms (both
large and smaIl) shifted the nature of their work from traditional
accounting narrowly defined to a more broadly defined multidisciplinary
role ofproviding 'business services' . The accountancy
professional associations were instrumental in this shift - which
taken together is called theorizillg change (Strang and Meyer,
1993). This had two parts (Tolbert and Z ucker, 1996). First, they
framed the problem in that thc profession was presented as being
under threat B:om the forces ofchange. Over a twcnty year pcriod
the 'problem was insistently specified and generalised as affecting
all members of the profession and change was presented as natural
and progressive' (Greenwood et al, 2002, p. 72). Second, the
language the associations used became steadily more expressi1}e
fl11d direct, with the imperative for change being cast within the
framework of protessional values. In doing so, the associations
promoted compliance with change in moral not pragmatic terms.
In other words, what Greenwood et al (2002) show, is that the
professional associations engaged in discourses that legitimated
significant shifts in what accountants actually do, and in doing so,
THINKING OUR WAY FORWARD 213
re-shaped the definition of "what it meant to 'be'" an accountant.
T he lessons for social work are clear. Social work professional
associations can, if they choose, act as strategic leaders and
engage deliberately in a sustained process of theorizing i1JStittttional
change. Blit they should be alert to the warning that such
processes, to be successful, need to be vigorously sustained over
a significant period of time.
Conclusion
This leads to my final point. I suggest there is nothing inherently
wrong with the professional project even if it is, as
I evidently think, somewhat outdated both conceptually and
strategically. What is wrong is an unreflective promotion of an
unre-constructed modernist vision (with all ofits attendant accoutrements);
onc which has not thought tllfough and evaluated its
strategic strengtlls and weaknesses in theorizing change. Further,
there is nothing wrong witll holding some attachment to the
notion that there is something special and worthwhile about social
workers (who mayor may not call themselves that). It is wrong
in the contemporary conditions to assume that goodness of heart
and purity of intent are sufficient characteristics to ensure desirable
outcomes for the people who use social work services and
for the professio n. People doing social work can still (and should)
hold on to the moral imperatives and the modernist optimism
that marked its founding. What is important in the contemporary
era is that we do this in a maturc, informed and critically reflexive
manner.
it has been my intent in tllis book to first, help readers
understand why the contemporary circumstances in which social
workers engage are different from what went beforc and different
from what formal social work discourses largely assume. I did
so to emphasize that social workers need to think about how to
respond - both individually and collectively. My second objective
was to evaluate some potential ways fonvard, and in doing so, to
model fl mea1lS by which social workers can themselves think about
other options tllat may confront them. Finally, 1 have suggested
that social workers can act as strategic agents in a framework of
bounded rationality. In other words, strategic social work leaders
214 CHALLENGING SOCIAL WORK
in different contexts can act - but to 'act' successfully they need
to understand the tlelds in which they engage. This book is my
contribution to the development ofsuch understandings. FinalJy,
I note that the positions I have taken here and the arguments
developed arc just that - they are positions and arguments which
I place on the public record as my contribution to thinking Our
way into the future. Let there be many morc.
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Index
acountancy, 212
see also accountants, 97
agency theory, 71-2
see also public choice theory,
new public management
anti-oppressive practice, 178-80
audit, 109- 10
Australia, 88, 98,102,107-8,
124, 167, 201
Bauman, Zygmunt, 126- 27
Bretton Woods Agreement, 45-7
Britain, 98, 99, 102,106- 7,161
bureau profession, 16,97
care management, 102, L06-8
charitable choice, 147
see also welfare reform
Charitable Organisation
Societies, 30
citizenship, 75-6, 122,203
citizens, 22, 125- 7
civil society, 195,201
communitarianism, 76, 141
social capital, 141
community, 74-5, 120, 121
see also matrix of ideas
community development, 194
constructive social work, 183- 5
consumption, 116, 126, 127
aesthetic of consumption, 127
consumer, 115, 116, 118,
123-5
consumer-citizen, 121
consumer sovereignty, 130
contemporary theory, 79- 96,
125- 9, 167,169, 174,
198-9
see also postmodernism
critical geography, 188
critical reflexivity, 95
critical social theory, 17 1-2
critical social work, 171 ,
180-6
cultural workers, 189
custol1ler, 107, lIS, 116, 118
customer charters, 124
dangerous classes, 27
deconstm ction, 83
de~professionalization , 98, 101
Derrida, Jacques, 82
discourse, 82-3, 165
discourses of welfare, 119-23
discourse theory, 116, 117-19
discursive context, 82, 83
discursive formation, 83,
86, 108
social work practice theory as
discourse, 15
disorganized capitalism, 49- 50
see a/so poljticai economy
distorted development, 194
Dominelli, Lena, 178
emancipation, 84
emancipatory project of social
work,91
enabling state, 65
enlightenment, 26- 7
enrerprise zones, 194
entrcpreneurialisl1l,69-70,
139-43,209
epistemology, 79
Escobar, Arturo, 198-9
evidence- based practice, 155-70
feminist practice, 178
Fook, Jan, 181-2
see also critical social work
formal rationality, 40-1
237
238 INDEX
Foucault, Michel, 84, 86
sec also contemporary theory
Freire, Paulo, 199
globalization, 46- 9
economic, 46- 9, 195
political,61
glocal social development,
196-201
governance, 65
see also new public management
governmentality, 65, 87,
see Foucault
Healy, Karen, 151- 2, 179,
182-3, see critical social work
hollow state, 67, see reconstruction
of the state
humanism, 95- 6
human rights, 176-7
human fights practice, 175-8
ideology, 71, see matrix of ideas
He, Jim, 175- 8, sec human rights,
human rights practice
indigenous people, 182, 188
individualism, 165
information and communication
tcchnolog}', 112-13, 147-9
institutional change, 39, 105,
136-7,205
theory, 205-6
welfare, 32-8, 206
see also neoinstitutional theory,
207-8
institutional rationality, 40
international social work, 188- 92
intervention research, 158
see also evidence-based practice
Jessop, Bob
see also post-Fordism
Jones, Andrew, 149- 51
Jordon, Bill, 152-3
keynesian welfare state, 28-9,
32-8
leadership, 210- 13
liberalism, 62
Lyotard, Jean, 84
managed carc, 103-6, 144- 5, 207
sec also, carc management
matrix of ideas, 75, 139-40
sec also civil society
Mead, Lawrence, 128- 9
see also welfare reform
Midgley, James, 91, 189, 192-6
modernity, 14,21-7,81,203,204
moral defective, 128
Mullaly, Bob, 172-5
see also critical social work
narrative therapy, l82
neodassical economics, 10
neoinstitutional theory, 38-42,
210
neoliberalism, 21, 61-6, 142, 207
neoliberal welfare regime, 209
new public management, 10,
69- 72, 109, 110, 147,
149,156, 162, 166, 175,
207-8,209
OECD, 49
ontology, 79
participation, 140, see welfare
reform
Parton, Nigel, 183-5, see critical
social work
Pease, Bob, 182
performance measurement, 112
political economy, 49-58
sce also post-Fordism,
disorganized capitalism,
post-industrialism
positivism, sec evidence-based
practice
post-development theory, 197
post-Fordism, 51-9, 58
atlantic Fordism, 51-2
capitalist accumulation
regime, 52
crisis of accumulation, 54
post-industrialism, 49-51
postl11odernism, 79, see
contemporary theory
practice guidelines, see
evidence-based practice
private practice, 146
professional autonomy
erosion, 106, 142, 161
professional project, 13- 19,
162, 204
professionalism,
aspirant model, 149
classical professionalism, l51
public choice theory, 70
quality, 111- 12, 123
quasi-market, 107
randomized controlled trials,
see evidence-based practice
reconstruction of the state, 66- 9
networked state, 69
overloaded state, 67
regulation deficit, 50
rent seeking, 7J
sec also public choice theory
representational knowledge,
see contemporary theory
risk,72-3
scientific practice, see
evidence-based practice
service users, 115, 130- 1
INDEX 239
settlement hOllses, 30
see also Charitable Organisation
Societies
single-subject design, 157
social development, 192-6
social exclusion, 55, 128, 140
social inclusion, 140
social rights, sec human rights
social work, 26-32
sovereign consumer, 101
spatial theory, 197- 8
streer-level bureaucrats, 113
structural social work, 172- 5
sec also critical social work
sllstainable profession, 150
TANF, 88, 143-4
see also welfare reform
technologies ofseU: 89, 126
therapeutic idea, 89
transnational corporations, 48-9
United Nations, 48, 175, 189,
191,198
USA, 45, 88, 143-8
welfare reform, 10,21,22,25,
37,38-41,73,76,87, 100,
122, 144- 5,204
workfare, 10,56-7,204
workfare states, 10, 56- 7
welfare state, 25, 26-32
*
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managed and sustained forest sources.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British library.
201nibrary of Congress Cataloging·in·Publication Data
~cDonald, Catherine, 1955Challenging
social work:the institutional context of practice/Catherine
McDonald.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISSN-l0: 1- 4039-3545-9 (paper)
ISBN-13: 97B-1- 4039-3545-8 (paper)
1. Social service. 2. Social workers. I. Title.
HV40.M447 2006
361-dc22
10 9 8 7
15 14 13 12
Printed in China
6 5 4 3 2 1
11 10 09 08 07 06
2006043166
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To my mothn' Patricia,
The most influential social ll'orker in my life,