Social policy and welfare movements ‘from below’: the Social Work Action Network (SWAN) in the UK

2019 ◽  
pp. 121-136
Author(s):  
Rich Moth ◽  
Michael Lavalette
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Policy Reforms ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Strategic Orientations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Action Network ◽  
Policy Agendas ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Alliance Building

Mainstream policy analysis tends to underplay the role of collective action and social struggles from below in influencing the political and ideological environment in which social policy agendas emerge. This chapter addresses this lacuna through an account of a social movement organisation, the Social Work Action Network (SWAN), and its involvement in campaigns to oppose neoliberal mental health and welfare policy reforms. The chapter examines SWAN’s primary modes of political intervention: ideological, agitational and grassroots campaigning which are underpinned by a strategy of cross-sectional alliance building that seeks to integrate the demands of diverse constituencies including practitioners and service users. We conclude that, while the network’s interventions may not have led directly to specific policy shifts, these strategic orientations have nonetheless strengthened challenges to service cuts and restrictions at both ideological and practical levels whilst simultaneously prefiguring elements of the inclusive, democratic and egalitarian welfare futures SWAN seeks to promote.

scholarly journals The new social work radicalism

2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-132
Author(s):  
Iain Ferguson
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Service Users ◽  
Resistance Network ◽  
British Psychological Society ◽  
The Social ◽  
Action Network ◽  
The Uk

On a cold January morning in 2017, a group of social workers, service users, claimants, psychologists, counselors and others gathered outside the annual meeting of the British Psychological Society (BPS) taking place that year in Liverpool. Those present represented a wide variety of grassroots organisations including the Social Work Action Network, Psychologists against Austerity and the Mental Health Resistance Network (SWAN). They were there to protest the BPS’s involvement in the UK government’s use of “psycho-compulsion” as a tool for getting people off benefits.

Reconfiguring professional autonomy? The case of social work in the UK

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Chandler ◽  
Elisabeth Berg ◽  
Marion Ellison ◽  
Jim Barry
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Professional Practice ◽  
Professional Autonomy ◽  
The Third ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk

This chapter discusses the contemporary position of social work in the United Kingdom, and in particular the challenges to what is seen as a managerial-technicist version of social work. The chapter begins with focus on the situation from the 1990s to the present day in which this version of social work takes root and flourishes. The discussion then concentrates on three different routes away from a managerial-technicist social work: the first, reconfiguring professional practice in the direction of evaluation in practice, the second ‘reclaiming social work’ on the Hackney relationship-based model and the third ‘reclaiming social work’ in a more radical, highly politicised way. Special attention is devoted to a discussion about how much autonomy the social workers have in different models, but also what kind of autonomy and for what purpose.

scholarly journals Practising social work

Social Work ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 97-114
Author(s):  
Guy Shennan
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Human Development ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Social Science Knowledge ◽  
The Social ◽  
Research Interviews ◽  
Work Education ◽  
Work Knowledge

The chapter considers changes and developments in the content of social work education under the three headings of social science disciplines, understanding human development and relationships, and theories, approaches and methods for practice. At the start of the period under review, social science knowledge (primarily from sociology and social policy) and human development theories predominated, but as their research base and published literature have expanded, theories and methods for practice have become more prominent. The contribution to knowledge from research conducted by social workers themselves is acknowledged, as is the contribution made by experts by experience, both directly and through research interviews. The prominence of sequences on law for social workers is noted. The chapter concludes by asserting that the broad partnership of interests which should determine the content of the social work knowledge base is threatened by Government's much-expanded role, but that most social work programmes continue to ensure a balanced curriculum.

The Rediscovery of Child Neglect

2000 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Scourfield
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Child Neglect ◽  
Work Team ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk

The article is a discussion of the construction of child neglect in a child and family social work team in the UK, based on ethnographic research in the social work office. Two influential and contrasting professional discourses on neglect are identified, and it is suggested that the dominant construction of neglect in the team studied is maternal failure to adequately service children's bodies. This construction is discussed in relation to some relevant theoretical insights and in the context of trends in contemporary child protection work.

Institute of social work as a promising tool for social dev

2020 ◽  
pp. 31-35
Author(s):  
Maria Kudryavtseva
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Social Development ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Social Assistance ◽  
The State ◽  
Economic Situation ◽  
Promising Tool ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Relationship

The article examines the relationship between the social policy of the state and the Institute of social work. Some foreign and domestic approaches to defi ning the essence of social work as a specifi c type of activity are presented. It is noted that at a specifi c historical stage, the prevailing directions of social work, models of social assistance and support are determined by the socio-economic situation in the country, the level of social development, and the socio-cultural context. It is emphasized that in the conditions of modern reality, there is a need to develop the Institute of social work and realize its potential.

Social Policy Review 32

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
British Society ◽  
Family Welfare ◽  
Youth Justice ◽  
Racial Inequalities ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk ◽  
International Social ◽  
The Welfare State

This book presents an up-to-date and diverse review of the best in social policy scholarship over the past year. The book considers current issues and critical debates in the UK and the international social policy field. It contains vital research on race in social policy higher education and analyses how welfare states and policies address the economic and social hardship of young people. The chapters consider the impacts of austerity on the welfare state, homelessness, libraries and other social policy areas. The book begins by asking what are the pressing racial inequalities in contemporary British society and to what extent is social policy as a discipline equipped to analyse and respond to them. It then discusses the key analysis and messages from the Social Policy Association (SPA) race audit, looking at the challenges facing the discipline, and moves on to examine the experience and views of young British Muslim women in Sunderland. Attention is given to the ‘othering’ of migrants, family welfare resources on young people's transition to economic independence, youths' labour market trajectories in Sweden, innaccessibility to community youth justice in England and Wales, benefits entitlement of different UK families, and the book concludes with the final chapters focussing on the impacts of austerity.

What is ‘impact’? Learning from examples across the professional life course

2018 ◽  
pp. 181-201
Author(s):  
Tina Haux
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Life Course ◽  
Research Impact ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Academic Community ◽  
Early Career ◽  
Professional Life ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Life Course

The inclusion of research impact in the 2014 Research Excellence Framework in the UK (REF2014) was greeted with scepticism by the academic community, not least due to the challenges of defining and measuring the nature and significance of impact. A new analytical framework of the nature of impact is developed in this chapter and it distinguishes between policy creation, direction, discourse and practice. This framework is then applied to the top-ranked impact case studies in the REF2014 from the Social Work and Social Policy sub-panel and the ESRC Early Career Impact Prize Winners in order to assess impact across the life-course of academics.  

Social work academia and social policy in Israel: on the role of social work academics in the policy process

2019 ◽  
pp. 89-104
Author(s):  
Idit Weiss-Gal ◽  
John Gal
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Policy Formulation ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Social Work Faculty ◽  
Policy Practice ◽  
The Social ◽  
Schools Of Social Work ◽  
Policy Engagement

This study contributes to research on policy practice by enriching our knowledge about the forms that the policy engagement of social work academics takes, the dynamics of this engagement, and the factors associated with it. The study is based on structured interviews with 24 faculty members from schools of social work in Israel, all of whom are actively involved in policy formulation. The findings of the study reveal that participants are motivated by ideology and values to engage in policy and that they do so despite their perception that there is a lack of institutional support for this type of activity. The participants report that they successfully manage to combine their policy-related activities with teaching and research. The study also indicates that the social policy formulation process in Israel offers specific opportunities for the policy engagement of social work faculty.

Social work academia and policy in the United States

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arati Maleku ◽  
Richard Hoefer
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Institutional Support ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Social ◽  
Work Education ◽  
Policy Engagement

This chapter examines the engagement of social work academics in the policy process in the United States. It begins by presenting an overview of social policy and the welfare state in the United States and by discussing the emergence of the social work profession in that country. The development of social work education in the United States and its contemporary features are then depicted. Following these, the methodology and the findings of a study of the policy engagement of American social work academics are presented. The findings relate to the levels of engagement in policy and the forms that this takes. The study also offers insights into various factors that are associated with these, such as perceptions, capabilities, institutional support and the accessibility of the policy process. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the findings and their implications.

Social work academia and policy in Sweden

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katarina H. Thorén ◽  
Pia Tham
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Work Education ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Institutional Support ◽  
The Social ◽  
Work Education ◽  
Policy Engagement ◽  
The Welfare State

This chapter examines the engagement of social work academics in the policy process in Sweden. It begins by presenting an overview of social policy and the welfare state in Sweden and by discussing the emergence of the social work profession in that country. The development of social work education in Sweden and its contemporary features are then depicted. Following these, the methodology and the findings of a study of the policy engagement of Swedish social work academics are presented. The findings relate to the levels of engagement in policy and the forms that this takes. The study also offers insights into various factors that are associated with these, such as perceptions, capabilities, institutional support and the accessibility of the policy process. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the findings and their implications.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document