Counselors as Change Agents in Rehabilitation of the Socially Disadvantaged
The problems faced by social minorities are fundamentally different and appear to require new ameliorative strategies. We have asked whether rehabilitation technologies developed for the physically and psychologically impaired are appropriately transferable to the socially disadvantaged. To answer this question we have examined the traditional counseling model and the disjuncture between rehabilitation technology and the problems of the socially disadvantaged. Some dimensions of an alternative model have been suggested. The kinds of strategies that appear to be most appropriate, however, underscore the uncertain relationship between the future of rehabilitation counseling (and the rehabilitation movement in general) and minority poverty. If counselors are to have an impact on the expansion and structure of helping arrangements in the disadvantaged community, basic decisions must be made concerning the objects and direction of change at both the individual and societal levels; the kinds of facilities and programs that need to be developed; the necessary and legitimate mechanisms for producing change and whether the rehabilitation counselor can and should function as a change agent in such communities. These decisions will cause discord within the rehabilitation movement, challenge its solidarity, and perhaps bring the movement into conflict with powerful sectors of the Society.