Social Works Theoretical Approaches - Case Study Example

Paper on social work’s theoretical approaches Introduction Social work, critical reflection and learning organization written by Nick Gould and Mark Baldwin is one of the finest model books for the social workers for understanding the theoretical approaches in the social work. This paper presents the case study of Badwall and Rossiter and analyses the different perspectives such as individual perspective, system perspective, structural perspective and community perspective. The paper consist of the individual section beginning by explaining the individual perspective, and then identifying the strengths of each of the main characters and presenting core of conflicts in the case study, systems section begins by explaining the systems perspective and then describing what happens systematically in the institution, the structural section starts by explaining the structural perspective and then discusses how institutionally embedded injustices are influencing specific members of the family and the family as a whole and discussing how race, class, gender and/or other oppressions impact the family’s experiences and their understandings of themselves and others, the community section begins by explaining the community perspective and then name one social problem that exists in this community and identify the root causes of this problem or issue.   Individual Perspective There are different types of organizational changes like anticipatory, reactive, incremental, strategic and changes through tuning, adaptation, reorientation and recreation and these changes are inevitable in the organization towards which people react in various ways. Anticipatory changes are the expected changes in the organization through planned and prepared activities. Reactive changes mean a change made after meeting an unexpected situation in the organization while incremental changes happen by way of introducing new subsystems in the organization. Strategic change is meant an alteration in the organization in result of the application of the new strategy in order to shape and lead the organization in the proper direction. Individuals react to these changes in different ways like in unrealistic optimism, feeling shocked on the reality and direction in the constructive way and the various patterns of responding to the change are coming to the right track, laughing it off, having suspicion about the change and buying in. organizational change or any alteration is perceived in many ways by the different individuals. Strength of main characters Amy is an eight year experienced professor in the department of social work. She liked to work in a health agency to spend her sabbatical year in order to relate the academic experience and the experience in the field. She was very much interested to find out the link between the social work program of the university and the social work program in the community. With this motivation she joined the health agency and she started the work as an assistant to the receptionist. She chose this post with a view that she would get more opportunities to get acquainted with the staffs, client and she could study more about the organization like its objectives, health programs and the various it projects. She could come to know about a project doing for the homeless people. Being a receptionist she could understand so many things happening in the organization like racial issues. There was a disparity in the organization in terms of color and the receptionists have been undergone for physical threat and verbal assault. “Informally, the women of color in the organization confined in me about the racism they encountered in the job. The discussions were filled with pain, anger, hopelessness and desperation, in addition to a sense of connection, safety an relief.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Page 151. Patricia is the health promoter of the health agency and she is responsible for the field work of the students who come in the organization for the practice. She worked with Amy and met different teams in the organization to understand the concept of social justice for them. Heeraj is a staff in the health agency who is been hired by the organization and he involved in the discussion with Amy about the racial oppression in the organization. The organization has more white workers than color of workers. “Racially there were clear hierarchies at the agency. The organization was dominantly made up of white workers, mainly white women.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Page 154. Core conflicts There emerged a severe tension among the health agencies and people due to the reforms of the neo-liberal government in Canada and the reform caused for a number of problems such as stopping of social housing, welfare reduction, etc. Many agencies were closed and homelessness was on the rise. Since there were many people who does not have home, the agency took initiative to help such people. The main conflict in the organization was among the employees. The racism was the core of the conflict in the organization. Because of the conflict in the organization, they could not focus on the basic problems of the marginalized people. “Once discussions about the race moved from informal spaces within the agency to the anti discrimination committee, staff members who worked closely with homeless populations began associating the anti discrimination work exclusively with anti racism efforts and did not feel issues around the class were being adequately addressed.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Page 152 Actually the intention of the social work is to eliminate such evil practices like racism and apartheid from the society, but unfortunately social work organization itself becomes a place of evil practice. “Social work situates itself with the social justice. Within the context of this organization, social justice was a practice workers engaged in with their clients. Social justice was seen as something out side of ourselves, something we fought for, for our client and out in the community.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Page 155. Systems Perspective Systems in an organization are the various elements in the organization and their interrelations between various factors. When we take an example of a school, there are so many systems and subsystems in the institution. There are a number of elements that which encourage the interaction between those factors. There is interrelation between principal and the teaching staff, there is relation between staff in the institution and rapport between the students, contact between teachers and students’ parents etc. All these elements in the institution are referred as the systems. These various elements could be said as the systems like systems in the administration, systems among the students and systems among the teachers. All these systems are intertwined in the organization and perception on all these systems are known as the system perception. There are some characteristics for the systems and they are constant change, dynamic and complex. Because of the nature of the constant change of systems, it brings a new result in the organization. System is very complex since there are a number of subsystems and the interaction between them. One of the important results of the system is homeostasis that brings equilibrium in the structure and function of the organization. “System perturbations (occurrences that promote change) may dramatically change the entire operating system (Kelso 1995): in essence, change creates change, and even small changes can have dramatic effects. Furthermore, change is an important facilitator for system growth and essential for self-organization”. http://www.pilambda.org/horizons/v81-1/81-1_zera_intro.pdf Page 19. There are a number of systems and sub systems in the organization such as the relationship between the receptionist and other employees, relationship between the client and staff, relation ship between the administrators, relationship between the marginalized people and the health agency. These are the systems we found in the organization. The problems between the employees will surely affect the objectives of the organization. There is a rise on the number of the marginalized people because of the reforms undertaken by the government in Canada. The agency is oriented to providing services to the people who are marginalized and homeless. There were problems in the reception and it was affected by racism. “I worked closely with the receptionist team to collaborate around exploring various strategies that might support anti- racist change. I attempted to highlight how difficult this role was in my location as a woman of color working in an agency that is affected by racism. What people of different color was experiencing was the direct result of white supremacy and white norms of intervention.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Page 152 The management also does not take effective step to stop such practices in the organization. Since the majority in the organization is white people, no step is taken for the sake of color of people. When the racism is taken to the attention of the management, the color of people will be blamed that they are not fulfilling the duties properly. “Within the context of the organization, women of color who were recipient of racial abuse were told that they were not performing their job duties adequately.” http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZJmcxpseFK4C&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143&dq=Badwall+and+rossiter+case+study&source=bl&ots=P1o7DwdgD_&sig=hkeGJjLuFHsie2Qq7aO-4nsFoGo&hl=en&ei=QbEPTOOOEcP48AahqImBCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Badwall%20and%20rossiter%20case%20study&f=false Structuralism Structuralism is an approach initiated in the early twentieth century in the social science to study the human society. The concept structuralism in social work profession is used more in terms of mental phenomena model rather than physical phenomena. It considers society as a whole structure where the individual behavior is given lesser importance. The society is considered as a system of organization. “The most difficult aspect of structuralism is that these structures are not based on concrete or physical phenomena as they are in biological or other sciences but based on cultural realities such kinship organization or tales” https://classshares.student.usp.ac.fj/SO303/so303-Structuralism-intro1.doc Ferdinand de Saussure, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Lacan and Lévi-Strauss are some of the thinkers in structuralism. Levi Strauss explained the society in terms of unconscious psychic structures which exist in all human societies. The underlying idea in the structuralism is that the individual does not have any independent identity out of the social organization. The individual get a meaning when they act as a part of the whole system. Marx also claimed that the structure of the society is a major reason for the exploitation of its members. The case study describe various conflicts occurred in a health agency organization. The conflict started due to the attempt of organizational change. The neoliberal government of the province of Ontario, Canada has reformed many policies. Cancellation of social house hold, welfare cut backs, agency closing and the decimation of the social safety network are some of the structural level changes n the organization. These wide level structural changes can cause huge impact on the individual. The substance abuse can be seen more visible in the agency which is en example of individual impact. The family members show aggressive behavior in the organization. The cancellation of the social house caused the homelessness. Other policy level reforms caused marginalization and race and class level issues. All these are the impact of the institutionally embedded injustice of the agency. According to structural perspective the marginalization and exploitation of the marginalization will always happen as a result of the poor social structure or the sudden social structural change. According to Karl Marx the exploitation of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie was due to the structural imbalance of the society. The major reason for this exploitation was the capitalist society. an is a major social injustice faced during the conflict. The racism among the employees also existed internally. There fore a healthy platform for solving the class and race related issues were needed. The working conditions were intolerable because of the racist name calling and threatened physical assault by such clients. Open discussion of race and class were not part of the norms of the agency. This is one of the reasons for the internal conflict. In the informal private space of the organization. The clients in the organization showed threatening and aggressive behavior. The issue of the social justice within the agency internally supportive for the race, class and gender level conflicts. The agency has a invisible domination of white norms. The unfair institutional arrangement also causes imbalances in the employees which can lead to conflict. The family experience a situation filled with pain anger, hopelessness and desperation, in addition to a sense of connection, safety and relief. Community Perspective. “Community, in the human context, refers to a group of people that share things in common and have mutual vested interests” http://comres.pbworks.com/Community-Perspective#BackgroundandRationale community perspective view the society in a broader sense. The social capital and all other resources in the community is used for the mutual and equal development. The community perspective is much more linked with the concept of development. World level projects and supportive programs are carried out in the entire world for the development of the entire people. In the Community perspective the interaction and interconnection between the members of the society is much more solid and stronger. The issue of inequality such as racial and class discrimination is a major problem in the occurred in a health agency organization. The organization has not created a healthy platform for a open discussion of the racial and class level discrimination. The employees were not in a position to work freely. The racial names were called to employees that lead to the humiliation of the employees. The existing norms on racial and class equality were supportive to the whites. As a solution to it various places can be arranged for open discussions. The legislative body of the organization must be reformed and anti harassing and anti discriminations laws must be formed. The organization must create a quality circle. The intolerable working condition due to the racist name calling and threatening atmosphere must be changed. The root cause of the social issue is the flop of the legislative body. The legislation itself can create racial discrimination. The need assessment of the clients should be taken. In the need assessment the need of the each employees should be collected individually and make sure that each individuals need is satisfied. The social workers should be collectively work together and should start a forum for the employees. The objective of the employees is to create a space for the employees to address their problems. Role of social worker The social worker has to assess the systems in the organization in order to evaluate the interrelationship between various subsystems such as the relationship between the administrators and staff, the relationship between the staff, the cooperation among the employees and various projects, strategies and its implementation. Then the social worker has to understand effect of the structure on the social change. This perspective shows that the marginalization of the people happens as a result of the poor social structure or the sudden social structural change. If a social worker wants to practice the social work in the community he has to understand the community organization of the people. Conclusion . This paper is a presentation of theoretical practice of social work presenting a case study of Badwall and Rossiter and it is being analyzed in different perspectives such as individual perspective, system perspective, structural perspective and community perspective. Individual perspective presents the strength of the characters in the case study and the core of the conflict outlined in the case study. There are various systems in the organization which are interlinked together. The coherence of these factors helps the organization to bring good result. Read More