Nilan G. Yu

How good is good enough? Exploring social workers’ conceptions of preparedness for practice

Abstract This study examined the question: ‘How do social work practitioners construct preparedness for practice?’ The answer to this question was explored through a research conducted in 2013 consisting of a survey based on the Australian Association of Social Workers’ Practice Standards and interviews with social work practitioners who had experience working with graduating social work students in their final field education placements. The responses of 25 survey participants suggest that social work practitioners generally expect new graduates to have ‘moderate’-level skills across the different practice areas, although a small but notable number of supervisors expect new graduates to have general work preparedness at a ‘developed’ level. In addition to having a clear understanding of and identification with professional values, purpose and ethics, the eight interview participants spoke of the importance of empathy and the ability to work within a multidisciplinary organisational environment.

Devolution: Discontinuity and dissonance

This article examines the devolution of social welfare services in the Philippines, focusing on its ideological underpinnings and implications for social welfare. It argues that the devolution resulted in a policy environment that allows for varying levels of social support across municipalities and, consequently, the fragmentation of Filipino citizenship.

The role of social work in Philippine poverty-reduction programs: ideology, policy, and the profession

This article examines the role of social work in three poverty-reduction programs in the Philippines. The examination centers on the values and principles underpinning the work undertaken and their relation to particular conceptions of social work. It is argued that the role played by social work in these programs reflects the dominant ideology in Philippine social policy. The perceived legitimacy of approaches is linked to the extent to which they embody mainstream conceptions of social problems and social work, characterized by intensive worker–client engagement with the aim of effecting changes in individuals and their immediate environment.

Class Identity, Class Interests: The Philippine Professional Association of Social Workers' Record under Martial Law

This article analyzes the underlying dynamics that shaped the response of the Philippine professional association of social workers to martial law and the human-rights abuses that accompanied it. It advances the notion of social work as a class to account for the seemingly inexplicable position taken by the professional association in relation to the Marcos dictatorship.

Interrogating social work: Australian Social Work and the Stolen Generations

Summary In the context of Australian social work’s “past complicity” in the disadvantaging of Indigenous Australians, this study examined what was said in the journal of the Australian Association of Social Workers about the taking of Indigenous children and the challenges confronting Indigenous Australians during the last two decades of the policies and practices that created what has since been known as the Stolen Generations. A content analysis was undertaken of 23 years of articles in the journal Australian Social Work between 1948 and 1970, the period roughly representing the first two decades of the journal’s publication and the last two decades of what was by then a time-honored practice that shaped the lives of thousands of Indigenous children and their families. Findings The study found that very little was said in the journal about the practice in question. Of the 331 articles in the journal within the period, only one article expressly touched on the care of Indigenous children beyond their biological family and community and only one article advanced a critique of the taking of Indigenous children. A landmark change in the constitution affecting all Indigenous Australians came and went without mention. Thus, some of the most important issues affecting the welfare and rights of Indigenous Australians were largely ignored in the professional journal. Applications It is argued that the findings in this study can inform a critical understanding of contemporary social work in different parts of the world.

Who owns the case record? Client access to case records in Canadian social work practice

This study looked into client access to their case records routinely maintained by social workers in the course of professional practice. An online survey and semi-structured interviews were undertaken with Canadian social workers. The study found that while the majority of the participants indicated that they granted clients access to their case records, clients were not effectively granted such access in practice. Client access to their case records is a core issue in social work, and social workers need to proactively grant such access if they are to live by the core values of social work.

Client access to case records in Australian social work

This study looked into client access to records – generally referred to as ‘case records’ – pertaining to themselves that social workers routinely maintain in the course of professional practice. An online survey and semi-structured interviews were undertaken with Australian social workers. The study found that while the majority of the participants indicated that they granted their clients access to their case records, this was not necessarily reflected in practice. It is argued that social workers would need to proactively enable client access to their case records if they are to abide by the spirit and intent of the principles they espouse.

Policy, plans and pathways: the ‘crisis’ transition to post-parental care for people ageing with intellectual disabilities in rural Australian carescapes

ABSTRACT The concurrent ageing of parental care-givers and people with intellectual disabilities is driving academic and social welfare concern for a post-parental care ‘crisis’. The ‘crisis’ typically pertains to a transition from primary care in the family home precipitated by the death or incapacity of older parents without a pre-planned pathway to post-parental care. This crisis is amplified in rural communities given low service engagement with families and a deficit of disability-supported accommodation and services. Academics, service providers and policy makers have responded through a problematisation of post-parental care planning. This focus continues to normalise informal care, burdens families with responsibility for planning, and diverts attention from structural deficits in the socio-political carescape. This paper attends to the Australian policy landscape in which long-term care-giving for families living with intellectual disability is enmeshed. It contends that the dyadic and didactic model of informal long-term care has profound implications for social service support and post-parental care planning. Problematisation of carers’ ‘need’ to relinquish primary care and for people with intellectual disabilities to transition to independent and supported living is necessary to unsettle the dominant policy and service discourse around the provision of services to sustain informal care-giving. Innovation is then needed to forge pathways of support for families in rural communities planning on continuing, transitioning and transforming care arrangements across the lifespan.

Social Work in Philippine Municipalities: A Critical Organizational Study

This article examines the organizational context of social workers in Philippine municipal governments. Recognizing the influence of the organizational context on social work practice, the article analyzes the distribution of power in Philippine municipal bureaucracies and the extent of influence municipal mayors have over the administration of local social welfare programs and services and the social workers who manage them. The analysis explores how workers manage to thrive in the face of the highly unequal relationship they have with their superiors and considers the implications for social work practice.