Ethical dilemmas of Israeli social workers

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to ascertain how Israeli social workers make ethical decisions. Areas studied included types of ethical dilemmas encountered by social workers, the decisions they made, their education and training in ethics, knowledge and use of the Israel Association's code of ethics, the systems that support staff decision-making in ethical dilemmas and demographic characteristics. One of the anticipated outcomes was the need to educate future social workers to identify and resolve ethical dilemmas. Literature reviewA code of ethics is one of the major attributes of a profession. It is a central component of professional status that includes a systematic body of theory, professional authority, community sanction, service to society and a professional culture (Greenwood, 1957). This article attempts to contribute to the professional knowledge of social work by ascertaining how social workers make ethical decisions and the role of the code of ethics in professional practice.Although Linzer (1999) and Congress (1999) offer models of ethical decision-making, no surveys have explored how social workers

Social Work Values, Welfare Reform, and Immigrant Citizenship Conflicts

“…The importance of values in social work is indisputable, for values represent a fundamental working element in social work practice and ethics (Bartlett, 1958;Gordon, 1965;Linzer, 1999;Loewenberg & Dolgoff, 1992). Social work values embody social workers' preferred views of people, what they prefer for people, and how they work with people (Levy, 1973).…”

“…Should the social worker validate Mr. C's wish not to become an American citizen, or should the social worker persuade him otherwise? Linzer (1992Linzer ( , 1999 has demonstrated that Levy's values classification model (discussed below) is indicated for analyzing social work values, as well as the values of each party to a conflict. Levy's (1973) model begins at the most abstract level (i.e., preferred conceptions of people), and develops toward defining more concrete preferences (i.e., outcomes and instrumentalities for working with people).…”

“…Levy (1973) contends that social workers ought to share common conceptions of people. Among these conceptions are the inherent goodness of clients, their dignity, and their capacity for change (Linzer, 1999). Social workers' preferred conceptions lead them to prefer certain outcomes for their clients, including self-actualization, attainment of social relationships, and fulfillment of basic needs (National Association of Social Workers, 1996).…”

“…In order to systematize and analyze ethical dilemmas, social workers must use the literature on social work values and ethics to compliment the Code of Ethics. Social workers may choose from many guides and models (See, Abramson, 1985;Beauchamp & Childress, 1994;Congress, 1999;Linzer, 1999;Mattison, 2000;Reamer, 1990). This author recommends that practitioners become acquainted with theories of ethics, choose appropriate models for guiding ethical decisions, and develop insight into how they respond to values conflicts in their daily practice (Mattison, 2000).…”

Ethically Difficult Situations Related to Organizational Conditions

“…Research findings (Lonne et al, 2004) have shown that emerging ethical issues affecting practice reported by managers and practitioners in public and non-profit agencies included changed accountabilities away from service users toward employing organizations and funders as well as the negative impact of resource constraints on quality service delivery. According to Linzer et al (2003) the main ethical dilemmas that social workers encountered were related to: confidentiality; their duty to warn about and prevent harm; number of client contacts; competence of practitioner; informed consent; 2 truth telling or not when it might cause harm to the client. Musil et al (2004) in a review of relevant literature came to the conclusion that social work service workers follow two kinds of patterns of dealing with dilemmas.…”