Social Work and Empowerment

Abstract

Social work is at an important stage in its development. All professions must be responsive to changing social and economic conditions if they are to meet the needs of those they serve. This series focuses on sound practice and the specific contributions which social workers can make to the well-being of our society. The British Association of Social Workers has always been conscious of its role in setting guidelines for practice and in seeking to raise professional standards. The conception of the Practical Social Work series arose from a survey of BASW members to discover where they, the practitioners in social work, felt there was the most need for new literature. The response was overwhelming and enthusiastic, and the result is a carefully planned, coherent series of books. The emphasis is firmly on practice set in a theoretical framework. The books will inform, stimulate and promote discussion, thus adding to the further development of skills and high professional standards. All the authors are practitioners and teachers of social work representing a wide variety of experience.

Sustainability of Non-Governmental Organisations During Climates of Reduced Funding: A Case Study of the Johannesburg Jewish Helping Hand Society

“…Support groups were one of the ways through which clients became empowered, as they were afforded the opportunity to share their experiences and support one another. These activities appeared to be consistent with approaches to empowerment advocated by Adams (2003), who explains that empowering people involves having dialogue between people, where people do not impose their own ideas on other people.…”

Parents and professionals working together: turning the rhetoric into reality

“…Several authors (Giddens, 1991;Adams, 1996;Pease, 2002) note an emphasis on empowerment as a process of helping people gain control over their own lives. For example, Adams (1996) de®nes it as`the means by which individuals, groups and/or communities become able to take control of their circumstances and achieve their goals' (Adams, 1996, p. 5). In that sense, then, the parents were providing clear evidence of this through their words.…”

Voices from the margins: inserting the social in mental health discourse

“…These issues have tended to be taken up in a somewhat separate literature which has focussed on analyses of power relations between service users and professionals---empowerment through user participation (Beresford & Croft, 1993), partnership (Marsh & Fisher, 1992;Braye & Preston-Shoot, 1993), and through self-help and user-run groups and services (Mullender & Ward, 1991;Adams, 1996). Within this literature there is an underlying tension between a 'radical' discourse, in which the service user-professional relationship is placed within a wider context of other structural inequalities (such as race, gender, class), and a 'liberal' discourse, in which society is seen as essentially unproblematic, and all that is required is for marginalised service users to take up their rights as equal citizens (see Taylor, 1989;Webb, 1994).…”