Social services
A social worker is a person employed in the administration of charity, social service, welfare, and poverty agencies, or religious outreach programs. Social workers may also work with community health agencies. In developed countries a large number of social workers are employed by the government. Other social workers work as psychotherapists, performing individual counselling, frequently working in coordination with psychiatrists, psychologists, or other physicians.
A social worker practicing in the United States usually requires a Master's degree (MSW) or a Bachelor's degree (welfare programs
- Food bank programs
- Needle exchanges, and drug addiction
- Support for homeless people, in the form of homeless shelters, medical support, counseling
- Family crisis intervention
- Child abuse
- Adoptions
- Battered women's shelters
- Helping the poor organize for better conditions - both economically (food banks, buying clubs) and politically - voting blocks during election campaigns, running candidates, organizing demonstrations
- Providing assistance to work through government red tape, including other social work agencies
- Tenants' rights
- Workers' compensation for on-the-job injuries (there are usually additional social workers whose jobs focus specifically on dealing with the beaucracy of workers' compensation problems)
- Refugee assistance (refugee camps, relocation, political asylum help)
- AIDS awareness
- Birth control and family planning
- Program evaluation to determine if various programs are providing services as they should, or how a program may be improved.
- Administration and coordination of services for disabled infants, children, and adults
The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) is the largest organization of professional social workers in the United States.
The difference between social work and social activism is sometimes impossible to differentiate. Similary the difference between government beaucracy and social work is sometimes impossible to differentiate.
Certain types of social workers are more likely to suffer criticism than most other workers because they often work in scenarios which are highly emotionally charged. Examples include:
- taking a child away from parents who are regarded as unfit (this is even more controversial when it involves religious beliefs)
- failure to remove children from parents who subsequently hurt or kill them
- organizing demonstrations that turn into riots
- supporting activities that are highly controversial - abortion, needle exchanges
Criticisms
Criticism often centers around social workers acting unprofessionally. This would include methodological errors, bias with or against those whom they work with, failure to perform their jobs, or even witch hunts.
Social Workers would respond that often problems with social workers can be traced to poor pay, inadequate training, excessive case loads, inadequate funding, and bad government policies. The reason social workers are singled out is because they are the ones who directly face and deal with the public.
Criticisms range from methodological errors to human rights abuses.
When social workers do not remove children from homes in which children are abused by their parents, there is often public outcry about child welfare agencies not doing their job.
Examples of Documented Abuses and Highly Controversial Behaviour
- Child welfare agency successfully sued. "Ontario Court of Appeal unequivocally found the Durham Children's Aid Society [Ontario, Canada] and its social workers guilty of the grossest negligence, gross incompetence and malicious prosecution."
Also, there have been several scandals involving false testimony about alleged child sexual abuse. In these cases, often referred to as modern witchhunts, it is generally acknowledged that some social workers, not sufficiently trained and often overzealous, created false memories through suggestive questioning. Internationally, many courts are now rejecting this type of testimony.
