On toleration in social work

ABSTRACT

Toleration is one of many responses towards diversity and difference. With the growing diversity, the theme of toleration has often taken centre stage in discussions of multiculturalism and social pluralism. Nonetheless, it has not received much attention in the social work profession. Social workers often encounter situations in which they face a choice between tolerating and not tolerating. We argue that toleration is a legitimate and relevant topic in social work discourse. To make this point, first, this paper discusses different conceptions of toleration. Then, it demonstrates its relevance to social work and explores a potential benefit of including the idea of toleration in social work discourse. Social work codes of ethics implicitly support toleration, or at least respect-toleration and esteem-toleration. Incorporating toleration in social work discourse may help social workers to better cope with or reduce ethical stress and disjuncture.

ABSTRAKT

Die Idee der Toleranz spielt oft eine zentrale Rolle in Diskussionen über Multikulturalismus, gesellschaftlichen Pluralismus, und der Suche nach angemessenen Antworten auf Diversität und Differenz. Das Thema der Toleranz hat jedoch wenig Aufmerksamkeit im Sozialarbeitsdiskurs gefunden. Demgegenüber argumentieren wir, dass Toleranz ein legitimes und relevantes Thema für diesen Diskurs ist. Wir unterscheiden mehrere Toleranzkonzeptionen, beleuchten die Relevanz von Toleranz in der Sozialarbeit, und weisen Vorteile auf die eine Integration des Toleranzthemas im Sozialarbeitsdiskurs haben kann. Berufsrelevante Ethikkodexe geben bereits wenigstens implizit Toleranz, oder zumindest Respekt-Toleranz und Schätzungs-Toleranz, einen wichtigen Stellenwert; zugleich kann die Toleranzidee Sozialarbeitern helfen, ethischen Stress oder verwandte Disjunktionen zu überwinden, zu reduzieren, oder zu vermeiden.

KEYWORDS:

• Toleration
• tolerance
• social work
• code of ethics
• diversity

SCHLÜSSELWÖRTER:

• Toleranz
• Sozialarbeit
• Ethikkodex
• Diversität

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Thomas M. Besch is Luojia Professor of Philosophy at Wuhan University, China. He works mainly in the area of contemporary moral and political philosophy. His recent work focuses on ideas of public justification, liberal justice, and discursive respect.

Jung-Sook Lee is a senior lecturer in social work at UNSW Australia. The focus of her research is the wellbeing of vulnerable children and their families. Specific topics include education of children in out of home care, long-term outcomes of care leavers, intergenerational social mobility, social and cultural capital, and social justice.

Notes

1 One intriguing question that can be raised here is whether it is possible to disagree and interfere with something and nevertheless be tolerant of it. This is a complex question. Insofar as all toleration involves the presence of an objection component, all toleration involves some degree of disagreement or disapproval, widely conceived. But where we are tolerant of something, we also see reasons to agree with or approve of our intended object of toleration, or to let it be, and we regard these reasons as trumping. This suggests that if we do interfere with something, we do not tolerate it–after all, if we knowingly and willingly interfere with it, we do not treat as trumping whatever reasons we might have, if any, to let it be. However, the situation is often more complex than this. Social workers operate under multiple, and not necessarily fully homogenous values, norms, and standards. Some of these values, norms, or standards, can call for toleration where others require interference. For instance, social workers might face situations in which they are morally committed to tolerate what they are legally required to interfere with. Or they might have no choice but to tolerate when interference seems to be desirable in light of other values social workers adopt. Such situations can raise difficult questions about the commitments and priorities of social workers, and the challenge to integrate their professional responsibilities and obligations with their personal beliefs and convictions. We shall touch on this below when we address the matter of ethical stress. We thank an anonymous reviewer for drawing our attention to this question.