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ABSTRACT
Bureaucratic settings pose particularly daunting problems for social workers trying to flourish as professionals, among others because the practice circumstances can be adverse. Flourishing in an Aristotelian sense requires that social workers act with skill to fulfil the goals of responsiveness (honesty and openness), fairness (justice) and compassion towards clients, as well as efficiency for the bureaucracy. Responding to the ethnographic work of Bernardo Zacka, we will outline the particular kinds of tensions these goals pose for social workers in bureaucratic settings and then will provide some proposals for mitigating these tensions. We disagree with Zacka that virtues are largely irrelevant to social workers trying to respond ethically to bureaucratic demands, but rather will propose that his ‘mechanisms of the self’ and others that we have developed in our work with students and practitioners, can strengthen social work virtues, enable social workers to flourish and foster a critical examination of one's organisation.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 We recognize that gender is not binary, but because there is no agreed upon pronoun, we will use the female throughout the paper.
2 Aristotle acknowledges that there are individual goods subordinate to happiness (for example, the good of medicine is health) but believes these are goods only if they accord with practical reason and virtue (Aristotle 1097a 19–27; 1097b 1–7).
3 This is why we do not follow the concept of subjective well-being (SWB) by Diener (Citation1984), which is, however, a concept widely used in research about social workers’ well-being.
4 Social justice is an essentially contested concept and we do not live in the sort of homogeneous community of free citizens, which excluded slaves and women, that Aristotle had in mind. Considerations of justice are complex. We assume the IFSW statement of ethical principles understanding of social justice including equality for all, non-discrimination based on any difference marker, e.g. race, class, religion or sexual preference (Citation2018).
5 Forcing another person, even in the name of their own good, is problematic since it violates the principle of honouring the capacity for autonomous decision making (IFSW Citation2018).
6 We do not think that a person's life can be compartmentalized and that virtues can be developed in one area of one's life, but will be lacking or non-existent in another. So, when we speak of social work virtues, we do not mean to imply that honesty in social work is of a different nature than honesty shown as a family member or friend. We agree with Annas (Citation2011) that virtues are cultivated as a whole and will be enacted situation-sensitive in different life contexts. We will not, however, further explore this issue here.
7 We add courage to those Zacka mentions, as it is central to confronting bureaucratic obstacles.
8 Virtue: a committed disposition to act in a certain way for certain reasons; in social work being committed to act upon social work values and principles, because one understands this is the best way to work towards the key professional goals, i.e. social justice and to further client autonomy.
9 Obstacles are further to be found in the fact that the nature of the work can be full of hardships that clients deal with. It poses difficult ethical problems to social workers, which they need to try to solve; finding the right path in working with clients can be difficult even under ideal practice circumstances (Banks Citation2016).
10 Zacka Citation2017, particularly chapter 2, 99–110.
11 See Flanagan (Citation1993) for more examples.
12 Justice as a virtue, central to Plato and Aristotle, suggests the importance of a just community to ethics. Hadot also views political activity as part of a lived ethic. For an example, see Hadot (Citation2011, 172).
13 The Stoic philosophers, in particular, stressed virtue theory as philosophy in practice. For a summary, see Hadot (Citation2004). And Aristotle stated: ‘the end is not knowing things but doing them’ (Citation2011, 1095a 5–6; ‘for the way we learn the things we should do, knowing how to do them, is by doing them’ (ibid., 1103a 33–34) and further on this: 1103b15–20; 1105b12–18.
14 This comes through in most chapters of the book, but see in particular Chapter 1.
15 We make this claim based on numerous factors: studies as undertaken for example by Bozek, Raeymaeckers, and Spooren (Citation2017) and Campanini and Facchini (Citation2013); our experiences with students; taking account of the continued self-organising and networking by practitioners and social work students, e.g. in Germany Arbeitskreis Kritische Soziale Arbeit; in Britain Social Work Action Network and finally, by following the debate during the last Global Conference of the IFSW in July 2020.
16 Zacka calls these gymnastics of the self.
17 There is a long history in philosophy of the importance of dialogue to questioning our beliefs. It connects also to Zacka's emphasis on the importance of encouraging diversity in human service organizations as a mechanism of the self.
18 Social work students referred to an informal support network they initiated during their practice placements to have room for exchange as ‘beer supervision’ (Wheeler Citation2017, 186).
19 ‘Free Ethics Consultations for NASW Members’. https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics/Ethics-Education-and-Resources/Ethics-Consultations
20 We have focused on the grinding, daily demands social workers face and the toll they can take. In addition, social workers may face catastrophes that result in rapid, disorienting changes in a bureaucracy. If social workers face a catastrophic event such as the pandemic, then there is a sense in which they do not flourish, no matter how appropriate their response, except in the sense of knowing that they are helping their society cope and heal from disaster. This sort of very unusual circumstance is deserving of a paper in itself.
21 Organizations can differ in their openness to criticism. However, the time and financial constraints, combined with the hierarchical organization in many social work organizations can result in workers being reluctant to voice doubts or criticism. That has been our experience and that of many in social services. See Fabricant and Burkhardt (Citation1992), Chapters 3 and 4).
22 This format and these questions connect to Rhodes (Citation1991).
23 Connects to Zacka (Citation2017).
24 Connects to Zacka (Citation2017), 73–74/ 148–149.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Heidrun Wulfekühler
Heidrun Wulfekühler is Professor for Ethics in Social Work at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts at the Faculty of Diaconic Studies, Health Care and Social Work. Her teaching and research interests include virtue ethics in social work, ethics of migration, international social work and the didactics of ethics.
Margaret L. Rhodes
Margaret L. Rhodes was an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the College of Public and Community Service, University of Massachusetts/Boston, where she taught courses on social work ethics and philosophy at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Her publications include her book on ethics, Ethical Dilemmas in Social Work Practice, as well as a number of published papers exploring the links between clinical and ethical issues in social work.