Exploring a New Direction for Social Work Education and Training in Nigeria

Abstract

American and British models of professional social work that have been exported to Africa have been critiqued as unable to address the unique issues and cultural characteristics of the majority of Africans. Such critiques have increased as the social work profession in the Western world has failed to come up with answers to many of its own most vexing social problems. African social work educators are therefore questioning the borrowing of such ‘problematic’ Western social work knowledge. This paper critically reviews the challenges for social work education and training in Nigeria of this Western‐influenced social work legacy that is largely remedial in nature and underpinned by the charity and casework model that locates problems within individuals and their families. Building on recent scholarship, personal experiences of schooling and working in Africa and the West, as well as experiences from collaborating on a project with colleagues in a social work program in a Nigerian university, three issues are put forth that could guide an exploration of a new direction for social work education in Nigeria.

Keywords:

• Social Work in Nigeria
• Remedial Social Work Model
• Social Development Model
• Indigenous Knowledge
• Indigenization
• Internationalization

Notes

1. The term Western refers to countries with advanced industrial development, for instance, the G7. However, very often in social work literature, developed countries is used interchangeably with the West or Western countries or the North. Very often these terms are loosely defined. Since it is not the intention of this paper to define these terms, I will use them interchangeably to signify a group of Anglophonic industrial countries.

2. Some people use third world or the South to describe countries that are economically underdeveloped. In this paper, for consistency, developing is used to signify the process of development.