Transcending humanitarian crises a call for transformative social work education

ABSTRACT

We are witnessing how humanitarian crises inflict unimaginable human misery. In the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, social workers were called upon as first responders who functioned interdependently with other humanitarian actors operating within social institutions and local or national government units. This article also draws from the self-examination of academic researchers from Poland, Romania and Germany at the early stages of the pandemic as they optimized the process of interviewing frontline social workers. While focusing attention on strengths as well as shortcomings, frontline social workers were made to compensate for their institutions while responding to unprecedented expectations from various sectors of society. Significant insights were gleaned from testimonial evidence contributed by interviewed frontline social workers which were subsequently used in further reflective discussions. Their critical experiences lent legitimacy to the urgent call for social work education to consider as fundamental, the preparation of professionals in humanitarian work. This reinforced the awareness of the academic researchers that social work education as a transformative project could address the causalities of humanitarian crises and contribute to the mitigation of their impact.

KEYWORDS:

• Humanitarian crisis
• COVID-19
• social work
• agency in social work
• risk in social work

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Polish Federation of Social Workers and Social Service Employees Unions.

Notes on contributors

Marcin Boryczko

Marcin Boryczko is a Social Science Faculty at the University of Gdańsk, Gdańsk, Poland.

Melinda Madew

Madew Melinda is a Professor in International Social Work at Protestant University of Applied Sciences Ludwigsburg, Ludwigsburg, Germany.

Daniela Gaba

Daniela Gaba is Faculty of Sociology and Social Work, Social Work Department, University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania.