Social work competence in disaster management: an integrative review

ABSTRACT

This integrative review provides an overview of the core competencies (i.e. knowledge, values and skills) of social workers in each phase of disaster management (i.e. mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery), using the core competency framework for social work practice. A total of 183 items, including 77 journal articles, 97 book chapters, 8 editorials and 1 dissertation, were retrieved from seven academic databases and their content analysed. This paper shows that reflective practice is an important resource for social work training and provides evidence of social work competencies in disaster management. In addition to supporting disaster response and recovery, social work can contribute significantly to disaster mitigation and preparedness. This paper identifies three important competencies for social work practice in disaster contexts: community resilience building, localisation and environmental sustainability.

ABSTRAKT

本研究基于社会工作实务的核心能力框架，运用整合性文献综述方法，概述了社会工作者在灾害治理的不同阶段 (即减灾、备灾、救灾与重建阶段) 的核心能力 (即知识、价值与技能)。本研究从七个相关的学术数据库中检索并分析了183篇文献，其中包含期刊论文77篇、图书章节97章、社论8篇、学位论文1篇。本文认为，反思性实践是社会工作培训的重要资源，并且是确立社会工作灾害治理能力框架的有力支撑。除了支持救灾和重建，社会工作还可以在减灾和备灾方面做出重大贡献。本研究明确了灾害背景下社会工作实践的三个重要的核心能力，这三种能力与以下方面密切相关：社区复原力建设、本±化灾害治理、以及环境可持续发展。

KEYWORDS:

• Social work
• core competencies
• disaster management
• integrative review

关键词:

• 社会工作
• 核心能力
• 灾害治理
• 整合性文献综述

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Ms. Lydia Ngai, Faculty Librarian (Health & Social Sciences) of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Pao Yue-Kong Library, for her insightful advice and guidance on the search strategy development.

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

The study was funded by General Research Fund from Research Grants Council, University Grants Committee in Hong Kong (RGC Ref No. 15604418).

Notes on contributors

Timothy Sim

Timothy Sim Associate Professor, S R Nathan School of Human Development, Singapore University of Social Sciences, Disaster management specialist, Social work, psychological counselling, and family therapy specialist, Honorary Principal of Wenchuan Yingxiu Primary School, 2010 Best Publication Silver Award of the Journal by Annals of Academy of Medicine Singapore, 2013 Annual Prize (Best article of 2013) of the International Social Work, 2014 Departmental Best Teaching Award by the Department of Applied Social Sciences

Minying He

Minying He Research Assistant, Department of Applied Social Sciences, MSc in Knowledge Management, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Research interests: professionalism, occupational training, knowledge management, resilience and social work, Research experience: over three years of research in social sciences and experienced in mixed-method research