Ethical dilemmas in policy practice: a Conceptual Framework

ABSTRACT

Policy practice refers to the engagement of social workers in policy processes as part of their job. Over the last decades the discourse on policy practice has expanded significantly. However, missing still is a comprehensive and systematic discussion focused on the ethical dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in policy practice. The aim of this article is to offer a novel conceptual framework that identifies and categorises the diverse potential ethical dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in policy practice. The framework draws upon the general conceptual and empirical literature on ethical issues within social work, the more specific macro practice literature which discusses ethical dilemmas, and our experience as teachers who have instructed social workers and social work students in policy practice. It combines two axes: the first axis relates to three prevalent types of ethical conflicts common both in direct and macro social work practice and the second relates schematically to three explicit or implicit decisions that social workers are required to take either prior to, or during, their engagement in policy process. The interactions between these two axes create 19 policy practice ethical dilemmas that are presented in the article.

תַקצִיר

למרות הגידול המרשים בשיח על אודות ההיבטים הנורמטיביים, ההכשרתיים והמחקריים של פרקטיקת מדיניות בעבודה סוציאלית בשנים האחרונות, הידע הקיים הנוגע לדילמות אתיות שעובדות ועובדים סוציאליים העוסקים בשינוי מדיניות ניצבים בפניהן הוא מועט. מטרתו של מאמר זה הוא להציג מסגרת מושגית המאפשרת לזהות ולסווג דילמות אתיות פוטנציאליות המתעוררות כאשר עובדות ועובדים סוציאליים מבקשים לעסוק בפרקטית מדיניות במסגרת מקום עבודתם. מסגרת מושגית זו נשענת על השיח והמחקר הקיים בנושא של סוגיות אתיות בפרקטיקה של העבודה הסוציאלית בכלל, על הדיון הממוקד בספרות העוסקת בנושאים אתים הקשורים בהיבטי מקרו בעבודה סוציאלית, ועל הניסיון שצברו המציגים בהוראת הנושא של השתתפות בעיצוב מדיניות לסטודנטים לעבודה סוציאלית ולעובדות ועובדים סוציאליים העוסקים בפועל בפרקטיקת מדיניות. המסגרת המושגית המוצעות בנויה משני צירים. הציר הראשון מתייחס לשלושה סוגים של קונפליקט אתי הקיימים בפרקטיקה בעבודה סוציאלית. הציר השני מתייחס לשלושה סוגים של החלטות שעובדים סוציאליים נדרשים לקבל כאשר הם מעורבים בפרקטיקת מדיניות: האם להיכנס למעורבות בפרקטיקת מדיניות? איזה תוכן מדיניות לקדם? וכיצד לפעול? הממשק שבין שני הצירים מאפשר לזהות 19 דילמות אתיות בפרקטיקת מדיניות בעבודה סוציאלית, המוצגים במאמר.

KEYWORDS:

• Policy practice
• social workers
• social policy
• ethical dilemmas
• macro practice

מילות מפתח:

• פרקטיקת
• פרקטיקת מדיניות
• עובדים סוציאליים
• מדיניות חברתית
• דילמות אתיות
• פרקטיקה ברמה המקרו

Policy practice is one of the routes through which social workers seek to influence social policies (Weiss-Gal, 2017). It refers to one-off or ongoing professional activities undertaken by social workers as an integral part of their job, on their own initiative or that of others, which seek to further changes in existing social policies, to prevent undesirable changes in them, or to impact the formulation of new policies. The aim of these activities is to contribute to the development of social policies on the organisational, local, regional or national levels which enhance service users’ wellbeing, secure their human rights, and better deal with the social problems confronted by them (Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2023a). This practice is undertaken by direct and community social workers who incorporate policy change activities into their practice (Aviv, Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2021; Lavee et al., 2018). Over the last decades, policy practice has generated growing interest in the professional discourse (Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2023b; De Corte & Roose, 2020; Pawar & Nixon, 2021; Saxena & Chandrapal, 2022).

Scholars concur that social workers are required to make ethical decisions on all levels of social work practice, from casework to social action (Loewenberg et al., 2000). Yet, national or international social work codes of ethics fail to relate explicitly to the ethical dilemmas encountered by social workers engaging in policy practice (Hardina, 2004; Hoefer, 2019). Similarly, the conceptual discourse on ethical issues in social work practice (Banks, 2021; Banks & Nohr, 2012; Clark, 2000; Clifford, 2012; Linzer, 1999; Loewenberg et al., 2000) offers only limited insights into this issue. Although this discourse relates to diverse ethical dilemmas that stem from polices or politics, the discussion is devoted primarily to situations in which social workers are required to implement unjust or insufficient organisational, local or national policies or those that run counter to their values and professional principles, to dilemmas that arise when social workers need to decide how to allocate scare resources or to ethical dilemmas associated with whistleblowing. Dilemmas pertaining to engagement in policy formulation are not a major focus.

The same is the case for the literature on ethical dilemmas relating to macro practice or community social work (Hardina, 2004; Haynes & Mickelson, 2009; Hill & Ferguson, 2014; Hoefer, 2019; Reamer, 2018; Reisch & Lowe, 2000). Though it offers useful insights into the values that underpin policy engagement and sheds light on dilemmas associated with policy implementation, the administration of social services (pertaining primarily to the allocation of limited resources), the use of digital media and social workers’ involvement in electoral campaign or case advocacy, it lacks a clear conceptualisation of ethical dilemmas related to policy practice.

Finally, dilemmas that social workers confront while engaging in policy are also absent in empirical research. While recent research on ethical dilemmas among social workers in different countries (Banks et al., 2020; Chatzifotiou & Papoul, 2022; Jönsson, 2019; Viscarret et al., 2022; Weinberg & Banks, 2019; Ylvisaker & Rugkåsa, 2022) relates to the implementation of existing policy and the administration of welfare programmes, it has little to say about social workers’ policy practice engagement.

Given the emerging interest in policy practice within social work, a comprehensive and systematic discussion on ethical dilemmas associated with this type of practice is clearly called for (Witt & Levin, 2021). This is particularly the case given that the policy process is a political arena in which ethical dilemmas inevitably arise. Within this arena, power relationships are central and social workers are often required to make difficult decisions pertaining to policy goals and strategies in a political process that determines the distribution of material and recognition resources, such as benefits, rights, power, status, and opportunities (Balaz, 2020).

The aim of this article is to address the lacuna in the literature by constructing a novel conceptual framework which identifies and categorises the diverse potential ethical dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in policy practice.

Policy practice: its importance and strategies

Policy practice is a crucial practice within social work (Jansson, 2018). It provides social worker with the means to operationalise the profession’s social justice mission and its core person-in-environment approach. Engagement in policy enables social workers to fulfil their ethical obligation and professional responsibilities to affect wider social systems and not only to concentrate on helping individuals, families or communities to adapt to them (De Corte & Roose, 2020; Jansson, 2018; Klammer et al., 2021). In other words, by engaging in policy change social workers can ‘not merely accept budgets as they are enacted by state and federal legislatures and then participate in debates about how to divide up the remaining budgetary pie … but [to] try to enlarge the pie’ (Reamer, 2018, p. 187). Finally, by promoting policies which increase equality, social rights, and inclusion and combating discrimination and other forms of social injustice, social workers do not only benefit their service users directly but also prevent social problems and distress for wider populations.

Social work ethical codes in different countries underscore the obligation to affect policy as part of the professional conduct of social workers (e.g. BASW, 2021; NASW, 2019). Similarly, the global social work statement of ethical principles (IFSW, 2018) emphasises that social workers should bring to the attention of their employers, policymakers, politicians and the general public, situations in which policies and resources are inadequate or where policies and practices are oppressive, unfair or harmful.

Research indicates that social workers in different countries do indeed engage in varied policy practice activities as part of their job (Aviv et al., 2021; Gilboa & Weiss-Gal, 2022; Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2023b; Lavee & Cohen, 2019; Levin et al., 2013; Zhang et al., 2021). They adopt a wide range of strategies: agenda setting, social action, legislative advocacy and using the media. Agenda-setting activities include bringing needs, social problems or policy limitations to colleagues’ or managers' attention; participating in conferences that seek to place a policy problem on the public’s or policymakers’ agenda; and the research, analysis and documentation of social or policy problems. Social workers also engage in social action which typically entails the acquisition of political knowledge and sharing it with service users and other stakeholders; enhancing service users’ awareness of a policy, working with community groups to influence policy, and organising or participating in coalitions. Serving as members in committees that formulate policies and participating in legislative advocacy activities are also undertaken by social workers engaged in policy practice. As part of their legislative advocacy, social workers contact or meet with legislative staff and elected politicians, testify in parliamentary committees, and organise meetings with policymakers and between them and people affected by the problem. Finally, social workers impact policy by employing the media.

Ethical dilemmas: definition, sources, categorisation

Chatzifotiou and Papoul (2022) argue that there is a lack of clarity in the definition of ethical dilemmas in the social work literature, which makes it difficult for researchers, scholars and professionals to identify and address them. Here, we draw on existing definitions within philosophy and social work (Banks, 2021; Chatzifotiou & Papoul, 2022; Sinnott- Armstrong, 1985; Viscarret et al., 2022) that define an ethical dilemma as a situation in which the agent (the social worker) has two alternative courses of actions, needs to adopt one of them but cannot adopt both. Each alternative represents a moral requirement (i.e. a situation in which there is a moral reason to do something). A conflict emerges when the agent cannot satisfy both requirements and has to make a choice between them. The dilemma arises because no single moral requirement overrides the other (Sinnott- Armstrong, 1985). In other words, an ethical dilemma is a case in which the agent has two alternatives and each alternative represents a value that the agent is obligated to uphold. Yet, the agent cannot uphold both values and is required to make a hard choice between them.

In their exploration of ethical issues associated with community practice, Reisch and Lowe (2000) suggest that ethical dilemmas emerge for several reasons. At times, they arise when two ethical principles–for example, confidentiality and truth telling–come into conflict. Ethical dilemmas also exist when the reasons to select, or refrain from adopting, a particular course of action are unclear or there is insufficient time to make a reasoned decision about a problem. A third type of ethical dilemma arises when practitioners and their service users are compelled to choose between equally satisfactory or unsatisfactory alternatives. Finally, ethical dilemmas occasionally take the form of a conflict between ethical principles and legal or organisational obligations. All these ethical dilemmas entail a high degree of uncertainty, expenditure of resources, and personal responsibility for the decision to be made.

Scholars have sought to categorise ethical dilemmas in social work practice by employing diverse criteria, but, as Viscarret et al. (2022) note, no consensus has emerged about a general classification. In his classic classification, Reamer (1983) distinguished between three categories of moral dilemmas in social work practice. The first refers to services provided by a social worker to individuals under her professional care. The second pertains to the design and implementation of social welfare policy and programmes, and the third category relates to relationships with colleagues.

While Reamer's second category concerns the policy realm, it focusses exclusively upon ‘criteria for distributing scarce or limited resources, welfare rights, and the role of the state in the provision of social welfare’ (p.32). As such, it is limited to those dilemmas that emerge either when social workers need to decide how to implement policies and to distribute scarce resources or when they seek to adopt a principled position on the role of the state in addressing needs. For example, Reamer (2018) describes situations in which social work administrators and community organisers encounter regulations and laws that appear unjust, which leads them to face difficult decisions about their obligation to adhere to these regulations and laws. In these cases, it is due to social workers’ role as the implementers of social policy that ethical dilemmas emerge. Dilemmas that emerge when social workers are the formulators of policy are missing from this categorisation.

In this article, we expand Reamer's second category and include in it dilemmas that result from efforts by social workers whom, as part of their job, engage in policy practice in order to affect the formulation of social policy. This does not revisit social workers’ role as policy implementers or relate to their political role as engaged citizens in struggles over the role of the state. Rather, it pertains to a wide range of dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in changing policy as part of their social work practice and play an active role in order to influence the formulation of specific policies on the organisational, local or national levels.

The conceptual framework

Three sources of knowledge provide a basis for the framework for the analysis of ethical dilemmas in policy practice. The first is the broader conceptual literature and research on ethical issues within social work (Banks, 2021; Banks & Nohr, 2012; Clark, 2000; Linzer, 1999; Loewenberg et al., 2000; Reamer, 2019; Ylvisaker & Rugkåsa, 2022). The second is the macro practice literature within social work which discusses, if not extensively, ethical dilemmas evident in civic political participation (Haynes & Mickelson, 2009), community organisation (Hardina, 2006; Hill & Ferguson, 2014; Reisch & Lowe, 2000), case and social advocacy (Hoefer, 2019), and engagement in policy processes (Balaz, 2020; Feldman, 2022; Jansson, 2018; Witt & Levin, 2021). A third source is our experience as teachers who have instructed social workers and social work students on policy practice and mentored them in their policy engagement as social workers.

The conceptual framework was constructed in a number of phases (Jabareen, 2009). After mapping and categorising existing knowledge on ethical dilemmas within social work and other disciplines and then collecting data from sources within the existing literature and our interaction with professionals and students, we constructed the two axes that enabled us to identify the components of the framework. The intersect between the axes provided the conceptual building blocks of the framework. We then drew upon the data collected to identify relevant examples and employed these to create a conceptual framework that offers insights into the ethical dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in policy practice.

The framework combines two axes (see Table 1). The first of these relates to three types of conflicts, which are prevalent both in direct and macro practice (Banks, 2021; Banks & Nohr, 2012; Chatzifotiou & Papoul, 2022; Clark, 2000; Hardina, 2004; Hoefer, 2019; Linzer, 1999; Reisch & Lowe, 2000):

Table 1. Policy Practice Ethical dilemmas: The framework

	Deciding whether to engage in policy practice	Determining the content of the policy solution	Choosing policy practice strategies
Conflicts of loyalty: to service users and employing organisation or policymakers	1. Should I engage in policy practice despite the opposition of my employing organisation or policymakers?	2. How can I choose between the policies supported by my organisation and those sought by my service users or by me?	3. How ought I act if I believe that confrontational strategies are crucial to furthering policies even if this entails going against my employers?
Conflicts of loyalty: to oneself and to service users and employing organisation	4. Should I engage in policy practice if I know that it will help my service users but is likely to adversely affect my workplace position or my family and friends?	5. Should I support a policy solution if I know that it will help my service users but is likely to adversely affect my workplace position or my family and friends	6. Should I adopt a strategy to promote a policy even if it may have an adverse effect on my workplace position or my family and friends?
Conflicts of loyalty: between different groups of service users	7. Should I engage in policy practice if I know that it will help my current service users but may have a detrimental effect on others in need?	8. Should I promote policies that help my service users but I am aware that they are undesirable to other groups? 9. Should I support policies that benefit more people but may be detrimental to my service users? 10. Should I agree to policies that offer short-term or partial solutions?	11. Should I adopt a strategy to promote a policy even if it may have an adverse effect on other service users?
Conflicts between self-determination and paternalism	12. Should I engage in policy change sought by my service users although I believe that it is not in their best interest or should I change policies detrimental to my service users even if they do not support this?	13. What should I promote when I believe that a specific policy is beneficial but my service users have a different perspective?	14. Should I employ a strategy that I deem useful even if my service users disagree
Conflict between the social workers’ personal or professional values, and the values of service users, social workers’ employees or the law	15. Should I engage in policy practice in order to promote policy change that is supported by my service users or my organisation even if clashes with my personal or/and professional values?	16. Which policy should I support when my service users’ preferred policy contradicts my personal or professional values?	17. Should I adopt strategies that my services users desire but that run counter to my personal or professional values? 18. Is there justification for engaging in strategies that I believe may further policy change but entail rule-breaking? 19. Should I collaborate with policymakers seeking to promote desirable policy change if their views and actions contradict my personal or professional values?

a) Conflicts between competing loyalties. Competing loyalties may create conflicts between (Aaslund & Chear, 2020; Banks, 2021; Loewenberg et al., 2000): 1. Social workers’ commitments, responsibilities or duties to the interests of their service users and to those of their employing agencies or policymakers in the local or national environments relevant to their agencies. These conflicts will emerge when they pit against one another two of the social workers’ legitimate duties – engaging in quality social work interventions on behalf of service users through policy engagement as opposed to furthering the interests of the institutions to which they are affiliated; 2. Social workers’ loyalty to their own perceived interests and their loyalty to either their service users or their employing agency; 3. Social workers’ loyalty to the conflicting interests of service user groups or other parties.

b) Conflicts between self-determination or autonomy and paternalism. Self-determination in the context of policy practice refers to people’s right to reach their own decisions and to have freedom in making their own choices with regard to the policy they want to change, its specific features, the strategies they prefer to adopt to further their desired policy and with whom to collaborate in their policy-change activities. Social workers are expected to respect service users' agency and their right to decide about, what they believe to be, is in their best interest (Banks, 2021; Reamer, 2018).

Paternalism is the overriding of individual's wishes or actions through coercion or interference (Linzer, 1999) or undermining their liberty for their own good (Clark, 2000). Social workers may find themselves, before or during their policy engagement, in situations in which they have to decide whether it is legitimate to restrict service users’ right to self-determination in order to advance their wellbeing (Reamer, 2018). This entails going against their service users’ wishes with regard to policy solutions sought or strategies adopted in order to advance, what the social worker believes to be, the service users’ best interest.

c). Conflicts between values. These are conflicts between social workers’ personal or professional values or the law, and the values of service users or of social workers’ employers (Banks, 2021; Loewenberg et al., 2000). Although social workers are expected to adhere to the social work principle of value neutrality and to avoid imposing their own personal values on the policies they try to impact, they are still confronted with dilemmas, prior or during their policy practice, due to a conflict between their own values and those of service users or of their employers.

The second axis comprises of three explicit or implicit decisions that social workers are required to take either prior to, or during, their policy practice:

1. Deciding whether, and when, to engage in policy practice. This is a stage in which the social workers acknowledge that their service users suffer from a problem that requires a policy change, and that they need to act in order to change this policy. Before embarking on their policy engagement, social workers may be confronted with an ethical dilemma as to whether to do so or not.

2. Determining the content of the policy solution sought. As part of their policy engagement, social workers are required to decide which policy solutions they seek to advocate for.

3. Choosing strategies and allies. Either at the onset of the policy process or during it, social workers need to decide on the form that their policy practice will take and with whom to collaborate.

On the basis of the interaction between these two axes, we identified 19 dilemmas that can emerge when social workers engage in policy practice. In Table 1, these dilemmas are phrased as questions that social workers are likely to be confronted with when engaging in policy. Below, these dilemmas are explicated according to the three types of conflicts presented above.

a. Dilemmas which relate to competing loyalties

Competing loyalties create ethical dilemmas in all the three decisions that social workers are required to take prior or during their policy engagement.

Initially, a conflict between loyalty to service users and loyalty to the employing service and policymakers, can emerge when social workers are convinced that their service users' problems stem from social conditions or flaws in organisational, local, regional or national policies. They believe that in order to fulfil their primary responsibility to service users, engaging in policy practice in order to address these flaws is required. However, their supervisors, managers or relevant policymakers oppose this engagement (dilemma #1) (Aaslund & Chear, 2020). This is reflected in a case reported in Banks and Nohr (2012) (case study, 6.1). It concerns Jennifer, a social worker employed by a refugee settlement agency funded by the Australian government. Jennifer was increasingly concerned about Australian government policies towards asylum seekers who arrived by boat and were mandatorily detained in immigration centres where they sometimes languished for many years. She deliberated whether to speak out publicly about detrimental policies despite the tacit rule in her agency that employees should refrain from expressing criticism of unjust policies because this might jeopardise funding for the programme, thus putting another group of clients at risk. Dilemmas that stem from competing loyalties also emerge when social workers engage in policy practice in order to affect the policies of their own, or other, organisations (Levin et al., 2013).

The same conflict of loyalty emerges when social workers are considering the specific content of a desired policy. This will occur when the social workers, their service users or other allies prefer to further a specific policy solution while the social workers' organisation or policymakers expect them to further a different policy solution (#2). This was the case when residents of a neighbourhood in an Israeli city sought the support of a community social worker in their efforts to convince local policymakers to adopt a detailed urban development proposal for their neighbourhood that differed from the original plan submitted by the municipality. The outright rejection of the residents’ proposal by the mayor created a moral dilemma for the community social worker, who supported the residents’ proposal (Geva & Rosen, 2016).

Social workers can also face this type a conflict of loyalty when they consider which strategies to adopt. For example, state-employed social workers engaging in policy believe that the best path to furthering a desired policy is to engage in confrontational tactics, such as overt criticism of policymakers in the social media or protests against them. The conflict will be even sharper when these tactic strategies are opposed by their superiors (#3). Loewenberg et al. (2000) refer to this dilemma when describing a social worker who is convinced that a protest rally held in front of City Hall is the best way to pressure the mayor to change a policy that harms the community in which he works but his supervisor opposes this type of adversarial strategy (p. 145–146). In the same vein, Aaslund and Chear (2020) discuss an ethical dilemma that emerged when marginalised groups organised protests against the services in which the social workers are employed.

The second type of conflict of loyalty emerges between the social workers’ loyalty to their own personal interests and their loyalty to their service users. For example, social workers are convinced that their policy engagement is necessary in order to influence a policy likely to harm their service users, or they think that a specific policy solution or a strategy are necessary, but these have the potential to have a negative impact on their own job (the danger of dismissal or being ostracised), their professional status (delay in promotion), or their own wellbeing or that of their family and friends (due to online harassment, demonstration outside the social worker’s home; or threats to their person) (Hardina, 2004; Hoefer, 2018) (#4, #5, #6).

The third type of conflict of loyalty emerges when the interests of different service user groups conflict. This can occur when the social workers recognise that their engagement in policy practice will benefit their current service users but will be detrimental to others in need, other service users groups or future service users (#7). For example, social workers are convinced that their policy efforts will contribute to the wellbeing of their current service users, but they also understand that these efforts are likely to adversely affect their ties with policymakers and possibly undermine efforts to pursue policy change in the future that may help future service users. As resources are always scarce, the implications of a decision by a social worker to actively engage in policy in order to devote additional resources to establish a programme for a specific social group, say single parents, may be at the expense of resources that would otherwise be devoted to other social groups in need, for example – the homeless.

When the social workers are already engaged in policy practice, a decision as to the specific content of the desired policy often looms and can lead to conflicts between the interests and preferences of different current service users (#8). Social workers seeking to promote the well-being of their service users will be aware that some policies are undesirable to other groups of service users or groups in the community. Thus, for example, a social worker seeking to improve the wellbeing of the LGBTQ community deliberates seeking to convince the mayor to allow a Pride Parade in the city though many of the more conservative service-users in the locality have expressed their opposition to this on religious grounds. Another example is a dilemma that emerged when social workers in Israel actively promoted the adoption of legislation criminalising clients of sex services Prohibition on Prostitution Consumption Law (Temporary Order and Legislative Amendment – 2019). Though they were convinced that this was in the best interest of the women they were working with, some of their sex worker service users opposed the legislation fearing it would undermine their source of income.

Social workers may also deliberate between advocating policies that will clearly benefit their specific service users and those that benefit a larger group of people but may be detrimental to their service users. (#9). Loewenberg et al. (2000) offer a pertinent example of this: A director of social work in an urban community hospital located in a low income area joined the planning committee formulating hospital policy. A majority of the committee members favoured the creation of a cancer treatment unit, which would enhance the status of the hospital and attract patients from throughout the state. However, adoption of this policy would defer the adoption of improvements in emergency and ambulatory care, desperately needed by low-income residents living near the hospital.

Conflicts of loyalty can also emerge when social workers need to consider if to support policy solutions that offer short-term solutions that may prevent harm or benefit their service users but may be less effective in the longer run (#10). Witt and Levin (2021) discuss a dilemma of this type encountered by a social work student in a field placement in a state legislature. The issue concerned birth control legislation, in which a good solution for helping a particular population (providing them with a year-long supply of medication), was politically infeasible while an inadequate policy (a six-month supply) could be successfully adopted.

The conflict of loyalty to different service users groups may create ethical dilemmas with regard to the strategies that the social workers employ in their policy efforts. While a specific strategy can promote policy change or empower specific service users, it may lead to a delay in addressing service users' needs or even have an adverse effect on an entire group of service users (#11). This can occur when social workers seek to adhere to the professional obligation to promote people’s participation in the formulation of policies (IFSW, 2018). While this will empower some service users, enhance their self-esteem, and their own capabilities, it is likely to delay the policy change process and thus have a negative impact on other service users. In more extreme cases, if social workers decide to strike in order to further a policy that promotes the wellbeing of some service users, other service users from be prevented from receiving services during the strike.

b. Dilemmas which emerge when conflicts occur between self-determination and paternalism

Social workers may find themselves considering whether to engage in policy when they are confronted by a conflict between self-determination and paternalism (#12). For example, service users can put pressure on social workers to seek to change a policy even though they are not convinced that this policy change will be in the service users’ best interest. Should the social workers recognise the right of their service users to self-determination and engage in policy practice, or should they refrain from doing so even if this can be construed as paternalism? Alternatively, when social workers think that there is a need to advocate for a specific policy on behalf of their service users even though the service users oppose this type of policy change, social workers may ask themselves if they should advocate for a policy that they think is crucial to their service users' wellbeing, although the service users do not agree.

The clash between self-determination and paternalism will also emerge when social workers’ views on specific policy solutions sought during the policy process or on the strategies adopted to further policy change diverge from those of the service users (#13, #14). This can occur when service users want to openly criticise the Minister of Welfare while the social worker is aware that this strategy may endanger the chance to further the policy the service users are seeking. Here again the social workers are confronted by the question- should a paternalistic approach be adopted that promotes or rejects a solution or strategy that does not take into account the self-determination of the service users?

c. Dilemmas relating to conflicts between the social workers' personal values, professional principles or the Law and the values of service users or social workers’ employers

The fourth and last category of dilemmas occurs in situations in which the social workers' personal or professional values conflict with the values of their service users or employer or the Law (#15). A decision whether to engage in policy in support of abortion rights or gay marriage reflects this type of dilemma. It arises when service users expect their social workers to join them in efforts to convince the state to adopt policies that permit abortions or gay marriage while these run counter to the social workers' personal values that abortion or gay marriage are ethically wrong. This type of dilemma can also occur when service users seek a social worker’s support in their efforts to close a hostel for people with intellectual disability in their neighbourhood even if this contradicts the social work professional principle of inclusion.

When the social workers consider specific policy contents and strategies, they may be confronted with additional questions: Which policy to support or strategy to adopt when the service users’ preferred policy or strategy contradict the social workers personal or professional values? (#16, #17). For example, social workers who need to decide if they should help their service users to further a policy solution that contains a requirement to expand the amount of income maintenance or distribute food stamps although they believe that these policy tools will undermine the work incentive and consolidate dependence. Similarly, a social worker may be confronted with the question if to adopt strategies that the service users support (such as exposing embarrassing personal information about a policymaker) even if they run counter to social work values of confidentiality and respect.

Another question arises with regard to justification for engaging in strategies that the social worker believes may further policy change but entail rule-breaking (#18). In this regard, Reamer (2018) asks if it is ethical to initiate a strategy of disrupting work in welfare offices to protest inadequate benefits or unjust regulations or demonstrating illegally at legislative hearings to draw attention to the plight of the poor? Finally, should social workers collaborate with policymakers promoting desirable policy change if their views and actions contradict the values of the social worker or those of the social work profession (#19). Discussing this dilemma, Witt and Levin (2021) describe how a social work student had to decide if to cooperate with legislators who vociferously opposed human rights legislation even if this would promote a specific desired policy.

Discussion

The point of departure for developing a framework to identify policy practice ethical dilemmas is the evidence that shows that social workers across the world engage in policy-change activities as part of their job and do not only implement policy. However, the dilemmas that emerge when social workers engage in policy are virtually absent in the literature. Clearly, there is need to identify, classify and discuss the ethical dilemmas linked to policy practice. The uniqueness of this type of practice is that it refers to what social workers do as part of their job. Consequently, ethical dilemmas often emerge because social workers need to take into account that, when engaging in policy change, they are acting within a complex institutional context in which the interests of their employing organisation may conflict with those of their service users or their own interests or values.

The policy practice ethical dilemmas framework developed in this article underscores the fact that there are diverse junctures encountered by social workers during policy engagement in which ethical dilemmas arise. In these situations, social workers are required to choose between two ethical values and it is unclear which course of action should be taken or, put differently, which value to prefer (Banks, 2021). The framework also reveals that at these junctures social workers encounter the types of conflicts that arise in everyday social work practice, be it micro, mezzo, or macro practice. These include conflicts of dual loyalty, conflicts between self-determination and paternalism and those between personal and professional values and the values of the organisation or its service users. When social workers engage in policy practice these conflicts take on a specific and unique meaning that social workers need to be familiar with.

The article does not offer solutions to the identified dilemmas due to limitations of space. Clearly needed is a conceptual framework relating to how to deal with policy practice dilemmas and the factors that influence social workers’ response to these dilemmas (Aaslund & Chear, 2020). With this, a structured identification of ethical dilemmas in policy practice and a clearer conceptualisation of the conflicts inherent in them can contribute to practice, theory, research and education.

For practitioners, the framework clarifies the ethical facets of policy practice. Given the understanding that an initial step in dealing with ethical dilemmas in social work practice is to identify the dilemma and the two values in conflict (Banks, 2021; Reamer, 2018), the framework can assist social workers, the organisations that employ them, professional organisation of social workers and other relevant stakeholders (Ribers, 2022) in recognising obstacles that may confront social workers when they engage in policy or consider doing so. Moreover, it will enable social workers to analyze dilemmas and gain a better understanding of the types of values that are in conflict. This is a crucial step towards solving dilemmas. We also assume that explicit discussion on the conflicts between loyalties when engaging in policy may enable social workers to address them and engage in policy practice in order to better serve service users and groups that suffer from diverse social problems.

The framework can also contribute to encouraging research on this topic. While this type of research with regard to direct practice has flourished in the last decade, research on policy practice ethical dilemmas among social workers has not been undertaken. The framework described here can offer a useful conceptual point of departure for this. It is also crucial that scholars employ diverse methodologies to explore how social workers deal with these (and perhaps other) dilemmas and the ways they impact their willingness to engage in policy and the form that this takes. Action research is one useful option that has been shown to be useful in this field (Ribers, 2022).

Finally, the suggested framework offers social work educators a useful heuristic tool for teaching policy practice. This framework can serve as starting point to discuss ethical dilemmas in this type of practice and enhance the capacity of social work students to think about alternative options with regard to what to do and how to engage in ethical policy practice.

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

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Idit Weiss-Gal

Idit Weiss-Gal is Professor and Head of the Bob Shapell School of Social Work at Tel Aviv University in Israel. Her fields of research and teaching include policy practice, critical perspectives in social work, and social work as a profession.

Sarit Smila-Sened

Sarit Smila-Sened is a lecturer at the Bob Shapell School of Social Work and TAU International at Tel Aviv University. Her research and teaching focus include normative and applied ethics, social work ethics, business ethics, medical ethics and global ethics.

John Gal

John Gal is Professor at the Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and heads the welfare policy program at the Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel. His fields of interest includesocial policy in Israel and in the Mediterranean region, policy practice in social work and the history of social work in Israel.