The first issue of the year 2024 is arriving at a time when the future is looking dark in various areas of the world, and in ways that can only increase widespread concerns arising from the interconnectedness of contemporary societies. Economic and political conflicts have always had unforeseen impacts on people outside of the immediate areas of struggle. Relatedly, increasing nationalism and right-wing populism has historically been associated with dangerous levels of antipathy between and within nations, often with dangerous and sometimes deadly outcomes. The current list of potential and actual hostilities does not need to be described: bad news gets plenty of air time.
There will undoubtedly be implications for ethical practices of social intervention in social welfare, when the latter may be in very short supply, non-existent, or completely negated by conditions of hatred and war evident in several continuing battles. Such desperate situations are clearly not unusual in the gravity of their effects on people’s lives: the previous century provides too many familiar examples. However the international development of the social professions over the past few decades puts a challenging gloss over what such professionals may now consider the nature and limits of ethical behaviour where professional social intervention is appropriate – or demanded – in relation to all sorts of people in conflict situations. It is to be hoped that reflections and research on issues arising for social professionals from current developments will be reflected in the pages of this journal, and readers are encouraged to consider contributions which are accordingly topical and up-to-date. It hardly needs to be said that other hopes may be focused on the possibility that the coming year turns out not to be as dark as it seems likely to be – and that social professionals – practitioners and academics – may be able to contribute across embattled lines towards a better, less violent, and more caring world.
The first paper in this issue is a joint contribution by a Japanese academic Chikako Endo from Osaka University and Young Jun Choi from Yonsei University in South Korea. It contains an important and interesting discussion of a concept of ‘active citizenship’ as applied to three policies that have been advocated in relation to the welfare state: the ideas of universal basic income, universal basic services, and the social economy. Active citizenship has often been thought of as a way of encouraging individual involvement in political processes – increasing people’s responsibility and capability for contributing to social and political affairs. A reflection of this idea may be seen in the advocacy of user involvement in social and community work. The laudable aim of empowering individuals to participate is valuable, but as these authors argue it is important not only to exercise individual self-determination, but also collective self-determination over shared conditions. They therefore conclude that opportunities for organised social cooperation are necessary to enable fundamental social policy issues relating to social welfare to be widely discussed and actioned. They thus examine their reconfigured concept in relation to the three identified policy alternatives, making a significant contribution to scholarly debate in this area.
The second paper in this issue by Anne Longmuir is entitled: ‘Developing partial cognitive impairment during hospital treatment: capacity assessment, safeguarding or recovery?’. This paper has relevance to increasingly older populations across the globe where hospitalisation leads to disorientation and raises problems about discharge and home support. Many readers of this journal, professionals, academics, carers, and service users will have first-hand experience of this kind of situation, sometimes as relatives or friends of older people experiencing the typical health problems of older age. The author is specifically concerned about the prevalence of ‘hospital induced delirium’, and the way in which issues of the cognitive competence of hospital patients interacts with their capacity for home discharge. She references evidence that a defensive, risk-averse emphasis on capacity testing and protection can increase distress and impairment, diminishing the chances for home discharge. She discusses recent research that highlights reservations about the tests for cognitive capacity, contrasting the conventional concept of autonomy with notions of relational interdependence. She also makes recommendations about organisations and processes in hospital assessment and discharge that could improve such situations – clearly a paper that should stimulate ideas about ethical and effective practice for anyone involved with the health of older people.
The third paper in this issue is also a joint project – between academic researchers in Universities in Taiwan and Australia, their topic of research being self-evident in the title of their paper: ‘Disability Policy Meets Cultural Values: Chinese Families of Children and Young People with Developmental Disabilities in Taipei and Sydney’. The authors, Qian Fang, Heng-Hao Chang, Karen R. Fisher, Ruixin Dong, and Xiaoran Wang, provide an interesting study of cultural and ethical differences in how their research subjects are treated in relation to the policies intended to support them. In particular they compare Chinese families in Taiwan and Australia, and analyse their evidence in relation to ethics of care principles on the one hand, and Chinese cultural values on the other. They contend that their evidence shows how important it is for the welfare of Chinese children and young people with developmental disabilities that social policies are constructed with sensitivity to both the local cultures and to ethics of care claims for recognition, rights and redistribution.
In the fourth paper in this issue two Israeli academics Michal Segal and Maya Peled-Avram have contributed a useful paper on: ‘Ethical Dilemmas in the Fieldwork Training of Social Work Students’. All academics having any responsibility for students sent into social and community agencies to begin their professional life will be very familiar with the ethical issues that inevitably arise. Students are exposed to the realities of ethical dilemmas, and are often questioning the organisations in which they are placed, and the expectations that surround them. This study highlights common ethical issues amongst undergraduate students and the authors contend that their evidence supports the need for an ethics course to help students to analyse ethical issues in relation to the local legal and organisational frameworks. The latter recommendation may be timely in some countries where ethics courses are squeezed out by the demands of defensive legal and management educational priorities in social care. They also significantly conclude that there is a need to raise awareness in educators and supervisors concerning moral distress that may afflict students coping with ethical dilemmas at this early professional developmental phase.
The final academic paper in this issue is by Patricia Turner, a researcher at the Arizona State University School of Social Work. Her title indicates her research focus on: ‘The Evolution of Self-Determination for People with Psychotic Disorders’. Her concern is that various movements that have sought to empower people with serious mental illnesses, aiming to reduce the influence of the dominant and intimidating medical model, have been impacted in recent times by financial and other factors that have a reverse effect. Although her study is concerned with the situation in the USA, there are global corporations that influence the practice of health provision world-wide, and the concern of this author about social services in the US maintaining the status quo of medical model dominance will have relevance to many other countries. Survivors and consumers of mental health services have often suffered from limited autonomy in living their own lives. This paper raises alarm bells about current developments, and warns readers against complacency.
The next two papers in this issue are part of our ‘Ethics in Practice’ section where we publish papers concerned with the experiences of a wide range of users, carers, practitioners and academics in relation to ethical values and issues that have arisen for them. The first paper in this issue is by a large group of authors who have formed a collective project that advocates and campaigns for relationship-based practice in the UK. Their title says it all: ‘Breaking the Boundaries Collective – A Manifesto for Relationship-Based Practice’. Their introduction to the paper explains how the collective was formed: a PhD researcher noticed how much ‘breaking’ or challenging boundaries in the ‘helping professions’ made a widely felt impact. Further enquiries harvested a huge response from many people – including clients, service users, academics, researchers, teachers, university lecturers, social workers, counsellors, and psychotherapists – and from this the collective was born. It raises interesting ethical issues about the nature of current professionalism and its practice in relation to boundaries and personal relationships in the era of late neo-liberal economics – and why this project stimulated such a response at this time.
The final paper in this issue is by Mark Taylor a social work academic and practitioner at Goldsmiths, University of London. ‘Reflecting on the loss of empathy for a parent in family therapy sessions’ is a discussion of his practice in family therapy, and specifically of his experience of finding himself out of sympathy with a member of the family with whom he was working, supposedly in an empathetic manner. This is a situation that must at some times be universally felt amongst social professionals, and probably not discussed as often as it might be – especially in relation to obvious ethical questions that could be asked. The paper honestly and usefully explores the practical and ethical problems not only as a member of this team, but also in relation to differing professional values. It suggests some ways of dealing with this situation and concludes that social professionals need to explore ways to increase empathy and compassion for clients they dislike.
Correction Statement
This article was originally published with errors, which have now been corrected in the online version. Please see Correction (https://doi.org/10.1080/17496535.2024.2339045)