CAPÍTULO VI Medidas Cautelares
RESOLUCION DIRECTORAL Nº 443-2008-PRODUCE-DGEPP
Social workers responses to oppressive social structures remain largely theoretical, since practical strategies to address these in education or communicative action in the context of self-awareness/consciousness are rarely discussed in the literature (Jessup and Rogerson, 1999). The work of Althusser, Foucault, Hegel, Fairclough and Freire (amongst others) provides new opportunities to bridge this gap. In signifying a change in relation to meaning, that is, how some discourses in social work might now be taken for granted based on cynicism (Carey 2012), these conditions of existence can no longer be assumed. My study analyses how the social organisation of social work accounts derived from social and political consequences in social work might also be contested. Critical social science embodies regulatory principles and ideas where any knowledge concerning reality or truth is contextualised within history and ideology (Guba, 1990; Alvesson and Willmott, 1996). The intention of critical theory in social work is to challenge the taken for granted assumptions surrounding its knowledge, truth and practice drawn from ideology and historical contexts, and to counter the development of oppressive institutions and practices (Alvesson and Willmott, 1996).
The broader aims of critical social work are based on methods for initiating personal and societal change (Healy, 2005; Fook, 2012). These can be aligned with a problem-oriented approach (van Dijk, 1995), and so research here is based on a highly context-sensitive and democratic approach that takes an ethical position on social issues (Huckin, 1997). Participatory action is dialectical, with a focus on bringing about change through the raising of consciousness in the context of helping individuals free themselves (Creswell 2007). These approaches are completed ‘with’ others, not ‘on’ or ‘to’ others, and indicate how research methods are not just an issue of an appropriate tool, but also a statement of the ‘positionality’ of the researcher – of how one considers the world can be known and drawn upon from an ethical standpoint (McLaughlin, 2012). Positionality is vital in critical ethnography research, and forces the researcher to acknowledge their own power, privileges and biases just as they are denouncing the power structures that
surround their subjects (Thomas, 1993). (See section 1.5 for further discussion on critical ethnography.)
Freire (1970) uses critical dialogue here, understood to raise awareness and to promote change as a result of dialogue. This method, intended to foster the ability to reflect on the world in a philosophical and historical way, involves critical dialogue that nurtures critical thinking. This is part of the process of social change, at both subjective and political levels. The aim here is to awaken political consciousness of the power of ideology and self-awareness in the context of the discourses available in which to account for contemporary social work. This methodological framework for education transcends understandings of ideology and crosses boundaries of positivism in the bridge between social oppression and subjective change, and retains its importance for analysing individual material conditions (history, culture, society) in their interpersonal context. Understood as the process of conscientisation, this refers to helping learners to become aware of the nature of these discourses and their power; and, in turn, to act to change them (Freire, 1970). Concerned with identifying who has power over whom and how this is maintained in hegemonic processes, the activist positionality in this research aims to liberate social work learners and practitioners from constructions of social work drawn from wider historical, occupational and cultural contexts. This is because these traditions embrace the concept of hegemony, aligned with the work of Gramsci (1971).6 Discourse here is understood as a form of domination over
economic, political, cultural and ideological domains of society. As respondents are encouraged to recover their own minds, these ideas can be aligned with the radical humanist paradigm in social work which believes that change must begin at the subjective level and draws attention to the social workers’ agency (Howe, 1992; Fook, 2012). This acknowledges that certain concepts of social work can produce oppressive rather than liberating forms of social work practice (Jessup and Rogerson, 1999).
6Gramsci’s (1971) notion of hegemony is based on the basic idea that government and the state cannot enforce control over
any particular culture or structure unless other more intellectual and sophisticated methods are employed. These hegemonic discourses are understood as pre-existing the subject (individual) before they are subverted (Weiss and Wodak, 2003).
If language is constructed, it can be deconstructed and reconstructed; and, as Dominelli (1997) notes, people are knowing subjects with the capacity for acting and reacting to the situations they find themselves in. In the context of social work education, these can be understood as liberatory educational methods where learners are encouraged to read the world around them, to be critical and to think for themselves, rather than to take what they read or hear at face value (Saleebey and Scanlon, 2005). This intellectual skill does not presuppose any particular ideological affiliation, but is aligned with participatory dialogic methods (Breeze, 2011). Whilst critical pedagogy knowledge cannot be neutral, this does not necessarily undermine its status as reliable knowledge. But it does imply posing the question of knowledge for whom and for what and in what context (Morrow and Torres, 1995). The following model (Figure 1) demonstrates my developed educationalist approach of critically deconstructing discourses of social work, and directly links to the pilot study/fieldwork of this research. This is discussed further in section 2.6 and returned to in the final chapter where the use of critical questioning is combined with a narrative-based method. Section 2.5 illustrates this process fully, and the final chapter of this thesis expands and builds on this model, providing a reflexive model for social work practice, education and further research.