She tries to gain control of the meeting. How professionals can have a relationship with someone who does not even want to be involved with them is one of the most difficult, important and yet under analysed dilemmas in social work. but "It says here ?." While transferential processes might be considered crucial in traditional psychotherapy, in CBT they are usually seen as interesting quasi-phenomena rather than material to be "analyzed" as if doing so would advance the therapy. Roberta was interviewed for the research on three occasions: in Months 6, 8, and 12. Roberta questions the history of drug use [even though she did agree earlier that she had a history of drug use]. Against this view we can say that a person may act or refrain from acting because s/he anticipates what others could or would do if s/he did or omitted to do a certain action. Power tempts to abuse power in the everyday work of social workers. This lack of acknowledgment deepens one's despair. This paper has presented what the research shows about the nature of hostile relationships in social work and how enormously difficult it is for all concerned to begin, develop and sustain them over time. A case study method was adopted by bringing together all the data on each case and this provided 30 very detailed case studies of long-term social work practice. So we have to be extremely careful in what we write down as it will live on after us, affecting other perceptions, and how social workers use their powers in their treatment of a client. While social work literature and policy stress the importance of user engagement and working in partnership, the reality is that most social work relationships are involuntary (Smith et al., Citation2012, p. 1462) because the person receiving the service does not freely enter into it. Statutory social workers on the other hand, by seeing Roberta through a lens of dangerousness, did not relate to the caring, loving side of her. The surprising reasons behind this common conflict and tips to restore harmony. Power also exists in the form of the client. The defenses we use in love can also work against us. However, some relationships in social work are not like that but are transacted through mistrust, fear, hostility and even hate. A phenomenology of power and subjectivity as informed by writers such as Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty and Gadamer in contemporary social and cultural theory, may influence critical social work in a constructive way. Involuntary clients and hostile relationships have a very powerful presence in statutory social work. No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors. Realistically, you are just two people with different skill sets working collaboratively to achieve therapeutic goals. for some children a classroom may be an intimidating place in which to answer a teachers question. Whats in a name: Client, Patient, Customer, Consumer, Expert by Experience, Service UserWhats Next? The problems of the subject and of power are ones Foucault himself was continuously rethinking. It is striking how these two colleagues wound themselves up into a kind of frenzy about Robertas dangerousness, including imagining and enacting the whack! of her assaulting the baby. Service users in child protection cases have increasingly been framed through such discourses as disgusting others (Warner, Citation2015). Power has been described according to: (a) who has formal authority to make decisions and who controls the resources; and (b) who has less tangible aspects of symbolic power or the ability to control ideas and meaning [ 17 ]. I wasnt given the opportunity for them to understand me properly, I have been to meetings with them and I was told that we can only read out what is important but we dont want to hear from you. The Cleveland Inquiry (1987) showed a child abuse scandal in the UK in which one of the professionals involved, the pediatrician, had failed to make a sufficiently comprehensive assessment because she was so committed to one method of diagnosis of child sexual abuse, i.e. Though social workers may try to produce change in their clients, they also often try to preserve their own status and methods of working and thereby resist change. Olivia has responded so well to the photos, smiling and saying how lovely they are, how nice the children look. in the form of the authority or the office. WebAs well as recognising power issues and imbalances, as the social worker l would also need to undertake a risk assessment. The same cannot be said of social work however, which urgently needs to face the harsh realities of hostile relationships, the risks of abuses of power they contain, and the enormously difficult feelings they bring up for service users, social workers and their effects on the emotional life of whole organisational systems. 6MDHF hJ&30x` #S Nevertheless, this can be thought of as similar to a physician having a greater understanding of a patient's medical issues than the patient has about the physician's, or an attorney knowing intimate details about a client's life circumstances that the client doesn't know about the attorney. From the start social workers always visited in pairs because Roberta was regarded as dangerous. Research in psychology is now showing that the colors of walls, carpets and furniture and the layout of a room can affect our mood, feelings and how we behave. In a staff supervision session a few weeks after this visit, Olivia and the social worker, Susan, agreed that Roberta was preventing the pre-birth assessment by refusing to cooperate. The Dreadful Physical Symptoms of Dementia, 2 Ways Empathy Determines the Type of Partner We Choose, To Be Happy for the Rest of Your Life, Seek These Goals, Why Men Often Feel Insecure in Their Intimate Relationships, Why Getting Along with a Mother-in-Law Is So Difficult, 7 Signs That You'd Be Better Off Ending a Relationship. Directly confronting racism at the individual, agency, and institutional levels is the antiracist mandate we all must embrace. While recognition that some service users do not want social work involvement has grown in recent years, little research has explored what relationships between social workers and involuntary clients look and feel like in practice and how they are conducted in real time. The manager is aware of the importance of providing emotional support to staff in Olivias situation and in order to protect her had ensured the case was now transferred to a new team. Can clients in court-mandated practice grant And straight away ((makes hitting noise)). While there is no doubt that Roberta could be a frightening person, and that she and her child were vulnerable, the possibility that she was right and that at an unconscious level this was a retaliatory act cannot be ruled out. 2.3 Dealing with power Both approaches emphasize unanimously that through power the behavior of other persons can be influenced independently of their will. Audit requirements and the pressure for performance data over-rode the need for attention to what was occurring emotionally and viscerally for the workers, mother and baby, alongside analysis of what was going on in the relationship, especially below the surface. Some parents were opposed to child protection involvement and this type of relationship was often hostile and remained that way. Our affective phenomenology is either affirmed or rejected, by people such as social workers, who intervene in our lives. Equally, if a social worker meeting with other professionals says "I've been a professional for 15 years and I know I am right"; while colleagues may reluctantly give way to the speaker, making it appear that the exercise of power has been successful, they will probably be offended by the confrontational style and be unwilling to accede to further demands by that social worker. There is a remarkable contrast between Rebecca, who sits rigidly and tensely upright on the sofa, and Ron and Angela who give off an air of not caring. The workers were conscious that they were, in their own language, monitoring Roberta Dixons mothering. Minson (1980) suggests that the constitution of subjects, such as clients and consumers takes place through the operation of specific relations of power which are best understood as the construction of personal categories. Olivia was very upset by Robertas threatening behaviour and cried at her desk. So what one has the capacity to do can be as significant as what one actually does in social and political relationships. This is because there are no truly psychologically mightier or superior people. Some things, like wanting to be liked by everyone, are near guarantees of stress and unhappiness. Postmodern feminist social work theories reject the notion of egalitarian power relations as a fantasy that does not engage with the power dynamics that always exist between social workers and clients, a point also made in earlier work ( Wise, 1990 ). A senior probation officer recently told me that he had put into interviewing rooms (which had suffered badly from vandalism) quality furniture and decorations and that in six months there had been no damage done. The findings show how hostile relationships were enacted through conflict and resistance especially on home visits and how anxiety and other intense feelings were often avoided by individuals and organisations. The reality is, however, that while a therapist might have more specific training, particular knowledge, and certain skills, the client has most of the actual power. It promotes, develops, and protects the practice of social work and social workers. Furthermore, forms of power are differentiated in the literature; this leads, for example, to distinctions between power to act, power to define, or power to limit. If the latter occurs, it may be taken by the social worker as a refusal to work for change, and the person or the family may be adjudged 'difficult'. Susan tells Roberta how gorgeous the baby is. Evenings and weekends: It has sought to convey the lived experience of being involved in such casework, the struggles over space and the rights service users have, or dont have, to refuse professionals access to their lives, the tactics of resistance that get played out and the deep emotional effects of such work. Therefore, it is necessary to establish what the term power means, what associations it evokes. This shows how even in long-term work where such children are regularly seen by practitioners, they can be kept at a physical and emotional distance (Ferguson, Citation2017; Winter et al., Citation2017). The new social workers withholding of information about where Susan was, her lack of attention to the child and disrespectful approach to the mother felt punitive and made a difficult situation and hostile relationship even worse. 72 0 obj <>stream So, and she, I felt, chose, and it seemed OK to come to the supervision and she didnt want in that setting to be upset and so I sort of thought, well maybe thats OK, I dont want to press her on that. A lot has been written about power, there are theories of power and concepts of power or to speak with the words of Theodor Fontane "that is a wide field". The object, in this case the record of a meeting, indicates that work has been done. In Being and Time,Heidegger explained that human existence constitutes the open-ness where beings can be revealed. Here the social worker starts out from a position of power over the client because s/he has prior 'knowledge' of what the client is like. Some families reconciled themselves to the inevitability of statutory involvement, were not overtly aggressive towards social workers and tried to make the best of circumstances to promptly get workers out of their lives. Professionals need much more training to help them learn strategies that defuse these potentially explosive relationships, recognise their role in co-constructing the hostility, and how to work through resistance and engage with children and parents in respectful, reciprocal ways (Smith et al., Citation2012; Turnell & Essex, Citation2006; Turney, Citation2012). Register to receive personalised research and resources by email. Wicked uses of power were legitimated through recording and acceptance of certain types of judgement about people. WebA social workers ethical responsibilities to clients is addressed in value 1: Respect for the Inherent Dignity and Worth of Persons, value 3: Service to Humanity and value 4: WebThe use of power to discipline clients is made legitimate precisely because of the unity of 'professionalism' and training of the social worker. Angela obviously does not see the problem with having Ron in the home. The study of the use of language in social settings (sociolinguistics) and its relation to power is one aspect of social work practice which has not been properly examined in the research and literature. A 'situated model of power' for social work is developed which draws on the writings of Michel Foucault. Social workers have an ethical duty to dismantle racism, both personally and professionally, and to demonstrate what it means to be antiracist. This leads to another point which is that the recording process acts as a 'structural' repository of power. power imbalance is being expressed when one partner (or a group of partners) is able to dominate decision- making or otherwise asserts power in ways that disadvantages other partners or are not in the best interest towards achieving the partnership objectives. This regular form is indicative of 'the way of doing X' being socially authorized and having a set of rules for the proper performance of X. The counselors choice to withhold or share information can have ethical implications for the client and potentially cause the client harm (Barnett, 2011). All these aspects can lead to an imbalance of power within the helping relationship, between social worker and client, at least initially (cf. As people who have no desire to use a service are not service users in any meaningful sense, the term involuntary client seems a more honest, accurate way of representing the relationship. The effects of the Pindown system on the children who experienced it were traumatic and in some cases devastating. Social workers have had roles in perpetuating these harmful social systems, and this history cannot be ignored. The awkwardness of these encounters was painfully obvious; contempt and hate filled the air. The initial social work response was to ring Roberta who responded by saying she does not want anything to do with social workers and would not meet with them. The social workers meanwhile, regarded the parents as being responsible for the lack of cooperation and saw this as further evidence of their problematic parenting. To learn about our use of cookies and how you can manage your cookie settings, please see our Cookie Policy. Many adults in therapy bestow great power onto their therapists. But yeah its a hard balance between, and then youre just avoiding it and lets move on and thats not intelligent, thats just kind of colluding with shutting that sort of discussion down and that emotion down. by poverty, by living in an unfurnished house and so forth. Case managers previously defined advocacy as occurring at individual, organizational, and community levels. This use of the notion of disguised compliance was highly problematic because it placed the service user in a lose-lose position where they could never prove their sincerity or worthiness as a parent (Leigh et al., Citation2019). WebThe role of power in social work practice has been generally understated despite its importance to the course and outcome of the clinical process. Social work is helping, is supporting. The teams where the casework with involuntary clients occurred that we have featured in this paper were not uncaring. This is exemplified by a social worker we shadowed on several occasions who, as he talked about the deep emotional effects the work had on him, cried, shook and sweated so profusely that his shirt became soaking wet. The Relational social work method supports the practical development of participation, collaboration, and reciprocity. gwright.nasw@socialworkers.org To this end psychotherapists are being consulted about the decoration of prison cells for violent prisoners. Leaders of all major social work organizations came together on Aug. 14 in a national town hall to report on their efforts to advance anti-racism within social work practice, education, regulation and research. NASW works to enhance the professional growth and development of its This is a skill which is a power in itself. The use of power to discipline clients is made legitimate precisely because of the unity of 'professionalism' and training of the social worker. WebBoundaries are a defining feature of the social worker-client relationship. The net result was an entire workforce fleeing from painful feelings. I'm sure the reader can think of other examples. Lundy (2004), basing her views on the work of Moreau (1989), highlights This arises from the therapist often learning the client's deepest secrets while the client usually knows only superficial facts about the therapist. Acknowledging this and the presence of difficult emotions in the dynamics of hostile and avoidant relationships is a very important way to begin to overcome them. Translated across to practice, the moral ideal of such a view of subjectivity would be that of the "fullness of being" which is maximized by the possibilities of the subject's open-ness to being and time. Power in discourse is concerned how power is actually exercised and enacted, that is face-to-face spoken discourse. Ron leans back, puts his arm behind his head and splays his legs. Thus in supervisions, social worker-manager interactions were fuelled by deep anxiety which at times built up into a frenzy of fear for the baby, and also for their own safety. The research was funded the Economic and Social Research Council and ethically approved by the participating social work agencies and universities. Soon after, Roberta rang the office twice to tell the team manager (Olivia) she was angry with her, and the researcher could hear her shouting a barrage of abuse at Olivia and demanding a complaint form. The majority (60 percent) of U.S. social workers are white; thus, issues of white privilege and the empathy gap between white social workers and clients of color must be addressed. social workers negotiating with other workers or professionals, the use of disciplinary strategies is not so evident. Nevertheless my point is to encourage social workers as a matter of good practice to understand how power operates in social work relationships; to uncover it in one's own and others practice. Such assessments can legitimately only take place in "social work space", they cannot take place in a bar or restaurant. Children in residential homes had been badly mistreated by social workers who used crude behavioral methods, namely tight negative reinforcement regimes, to control them and make them behave 'properly'. Looked at in this way we can see that so many aspects of our lives are the result of this type of power and are not, as we uncritically tend to say, simply a matter of normal behavior. Assuming the existence of power in social work, and indeed its justification, this thesis will deal primarily with asking why. As has been shown, on most occasions interactions between social care and families went on in the home. We could extend this to say that consensus of opinion is power. Like our nation, the history of social work is complicated. Having shown some general features of social workers and involuntary clients experiences, the paper will now develop these insights by exploring in-depth how hostile relationships developed and were sustained over time. It may frighten a parent into adequate parenting and thus the social worker may feel s/he has been successful in this use of power. It is crucial to recognise however the role the service user played in placing the professionals either in an upright, standing position, gazing down at her, or crouching or sat on the floor with her gazing down at them. We had no way of knowing at the outset how long the 30 cases (15 at each site) we sampled would be open for and in the event 12 were shadowed for the full 12months, one for eleven and 22 were shadowed for at least eight months. And while this is true, having less money than your neighbors doesn't make you any less of a person than they are, nor them any better than you. If this summed up my view of power, I could be accused of 'atomism' - the idea that persons are at all moments asocial independent beings unshaped by forces of the collective, historical/evolutionary entity we call society. This was on top of their many other duties. The latter, drawn from many sources, is given a refined professional expression through the trained persona of the social worker. In presenting the findings key scenes from the data are selected that typify what was said and done and the atmospheres of encounters and experiences over time, their smells, sounds, moods, emotional textures in essence, how the work and relationships felt. Get the help you need from a therapist near youa FREE service from Psychology Today. WebWhen a dominant culture member disregards the clients own beliefs and perspectives, the power imbalance can become exploitative. WebWhat is a power imbalance? In other cases parents were extremely unhappy, often hostile and remained that way. Within the sub-sample of cases where service users did not want a service there were different degrees of resistance and discontent. As Thompson (2000) highlights, to assess the The decision was that it was highly unlikely that she would be allowed to keep her baby and Roberta stormed out before the end of the meeting. Fairclough, N. (1989) Language and Power, Longman, London. Seven minutes into the visit Roberta moves forward and picks the baby up. Well, no, youre not because youre just causing problems and making everything a lot worse and worrying people and stressing people out rather than actually doing anything to help anyone. The two types of power discussed by Fairclough, roughly correspond to my examples of power as capacity and power as exercised. An implicit power imbalance exists between therapist and client that is particularly relevant to this client group; and the egalitarian nature of person-centred Developing Winnicotts work, Kahr (Citation2020) uses the metaphor of hostile clients throwing bombs into encounters with professionals, causing psychological shrapnel that workers and clients have to find ways to survive. To give a fairly obvious example, Hitler and the Nazi Party portrayed the Jewish people as vermin who were destroying German life and culture. So it was seven weeks after the initial referral that face to face contact was made with Roberta on a home visit. But in the 12months of casework we observed where hostile relationships persisted professionals and parents remained deeply mutually suspicious of one another. 0 Freuds work and psychoanalytic theory as developed by Klein (Salzberger-Wittenberg, Citation1970), Winnicott (Citation1949) and Bion (Citation1962), argues that professionals capacities to think clearly about and relate to the service user (referred to as transference) is particularly influenced by the level of anxiety the professional experiences and what the service user projects into them (referred to as counter-transference). Somewhat paradoxically these were not workplaces where sadness, fear, anger, guilt and other painful feelings were easily or openly expressed. You can feel the anger coming off him, anger with Rebecca and her manager for how he feels hes being described, anger with Angela for seeking to go back to court and complaining no one helps him. Already This was averted in part by Roberta agreeing to the intensive family support service working with her. We have been lied to actually from social services, blatant lies to our face so there is definitely no trust or anything there. It is Foucault who teaches us that "power is co-extensive with the social body" and that "relations of power are interwoven with other kinds of relations" (1980, p.142). With respect to people experiencing mental distress and detained through the use of compulsory powers, Beresford (Citation2005) suggests the term service refusers might be more appropriate. Similar close attention was given to observing and recording encounters between staff in the social work offices, soaking up atmospheres and organisational cultures. On a home visit a few days later Olivia was still feeling traumatised by Robertas attack, couldnt stop crying, felt ill and stayed in the car while Susan and the researcher went into the house. My knowledge of the laws, mastery of diagnostics and methodology, how I conduct and steer consultations or conversational processes, put me in a position of power. The reason workers lacked awareness of these dynamics was because there was so little help with getting it. But ? In the above discussion it was indicated that there are two basic notions of power: power as capacity - one's ability to produce change; and power as exercised - one's doing or saying something, and changing or trying to change a situation.