Social workers make decisions every day involving the protection of children and/or adults who are at risk of, or are experiencing, abuse and neglect, exercising power and authority derived from law. Social workers must act within the law: “doing things right.” Accountable, legally literate practice additionally includes standards from administrative law when statutory duties are used. However, decision-making frequently also raises ethical dilemmas, including whether, when, and how to intervene in people’s lives. Practice must, therefore, be ethically literate: “doing right things.” Human rights, equality, and social justice issues will also feature in social work decision-making: “right thinking.” This chapter presents a framework for social worker decision-making that is legally and ethically, but also emotionally, relationally, organizationally and knowledge, literate. It proposes that this framework is transferable across the different jurisdictions within which social workers practice, and that it helps social workers to make good as well as lawful decisions.

In this chapter we identify some aspects of Indigenous epistemologies (ways of knowing) and ontologies (ways of being) and apply them to the re-imagining of social work, grounded in contributions, experiences and knowledges shared by Indigenous scholars in the field. Social work has too often been part of the colonial project rather than the decolonising project, though in the twenty-first century the decolonisation of social work has emerged as a more important agenda. This chapter is concerned with Indigenous ways of knowing and being as representing important alternatives to Western modernity. We argue that to achieve re-imagining of social work requires social workers to adopt an epistemological shift that centres and values Indigenous epistemologies and ontologies as core, consciously and intentionally removing them from the margins that they have occupied in social work education and practice. We start the chapter with some notes on its authorship. We then briefly describe colonialism’s stifling of Indigenous epistemologies, after which we explore Indigenous ways of knowing and being and how they inform the re-imagining of social work.

This chapter argues that to practise social work in the Anthropocene it is crucial to decentre the human. This decentring does not involve devaluing the human but embedding their experience in the non-human world. We begin with a discussion of the Anthropocene along with the ecological crises and the growth in population, production and consumption as issues that underpin it. We highlight the importance of moving from anthropocentrism to Gaia in the way we understand the relationship between the human and the non-human world. This shift will enable social workers to rethink the social, the community and human rights in more ecocentric ways and will have implications in the ways social workers engage in activism and practice to affect social change.

This chapter examines how social work, as a profession with the heritage of Western Enlightenment modernity, must be re-imagined if it is to respond appropriately to the twenty-first-century crises and future uncertainties facing the world. It sets the scene for social work re-imagination by exploring the characteristics of Enlightenment modernity (which flourished from the late seventeenth to the eighteenth century) and the crises at hand and by exposing the inadequacies of a business-as-usual approach to the blatant unsustainability of the existing order. We argue that the future of social work lies in its revamping and recognising that it is about working with and in the social through a systemic perspective. The social must be brought back to social work by breaking out of the heritages of Enlightenment modernity and isolated individualism.

Social work has always existed in a society with opposing values and ideologies, but in the years of liberal consensus (up to the 1990s or early 2000s) it was possible for social workers to have a legitimacy, as the values of human rights and social justice, of caring for others, received tokenistic attention from political leaders and were seen by populations as important. Much has changed in the globalised world: in the 2020s even strong social democracies, exemplified by those in Scandinavia, are experiencing both the pressures of neoliberal globalisation and the threats of right-wing populism. In this chapter, we confront political contexts and discuss social work resistance to neoliberal, patriarchal structures and alternatives for progressive change.

Technological development typically has outcomes that can be perceived as both positive and negative for humanity. In a capitalist society, the benefits of new technology are often evaluated in economic terms, whereas the negative impacts are often evaluated in social, health-related or environmental terms – the externalities of conventional economics. The benefits of a new technology are often immediately obvious, while the negative consequences appear rather later. In this chapter, we examine four areas of major development or change: industrial technology, agricultural technology, medical technology, and digital and communication technology. Each has had, and continues to have, a significant impact on individuals, families, communities and societies, as well as on the understanding and practice of social work. These are discussed using the questions identified above: Who owns? Who uses? Who or what benefits? Who or what loses? This allows us to consider their implications for social work and for the re-imagining of social work in the twenty-first century.

Spirituality, religion and a sense of the sacred can be important areas for creativity and the re-imagining of social work. This chapter explores this arena, arguing that acknowledging and drawing on spirituality and sacredness are significant parts of social work and that to ignore them is to deny an important dimension of humanity. However, spirituality and sacredness are experienced and manifested in different ways and can be affected by dominant narratives in different cultural and political contexts and at different historical times. This chapter avoids making any claims as to the truth or otherwise of any forms of religion or spirituality and instead considers the role that a sense of the sacred and the spiritual can play in the re-imagining of social work.

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the conventional view of science and of the scientific paradigm is under question. This chapter presents a perspective on science for social work practice that is not against science per se but that critiques positivist science’s heavy emphasis on evidence-based practice and draws instead on alternative, more fluid and creative approaches. Science is, of course, important for its insights and its ways of studying the world, and to attack science is to allow anti-scientific arguments a legitimacy they do not deserve. The approach here values science and scientific inquiry but not to the point of denying the importance of other ways of knowing and being.

Social work stands for the values of humanity. Such a statement would go unchallenged by social workers throughout the world. Yet in this chapter we consider the values of humanity in some detail, recognising that they are both complex and contested, and that humanity is not to be idealised but can be brutally destructive. In pursuing this discussion, we show how a deeper and wider exploration of humanity can be an important source of inspiration for creative social work and can enhance social work’s advocacy of the values of humanity in the contemporary context, where much that seemed to be settled has become unsettled and where people often feel less like rational decision-making beings optimising their wellbeing and more isolated, bewildered and uncertain in a world of paradox and confusion.

Colonisation and colonialism have denied legitimacy to the Indigenous world views and ways of knowing and being described in Chapter 4. In this chapter, we turn our gaze on the coloniser and consider the influence of colonial cultures and the ways in which they need to change so that other ways of knowing and being can flourish. We start our discussion with an example of the unacknowledged nature of colonialism in modern Australian society. We then argue that decolonisation is essential, not only for social work with Indigenous or culturally diverse populations but for all social work practice.

This chapter argues that irony in language emerges as an exquisite form of social work, through the operations of opposition, expectation violation, and contrast. Among all the different and varied figurative forms, irony may be particularly well suited in helping us form a sense-of-self that aligns with other people’s expectations, connect with other people, and manage our positions in social networks and hierarchies. Verbal irony’s oppositionality can lead to an expression of a violation of expectations on a speaker’s part through various methods (e.g., echo, pretense, allusional pretense, salience, contrast). But irony does more by providing speakers with a way to express their attitudes about different situations (e.g., agreeing or disagreeing with some other person’s attitude). Hearing irony may also help people form attitudes about the ironic speakers (e.g., finding the use of sarcasm as funny, clever, boorish). Thinking of irony as social work highlights the utility of this figure in delicately dealing with a wide range of interpersonal circumstances in everyday life.

By the end of the Second World War, the professional class presided over a massive alignment of national and global institutions with virtue capitalism. This global ‘welfare state’ moment makes it seem that virtue capitalism went hand in hand with state control. However, professionals were often ambivalent about their connection to the state. When Canada first ventured into nationalised healthcare, for example, doctors in Saskatchewan went on strike to avoid it. Despite often rejecting state interference, which many professionals feared might impede the integrity of their work, professionals held a moral relationship between knowing and doing, where they sought to use expertise to effect material change in the world and in individual lives. Such technocratic planning was fundamentally moral, embedding into mid-twentieth century capitalism the internalized, disciplining practices known as governmentality. Professionals were, to use Giorgio Agamben’s framing of the governmental economy, angels of the state. Human capital investment entangled industry, military, and education but, perhaps most importantly, led to an internalized, universal industriousness. The material effects of this ‘angelic’ work were sometimes deeply damaging, building social and economic ‘dependencies’ through the economy that mirrored, in individual lives, the hierarchies constructed by the colonial world.

Social workers practise across a wide range of settings, with all kinds of different people who have diverse cultural experiences. Some work primarily with individuals, whereas others work with families or groups of people in therapeutic or community contexts. Some social workers focus on community advocacy, community action and social change. In such diverse practice contexts, the notion of theoretically informed practice can seem complicated. Yet social workers do draw upon a range of theoretical perspectives in their work, using theory to help understand and make sense of what is, in reality, a complex human world. Many theories used by social workers can also be found influencing the practices of allied professionals: counsellors, psychologists and others working within health and human services. We would argue that theory applied in social work has a disciplinary character that distinguishes it from the application of the same theories across allied disciplines. This is because knowledge and theory in practice are critically influenced by disciplinary attachments and the underpinning values and nature of the profession itself.

Notions of professional social work knowledge, theory and practice often rest uneasily within the context of interests, aspirations and sovereignty of First Peoples. It has long been so, and it remains a challenge in contemporary social work. This chapter provides an opportunity to encourage specifically theoretical engagement with an Aboriginal peoples’ standpoint and to understand social work practice that is responsive to it. It is often said that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and so it is within an holistic framework of social justice and self-determination that Aboriginal health and well-being must be approached. This is a standpoint that encompasses the well-being of the collective; provides recognition of the Aboriginal world-view; and validates the cultural memory of an ancient oral tradition filled with stories and connections to Country. It is through human rights and decolonised practices that these elements can be framed, and from which equitable and socially just outcomes for Aboriginal communities can be achieved.

To suggest that social work theory and empirical research necessarily inform and strengthen practice under-estimates the difficulties involved in bringing together conceptual and practical endeavours. Building linkages between theory, research and practice has been a long-standing challenge in social work. Busy practitioners have little opportunity to keep abreast of new research, and the higher-order nature of some theories and perspectives means that they lack the capacity for straightforward translation into practice. As a consequence, models of practice have emerged from theoretical ideas. These function as bridges between broader theoretical ideas and intervention strategies used in daily practice. For example, empowerment perspectives (see Chapter 8) do not provide a tractable practice pathway, yet the family group conference is a good example of a practice model that can trace its roots to the empowerment tradition. This is an example of a practice model that has emerged from theoretical concepts and ideas. When theory, knowledge and practice come together in this way, the result becomes part of a rich and continually evolving intellectual tradition within social work.

Throughout this book, we have explored the ways in which we bring theory to our practice as social workers. This process is a complex and continuing one. As theoretical understandings change and develop over time, and as service systems change, we develop our understandings, practice wisdom and insights. Social work as a profession has been strong in emphasising both the need for more formalised reflective practice and the opportunities that social work supervision presents to consider how practice can be improved through processes of critical reflection. In this chapter, we look at the skills involved in critical reflection and how social work as a profession benefits from engaging in reflective and reflexive, theoretically informed practice. So, we explore the elements of successful supervisory relationships, as well as some ways of thinking about supervision within the client, worker, agency and community system. Then we return to the importance of the cultural lens in supervision – ensuring culturally responsive supervisory practices as one vital way of supporting optimal practice.