International Social Work 52(3): 287–298

i s w
Sage Publications: Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore and Washington DC
DOI: 10.1177/0020872808102064

Social work as a moral and political

practice

William C.K. Chu, Ming-sum Tsui and Miu-chung Yan

In July 2001, the International Association of Schools of Social Work

(IASSW) and the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW)
jointly agreed to adopt an international definition of social work, which
contains the statement: ‘Principles of human rights and social justice
are fundamental to social work.’ The definition, which was incorpo-
rated into the Global Standards for the Education and Training of the
Social Work Profession in 2004 (Sewpaul and Jones, 2004), has gener-
ated a heated debate about the extent to which social work principles
are universal (Gray, 2005; Gray and Fook, 2004; Sewpaul and Jones,
2004).
The Global Standards represent an attempt to reclaim the moral and
political aspects of professional social work practice. The principles
of human rights and social justice are clearly regarded as fundamental
to the practice of social work. Social justice is pursued by challenging
societal barriers, inequalities and injustices; facilitating the inclusion
of marginalized and at-risk groups; promoting human rights; advo-
cating changes in policies and structural conditions that allow peo-
ple to remain in vulnerable positions; and encouraging a respect for
diversity. Social workers must engage in social and political actions
to improve social policy and economic development and to eliminate
inequalities. In the pursuit of social justice, the social work profession
has inevitably engaged in activities that have had an impact on the

Key words moral political practice social work

288 International Social Work volume 52(3)

political system and on the processes of local government (Reisch,

2002).
Important as social justice is to the core purposes of social work, its
pursuit would be incomplete without a concomitant commitment to the
enhancement of people’s well-being and problem-solving capacities
(Sewpaul and Jones, 2004). The quest for social justice must be under-
taken hand in hand with the quest for individual well-being, societal
harmony and mutual respect.
To achieve these goals, the social worker must become a critically
self-reflective practitioner, whose actions convey the values of the
social work profession. Social workers must take into account the rela-
tionship between personal value systems and social work practice. It
would be hypocritical for practitioners to view their clients as a product
of various factors but not consider the ways in which they, themselves,
have been affected. The stipulations of the Global Standards draw atten-
tion to the special nature of social work practice and its demands on its
practitioners.
Social justice is not just a political issue, it is also a moral issue.
Many scholars (Habermas, 1999; Rawls, 1971) have drawn attention
to this fact. The moral dimension of social justice is also recognized
in the international definition, which links social justice with human
rights, which are largely grounded in moral consensus (George, 1999).
To pursue social justice is therefore a moral responsibility of the social
work profession (Reid and Popple, 1992; Specht and Courtney, 1994;
Whan, 1986).
The Global Standards emphasize the moral and political nature of
social work practice by upholding social justice as a fundamental
principle. However, despite the fact that social justice is a primary
concern, there has been little discussion of the moral and political
character of social work. While upholding social justice theoretically,
the social work profession in many Western countries has been strug-
gling with the withering of political bases. There is a risk of collective
amnesia in the social work profession, resulting in a repression of its
critical and political nature. The realization of social work values in
professional practice cannot be achieved programmatically in a disen-
gaged manner: it requires an integration of personal and professional
values on the part of the practitioner. The integrity of the individual
practitioner must be ensured before the realization of values is pos-
sible. Social justice must be contextualized and take into account the
related goals of social harmony, stability, human rights and individual
well-being.
 Chu et al.: Moral and political practice 289

The moral basis of socially just practice

It is an inherent concern for a client’s well-being, coupled with
commitment to social justice, which elevates social work to the posi-
tion of a humanistic service profession. Setting human dignity, human
rights and social justice as its highest priorities, social work is a profes-
sion characterized by putting humanistic values into practice. Human-
ism informs the working principles of social work intervention (Clark,
2006) and its goal, which is helping clients to solve their problems and
retain their dignity. The seven principles of social casework proposed by
Biestek (1957) – acceptance, non-judgemental attitudes, confidentiality,
purposeful expression of feelings, individualization, self-determination
and controlled emotional involvement – are direct expressions of these
humanistic values.
Whan (1986) asserts that the relationship between social workers and
their clients is a kind of practical moral involvement, which implies
that the personal and the professional spheres, though conceptually
separate, merge in actual practice. The two spheres are mutually con-
stituted and enriched, and dialectically related to each other. This is
because social work intervention is inevitably concerned with under-
standing the sources of clients’ sense of well-being and their suffering.
To understand clients’ problems and find solutions requires not only
technical expertise but also ethical awareness. Social workers must
confer with clients to determine what is truly good for them; this is
an intersubjective process that involves critical self-reflection on the
part of the practitioner, who must interpret the situation correctly and
choose the appropriate response from many alternatives (Yan, 2005) in
order to avoid the imposition of outside values.
To interpret the client’s situation correctly involves much more than
the implementation of a practice theory. As Taylor and White (2001)
note, making judgments is inevitable in social work practice. These
judgments do not rely merely on formal knowledge. They are also
based on a wide range of rationales and evidence, as well as intuitions.
Most crucially, they rely on moral attitudes about what is good and bad,
what is socially acceptable and unacceptable, and who is responsible for
a particular situation. As Habermas (1984) suggests, the moral claims
of goodness require a form of communicative reasoning that is beyond
instrumental considerations. The moral knowledge of what constitutes
‘the good’ for clients, according to an understanding of clients’ values,
is as important as practical knowledge, if not more so. The acquisition
of moral knowledge must be undertaken in a dialogical spirit: client
and worker must act on the basis of shared beliefs (Whan, 1986). Social
290 International Social Work volume 52(3)

workers must abide by their own moral code. How they can do so
without domination and imposition, particularly when a client’s values
differ, is an issue that requires serious attention.
To take a moral approach to social work, its practitioners must bear
in mind the following questions: How can we reach an agreement with
our clients on their history and feelings? How have our own social
positions, cultural traditions, ideologies, values and beliefs distorted
our mutual understanding? How do the larger organizational and social
contexts of our relationships with our clients limit our understanding
of each other and hence the implications of our actions? And, finally,
when we have achieved a shared understanding, how do we ensure that
our intervention is not only a product of this understanding but also
socially just? The Global Standards are relevant here. The principles
upheld in the Standards reflect the dual role of social work: to pursue
social justice and to safeguard individual well-being. In order to bal-
ance these concerns, the social worker must bear in mind the effects of
the socio-political and cultural context.
To answer the questions listed above requires both technical exper-
tise and a moral appreciation of what constitutes ‘the good’ for a partic-
ular client in an individual and collective context. This appreciation is
acquired through a process of dialogue and critical self-reflection. The
claims of personal well-being must be balanced against those of social
justice. Goals must be pursued not only on an individual basis but in a
collective context in which social harmony and stability are given due
consideration without sacrificing human rights and individual well-
being. Social workers need a dynamic and deep understanding of their
clients’ unique problems, rather than general guidelines. A humanis-
tic moral practice demands more than detached cognitive engagement.
It will not leave the practitioner untouched. It requires social workers
to be empathetic sharers in human suffering, to be capable of putting
themselves in another’s position, and to communicate with compas-
sion. Social workers must view their clients and their selves as whole
people with souls, minds and lives that are situated in specific con-
texts and histories, as both individuals and communal beings. With a
holistic and engaged understanding, social workers are more likely to
identify with their clients’ predicaments. Such an understanding can-
not exist separately from critical self-reflection, moral consciousness,
and responsiveness (Taylor and White, 2001). Social work practice
is distinguished from other professional practices because it is deeply
embedded in humanistic values. Social work practitioners cannot be
technocrats, they must be moral actors.
 Chu et al.: Moral and political practice 291

Critical self-reflection enables social workers to pursue an appropriate

balance between professional values and their clients’ personal moral-
ity. It takes into account the claims of individual well-being, human
rights, social harmony and community interests. The adoption of an
attitude of critical self-reflection serves at least two purposes. First,
practitioners are more aware of how their prejudices and assumptions
have limited their understanding of their clients’ systems of values.
They can comprehend the process by which their clients have devel-
oped their idiosyncratic world view. As the Global Standards recog-
nize, practitioners must develop a critical understanding of how their
traditions, culture and beliefs influence their attitudes, and how these
factors encourage and restrict growth and development. If a practitioner
engages in a dialogic process, the reflexivity developed between client
and practitioner is likely to result in a shared understanding of ‘the
good’ of the client. Social work as a moral practice not only involves a
revision of the practitioner’s frame of reference but the convergence of
social work values and personal value systems (see Section 4.2.2 of the
Global Standards, Domain of the Social Worker). Second, critical self-
reflection, which takes into account the role of socio-structural deter-
minants, individual context and cultural factors in constituting human
behaviour, provides a larger perspective for the interpretation of indi-
vidual phenomena. This perspective will prevent the practitioner from
reductively individualizing, trivializing or depoliticizing any personal
phenomenon. In this way, the moral and the political natures of social
work practice are inextricably connected.
The recognition of this fact does not negate the importance of practice
theories and techniques. In fact, it encourages us to acknowledge that
these theories and techniques are themselves informed by moral world
views. Values, ideologies, and assumptions about the nature of soci-
ety and human beings are embedded in social work theories and skills
(Howe, 1992). Adopting certain theories inevitably implicates us in the
substantiation of certain world views. In this sense, social work practice
cannot be divorced from moral practice. Whether social workers are
aware of it or not, attitudes about the world are, at least implicitly, put
into practice in the course of professional interventions.
A moral practice requires practitioners to be actively engaged in
expressing their own values and integrating their personal and pro-
fessional selves. It would be hypocritical if social workers displayed
one set of moral principles professionally and another privately. Such
hypocrisy would be personally damaging and would also compromise
their relationship with clients. If social work is a two-way process
(Yan, 2005), social workers are inevitably affected by their clients.
292 International Social Work volume 52(3)

To understand their client’s story, social workers often must acquire

a new perspective. This involves a hermeneutical dialogue between
two sets of cultural values, traditions and personal experiences – the
practitioner’s and the client’s (Yan and Wong, 2005). Engaging with
the moral framework of clients forces social workers to undergo self-
reflection and self-criticism (Miehls and Moffatt, 2000). As a result,
their frames of reference are challenged, broadened, refined, redefined
and reconstructed. Social work practice is inevitably a moral practice
because the practitioner’s own moral standard must be challenged in
order to treat the client’s views with the respect they deserve. Social
work practice does not just possess a moral dimension; it is basically
moral in nature. Social workers must embody the humanistic values of
their profession. They cannot be racist or prejudiced. They should be
tolerant of diversity, open to new experiences, humble enough to accept
their own ignorance and willing to learn from those they serve. If they
do not have these qualities, they run the risk of losing their integrity
by acting against their own principles or imposing values on reluctant
clients.

The political basis of social work practice

Social work is also inevitably political because, in order to uphold
humanistic values in a capitalist society, social workers must participate
in social advocacy and promote reforms that will challenge the existing
power balance, resource distribution and domination of the oppressed.
As Hartman (1993) contends, social work is always a form of politi-
cal practice. As the early history of social work reveals, many social
work leaders were also social activists and advocates. Bertha Reynolds
and Jane Addams, for example, were both high-profile social activ-
ists. Reynolds was the spiritual leader of a radical movement. Addams
almost lost her licence to practise social work because of her opposition
to the overwhelming influence of psychiatry on social work, which, she
felt, deflected the focus of the profession from its primary goal: social
justice (Addams, 1926).
To serve marginal groups is the mandate of social workers: prac-
titioners’ concern for social justice and their role as advocate natu-
rally lead to political actions, in both a specific and a general sense.
As Reisch (2002: 351) observes, the social work profession inevitably
challenges ‘prevailing assumptions about power, privilege, and various
forms of oppression in the theories that underlie current policies, pro-
grams, and practice methods’. Advocacy, the empowerment of clients,
 Chu et al.: Moral and political practice 293

the evaluation of social policies and the mobilization of marginalized

groups are legitimate ways to achieve the aims of social work.
The political involvement of social workers is evident at two levels.
Narrowly understood, it can be seen in protests against government
policies that impinge on clients’ rights. This political activity involves
the promotion of goals that redefine the relationship between the
people and the government. Throughout the world, social work has
always been a vehicle of social justice. Following the path of social
work pioneers, many practitioners engage in political activities in
their local communities. Many professional organizations have issued
statements and organized their members to speak out against unjust
policies and practices. Human dignity, social justice, freedom and
equality are strenuously protected and pursued. It is these preoccu-
pations that give social work a political dimension that is absent in
many other professions.
In a broader sense, political actions include any interventions that
involve correcting power imbalances. Even family and individual
counselling is basically a political practice since it often addresses the
exercise and distribution of power, affirms or revokes prevalent ide-
ologies or social orders, and re-examines assumptions. In this sense,
‘the personal is political’ (Hanisch, 1971). Social work is a means of
raising political consciousness. Simpkin (1983) asserts that many social
problems stem from the unequal distribution of wealth and from institu-
tional injustices, inequalities that cannot be resolved by the provisions
of social services alone. These issues must be dealt with in a wider
political context.
Social workers tend to respond to social injustice in two ways. Some
follow the ecological model, systems theory or functional school.
They intervene through active research (DePoy et al., 1999). They try
to resolve social problems through data collection and present their
findings to policy-makers in the hope that their suggestions will be
implemented. They work within the political structure. Others pursue
‘structural social work’ (Mullay, 1997). They mobilize their clients
and accept the role of social critic as part of their duties. They per-
ceive social work as an unambiguously political practice. It is undeni-
able that our practice arose from such a cultural tradition. The example
of our predecessors shows that concern for individual well-being has
always been closely integrated with social justice. For social workers,
it is not only the case that the personal is political; the professional is
political (Hartman, 1993) as well. Social workers are both moral actors
with political agency and political actors with moral agency.
294 International Social Work volume 52(3)

The withering moral and political bases of social work

Although social justice is the basic principle of social work in the
international arena, we contend that the moral and political bases of
social work in many developed countries are being threatened. We will
focus on current debates in the USA and the UK because the devel-
opment of the social work profession in these two countries has had a
profound impact on the practices of many developing countries. The
therapeutic perspective on social work adopted in the USA has caused
ongoing debates about the mission of social work (Specht and Courtney,
1994; Yan and Tsui, 2007). It has been predicted that social work will
cease to be solely committed to the poor and disadvantaged, and extend
its scope to include the middle class (Ehrenreich, 1985). On the one
hand, the therapeutic focus has accelerated the professionalization of
the field, a dream of social workers since Flexner ([1915] 2001) dis-
missed social work from the rank of professions. On the other hand,
it has moved the social work profession so far away from its original
mission that American social workers are running the risk of becoming
‘unfaithful angels’ (Specht and Courtney, 1994). Although some clinical
social work scholars have tried to reconcile therapeutic work with social
justice (Sachs and Newdom, 1999; Swenson, 1998), it has been argued
that social work in the USA has abandoned its role as an advocate for
humanitarianism and social justice (Specht and Courtney, 1994).
Across the Atlantic, social workers in the UK face another form of
alienation from their moral and political bases. The re-emergence and
growing dominance of conservatism, economic rationalism and man-
agerialism have created an atmosphere that is not conducive to the
authentic practice of social work (Tsui and Cheung, 2004). While still
recovering from the Thatcher regime, the social work profession has
been plagued by the new managerialism, a technocratic micro-practice
with an overwhelming focus on outcome – promoted by New Labour.
A vicious cycle has been generated: tightened resources have led to
tremendous pressures on frontline social workers, who already carry a
very heavy workload; cost-saving measures have led to doubts about
the profession’s effectiveness and efficiency; the negative perception of
social work has led to further cuts in funding, which, of course, in turn,
further affects service quality.
Many scholars deplore the replacement of moral and political ideals
with administrative and therapeutic agendas which have distanced
the social work profession from its humanitarian mission (Mohan,
1995; Specht and Courtney, 1994; Tsui et al., 2004). Without criti-
cal reflection, social workers are running the risk of becoming merely
 Chu et al.: Moral and political practice 295

human-service technocrats (Tsui and Cheung, 2004) or, as Epstein

(1999) contends, cheap therapists whose primary concern is value-for-
money solutions to the problem of human suffering.
The technocratic rhetoric of the new managerialism emphasizes
evidence-based practice and outcome evaluation, which rely on mea-
surements of instrumentality. Pursuing professionalization, social work
has adopted the positivistic paradigm of the physical sciences (Witkin,
2001). Knowledge developed on the basis of this paradigm, however,
has deficiencies (Schon, 1983). An over-emphasis on scientific ration-
ality has changed the nature of the core activities of social work. Deep
understanding has been replaced by one-shot assessment and diagnosis.
The new approach emphasizes the technical application of procedures
but runs the risk of trivializing, or even ignoring, the moral and politi-
cal nature of practice. The positivistic epistemology of professional
expertise may only widen the gap between theory and practice (Fook,
2002; Schon, 1983). Meanwhile, the political activism of social work
practice has been subjugated to the managerial accountability and cost-
effectiveness pressures exerted by budget cuts. The professionalization
of social work in the USA has been accompanied by a depoliticization
process (Wenocur and Reisch, 1989). We argue that the therapeutic and
new managerial developments in the USA and the UK, respectively,
have led to the weakening of the moral and political grounds of the
social work profession in many developed countries.

Implications of and for Global Standards

As the Global Standards affirm, social justice is a mandate for social
work professions throughout the world. However, as we have argued in
this article, without re-engagement with the moral and political bases of
social work practice, this mandate may be just another rhetorical banner
that does not reflect the dominant trends. The universality of Western
social work should be subjected to critical scrutiny for internal consis-
tency and external transferability.
So far most discussions of the Global Standards have focused on
the external transferability of Western social work values, knowledge
and skills. Little attention has been paid to its internal consistency
(Tsang and Yan, 2001). Examining the issues that are currently being
debated in social work literature in the USA, Yan and Tsui (2007)
have noted the internal inconsistency of the knowledge base and pro-
fessional mandate. Likewise, a brief glance at the social work litera-
ture in English points to the tentative conclusion that, as a result of
the withering of moral and political bases, the actualization of social
296 International Social Work volume 52(3)

justice as a basic principle of social work practice in some developed

countries is threatened.
We, however, have not concluded that social justice is no longer
important to the social work profession or that it should be absent
from the Global Standards. On the contrary, we believe that it is still
the highest principle of our humanitarian profession. However, we also
believe that our colleagues in the West can no longer assume that social
justice is the guiding social work principle in their own countries; they
must recognize that the withering of the moral and political bases of
their practice is leading to the neglect of the claims of social justice. It
is important for social workers in the West to provide examples of how
to promote social justice for colleagues in countries where it may be
non-existent.
Although we have no intention of undermining the ideals expressed
by the Global Standards, we do want to point out that, like many philo-
sophical concepts, social justice is open to interpretation, particularly
because of its inherently moral and political nature. To put social jus-
tice into practice, the social work profession must examine its own
moral and political bases. Moreover, the articulation and realization
of moral and political bases of social work practice need to be under-
stood within their particular socio-politico-cultural context.

Conclusion
We have tried to convey the urgent need for international social work
bodies to re-examine the moral and political bases of social work prac-
tice because we have witnessed them withering in developed countries
in the West. As these countries have served as our reference, we need
to re-evaluate the current scene. Social justice and human dignity are
two core values of social work, which we neglect at our peril.
Our counterparts in the USA and the UK have eroded their value
bases by developing therapeutic and managerial orientations. Although
the interpretation of the core value of social justice may vary as a result
of the cultural context, we still maintain that, if social work is going to
honour its historical mission, we have to reclaim its moral and political
bases.

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William C.K. Chu is Assistant Professor in the Department of Applied Social

Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon,
Hong Kong. [email: ssckchu@inet.polyu.edu.hk]
Ming-sum Tsui, to whom correspondence should be addressed, is Professor
of Social Work in the Department of Applied Social Sciences, The Hong Kong
Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong.
[email: ssmstsui@polyu.edu.hk]
Miu-chung Yan is Associate Professor in the School of Social Work, University
of British Columbia, Jack Bell Building, 2080 West Mall, Vancouver BC, V6T 1Z2,
Canada. [email: miu.yan@ubc.ca]