Islam and Social Work

Culturally Sensitive Practice in a Diverse World

Crabtree, Sara Ashencaen, Husain, Fatima, Sara Ashencaen Crabtree, Fatima Husain, Basia Spalek

• Publisher: Policy Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781447330103
• Edition: 2
• eBook ISBN:
  9781447330110
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Islamic Theology
• Index: Social Sciences

This unique textbook enables social work practitioners to gain a deeper understanding of how Islamic principles inform and influence the lives of Muslim populations.

Designed to support work with families and faith communities, this completely revised and updated edition examines religious precepts, cosmologies, philosophies and daily practices, while acknowledging cultural variants and population heterogeneity. It includes a comprehensive update of the research literature, international case studies, and new sections on religious extremism and ageing and end-of-life.

This is the only book specifically on social work with Muslim communities and provides an essential toolkit for culturally sensitive social work practice.

NINE

Concluding remarks

Reflecting on the journey

Since the first edition of this book the geo-political context has shifted markedly with many seismic changes shaping ‘glocal’¹ balances of power. This second edition, like the first, has been a culmination of an ambitious undertaking in attempting to offer a comprehensive introduction to social work and Islam for practitioners, students and academics. The scope of the book is therefore deliberately and of necessity wide. Our authorial intention, however, has been to grapple and problematise issues and in so doing to avoid the easier task of offering an anaemic and anodyne account that remains at a superficial level in arguing for the ‘oughts’ rather than tackling what ‘is’.

The central purpose of the book has been an attempt to expand on many of the assumptions and stereotypes that underpin the way Islam and Muslims are perceived in a transitional and challenging post-9/11 culture. A further aim has been to highlight both the conspicuous and, sometimes, less evident needs of Muslim individuals, families and communities in familiar contexts as well as across less familiar international settings. Throughout the book we have attempted to avoid parochialism and short-term, localised policy shifts of limited duration, in order to obtain a deeper understanding of and traction with international policy trends, arguably of greater utility to social work as a global, multicultural and multifaith profession.

In this objective we have been aided by nothing short of a quiet revolution of academic interest in a topic area that was once considered highly obscure. Today there is a growing body of useful research literature on social work and Islam seeking to inform social work practice, much of which is distilled in this volume, in addition to our own research among and interdisciplinary practice with Muslim service users and client groups.

Revisiting the terrain

In revisiting the first edition of Islam and Social Work we have been struck by how much has changed globally, although at the local, national levels some aspects, particularly perhaps socio-economic and educational factors, insufficient change has been seen. However, what is apparent is that the perception of ‘Islam’ has undergone a number of reconstructions, where a ‘political Islam’, a ‘violent Islam’ and a ‘religious Islam’ can be discerned, all of which carry numerous implications, as well as potential and possibilities.

Political Islam encompasses the civic and social participation of Muslims within society and across ethnicity, gender and class. It has a crucial task to play in terms of issues relating to identity, citizenship, democratic values and the multicultural agenda, which is often seen as increasingly in jeopardy in Europe. Mutual antagonism across sectors of society tend to drown out the more subdued voices of moderate, law-abiding Muslim citizens, although their views are vital in modifying extremist views and mediating across divisions in society. Where advocacy, partnership and negotiation is weak, the repercussions will be felt by vulnerable and impressionable members of society, as the following indicates: ‘For some youths, the measure of their faith is proportionate to their rejection of the west, as if they defined Islam by what it is not, rather than what it is’ (Irfan Cole, 2004, p 119).

Commensurately, Islam as a terrorist scourge poses an international threat to democratic nations and those national groups trying to recreate new political social orders that are not premised on corruption and tyranny. In this respect ‘violent Islam’ is, as King Abdullah of Jordan observes, a clear threat to political Islam, in promoting a dangerously homogenising, extremist Islamist discourse that runs counter to building diverse, peaceful and egalitarian civic societies.

Finally, ‘religious Islam’ forms the last point of this unstable triangle. Owing to the marginalisation of many Islamic denominations through the rise of hegemonistic religious interpretations and in conjunction with ideological Islamist aggression, keeping the candle of Islam burning as a gentle religion of peace and tolerance is increasingly eclipsed by Islam as a notionally terrifying and chaotic conflagration of neo-medieval violence. Daesh’s bloody crusade to establish a new ‘caliphate’ based on fanatically fundamental religious interpretations, exemplifies this implosion of religio-political ideologies.

Thus Islam’s celebrated, seamless holism can be viewed as either a cradle of potential that seeks to enhance and affirm the social, civic and spiritual wellbeing of all citizens in modern societies – or as a crucible of destruction in peddling values and beliefs that demonise and damn all but a very few. Although certainly demonising of the ‘other’ is by no means the prerogative and vice of Muslims, many of whom who would claim with much justification, that they above all are on the receiving end of such prejudice.

As we stated in Chapter Two, since the first edition, ‘Islam’ and ‘the west’ have moved further towards positioning themselves as huge monoliths of oppositional power locked in continual historical combat. This flies in the face of historical evidence, any conception of civil society and plain common sense. We live and work with Muslims, we teach and are taught by Muslims, we care for and are cared by Muslims, many of us are Muslims – more than this, we all belong to one human family, and for those readers of faith, we are all simply God’s fallible and often frighteningly foolish, children – whatever one’s name or understanding is of that overarching, omniscient, omnipotent, universal power.

Acknowledging faith

The ‘post-secular’ age (Crisp, 2010) demands that as practitioners we engage fully with the spiritual and religious meanings of not only service users/clients but also of those with whom we work – our colleagues – and perhaps even more critically to our personal and professional self-development, that of the transcendent which lies within ourselves. Beckett and Maynard (2005) suggest that Neil Thompson’s original PCS model (personal/psychological, cultural/commonalities and structural/social) (Thompson, 1993) remains a useful vehicle to explore more fully the role of faith in the lives of clients. However, they also note the inherent tension of religion in that it may lead to resilience, as well as to inflexibility; to cohesion, as well as to exclusion and exclusiveness. As we have also seen, religious interpretations can be used to uphold damaging cultural norms and attitudes that oppress vulnerable groups within faith communities.

Taking due account of faith is essential in social work intervention with clients, which spiritually and functionally provides a critical resource of strength and solace to draw from. Faith thereby is an asset that should be valued and used by practitioners in developing their strengths-based practice. To fail to fully address faith and spirituality where that is important to individuals, or to view it as a mere ‘bolt-on’ to a social work assessment of need that focuses primarily on all other aspects of the psychosocial and physical, is not merely negligent and ignorant, it is nothing less than oppressive practice.

Future directions

Over the years many of the gaps in practice knowledge that we highlighted in the first edition are beginning to be excavated. The implications and impact of poor health and low socio-economic status for many first- and second-generation immigrant Muslims, along with ageing factors, obviously requires further elucidation and theorisation. The abuse of girls and young women in local communities is an extremely worrying situation that demands further attention. While questions of citizenship, multiculturalism, social inclusion and identity increasingly bedevil social commentators, politicians and the general public that must be opened for debate.

What emerges strongly from a theorised understanding of Islam, however, is the compatibility of social work with Islamic principles and evolving concepts. Thus the rise of research and discursive literature in this area is greatly to be welcomed in informing the profession. In 2008 we concluded the first edition by anticipating that the expertise of a new and larger generation of Muslim social workers would be able to make a very important contribution to social work. We repeat now that it is no exaggeration to say that their knowledge and professional collaboration have never before been so urgently needed.

Note

¹ ‘Glocal’ refers to the impact and influences of global and local phenomena upon each other.

References

Abdel Haleem, M.A.S. (2001) ‘The blind and the Qur’an’, Journal of Qur’anic Studies/Majallat al-Dirasat al-Qur’anya, 3(2): 123–5.

Abdullah, S. (2016) ‘Kinship care and older persons: An Islamic perspective’, International Social Work, 59(3): 381–92.

Aboulgar, M. (2006) ‘Ethical aspects and regulation of assisted reproduction in the Arabic-speaking world’, Ethics, Law and Moral Philosophy of Reproductive Biomedicine, 2(1): 143–6.

Aboulhassan, N.M. and Abdel-Ghany, T.M. (2012) ‘The impact of urbanization and globalization in social welfare policies in Egypt: A critical analysis’, in S. Ashencaen Crabtree, J. Parker and A. Az...

Table of contents

• Coverpage
• Title page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of case studies, figures and tables
• Acknowledgements
• one: Introduction
• two: The Muslim ummah: context and concepts
• three: Social work education and Islam
• four: Gender relations and the centrality of the family
• five: Working with families
• six: Muslim families and health
• seven: Ageing and end of life
• eight: Muslim communities, crime, victimisation and criminal justice
• nine: Concluding remarks