Macro Social Work Practice

Advocacy in Action

Carolyn J. Tice, Dennis D. Long, Lisa E. Cox

• Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781506388397
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Work
• Index: Social Sciences

Empower your students to become advocates for change. Macro Social Work Practice: Advocacy in Action shows students studying in macro social work practice how to enact change at the organizational, community, societal, and global levels. An emphasis is placed on engaging in macro practice using the tenets of the award-winning author team's Advocacy Policy and Practice Model (APPM) that highlight the inclusion of economic and social justice, supportive environment, human needs and rights, and political access. Beginning with a history of macro practice and continuing with contemporary issues facing social workers, this new text helps readers learn how to enact advocacy, informed by key orientations and perspectives and grounded in timely and relevant examples and causes. FREE DIGITAL TOOLS INCLUDED WITH THIS TEXT SAGE edge gives instructors and students the edge they need to succeed with an array of teaching and learning tools in one easy-to-navigate website. Learn more: edge.sagepub.com/ticemacro

1 A Historical Perspective of Macro Practice and Advocacy

Learning Objectives

After reading this chapter, you should be able to:

1. Define macro practice and explain its meaning to social work practice
2. Describe the historical context of macro practice
3. Understand the unique contributions of macro practice
4. Define the social work values of macro practice
5. Connect macro practice with advocacy and empowerment

Liam Develops a Community-Based Reading Program

Liam is a community development coordinator in southern West Virginia. In this role, Liam was responsible for collaborating with consumers and community stakeholders to ensure their needs and wants were addressed. This required interpersonal skills, analysis, critical thinking, concise writing, data gathering and analysis, and attention to details. In response to consumers, Liam planned a community-wide effort, and after-school district data revealed that 75% of the county’s elementary school students were reading below grade level. Relying on his social work skills, Liam collaborated with public school teachers, child welfare social workers, and parents to organize a community-based reading program for elementary school children.

Throughout the program’s development, Liam worked closely with his advisory board to ensure that they were well informed on the project status. He also developed a network of funders associated with local businesses and the faith-based community. Throughout his project interactions, Liam demonstrated an array of skills associated with macro practice: community organizing, community development, planning, administration, financial management, analytical thinking, and grant writing. For example, he organized a breakfast for funders and created a list of possible fundraising activities with people assuming responsibilities for the various activities. He followed up by writing an article for the local newspaper that described the fundraising projects and solicited additional support from the community.

Liam’s personal qualities also enhanced his work with others on the reading program. Specifically, Liam’s program collaborators described him as energetic, committed, humorous, persistent, and motivated. Liam’s activities demonstrated an array of skills that blended interpersonal interactions with his ability to analyze need, gather resources, and articulate goals.

What Is Macro Practice?

Although Liam’s work on the reading program demonstrates an array of macro-related social work skills, you may still be grappling with the question, “What is macro practice?” Indeed, practitioners and educators often differ when asked to define macro social work practice. If you were to ask the instructors in your program for their definition, you might be surprised at the variety of responses. Definitions would most likely vary depending on the era of the social worker’s professional education, the program from which he or she graduated, and his or her practice experiences (Hill, Erickson, Donaldson, Fogel, & Ferguson, 2017).

For many social workers educated in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, the term macro practice probably still seems somewhat foreign. These social workers are more familiar with the notions of social casework (Perlman, 1957), environmental work (Hollis, 1972), innovation and change with organizations and communities (Rothman, Erlich, & Teresa, 1976), social welfare administration and research (Friedlander, 1976), and group work for social reform (Roberts & Northen, 1976). It would not be unusual for social workers of this era to perceive macro social work in terms of community organization, administration, research, or policy development. Much of this same language continues to be used today, as social workers have a propensity to define macro practice in terms of the roles they enact or the functions they perform (Reisch, 2016).

Time to Think 1.1

Macro social workers often enact several roles. In nonprofit organizations, like the Red Cross or a social service agency, they are often organization leaders responsible for staff, volunteer, and financial management. They are also community organizers who form movements or groups to challenge social issues like the opioid crisis or the need for adequate community-based mental health services. Advocacy is often the foundation of macro social work. Such advocacy can range from mobilizing groups around concerns, like environmental justice, or a particular policy that will affect a vulnerable population. Embedded in all advocacy action are themes of human rights and social, economic, and environmental justice. How do your academic strengths and professional interests complement the roles of macro practice?

What Does Macro Social Work Practice Mean?

Macro means large-scale or big. In social work, it involves the ability to see and intervene in the big picture, specifically with larger systems in the socioeconomic environment. Macro social work practice can include collaboration with consumers of services to strengthen and maximize opportunities for people at the organizational, community, societal, and global levels. Some social workers would argue that it is the macro level—the attention given by social workers to the big social issues of importance to consumers—that distinguishes social work from other helping professions (Glisson, 1994).

Historically, another term that has been used to describe macro social work practice is indirect work. Although this term is becoming less popular, the word indirect served for many years as a reference to social work’s commitment to environmental modification and the alleviation of social problems. Whereas direct practice connoted face-to-face contact with clients aimed at supporting or strengthening them as individuals, indirect practice was the catchphrase for change efforts involving the environment and the social welfare system (Pierce, 1989, p. 167). Although schools of social work note that there is a growing trend toward direct practice, the need for indirect or macro practice is persistent, especially in light of policy analysis and development, income distribution, community building, and political organizing.

For many other social workers, the macro in macro practice is synonymous with community organizing. Rothman (1964, 1974, 1995) provides the social work profession with a pointed conceptualization of large-scale change that emphasizes three basic modes: locality development, social planning, and social action. As summarized by Weil (1996), locality development focuses on community capacity building and the role of social workers in engaging citizens in determining and resolving community-based issues. Social planning refers to the use of a rational problem-solving strategy aimed at combating community problems. Social workers use their knowledge and skills in research, assessment, and program implementation as they work with clients to identify logical steps and means of addressing community problems. Social action references the ability of social workers and consumers of services to confront and change power relationships and the structure and function of important social institutions in communities.

Photo 1.1 Social justice brings the people of the world together.

©iStockphoto.com/CherriesJD

As can be seen, the term macro has several connotations, both general and specific. In this text, preference is given to the term macro social work practice. Indirect practice is often viewed as a nebulous, uncelebrated term in social work (Johnson, 1999), but conceptualizing macro practice primarily in terms of community organizing is limiting. Macro social work practice is more specific, suggesting the importance of strengthening higher order social systems—organizations, communities, and societies. Thus, macro social work practice changes conditions in environments and addresses community issues through the empowerment of consumers. This action often involves conflict resolution, organizational change, power redistribution where consumers are decision makers, public education, and building on existing strengths in individuals and the communities where they live.

The Historical Context of Macro Practice

Throughout the years, social work practice has been concerned with promoting social reform and social justice to advance the well-being of people. Some of the first writings associated with the profession of social work provide insight into the importance of affecting larger structural issues in the lives of consumers. As a student of social work, take some time to acquaint yourself with some of the influential writers in the field—the “ghosts” of social work past. Take time to review the contributions of historic social workers such as Jane Addams, Mary Ellen Richmond, Frances Perkins, Dorothy Height, and George Haynes. There is no substitute for reading the original words and impressions of these great authors and innovators.

Be forewarned that the following historical overview emphasizes social determinism. There is an underlying assumption about the importance of social forces (such as historical occurrences, political climate, and economic circumstances) in affecting people’s desire and ability to engage in large-scale social change. Such an outlook is useful for ascertaining the various factors involved in helping to shape and better understanding the methods and forms of macro social work practice over the past century.

The Progressive Era: Mary Richmond

Mary Richmond (1861–1928) is often described as one of the eminent founders of social work. In Social Diagnosis (1917), Richmond describes social work as consisting of a common body of knowledge based on collecting and understanding information, especially social evidence. Richmond was one of the first social workers to advocate for a more comprehensive method of inquiry and intervention, including a “wider view of self” (p. 368). Such an approach embraced an analysis of various forms of human relations, consideration of the social situation and surroundings, inquiries concerning social agencies, and an appreciation of economic conditions and neighborhood improvement (pp. 369–370).

While acknowledging that a majority of social workers at the turn of the 20th century engaged in casework, aimed at “the betterment of individuals and families,” Richmond clearly recognized the need for “betterment of the mass” (p. 25). But what is meant by betterment? The term implies strengthening, improving—making “better off.” At a very early stage in the development of our profession, Richmond acknowledges, “Mass betterment and individual betterment are interdependent,” with the need for “social reform and social case work of necessity progressing together” (p. 25).

For Richmond, the movement from a focus on the individual to an emphasis on social concerns was directly attributable to the influence of the charity organizations. New methods emphasizing “social” diagnosis or the problems and issues associated with life conditions and living circumstances were born from campaigns by a number of social activists working to improve housing, promote child labor reform, and prevent the spread of diseases like tuberculosis. Richmond notes that in charity organizations, “some of [the] earliest leaders had grasped the idea of the sympathetic study of the individual in his [or her] social environment” (p. 32). Undoubtedly, as social activists worked to strengthen opportunities and economic means for their consumers of services, casework “had at its command more varied resources, adaptable to individual situations.” As a consequence, “the diagnosis of those situations assumed [a] fresh [and broader] importance” (p. 32).

Mary Richmond is one of the best-known leaders of the Charity Organization Society (COS) movement, which was grounded in convictions derived from England. Leaders of the COS often “believed that many poor people were unworthy, so that applicants for aid should be carefully investigated. Records were to be kept about each case, and a central registry was developed to ensure that no person received aid from more than one source” (Suppes & Wells, 2003, p. 87). These written records eventually became important sources of documentation for use in advocating for social change and reform. Many would argue that these early efforts to advocate for reform on the basis of documented human need constituted the beginning of community welfare planning in the United States and eventually gave rise to what we now know as the community-based United Way system.

Photo 1.2 Recognition is given to Mary Richmond for her contribution to the social work profession.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print

The relationship between human need, casework, and social reform is an interesting and profound theme when we consider the emergence of macro social work practice. Richmond was astute in advancing the argument that necessity, as evidenced by human struggle, was a driving force for social reform and ultimately responsible for reshaping casework into “social” casework. If Richmond’s perceptions are correct, then the movement of social work practice toward a more structural, macro orientation is directly related to consumer plight and not merely a philosophical position fashioned by progressive professionals.

Characterized by intense industrialization and massive immigration, the era from 1900 to 1920 was a decisive period for rethinking and reconstituting social services in the United States. As Mary Richmond was redefining casework, Jane Addams’s Hull House became a model for the settlement movement in large urban areas across the nation. In addition to providing a wide array of goods and services in the poorest neighborhoods, settlement houses and the settlement movement “concentrated on the totality of problems in a single geographical area … the central focus was on the experiences, thinking, and actions of local populations that could affect broad social and economic reform” (Haynes & Holmes, 1994, p. 65).

Settlement houses were neighborhood houses or community centers. In addition to addressing the everyday needs of local residents, they often provided recreational, instructional, and community programs (Federico, 1973, p. 170). From a macro perspective, settlement houses established a place for people to meet, express ideas, share concerns, and pool their strengths. From this new, informal setting emerged leadership in identifying, specifying, and organizing to meet the issues of the day.

Indeed, the very origins of group work are often traced to the settlement movement. Today, many people simply see group work as synonymous with group therapy. For settlement workers, however, group meetings were not merely a medium to educate and treat people but also a forum for exploring community-based needs. In other social work classes, you will learn more about the multiple functions and purposes of group work. Here, it is important to make a mental note that group work is a valuable method for promoting larger scale change and an important means of promoting collective action.

It is noteworthy that although charity workers and volunteers had been hearing the struggles and misfortunes of individuals for some time, the formation of settlement houses was instrumental in identifying and advancing a united voice from consumers. At settlement houses, social workers could listen and learn directly from the mouths of people living in turmoil. This resulted in new, often group-determined ways of identifying opportunities and contemplating social change.

Given this context, it is not surprising that charity workers began to think of help as something more than face-to-face assistance to the poor for the purpose of addressing basic, everyday needs. What emerged was a pencha...