This is a book that sheds light on social work education and its development in 42 countries across the globe. The book documents the status of social work education and examines context-specific challenges faced by the profession in both developed and developing economies. This book, which targets social work educators in an international context, aims at developing a global perspective in social work education and collaboration in teaching and research. It is written at a time when social work education across the globe is in transition and facing several challenges such as professionalism, accreditation, curriculum content, sharp focus, and field education. It provides cross-national perspectives on how the challenges faced by social work education are addressed in countries across the globe. In doing so, we intend to bring international social work educators together to learn from each other and to develop some standard ways in which to address specific social work education challenges.
Social work education is continuously evolving in terms of curriculum development, accreditation standards, and transferability across countries. The emphasis of social work education across the globe is to develop qualified social work professionals who will then address the contemporary social issues and problems in both local and global societies. Social work education aims at achieving integration of social work knowledge, attitude, and skills among the graduates that are relevant to contemporary social realities. However, at present, the social work education and practice across the world, especially in the developing countries, are facing many challenges, which pose hurdles in the process of modernisation, professionalisation, and standardisation of social work education and practice. Globalisation in the twenty-first century has triggered several changes in the world. Countries across the world are facing issues such as climate change, overpopulation in some countries, and negative growth of population in several others, rapid ageing, and issues related to immigration, migration, mental illness, and rising income inequality. In addition, established world order and global dominance of the West-centric development agenda and modernity and the unequal distribution of the world’s resources have created tremendous problems for many people living in both global and local communities in the developed and developing countries.
Professionally trained social workers strive to achieve equality and social justice in the world’s societies (International Federation of Social Workers [IFSW], International Association of Schools of Social Work [IASSW], and International Council on Social Welfare [ICSW], 2012b). Developing culturally competent social workers who have cross-national perspectives is the need of the hour. Among the human service professionals, social workers are most committed to achieving social justice, human dignity, and worth (Bonnycastle, 2011; Van Voorhis & Hostetter, 2006). Social workers across the globe fight against social economic and political injustice and assist the affected population with a variety of social issues (McBeath, 2016). Further, the core purpose of the social work profession is to meet the needs of the disadvantaged and populations that are at risk. Fundamentally, grounded in the principles of dignity and worth of all people, social workers practice micro- and macro-social work in pursuit of well-being of people at risk in all national contexts (Keenan, Limone, & Sandoval, 2017). Thus, both micro- and macro-social work practices are believed to help in alleviating individual suffering and bringing the essential changes in the systems that are responsible for human suffering (Austin, Anthony, Tolleson Knee, & Mathias, 2016). Training culturally competent social workers who will then respond to human suffering, irrespective of national boundaries, is a need that has been created by neoliberal economic and political development. Questioning and reimagining the social work educational programmes across the world societies is most required now, at a time when efficacy and effectiveness of social workers and social work methods are contested globally (Lorenz, 2014), in line with neoliberalism, austerity policies, and new public management (Houston, 2016; Virokannas, Rauhala, & Harrikari, 2014). The world is in chaos and peaceful human existence is in uncertain. Issues related to human suffering across national boundaries are on the rise, and the need for human service professionals to address these issues is higher now than ever. Hence, there is a need for social work to develop and deliver educational programmes that will have the most effect on social issues. The Palgrave Handbook of Global Social Work Education is about such efforts to educate social workers across different nation societies, who will respond to the world’s needs, either directly or indirectly. The book casts light on social work education and its delivery in different countries and in different socio-economic and political contexts.
International Social Work—The Debates
The importance of this book in these times, when social work across the globe is in transition and status and the credibility and existence of the profession is challenged in many countries across the world, hardly needs to be emphasised. Further discussion on internationalisation of social work education and practice on the one hand, and indigenisation and culturally specific social work on the other, makes social work in the twenty-first century a closely contested profession. Since this book, The Palgrave Handbook of Global Social Work Education, deliberates the issues related to international and global social work, in this part we will discuss the origin, development, and the present status of internationalisation of social work in the globe. Internationalisation of social work programmes and curriculum across the world started in 1996 (Johnson, 1996), and the movement influenced the countries across the world. The early years of internationalisation of social work started with faculty and student exchanges on the topics related to global concerns and outreach programmes in and around the neighbouring countries (Johnson, 1996). The effort then started to reflect the dominant global models of social work education in the Asia and Pacific region (Healy, 2001; Midgley, 2000). The internationalisation of social work is increasingly an important aspect as the profession responds to issues related to marginalisation that have spread across borders (Dominelli, 2010; Healy, 2008; Hugman, Moosa-Mitha, & Moyo, 2010; Lyons, Hokenstad, Pawar, & Huegler, 2012).
In the present globalised world, with new emerging orders, social work programmes around the world are emerging at a faster rate. The current trends occurring across the world provide very compelling evidence of the demand for new approaches to social work education and practice internationally. Pressing current global trends include the dramatic rise in global poverty, disparity, and continued issues of extreme famine across the globe; the growth of political and economic refugees in the world; war, terrorism, and human rights violations such as the growing world problem of human enslavement; global warming; global pandemics; problems of homelessness, combined with increased unemployment and underemployment; child abuse; and human trafficking. Many of the most challenging domestic social problems confronting social workers in the world today are rooted in transnational forces that originated in other regions of the world. Social work today is a global profession, and the education of social workers takes place in countries throughout the world; the aim of social work is to find a solution to the social problems which are hindering the development of the country in general, and ...