CHAPTER SEVEN
SOCIAL WORK PERSPECTIVES
& METHODS
Social Work & Social Welfare: An Invitation (2nd ed.)
Key Ideas

Generalist social work practice
 Levels
of practice
 Skills and roles

Theory in Generalist Practice
 Person
in Environment
 Ecological Perspective
 Ecomap
 Systems
Theory
 Empowerment
 Solution
Focused Model
Generalist Practice



Being able to work with a variety of issues of
concerns
Being able to work with diverse client systems
Being able to influence change at multiple levels or
client systems
Levels of Practice
 Micro
 Direct
practice with individuals and families
 Mezzo
 Groups
 Macro
 Organizations
and communities
Skills and Roles

Direct services


Systems linkage



Broker, case manager, mediator, advocate
Systems maintenance and enhancement


Counseling/therapy, group work, educator
Organizational analyst, facilitator, team member, consultant,
survivor
Research
System development

Program developer, planner, policy developer, advocate
Theory in Generalist Practice

Theory: an empirically tested concept
used to explain behavior, process, or
phenomenon
Theoretical Perspectives
Person in Environment
 Ecological Perspective
 Systems Theory
 Solution Focused Model

Person in Environment Perspective

The social worker perceives each individual as an
interactive participant in a larger physical, social
communal, historical, religious, physical, cultural, and
familial environmental system
Kondrat, 2008, 348
Systems Theory



Most used theoretical approach in social work
Aids in understanding the multiple and complex lives
of families and the systems with which they interact
Can be used with:
Individuals within family, group, organization, community or
society
 Interactions within any of the above groups
 Interactions between any of the above groups

What is a System?

A set of elements that forms an orderly,
interrelated, and functional whole
Systems Theory continued





Enables understanding and use of potential growth in
the broad environment
Eclectic and integrative perspective
Interactions are influenced by mutual feedback
process
Views self as part of the system/process
Emphasizes the dual task that is the purview of social
work (PIE)
Eco-Map
Paper-and-pencil assessment tool used to
assess specific troubles and plan intervention
for clients
 A drawing of the client or client family in its
social environment.
 It helps both social worker and client view
client’s environmental context from a systems
and ecological perspective

Eco-Map

Helps both social worker and client
achieve a holistic or ecological view of the
client’s family life and the nature of the
family’s relationships with groups,
associations, organizations, and other
families and individuals
Social Environment
Commonly Used Symbols in Ecomaps
A stressful, conflictladen relationship
++++++++
A tenuous, uncertain
relationship
---------
A positive relationship
or resource
_________
The direction of the
giving & receiving

exchange or a relationship or resource
Strengths Perspective

Process of increasing personal,
interpersonal or political power so
that individuals, families and
communities can take action to
improve their situations
Empowerment

The process of helping individuals, families, groups
and communities to increase their personal,
interpersonal, socioeconomic , and political strength
and to develop influence toward improving their
circumstances. (Barker, 2003, 142)
Principles of the Strengths Perspective
(Saleeby, 1995, 12-15)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Every individual, group, family, and community has
strengths.
Trauma and abuse, illness and struggle, may be
injurious but they may also be sources of challenge
and opportunity.
Assume that you do not know the upper limits of the
capacity to grow and change. Take individual, group,
and community aspirations seriously.
We best serve clients by collaborating with them.
Every environment is full of resources.
Solution-Focused Model




Construct/re-construct the person’s reality
Builds on strengths to change a self-perception
Focus on individual goals
Effective with individuals and families