By using human rights as a guidepost, social workers can help create social welfare policies that better serve societal needs. However, in applying human rights to contemporary situations, social workers often encounter challenges that require thinking outside the box. Bringing together provocative essays from a diverse range of authors, Elisabeth Reichert demonstrates how approaching social work from a human rights perspective can profoundly affect legislation, resource management, and enforcement of policies. Topics include the reconciliation of cultural relativism with universal human rights; the debate over whether human rights truly promote economic and social development or simply allow economically developed societies to exploit underdeveloped countries; the role of gender in the practice of human rights; the tendency to promote political and civil rights over economic and social rights; and the surprising connection between the social work and legal professions.
- Table of Contents
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction: Social Work Perspectives on Human Rights
- 1. Human Rights in the Twenty-first
Century: Creating a New Paradigm for Social Work
- 2. Human Rights in Social Work Practice:
An Invisible Part of the Social Work Curriculum?
- 3. Global Distributive Justice as a Human Right:
Implications for the Creation of a Human Rights Culture
- 4. Cultural Relativism and Community Activism
- 5. Development, Social Development, and Human Rights
- 6. Using Economic Human Rights in the Movement to End Poverty:
The Kensington Welfare Rights Union and the
Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign
- 7. Economic and Social Rights: The Neglected Human Rights
- 8. Human Rights and Women: A Work in Progress
- 9. Human Rights Violations Against Female Offenders and Inmates
- 10. Children’s Rights as a Template for Social Work Practice
- 11. Globalization, Democratization, and Human Rights:
Human-Made Disasters and a Call for Universal Social Justice
- 12. Law and Social Work:
Not-So-Odd Bedfellows in Promoting Human Rights
- Contributors
- Index