Publications from ODSW Social Insights: Letters by DSW (Vol 2)

Practice Issues Dear Social Service Practitioners, The Role of Social Service Practitioners in Welfare policy analysis Social work students are sometimes unwittingly caught in having to respond to whether they should be in direct practice or in policy work. This however does not require an either-or answer. When we train students and practitioners holistically, they will see the inter-connectedness and how each complements the work of the other. Through training, we equip students with a working knowledge of the social welfare system which will include learning about how to analyse social welfare policies. 1 Social welfare policy analysis does not belong solely to political scientists, economists or government officials. As social work is about the delivery of social services, practitioners bring with them a unique perspective on the purpose and rationale of social programmes and their outcomes. This perspective is critical to the design, evaluation, review and improvement of policies. This includes the knowledge of the personal experiences of people who are affected by these policies. This feedback is necessary as all too often, policy decisions are made on the basis of economic and political considerations, whereas the experiences of those directly affected by these decisions are often not given due attention at the conception of the policy. The Science of muddling through Another interesting aspect of social welfare policy making that is worth early appreciation by students is the fact that the policy making process does not work like a standard operating procedure manual of systematic steps and is often not presented in neatly drawn diagrams. Policy making is usually messy, and only occasionally pristinely logical or rational. Many factors interfere with rationality such as the lack of information, diverse interest groups with varying resources, the lack of time to weigh the different possibilities and competing personal and social values. Other factors also play a part in influencing the development and implementation of policies, and the influences vary at different times in the history of each policy. Charles Lindblom’s theory of incrementalism 2 which states that public policy is developed through small changes to existing policies is also relevant to 1 2 Gilbert, N., Specht, H., & Terrell, P. (1993). Dimensions of social welfare policy (3rd ed.). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Lindblom, Charles E. (November/ December, 1979). “Still muddling, not yet through”. Public Administration Review, 39 (6), pp. 517–526. Retrieved from http:// publicadministrationreview.org/still-muddling-not-yet-through/ 90

Publications from ODSW Social Insights: Letters by DSW (Vol 2) | Page 91