Critical Practices Adopted by Minority Group Social Workers Working in the Third Sector

Abstract

Abstract The research traces the adoption of critical practices by minority group social workers working in the third sector. A phenomenological approach was employed, drawing data from semi-structured in-depth interviews with social workers from two entities composing the third sector in Arab society in Israel: dozens of volunteers from the religious Zakat committees and a large proportion (the statistics are confidential) of those employed in the secular battered women’s shelters. It was found that critical practice is context-dependent: operatively, management in both entities, religious and secular, provides conditions enabling their employees to adopt critical practices such as: decreasing workloads to a minimum; permitting maximal application of professional discretion; freeing time for direct intervention; encouraging collaborative relations with service users and learning from successes during the interventions. These social workers apply minor, daily but incremental critical practices, selecting underprivileged, excluded target populations, setting intervention goals opposing the oppressors while recognising abused women (giving voice and visibility) and redistributing material resources for the needy, employing intervention methods that see distress as a structural product, standing by their applicants and encouraging change. Structural, oppositional and activist critical practice fits the social work profession when overshadowed by ‘government failure’ in general, especially among minorities.