Empowering the Powerless: A Social Work Series – serie

This invaluable text on community organizing is designed to help those who want to build powerful community organizations, empower ordinary citizens to become strong leaders, and bring about change in the major social and economic issues of our day. The book examines specific strategies for building a successful progressive organization that include recruiting members, developing leaders, building consensus, identifying issues, and developing and implementing practices. Rich practice examples are included from neighbourhood, peace, environmental, welfare and homeless, women's and gay and lesbian groups. The authors give detailed advice on everything from planning and implementing strategy, to evaluating and publicizing organizational victories, to structuring and funding social action groups.

Designed to help build powerful community organizations, empower ordinary citizens to become leaders, and bring about major social and economic change, this book offers a coherent practice-based framework for understanding social action, with power and empowerment at the center of analysis. Topics include recruiting members, consensus building, leadership, publicity, and fundraising.

Barbara Levy Simon argues that empowerment is only the latest term for a point of view that has been at the heart of social work since the 1890s. She presents the history of this tradition from 1893 to the present and explores the social movements, ideas, and beliefs that have been most influential in shaping its development. The empowerment perspective within social work practice seeks to help clients draw on personal, interpersonal and political strengths that enable them to gain greater control - both individually and collectively - over their environment and to attain their aspirations. Simon argues that the empowerment tradition developed among a diverse group of social work professionals who rejected the paternalistic approach to practice and shared a common commitment to enabling marginalized and impoverished people to help themselves, to claim their share of social, economic and political resources.She demonstrates that in every historical period the empowerment approach to practice included five basic processes: constructing collaborative partnerships with clients; emphasizing the strengths of clients rather than their incapacities; focusing on both individuals and their social and physical environments; recognizing the rights, responsibilities, and needs of clients and client groups; and directing professional energies toward helping historically disempowered groups and their members.

This book is the first to utilize the empowerment approach of social work practice with substance-abusing clients, bridging clinical, community, and social policy approaches in order to place individual addiction in its sociopolitical context. As Lorraine Gutierrez points out in her foreword, the book "challenges us to transform our thinking about substance abuse and move beyond our existing focus on individual deficits." Arguing that pathology-focused definitions of substance abuse tend to transform people into their problems, Freeman instead advocates for strengths-centered policies and regulations as the means to empower clients, communities, and society as a whole. Freeman outlines basic empowerment principles and practices, then details the service delivery processes; offers a context for power, policy, and funding decisions; and examines the needs of special populations. Case examples supplement each chapter, and the final part examines four exemplary programs that demonstrate the empowerment process in action.

The most comprehensive resource to date on the methods of empowerment with lesbian and gay clients, this book explores the history and politics of gay identity and explains the basis and development of the empowerment approach in social work practice in the United States. After analyzing the different types of homophobia (individual, institutional, and internalized) and how these are manifested in real life situations, Tully addresses the special needs and issues particular to three age groups: gay and lesbian youth, adults, and older clients. The author offers practical applications for the social worker and client at the micro-, mezzo-, and macro-levels, from helping a teenage client to discover a personal sexual orientation (micro), to organizing a social event for lesbians and gays (mezzo), to building a community coalition (macro). Eye-opening case studies are provided for each age group and cover everything from defining problems, identifying the underlying issues causing them, understanding the role of homophobia, and the application of the empowerment perspective.

For more than 150 years, empowering practices have been used by social workers in their work with families, but the techniques of today differ significantly from those of the pioneers or even from those of a few years ago. Today's practitioners recognize that empowering others is impossible; social workers can, however, assist others as they empower themselves. This book integrates time-honored approaches with today's more modest goals, mindful of what empowerment can and cannot do. Synthesizing several theoretical supports-the strengths perspective, system theory, theories of family well-being, and theories of coping-the author responds to the question "What works?" with today's families in need. Practice illustrations are provided throughout to bring concepts to life and, more important, to present families describing their own experiences with achieving empowerment.

For more than 150 years, empowering practices have been used by social workers in their work with families, but the techniques of today differ significantly from those of the pioneers or even from those of a few years ago. Today's practitioners recognize that empowering others is impossible; social workers can, however, assist others as they empower themselves. This book integrates time-honored approaches with today's more modest goals, mindful of what empowerment can and cannot do. Synthesizing several theoretical supports-the strengths perspective, system theory, theories of family well-being, and theories of coping-the author responds to the question "What works?" with today's families in need. Practice illustrations are provided throughout to bring concepts to life and, more important, to present families describing their own experiences with achieving empowerment.

Whether it's physical, psychological, social, historical, or ongoing, trauma is a universal experience, and this book provides professionals with the approaches necessary for successful and empowering interventions across the trauma spectrum. Part one examines the steps individuals take to heal their traumas. Nicolas survives an attack by his own dog; Tay rebuilds her life after years of incest; Claire speaks out about being molested by a program participant at her mental health clinic; and Erma copes with the shattering memories of childhood abuse. Part two focuses on interpersonal dynamics. Frank is held accountable for his violence toward his wife; Erin and her mother confront the reality of bullying and victimization in schools; Beth faces discrimination because of her sexual orientation; and staff members at a transitional housing shelter deal with the death of a client. Part three recounts stories of resilience and healing at the social and community level. Salome and her family process the historical trauma of the massacre of her American Indian ancestors. A group of boys who became fatherless after 9/11 respond to experiential ways of coping with their grief.Jennifer and Kim live daily with the social trauma of poverty. Three Liberian families survive torture, flight, refugee camps, and resettlement. Amory struggles to find meaning and move on from his experience as a combat veteran, and the story of Angelina Batiste epitomizes the loss and resilience of those who lived through Hurricane Katrina. Trauma Transformed provides insight into the psychological and spiritual resources practitioners need to help victims move forward and improve upon their circumstances. Readers will also learn to strengthen their sense of self to prevent secondary trauma.