HSW401 Social Work Research Methods | Impact on Human Services

Human service work can provide an opportunity for social change as well as a means of maintaining social order?

Discuss the above statement.

1. Your own values and the way they have impacted on you view of the world

2. How dominant ideologies (as expressed by media and politics) impact on human services

These two frameworks - your own values and the dominant ideologies you have- identified should provide the basis for your discussion of the question.

You may use first person when describing your values as this is a partly reflective piece but you must use aca- demic language and references to support your argument. 

Answers:

Human services have been thoroughly researched, studied and has also been regularly reviewed as an independent body of knowledge in the field of social science. It is defined as the study of every human system, social innovations and most crucially service technology, which have been modeled with an aim of enhancing the living standards of individuals, their households and the community that they live (Almog-Bar, and Schmid, 2014, p.24).  There are very many different schools of thoughts on the discipline, one such, makes us believe that human services and social work encourage social change. It also brings in liberation and empowerment among individuals and makes them have faith that the principle of social justice and human rights are the uniting factors that they have to practice for them to progress economically and stay in peace and harmony. This is because this discipline aims at improving the living standards of the people and also improving the welfare of the community at large.

  There is also the existence of other individuals who still believe that human service at most times is used as a masquerade to acquire social control. This is because some individuals and firms try to take advantage of situations to gain in the name of human service. This is mostly seen when disasters occur. Michael Foucault a sociologist gives us a suggestion that social control is one of the most crucial parts of any act of human service. From this suggestion, we may have no choice than to agree that social control is hard to avoid (Astvik, and Melin, 2013, p.344).

I have personal values such as autonomy, commitment, responsibility, and the resilience towards the service to humanity. Personally, my values are founded on the philosophy of socialism and existentialism. I strongly believe that each activities main aim should be to liberate the people, empower them and try to improve their social welfare without being bias. I believe in uniting the people and giving them the power to rule their own lives. I also believe that all activities should aim at improving the living standards of every member of the community without discrimination (Garrow and Hasenfeld, 2014, p.88). Hence, my stands on human service, in its current nature are to some extent negative. In my view, I think in the present day, human service is a strategy to gain social control and order instead of any real improvement and empowerment in the lives of the people. It is extremely choosy and it also has a habit to shift towards profit motivation instead of improving, empowering people lives and rendering services to them without any bias (Cohen, and Felson, 2016, p.212).

The dominant ideologies that exist in the society include nepotism in that one needs to help people of same blood. The self-love ideology has made leaders become full of greed, corrupt and hard-hearted. They do not practice service to humanity but focus of their well-being. Democracy is an ideology that aims at making people free to move around and talk without fear as long as they do the right in the society (Hochschild, 2015, p.52). Other leaders have become dictatorial and have been exercising forced rule on the people. The society is full of absolutism ideology in that they have unlimited powers to control and make people suffer. Sexism is an ideology from the media that makes people even the young mistreats those of the opposite sex in the society. In this case the women fall victims of sexual misconduct from such ideology.       

Currently, a lot of things around us are as a function of perception governance where realities are made and brought down every day for the masses by the mainstream media. A lot of the human service efforts carried out by the multibillion-dollar firms are nothing better than claptrap and an activity made to further their own interests and to widen their brand awareness.

These firms know that when the media reports that they have done a certain human service to some people, many people will be aware of the firm thus increasing their market and as a result of that they will enjoy increment in the revenue they collect from sales.  Naomi Klein in her book ‘’ the shock doctrine “clearly illustrates how firms in a period of chaos or destruction when individuals are physically and also emotionally drained, choose to assist them on the outside pretending its human service, but their main agenda is to take advantage of the sad condition and create revenue out of the calamity and also make the individuals to only depend on them (Gillingham, 2011, p.305)

To make matters worse, some of the disasters are not caused by nature but by this corporation so that they can make money out of the situation. Possessing socialistic value in my heart, to me, such activities are a big blow on the face of all those beings and academic institutions which honestly work to understand human service as a subject and put an effort in making sure the living standards of the people are improved. The centre of attention ought to be relocated from such a travesty to these true firms and rather than giving free marketing services to the firms. The government should sponsor these entities. We are crafting more divisions in the society and they are being a barrier to our distribution of the gains of human services. This is the main reason as to why am saying that human service is not functioning as expected Because human service should not bring on board divisions in the community .it should result in peace and harmony in the community and also lead to an improvement in the living standards of the people.

The attitudes of human rights and social justice should aim at the spirit of human service and not motivations like taking advantage and selectiveness. Genuine chipping in, by the government and the private sector players is the desire of the hour to make human service, truly inclusive and functional in every part of the state (McLaughlin, 2009, p.1112).

Corporations should be encouraged to carry out human sacrifice activities without a hidden agenda. They ought to understand that when they empower the people they increase the purchasing power of their customers (Mosley, 2011, p.448). Transformation activities ought to be carried out for the subject of human services beyond doubt make a very significant impact in the living standards of the community and the people thus resulting into liberation and a great improvement in the social welfare.                                           

References

Almog-Bar, M. and Schmid, H., 2014. Advocacy activities of nonprofit human service organizations: A crit Lynch-Cerullo, K. and Cooney, K., 2011. Moving from outputs to outcomes: A review of the evolution of performance measurement in the human service nonprofit sector. Administration in Social Work, 35(4), pp.364-388.ical review. Nonprofit and voluntary sector quarterly, 43(1), pp.11-35.

Astvik, W. and Melin, M., 2013. Coping with the imbalance between job demands and resources: A study of different coping patterns and implications for health and quality in human service work. Journal of Social Work, 13(4), pp.337-360.

Cohen, L.E. and Felson, M., 2016. Social Change and Crime Rate Trends: A Routine Activity Approach (1979). In Classics in Environmental Criminology (pp. 203-232). CRC Press.

Garrow, E.E. and Hasenfeld, Y., 2014. Institutional logics, moral frames, and advocacy: Explaining the purpose of advocacy among nonprofit human-service organizations. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 43(1), pp.80-98.

Gillingham, P., 2011. Computer-based information systems and human service organisations: Emerging problems and future possibilities. Australian Social Work, 64(3), pp.299-312.

Hochschild, A.R., 2015. The managed heart. In Working In America (pp. 47-54). Routledge.

McLaughlin, H., 2009. What's in a name:‘client’,‘patient’,‘customer’,‘consumer’,‘expert by experience’,‘service user’—what's next?. The British Journal of Social Work, 39(6), pp.1101-1117.

Mosley, J.E., 2011. Institutionalization, privatization, and political opportunity: What tactical choices reveal about the policy advocacy of human service nonprofits. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 40(3), pp.435-457.