Principles:
-Respect for the inherent worth and dignity of human beings, doing no harm, respect for diversity and upholding human rights and social justice.
Major focus of social work is:
-To advocate for the rights of people at all levels
-To facilitate outcomes where people take responsibility for each other’s wellbeing
-To realize and respect the inter-dependence among people and between people and the environment.
In some instances “doing no harm” and “respect for diversity” may represent conflicting and competing values, for example where in the name of culture the rights are violated.
-Constructive confrontation and changewhere certain cultural beliefs, values and traditions violate peoples’ basic human rights. Such constructive confrontation, deconstruction and change may be facilitated through a tuning into, and an understanding of particular cultural values, beliefs and traditions and via critical and reflective dialogue with members of the cultural group vis-à-vis broader human rights issues
Knowledge:
-Social work draws on its own constantly developing theoretical foundation and research, as well as theories from other human sciences, including but not limited to community development, social pedagogy, administration, anthropology, ecology, economics, education, management, nursing, psychiatry, psychology, public health, and sociology. The uniqueness of social work research and theories is that they are applied and emancipatory. Much of social work research and theory is co-constructed with service users in an interactive, dialogic process and therefore informed by specific practice environments and also by indigenous knowledge
