Unfaithful Angels by Harry Specht

Author:Harry Specht
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Free Press
Published: 2007-04-13T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIVE THE MOVEMENT OF SOCIAL

WORK INTO PRIVATE PRACTICE (AND AWAY FROM THE POOR)

Forty years ago, two leaders in the fields of social work and psychiatry had this to say:

At present, psychiatrists, social workers and psychologists are all quarreling among themselves like jealous children, over who has the right to “do therapy,” and who does the best job. The unfortunate patient seems in danger of being pulled to pieces by us professional wolves in sheep’s clothing. Quite often, however, he gets well in spite of us, which should give us pause to consider whether we are not all taking ourselves a bit too seriously. We would do well to admit that no one profession has the answer now. Then perhaps, we could get beyond our sibling rivalry to the point of using the pooled intelligence and experience of all three professions to find a really practical answer, that will enable any psychiatrist, social worker or psychologist who is interested in therapy and fitted for it, to become qualified through a recognized training. 1

If it were possible or desirable to extend training in psychotherapy to non-medical personnel, the caseworker is indeed in a strategically placed position. However, I think there is a greater need at this time for well-qualified caseworkers practicing their own profession than for any ambitious expansion in the number of therapists. We have still to learn how much the caseworker can contribute through his own methods to a lessening of human misery. There have never been enough well-trained caseworkers to begin to touch the problem; it would seem a pity to divert any large numbers of them into psychotherapy. 2

We agree wholeheartedly. The professional wolves in sheep’s clothing (which now include the“marriage, family, and child counselors”) are still fighting territorial battles with each other over the psychotherapeutic pie, and there are still too few welltrained social workers in public and voluntary agencies to deal practically with glaring social problems.

On the other hand, some things have changed, although not for the better. Social work has become the largest single mental health profession, and the development of the private practice of social work has become one of the most significant trends in the profession. 3 Confluent with these developments there has been an increasing tendency of the profession to use its political power to support licensing of clinical social workers and third-party payments for social workers who are so licensed, to the relative neglect of efforts to improve the lot of social workers employed in the public social services and their clients.

How is it that so many social workers have come to see their primary role as the provision of psychotherapeutic services, and why has this increasingly taken on the form of private practice? We believe that the answer can be found through an understanding of some of the characteristics of professions in general and an appreciation of the subtle effects that the American ideology of individualism has had in shaping the employment options of social workers. We will show

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