Reimagining Social Work in Aotearoa

Kia ora koutou katoa

Another year slips by. In this post our RSW collective reflect individually on some of the social challenges that lie ahead – for social work, for Aotearoa and in the struggle for a just world across the globe. Questions are being asked about why we live as we do – what is sustainable, what can and must be changed? In much of the old world we have seen a shift to the political right amid a climate of fear and insecurity. The parallel threat which industrial production for private profit poses to our fragile biosphere hangs over us all. It has been a tumultuous year in Aotearoa: the horror of the mosque murders, the rising of spirit and solidarity seen at Ihumātao and the deep questioning (for social work) sparked by the OT uplift and its aftermath. There is an opportunity for progressive change in all of this: for a politics which embraces a vision of distributive justice and social equality. 

“It appears that FACS may regularly omit evidence such as evidence of a parent’s ‘strengths’, the effort a parent has made to address substance abuse issues, or the positive parenting approach of the parent. This has occurred despite there being numerous policy documents that indicate that this approach is not permitted,” (Davis, 2019, p.13).

This was a key finding, not of the Hawkes Bay case, but of the ‘Family is Culture’ review, released in New South Wales last week.