Abstract: Social Work's Advocacy Record: Reviewing NASW Members' Advocacy Behavior (Society for Social Work and Research 24th Annual Conference - Reducing Racial and Economic Inequality)

747P Social Work's Advocacy Record: Reviewing NASW Members' Advocacy Behavior

Schedule:
Sunday, January 19, 2020
Marquis BR Salon 6 (ML 2) (Marriott Marquis Washington DC)
* noted as presenting author
Mary Dungy-Akenji, MSW, Research Assistant, Loyola University, Chicago, Chicago, IL
Teresa Kilbane, PhD, Associate Professor, Loyola University, Chicago, Chicago, IL
Amy Krings, MSW, PhD, Assistant Professor, Loyola University of Chicago School of Social Work, Chicago, IL
Background and purpose: Advocacy is one of the key activities that social workers engage in to promote social justice and improve the lives of their clients. Social and political advocacy are central to enacting racial and economic equity in the United States. Though the field calls for social workers to participate in advocacy, social workers’ advocacy activity does not appear to be a priority. This paper asks the question: “What factors influence participation of professional social workers in political advocacy?”

Methods: This paper systematically reviews studies published between 1980 and 2018 documenting the political advocacy activity of NASW members. The most fruitful Boolean operators, “advoca*” and “activi*”, were searched in combination with the terms “NASW” or “National Association of Social Workers”.  Four key databases were used in gathering the data.

These searches yielded 340 sources with 29 of these being relevant to the topic of professional social workers and advocacy activity. Of these 29 sources, 16 were studies with samples taken from NASW membership. These 16 abstracts were the most relevant for the critical review of studies for our own future study of NASW members in Illinois.

Results: Studies found that level of education, age, economic status, and place/type of employment impacted NASW members likeliness to participate in political advocacy.  It appears that older social workers, social workers with higher economic status, social workers with PhDs, and social workers in the public sector are more likely to engage in advocacy. Two key themes emerged from the review. First, increasing advocacy behaviors in professional social workers was desirable. Most studies cited the NASW Code of Ethics or CSWE’s Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards sections on social justice as a rationale. Some studies framed social work’s history as rooted in advocacy by recounting the political activity of settlement houses, and others discussed economic crises as demanding that social workers participate in advocacy to address structural social problems.

A second theme was that social workers are still more politically active than the average person despite the admonishments that social workers need to be more involved in advocacy. There was variability in the types of advocacy engaged in - it was common that social workers voted but less common for them to engage in “non-institutionalized” social action such as marches or protests

Conclusion and implications: Political participation has varied over the years but comparison across studies is difficult due to the various samples, locations, and measures used.  Many factors could influence the reasons for the changes in outcomes across studies, but some studies focused on changes in the presidency and other political dynamics influencing social workers’ advocacy behaviors. . This critical review recommends replicating these variables and more from previous studies with focus on the current political climate and administration’s impact on social workers’ advocacy behaviors. In addition, this review was done as a precursor to a survey of NASW Illinois members about their political advocacy activity that has been approved by the Institutional Review Boards of NASW and the authors’ university.