When Safe Spaces Aren't Safe: Understanding the Relationship between Organizational Characteristics and Service User Experiences of Oppression in Social Service Organizations

Background and Purpose: Far too often the individuals that social service organizations (SSOs) are designed to support are met with discrimination, marginalization and exploitation. These interactions can result in further marginalization, isolation, disempowerment and dependency. This study examines organizational dynamics that contribute to service user experiences of oppression in SSOs using the following two research questions: 1) What is the relationship between key organizational characteristics (i.e. service user participation, cultural competency, supervision, inclusion and accessibility, staff retention, human resources, and relationship with staff) and service user experiences of oppression in SSOs?, and 2) To what extent do these factors reflect an anti-oppressive social services organizational environment from the perspective of service users.

Methods: It uses survey data (n=374) from social service users over the age of 16, from 13 different SSOs across seven service areas including: homelessness, resource centers, addictions, older adults, children and youth, support for individuals with disabilities, and family services/counselling. Data was analyzed using multivariate analysis with structural equation modeling to explore the relationship between organizational characteristics (service user participation, cultural competency, supervision, inclusion and accessibility, staff retention, human resources, and service user relationship with staff) and service user oppression. Each organizational characteristic was tested against each of the five forms of oppression using multivariate regression through structural equation modeling with full information maximum likelihood estimation. The organizational characteristics that were found to be significant were then used to assess for a higher order factor structure, using confirmatory factor analysis of survey data, and labeled the Anti-Oppressive Social Service Organizational Environment (AOSSOE) scale. The AOSSOE scale was then tested with each of the variables representing the five forms of oppression to determine the relationship between the latent construct of an anti-oppressive organizational environment and service user experiences of oppression.

Results: Five of the seven organizational characteristics were found to be significant (Staff retention, service user participation, relationship with staff, physical access, and cultural competency) confirming the importance of organizational characteristics in relation to service user oppression. Age and gender were also found to be significant predictors of service user oppression. Cultural competency contributed to increased violence, service user participation and relationship with staff reduced powerlessness, physical accessibility reduced violence and staff retention was found to reduce all forms of oppression.

Conclusions and Implications: These findings highlight the importance of anti-oppressive social service management and provide a map of tangible ways that SSOs can prevent and reduce service user oppression of all forms. It highlights the prevalence of age and gender-based discrimination and the need to change our educational practices to truly support anti-oppressive practice and alter nonprofit management styles to ensure accountability for creating and sustaining anti-oppressive SSOs. It contributes a scale that can be used by SSOs to evaluate their level of Anti-oppressive practice. Further research is needed to understand services experiences of oppression based on identity group association (race, sexuality, gender) and how cultural competency contributes to increased violence.