By Jane Smith
In this blog post, I’d like to tackle some of the challenges that social workers face in their profession, namely their perception of themselves and why this might be the case. Social workers don’t believe the public has a particularly great opinion of social workers (Staniforth, Deane & Beddoe, 2016). Why is this the case? Why do social workers think more poorly of themselves compared to what the public actually thinks? Where is this internalised stigma coming from?
The public’s perception overall is pretty good. When people think of social workers, their main thoughts are that social workers are ‘helpers’ (Staniforth, Fouché & Beddoe, 2014). Other responses from the public were around meeting personal or community needs (Staniforth, Fouché & Beddoe, 2014). Conversely, social workers themselves believe the public has a poor perception of the profession. When social workers were asked what they thought the public thinks, the responses were more negative, such as ‘stealing kids’ or ‘interfering/busy bodies’ see (Staniforth, Deane & Beddoe, 2016). Social workers overwhelmingly believed that when the public thought about them, their main association was ‘Children, Youth and Family’ (Staniforth, Deane & Beddoe, 2016). It seems like a lot of social workers think that the public associate social work with child protection services and the accompanying responsibilities.
Why, then, do social workers mostly focus on child protection services when considering the public’s perception? One reason could be the media. Social work and child protection often go hand in hand because it’s a social work dominated area. Commonly when child abuse is reported on, the media frames the social worker as either being incompetent for not picking up on the abuse or as being baby snatchers, as identified by the social workers themselves. Child protection in social work rarely gets a positive news story, as shown even within the last month. An opinion piece by Hinemoa Elder discusses her disappointment in the name change from Child, Youth and Family to Oranga Tamariki (OT). Elder says “It has precious little about oranga (wellbeing), and little – if any – organisational understanding about tamariki” (Stuff, May 19 2019). With negative news stories in the media surrounding OT, along with negative opinion pieces, it is little wonder that many social workers (both statutory and non-statutory) take on this negative opinion of their profession. To be clear, I am not arguing that social workers in statutory roles should not be held accountable for the work that they do, I am merely pointing out the mostly negative response they have in the media.
Recently, Children’s Minister Tracy Martin was reported as being unhappy with the reporting of social workers working for Oranga Tamariki . An interview by Satherley with Tracy Martin describes how she isn’t happy with how the media are reporting on OT. With a recent rise in reporting, particularly during the recent Hawkes Bay cases, OT has received a lot of negative press. “Privacy concerns meant Oranga Tamariki was often unable to defend itself against criticism, with journalists and editors having “decided already Oranga Tamariki is the problem, as opposed to Oranga Tamariki being part of the solution” (Satherley, Newshub, 2019). In my opinion, it is good to see a Minister defending a state organisation given that both legislation and policy (set by the government) require Oranga Tamariki social workers to work in the way that they do. Oranga Tamariki social workers are working in the climate set by the government which comes with limitations.
My final thoughts to leave you with are these; with the media framing social work in such a negative manner, mostly focussing on child protection social work, it’s no wonder that many internalise these perceptions. While it is good to see some support from the Minister in this area of social work, this is only one good article out of many poor ones. Surely these negative perceptions are not helping with encouraging people into social work, and with an ageing workforce , this poses a problem. What do you think can be done?
References
Edler, H (2019, May 19). Oranga Tamariki is doing more harm than good. Stuff. Retrieved from https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/112713542/oranga-tamariki-is-doing-more-harm-than-good
Satherley, D (2019, May 18) Oranga Tamariki isn’t ‘snatching babies’ – Children’s Minister Tracey Martin. Newshub. Retrieved from https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/shows/2019/05/oranga-tamariki-isn-t-snatching-babies-children-s-minister-tracey-martin.html
Staniforth, B., Deane, K. L., & Beddoe, L. (2016). Comparing public perceptions of social work and social workers’ expectations of the public view. Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work, 28(1), 13. https://anzswjournal.nz/anzsw/article/download/112/220
Staniforth, B., Fouché, C., & Beddoe, L. (2014). Public perception of social work and social workers in Aotearoa New Zealand. Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work, 26(2/3), 48. https://anzswjournal.nz/anzsw/article/viewFile/42/146
2019 Social work blog 413 /713 