Abstract
Indigenous social work is gaining significance in the social work profession to respond to Indigenous voices. However, there is still ambiguity on how Indigenous social work is conceptualised, and this ambiguity has resulted in reluctance in the social work profession to accept Indigenous perspectives and knowledge in education and practice. To clear this ambiguity, this article examines Indigenous social work as a concept and explores its diverse discourses work through a critical review of 40 articles. The review analyses four lines of thoughts that emerged on how Indigenous social work is conceptualised across the globe.
Keywords
Introduction
The social work profession has come of age and has evolved and expanded in terms of its nature, values and practice. In response to the changing socio-economic, political, religious and cultural contexts, it has undergone a paradigm shift in the last few decades by increasingly recognising and including voices from various categories of caste, class, gender, ethnicity, culture and religions and also including values such as interdependence and collectivism in its existing set of values. Nevertheless, these shifts are coupled with the change in its nature that has become more administrative. More often, the profession emphasises the development and delivery of social work services based on Western paradigms (Gray et al., 2007). The last few decades have witnessed many debates on the nature, role, purpose and relevance of social work. Globally, the debates are focussed on the relationship between the profession’s academic and practice worlds (Golightley and Holloway, 2019), the nature of international social work, the universality of social work values, the profession’s commitment to internationalising social work education and practice, and the nature of social work itself, that is, whether the profession should be committed to remedial, activist or developmental forms of practice (Midgley, 2001). Most recently, larger debates are questioning the relevance of the social work profession and the way it was framed based on Western culture, which was then borrowed and practised in Eastern and Asian cultures. This has transpired as a serious debate among social work authors (Law and Lee, 2016). Gray and Fook (2004) also emphasise that while the debates and trends on various themes are ongoing, social work authors have been advocating about the dominance and irrelevance of Western influences on social work over the past three decades (Gray and Fook, 2004).
Western knowledge and culture have been derived from research on and observations of White populations (Asante, 1991). It emphasises concepts such as individualisation, individual self-determination and self-reliance, and therapy, which are frequently out of place in communal and traditional Eastern and Asian societies in which deference to the family and community is the priority (Gray and Coates Bird, 2008). Western concepts, policies and approaches are largely clinical and tend to be more focussed on individuals, ignoring the cultural, communal and spiritual values that are central to Indigenous communities (Midgley, 2008). The contexts in which social work is practised around the world remain sharply distinguished by socio-economic, political, religious and cultural differences (Golightley and Holloway, 2017). Furthermore, in Asian countries, new forms of inequalities and discriminations are emerging due to political and economic instability and oppressive social structures. For instance, Mongolia, Taiwan and Vietnam have gone through increasing poverty, unemployment, migration to urban areas and class disparities influenced by the liberalisation of their economies; Nepal and Sri Lanka are recovering from conflict (Nadkarni, 2010); and South Korea and Japan are confronted with massive influxes of immigrants with different ethnicities (Law and Lee, 2016). Furthermore, India and China are currently facing structural and societal changes. The growth of industrial and commercial centres, reallocation of resources, breakdown of traditional self-sufficient village systems, expansion in social overheads capital, and change in social beliefs and values have led to various forms of violence, injustice, discrimination and vulnerabilities. Responding to such diverse issues in non-Western societies requires the social work profession to accommodate diversity in its practice. However, the social work profession still relies on Western knowledge and continues to apply it irrespective of the context of practice, resulting in a lack of congruence between education and practice.
In the light of these concerns, debates on Indigenous social work were initiated by educators and practitioners. Originally, the Indigenous social work discourse started mainly in relation to social work practice in developing countries in Africa, Asia and South America (Gray and Coates, 2010). The first mention of the word ‘indigenisation’ in the field of social work profession was in 1971 when the fifth United Nations international survey of the social work training used it with reference to the inappropriateness of American social work theories to their societies (UN, 1971). Gray and Coates (2010) and Simonds and Christopher (2013) espoused the need for Indigenous social work. However, despite the upsurge in literature on Indigenous social work, and the growth of the profession in different contexts, to date, there is no consensus on what defines being Indigenous (Ibrahima and Mattaini, 2017). The global definition of social work by the International Federation of Social Workers defines Indigenous peoples as people living within geographically distinct ancestral territories, maintaining distinct socio-economic, cultural and political institutions, and identifying themselves as Indigenous or tribal. In relation to this definition, two key streams of debate arise: the first one from developing nations that seeks culturally appropriate research, education and practice, while the second one from developed Western contexts that is associated with professional education and practice relating to Aboriginals or First Nations Peoples (Gray and Coates, 2010). This implies that the scope of the term has been expanded to the more aptly descriptive term of local relevance rather than focussing only on First Nations social work, as was the case initially (Gray and Coates, 2010). Thus, the term Indigenous social work is not limited to only the Aboriginals or First Nations (as was implied earlier), but also includes the knowledge that arises from within any local culture.
The above discussion reveals the irrelevance of Western concepts in non-Western cultures, especially in Eastern countries, and the lack of consensus on the definition of Indigenous social work. It highlights the need to understand Indigenous social work as a concept, and explore its diverse discourses across the globe. This article thus seeks to examine the term Indigenous social work through a critical review of articles written on the subject in major social work journals.
Methods
Currently, over 300 social work journals are published internationally on different platforms. For the purpose of this article, the selection of the social work journals for the review was based on three criteria: (a) journals which are international, peer reviewed, published and indexed in globally recognised platforms such as Scopus and Web of Science, (b) journals whose scope and aim provide a platform for theoretical and empirical developments on different aspects of social work, international debates on topical issues, discussion on social work education, social work practice, social work research and expression of new ideas and knowledge, and (c) journals which were in publication for around 50 years to capture various dimensions of history and evolution of the concept of Indigenous social work.
After examining their indexing status, scope and aim and publication span, British Journal of Social Work (BJSW) (established in 1971), Social Work Education (SWE) (established in 1965), International Social Work (ISW) (established in 1957) and The Indian Journal of Social Work (IJSW) (established in 1940) were identified and selected from various online databases.
The review included articles published in all the issues of these four journals. The search for relevant articles was initiated by using the key phrase, ‘indigenous social work’. This process provided 160 results from BJSW, SWE, ISW and IJSW. To supplement the search that might have left out any relevant articles, an additional search was carried out using the specific key phrase, ‘indigenous knowledge in social work’. This process added one article from SWE, one from BJSW and no results were shown in IJSW and ISW. The total articles after the expanded search were 162, inclusive of articles, editorials, reports, panels and notes. All the searches were carried out on 8–10 October 2018 and included all the published issues of each of the four journals since the establishment of the journal to October 2018. The timeframe of all the identified publications thus ranged from 1940 to 2018.
The titles and the abstracts of all the selected articles were next scrutinised. Only research articles and editorials were downloaded for further scanning and reports, panels, and notes were excluded from the review. The eligibility criteria for the articles to be included in the conceptual review are as follows: (a) discussion or argument for Indigenous social work or indigenisation of social work and (b) providing new perspective or framework for Indigenous social work. The articles and editorials that meet any one of the inclusion criteria were included for the final review. Only the articles whose full text is accessible were selected. The total number of selected articles and editorials was 40 (n = 40).
Thematic analysis was used to identify the patterns of meanings and/or ideas that contribute to defining the concept of Indigenous social work. Any information on Indigenous social work was extracted and synthesised from all the selected articles. The synthesised information was organised into meaningful groups by generating codes. Codes such as ‘indigenous beliefs and values of helping’, ‘accepting diversity’, ‘decolonisation’ and ‘local concepts’ were generated. Similar meaning codes were mapped and moved together towards defining the concept of Indigenous social work. This process helped in generating multiple themes. Information that has a similar group of codes such as ‘indigenous beliefs and values of helping’ and ‘accepting diversity’ resulted in generating the theme ‘cultural awareness and diversity’. A similar process was carried out to generate other themes such as culturally competent practice frameworks/models, localisation of Western concepts and political competence.
Data were reviewed from 40 articles. Table 1 provides the distribution of emerged themes chronologically.
Emerging themes in the articles that focussed on Indigenous social work.
Results: Understanding of Indigenous social work around the world
Cultural awareness and diversity
Understanding of cultural values, beliefs and practices is crucial to understand and respond to community needs and priorities. Coates et al. (2006), Hammoud (1998), Small et al. (2017), Chong (2016), Lan et al. (2001), Cheung and Liu (2004), Vijayalakshmi (2004), Gray and Coates (2010) emphasise recognising Indigenous beliefs and values of helping, and accepting diversity within the social work discourse which can then be translated into practice approaches, which enable the profession to move forward to take a more significant place in the many cultures around the world. Social work has primarily imposed Western social work beliefs and practices rather than accepting Indigenous perspectives and traditional forms of helping and healing. Embracing Indigenous social work, it is argued, is to be comfortable with accepting diverse Indigenous knowledge.
According to Gray (2010), indigenisation means ‘bringing out multiple voices and ways of knowing that are situated in particular socio-historical and cultural locations’. Similarly, Mathebane and Sekudu (2018) argue that in Africa, epistemologies, ideals and values are at the centre of any analysis involving African Black people. In a slightly different perspective, Yunong and Xiong (2008, 2011) argue that developing Indigenous social work knowledge, which is based on culturally and locally relevant and problem-oriented research, is an inherent and basic requirement of the profession. However, the proponents of indigenisation have focussed largely on the mainstream culture both in Western and Indigenous societies. There are differences regarding the freedom to choose values, beliefs and behaviours in Western societies and the lack of freedom to do so in Indigenous societies, such as mainland China. It is also an illusory and destructive tendency to categorise humanity in terms of a single identity, such as culture. This may lead to miniaturisation of humanity, with everyone locked up in tight little boxes from which they emerge only to attack one another, as observed by Yunong and Xiong (2011). While many authors argue for a culturally relevant holistic approach that honours the diversity of local Indigenous knowledge, others believe that it is likely to give people a connection to a single group which is detrimental for the social work profession.
Laitinen and Väyrynen (2016) stress the development of local theories and practices by recognising silent voices and experiences to indigenise social work. More specifically, emphasis on relationships, communities, spirituality, nature and the environment, real ecological sustainability (Coates et al., 2006; Jones, 2018), religious heritage (Graham et al., 2007), human rights (Yunong and Xiong, 2011) and ubuntu (group consciousness and cohesiveness) (Mathebane and Sekudu, 2018) are the key features that define an Indigenous perspective. Goldstein (1986) observes that conscientisation is an effective form of helping and must be securely rooted in the cultural patterns and belief systems of the people that social work intends to serve. It can help clients to expand their consciousness, reflect on and reframe their way of looking at themselves and their world.
In the Pacific, Thomspon and Wadley (2018), and Mafile’o and Vakalahi (2018) emphasise core Pacific values and beliefs such as spiritual strength, and reverence for environmental and human relational gifts, and issues on justice based on a transnational context reflecting the diaspora of Pacific peoples. While in Africa, Mabvurira (2018) focusses on Indigenous ways of helping and natural kinship networks, beliefs in witchcraft, ancestors and the Supreme Being. In India, Desai and Narayan (1998), and Rekha (1977) argued for a people-centred and country-specific development respectively. Vijayalakshmi (2004), too, states that social work, being a profession rooted in the sociocultural realities of the contexts in which it operates, should be responsive to the changing social needs, if it is to expand its knowledge base. Kulkarni (1993) argues that an Indigenous base for social work is local socio-economic, philosophical and cultural ethos. Rock (2015) discusses the impact of the various socio-economic, political and cultural systems on the people, the common social issues that confront people, and the policies and practice methods that are appropriate to address social ills and the needs of vulnerable groups and that are required to form an Indigenous perspective in social work. From these perspectives, a culturally appropriate approach to social work means emphasising each culture’s unique values, beliefs and preferences that distinguish a society.
However, social work is struggling to accommodate diversity due to its preference for modernist, Euro-American paradigms which define rules for acceptable knowledge and practice (Gray and Coates, 2015). Mathebane and Sekudu (2018) argue against any attempt to superimpose homogeneity and universality on the grounds that such attempts reinforce colonial tendencies and promote Western hegemony. Therefore, decolonisation is a crucial part of indigenisation. The process of decolonisation involves challenging the ideology of colonisation (Mathebane and Sekudu, 2018). Mabvurira (2018) argues that Western thought focusses on the visible and physical reality, and decolonisation should involve unlearning of this thought and valuing the spiritual dimension of phenomena and the Supreme Being. From a similar perspective, Ibrahima and Mattaini (2017) put decolonisation as a process of displacing colonial discourse and power structures and do not negate collaboration with external partners and experts, or seeking resources for capacity-building.
The theme of cultural awareness and diversity has been discussed by most of the authors. The irrelevance of Western thought and concepts in local contexts and focus on these ‘local contexts’ has triggered the debates and discussions. In this theme, the emphasis is on two components, namely, cultural values and beliefs, and decolonisation. While subjectivity is emphasised, deconstruction of colonial ideas is examined as an accompanying process towards conceptualising Indigenous social work.
Culturally competent practice frameworks/models
Knowledge of the core values and beliefs that are cultural and spiritually sensitive is conceptualised in terms of practice frameworks and models. To enhance reflection of social workers on their own values relating to religion and belief, Furness and Gilligan (2010) propose a culturally competent practice that will help to develop a greater self-awareness and recognition of the impact of individuals’ personal beliefs. Nine interconnected principles related to self-awareness and reflexivity about one’s own religious and spiritual beliefs; people’s needs and beliefs; strengths, difficulties and needs which arise from them; and creative responses to individuals’ beliefs and strengths are emphasised for appreciating and engaging with matters relating to religion and belief. In a similar perspective on culturally competent practice, Akintayo T, Hämäläinen J and Rissanen S (2018) propose the EHT model for multicultural and international social work intervention, in which ethno-cultural diversity (E) symbolises in-depth understanding of their clients’ culture and traditions through formal and informal education; human rights and social justice (H) symbolise considering the rights of their multicultural clients within a social justice framework practice in multicultural settings; and themes in strategic statements (T) symbolise how social work practice in multicultural settings should reflect the prevailing aims, objectives, mission, vision and goals within their social contexts as reflected in their educational curricula.
Alternatively, Jones et al. (2018) argue that moving beyond notions of cultural competence towards a critical appreciation of cultural diversity, imperialism, racism and privilege is important. Towards this end, they developed an intercultural learning module aimed at preparing social work students on core concepts of culture and cultural competence, imperialism and cultural diversity, racism and privilege, critical reflection and culture, and intercultural practice. The authors move beyond practical preparatory tasks and superficial context descriptions, to encourage critical self-analysis around the mentioned issues. Contrary to many authors who contend that indigenisation is a starting point for evaluation of the cultural hegemony of the West, Mathebane and Sekudu (2018) developed a framework for cultural relativity which argues that indigenisation coupled with decolonisation and a sense of critical consciousness will allow for intercultural translation and mutual intelligibility among the diverse experiences of the world, resulting in dialogue between knowledge. The framework encourages a dialogue between individualism and collectivism, freewill and determinism, materialism and spiritualism, cognitivism and emotionalism to understand the voices of culture. From a different perspective, Nadkarni (2002) puts forward a framework that deals with biological disasters arising out of environmental pollution to bridge the widening gap between people and their environments.
Attention to the theme of practice frameworks/models emerged recently as authors recognise the irrelevance of practice that is based on Western theories and principles. The frameworks provide different structures for analysing and responding to people’s needs and issues. While culturally competent practice remains the core emphasis, the frameworks call for self-reflection and critical consciousness to develop a dialogue between knowledge. In conceptualising Indigenous social work, these frameworks provide structures to engage in self-reflection and critical consciousness in addition to culturally competent practice.
Localisation of Western concepts
Trygged (2010) argues against an approach that only recognises context-bound social work. Although social work is contextual because needs, economies, cultures and societies are diversified, there are aspects that must be considered in a broad cross-border perspective. He further asserts that international social work represents a modernity perspective, a common understanding of problems, that people are much the same, that we are all citizens of one globe and that problems can be understood across borders. In a similar fashion in China, Law and Lee (2016) argue that importing Western values and practice can help break the institutional and cultural barriers, within which the predominantly Chinese oriented social work practice is embedded, to make the Hong Kong government and social workers start expressing their concern for the needs of ethnic minorities. Yunong and Xiong (2008, 2011) too stress a balanced focus on both Western and local concepts, which would allow people to exchange knowledge with one another. Contrary to most of the authors who are against the import of Western concepts due to which the indigenisation movement started, these authors (Law and Lee, 2016; Trygged, 2010) explain that Western concepts do not corrupt the local concepts and in fact, allow for a more common understanding of problems.
Political competence
Responding to politically motivated violence requires negotiating ways through complex political situations. Spalek and McDonald (2012), as editors of an issue on social work and political contexts, recognise that social work does not take place in a social or political vacuum, particularly while engaging in community-based approaches to conflict transformation. The authors argue that critical, reflexive approaches are crucial in dealing with politically affected communities who may view state institutions with mistrust. They claim that relationship building is one important aspect of building peace, and knowing the dynamics of power, expertise and conflicting expectation will result in politically minded practice. Although only one article constitutes this theme, it provides a strong case for understanding the political contexts by focussing on relationship building and politically minded practice. The understanding of powers and structures is crucial in conceptualising Indigenous social work, particularly in conflict ridden contexts.
Discussion
Four lines of thoughts emerged on how Indigenous social work is conceptualised from the current review: cultural relevance and diversity, practice frameworks/models, localisation of Western concepts and political competence. While they emphasise specific connotations, they have partial overlaps in their focus on cultural appropriateness. The practice framework and model can be an extension of the first line of thought which is that of cultural relevance and diversity.
Cultural relevance and diversity along with decolonisation emerged as fundamental elements that are crucial to developing Indigenous social work. The culture-related notions are deepened by emphasising distinct values such as ubuntu (Mathebane and Sekudu, 2018), ecological sustainability (Coates et al., 2006; Jones, 2018), religious heritage (Graham et al., 2007), conscientisation (Goldstein, 1986), natural kinship networks (Mabvurira, 2018; Sinclair, 2004), racism and privilege (Jones et al., 2018), self-reflection and critical consciousness frameworks (Mathebane and Sekudu, 2018) and spirituality (Mafile’o and Vakalahi, 2018). However, Rankopo and Osei-Hwedie (2011) argue that blind adherence to Indigenous cultural and social structures has to be resisted. Yunong and Xiong (2011) also observe that this may lead to miniaturisation of humanity, with everyone locked up in tight little boxes from which they emerge only to attack one another. The authors of the current review article concur with this statement as there is a risk of generating new forms of stereotyping, discrimination and racism. To counterbalance this issue, Gray and Coates (2010) propose to complement the focus on cultural relevance with internationalisation that seeks commonalities across diverse contexts. With the inevitability of globalisation, neoliberal policies and weakening welfare states, the agenda of environmental, global or international social work is crucial, and therefore, a blended model of Western influenced social work education and Indigenous social work education has been suggested (Pulla et al., 2020). Taking into consideration the ongoing debates, the Global Agenda for Social Work and Social Development has selected ubuntu as the theme of the decade 2020–2030 to strengthen international social work ethics. ubuntu is a philosophy and practice that resonates with many cultures around the world and is consistent with the values of social work and can expand our understanding of the profession’s principles, focussing them on human relationships, making them more holistic (Mayaka and Truell, 2021). Second, practice frameworks that are cultural and spiritually sensitive emerged as equally important constituents for developing Indigenous social work. Keeping culture at the centre, these frameworks provide directions and structures to engage in self-reflection, critical appreciation and critical consciousness. They underpin an intercultural practice that enables exchange of knowledge between local and global values. Thus, both ‘cultural relevance’ and ‘internationalisation’ are essential in the conceptualisation of Indigenous social work provided that it is rooted in the local socio-cultural realities.
All the approaches that are discussed contribute to conceptualising Indigenous social work based on cultural or local relevance. Developing a full-fledged culturally based Indigenous social work comes with various challenges, particularly when its overarching social work discipline already has a strong base in Western concepts. There are two main challenges. First, developing a culturally based curriculum based on cultural beliefs, values and practices requires materials and resources that are produced based on local realities. In-depth information and documents based on firsthand experiences of local collective practices, local institutions, perspectives and knowledge of the local people, shared beliefs and values, social structure, power dynamics, histories, contemporary ways of life, relationships with natural resources, spirituality, needs and capacities are significant resources for curriculum development. There is lack of such resources as there has been very less research and documentation activities to capture Indigenous concepts and practices. Kalinganire and Rutikanga (2015) and King et al., (2017) too asserted that lack of locally generated materials, inadequate sponsorship for social work-based research and lack of local literature on cultural approaches hinder indigenisation of social work knowledge. Facilitation of research activities by research funding organisations and universities to develop Indigenous resources and linking them to theory and curriculum development could enhance a culturally based discipline. However, it is crucial to understand that it is even more challenging to bring Indigenous beliefs and values into the classrooms without appropriating them. For instance, Lavallee (2010) argues that for Aboriginal people, knowledge is power and it can be used both for good and evil that needs responsible usage of it. The social work profession should not control Indigenous knowledge and must recognise the danger of appropriating cultural practices before bringing them to the classrooms.
The second challenge is localisation of Western concepts, that is, modifying the Western theories and concepts based on local culture and practices to allow exchange of knowledge between global and local. Localisation of the concepts in continents such as Asia and Africa is challenging, as there are significant cultural differences between Western countries, and Asian and African countries. The collective-based cultures do not identify or accommodate individual-based concepts and methods. Localising these concepts and methods requires local leaders and experts to collaborate with educators and practitioners to share their knowledge, experiences and preferences. Thus, developing a culturally relevant social work discipline is a meticulous task that can be achieved through collaboration between local leaders, social work educators and practitioners. The current article focusses on Indigenous knowledge that arises from within any local culture. Future research that focusses exclusively on Aboriginals or Indigenous peoples such as Sami, Maori, Aboriginal and Inuits may greatly contribute to the development of Indigenous social work.
Limitations
Since the review selected only four key journals, relevant articles from other journals that discuss different aspects of Indigenous social work have been missed out. Furthermore, many Indigenous-oriented articles that are published in anthologies have not been studied.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
