Moral Agency and the Service Ideal: Nigel Elliott Overview of presentation

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Moral Agency and the Service Ideal Nigel
ElliottOver-view of presentation

• Some voices from the front line.
• Drivers behind the current policy and practice
  environment in social work and the social welfare
  professions and increasing authoritarianism.
• Two moral voices instrumental utilitarianism and
  the service ideal the exercise of moral
  agency. 
• Using the authors own experience of social work
  practice, research, reflection and writing within
  the probation / criminal correctional field.
• A good practice framework for establishing the
  potential for congruence between practice
  realities in any setting and ones own service
  ideal.
• Worked examples demonstrating the application
  of the framework.

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Voices from the Front Line

• I now have to work much harder that I have ever
  worked in my life. You are expected to work much
  faster with no breaks. It is no wonder that so
  many social workers are off with stress and on
  long term sick. It is appalling and it is going
  to get worse now we have all these league tables
  that are beginning to drive things.
• Social work is more and more about numbers with
  managers wanting to hit so many targets which
  involves turning cases over quickly. They want a
  case in, sorted and pushed out --- I think this
  emphasis on turnover is cosmetic to make it seem
  that we are giving a service to the public. But
  we dont give anything. We have nothing to give.
  
• (Jones, 2001, pp.553-4)
• I think back to when I first did child
  protection in the mid-80s --- its just horrific
  to think people could --- have a meeting about
  people and they wouldnt even know it was taking
  place --- today it is about being open to
  scrutiny, open to accountability, much more
  inclusive in the way that information is used and
  shared.
• (Banks, 2004, p.158)

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The Revolution in Public Welfare

• Voices from the front line and their moral
  urgency.
• The changes to public welfare services in a
  neo-liberal market environment the
  managerialist marketization of fragmented public
  services.
• Difficulty of controlling fragmented services
  the surveillance of targets, monitoring, audit
  and star ratings.
• A competitive society that feeds insecurity and
  anxiety.
• Resulting authoritarianism and focus on risk
  within the public welfare services, leading to
  ---
• An instrumental utilitarianism that can slip into
  an amoral technical rationality what works
  over-rides the moral merit of the methods chosen.
  
•  
•  

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Two Moral Voices and the Exercise of Moral Agency

• Instrumental utilitarianism. The commitment to
  equity, transparent criteria and accountability
  measurable and project based practice.
• The service ideal. The commitment to ethical
  practice as an end in itself see Kant and
  virtue ethics. Relationship-based, valuing
  process and social well-being as well as
  outcomes.
• An imbalance between the two moral voices
  requiring a re-balancing because of the
  authoritarian and oppressive risks when
  utilitarianism ceases to rein in instrumentalism.
  
• Exercising moral agency and judgement i.e.
  making demands of ones place of work.
• The framework and the personal experience of
  reflective practice that lies behind its
  formulation.
• A set of questions not as absolute standards
  but so that settings may be assessed according to
  criteria of good practice.

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Typology for Interrogating a Professional
Practice Setting(Worked examples from Elliott,
1995, 2001 and 2003)
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REFERENCES

• Key references include
• The full (pdf) text and references of this paper
  are available in the Kingston University Research
  Repository (http//eprints.kingston.ac.uk)
  Elliott, N. (2008) Moral Agency and the Service
  Ideal, in Improving Practice by Research, paper
  presented at the Olive Stevenson Seminar Series,
  Kingston University, 7th Nov. 2008.
• Worked examples given are
• Elliott, N. (1995) College Reflections on
  Practice Theory, Social Work Education, 14(3),
  pp.5-24.
• Elliott, N. (2001) Working with Structural and
  Ideological Change, Norwich University of East
  Anglia, Social Work Monograph.
• Elliott, N. (2003) Portfolio Creation, Action
  Research and the Learning Environment,
  Qualitative Social Work, 2(3), pp.327-45.
• The JSWEC conference paper is based upon and
  develops the article
• Elliott, N. (2008) The Global Vortex Social
  Welfare in a Networked World, Journal of Social
  Work Practice, 22(3), pp.269-87.

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The following are key references for the paper

• Banks, S. (2004) Ethics, Accountability and the
  Social Professions, Basingstoke Palgrave
  Macmillan.
• Charles, M. and Butler, S. (2004) Social
  Workers Management of Organisational Change in
  M. Lymbery S. Butler (eds) Social Work Ideals
  and Practice Realities, Basingstoke Palgrave
  Macmillan, pp.57-82.
• Cooper, A. and Lousada, J. (2005) Borderline
  Welfare Feeling and Fear of Feeling in Modern
  Welfare, London Karnac.
• Jones, C. (2001) Voices from the Front Line
  State Social Workers and New Labour, British
  Journal of Social Work, 31(4), pp.547-62.
• Robinson, G. and McNeill, F. (2004) Purposes
  Matter Examining the Ends of Probation, in G.
  Mair (ed) What Matters in Probation, Cullompton
  Willan, pp.277-304.
• Sennett, R. (2006) The Culture of the New
  Capitalism, New Haven Yale University Press.
• Email contact N.Elliott_at_sgul.kingston.ac.uk