Photo credit: BigStockPhoto/Ivelin Radkov
by Allan Barsky, JD, MSW, PhD
As social workers, we take pride in our mandate to promote social justice and advance the dignity and worth of all people. Our Code of Ethics explains our duties to advocate for these principles, particularly to address social injustices such as racism, xenophobia, ableism, religious bigotry, heterosexism, and other forms of discrimination (NASW, 2021, ss. 6.01 and 6.04). Although advocacy for the well-being of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society is an essential component of social work practice, we may face restrictions from our employers in terms of whether, when, and how we may advocate. The purpose of this article is to offer guidance about how to balance our ethical obligations to advocate with our responsibilities to our practice settings, as outlined in Part 3 of the NASW (2021) Code of Ethics.
Distinguishing Work-Based and Personal Advocacy
Although the NASW Code of Ethics does not reference the terms work-based advocacy and personal advocacy, it is crucial to distinguish them. Work-based advocacy refers to the advocacy that we perform as part of our work responsibilities. In general, work-based advocacy is advocacy that is conducted during our regular work hours. It is authorized by our employer, which may include authorization from supervisors, agency policies, and laws governing our practice. In contrast, personal advocacy is advocacy conducted during our personal time. Typically, personal advocacy does not require permission from our practice settings or supervisors.[1] Under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, we not only have freedom of speech, but also freedom of association, allowing us to join with unions, civil liberties organizations, law reform groups, political parties, or others to advocate for social change.
When advocating as part of our work responsibilities, our practice settings may determine which types of causes we may support. Our constitutional rights to free speech and freedom of association are somewhat limited when acting within the scope of our employment. By agreeing to work for a social agency or other employer, we agree to abide by their rules and policies. They are paying us to perform particular tasks or roles. Just as employers may restrict us from playing games or going shopping during required work hours, they may also limit our advocacy efforts. If our practice settings prohibit us from advocating for a particular cause or in particular manner, one option might be to advocate on our personal time. Whereas it would be inappropriate, for instance, for social workers to use their work time and agency resources to support a particular political party, social workers may generally participate in partisan political campaigns on their own time.[2]
Ethical conflicts may arise when we believe that a particular form of advocacy is essential to our work but our supervisors or agency policies advise against participating in such advocacy. Standard 3.09(a) of the NASW Code of Ethics says that, in general, we should adhere to commitments made to our employers. These commitments are stated in our work contracts and agency policies. When we experience conflicts between our professional ethical duties and agency responsibilities, Standard 3.09(c) suggests we should inform our employers of our ethical obligations. Standard 3.09(d) recommends taking “reasonable steps to ensure that [our] employing organizations’ practices are consistent with the NASW Code of Ethics.” Hence, if a conflict arises between our ethical obligations and our commitments to our employer, we should engage in frank communications, identifying our concerns and seeking a mutually satisfactory solution. If we cannot reach agreement, then we are faced with a challenging dilemma. We may benefit from consulting supervisors, attorneys, or others to determine the best way forward.
A Case Example
Consider a scenario in which our professional obligation to advocate for social justice clashes with our employer’s directives. Imagine you are a school social worker. You are concerned about a recently passed state law that requires you and other school personnel to contact a student’s parents (or guardians) if you discover that the student is LGBTQ+. You believe that students should have a right to privacy and that they should not be outed to their parents if they are not ready to disclose their sexuality or gender identity. The students may be concerned that they will experience bullying, rejection, or harassment. Such negative parental reactions may lead to mental health issues, such as depression, suicide, and illegal drug use (Estep & Mirman, 2023). The law is based on an argument that parents have a right to know information about their children (Florida House Bill 1557, 2022). You approach your supervisor to discuss using work time and resources to advocate for repeal of this law. However, your supervisor instructs you to refrain from such advocacy, citing two primary reasons:
- Your primary responsibility in the agency is to provide direct services to clients in need, not to advocate for law reform.
- Advocating against the law could alienate members of the current government and jeopardize the agency’s state funding and support.
Sometimes, agency administrators and attorneys tend to be risk-averse, preferring to avoid actions that could potentially expose the agency or its staff to lawsuits, client complaints, retaliation, or other risks. However, as social workers who advocate for social justice, we are sometimes faced with situations in which taking risks is necessary. This is particularly true when the stakes are high, and failing to act could implicitly condone policies or practices that are unjust. In such instances, our commitment to upholding justice may compel us to make morally courageous decisions, even in the face of potential risks (Strom, n.d.).
Options
When confronting challenging ethical issues, it is important to explore various options (Barsky, 2023). The question in the case example is not simply, “Should we advocate or not advocate?” but rather, given that the current law is abridging students’ privacy rights and putting LGBTQ+ children at risk, what should we do? Note that the supervisor’s primary concerns were not related to the cause you wanted to pursue. The supervisor acknowledges the law’s harmful effects. So, rather than focusing on whether this is a good cause to pursue, the question could be phrased, “What are our options for advocacy to repeal or amend this law?”
One option could be for you to participate in advocacy on your own time and with your personal resources. You could also collaborate with civil rights organizations, LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, and professional associations that represent teachers, school social workers, guidance counselors, and other professionals that serve schools. Unfortunately, you would not have your institution’s support. You may also have limited time outside your work hours to participate in such advocacy.
Another option would be to advocate in a manner that addresses your supervisor’s concerns. In terms of your primary work commitment, consider ways that you could continue to fulfill your tasks as a direct service provider, while also engaging in certain forms of advocacy. Could you pool the resources of various school personnel, sharing advocacy-related tasks alongside other work responsibilities?
The supervisor’s second concern revolves around the potential political repercussions of opposing a law endorsed by the current government. There are various forms of advocacy, including discreet, consensual, and collaborative methods. Although your supervisor might not support your participation in staging a student walkout or a confrontational public protest at the state capital, your supervisor might be open to a coalition of school social workers holding private meetings with members of the executive branch of government to educate them about the harmful effects of the law. Rather than working “against the system,” you could try to work within the system. The law purports to protect parent rights, which is a valid objective. Nonetheless, it would be helpful to consider how parental rights may be balanced with the rights of students, including their rights to privacy and their rights to access social workers or other helping professionals when they have concerns related to their sexual orientation or gender identity. Social workers are well positioned to help engage various stakeholders in constructive discussions and collaborative problem-solving processes (Barsky, 2017).
Conclusions
While advocacy for social justice is integral to social work, there may be times when our employers limit or forbid it. In such cases, it is critical to listen to and validate their concerns (Barsky, 2017). We may then be able to address their concerns and highlight how our proposed advocacy fits not only with our ethical obligations as social workers, but also with the mandates, missions, and goals of our employing agencies. Agency concerns may be related to resource allocation, including funding and the time commitments of social workers and other agency employees. Through collaborative negotiation, we may reach an agreement to advocate by delineating what resources will be needed, how we can procure them, and how we can ensure that the resources will be used in a cost-effective manner.
Although the immediate provision of direct services is a priority, we also recognize that policy affects practice. Accordingly, it is often essential to address policy issues to address direct practice concerns. When advocating on behalf of our agencies, we should be open and honest with our supervisors and administrators about what we are advocating for, how we plan to advocate, and how we can mitigate any risks associated with advocacy. We should also be aware of the limits of agency-based advocacy and consider when it might be more appropriate to advocate using our personal time and resources. Ultimately, we must navigate the complexities of advocacy within organizational contexts with integrity, discerning the best ways to ethically advance the well-being of the communities and clients we serve, whether within the walls of our agencies or beyond them.
References
Barsky, A. E. (2023). Essential ethics for social work practice. Oxford University Press.
Barsky, A. E. (2017). Conflict resolution for the helping professions (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press.
Estep, C., & Mirman, J. H. (2023). Parent reactions to sexual and gender identity disclosure events in the deep south. LGBTQ+ Family: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 19(1), 21-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/27703371.2022.2131674
Florida House Bill 1557. (2022). Parental rights in education. https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2022/1557
National Association of Social Workers. (2021). Code of ethics. https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics/Code-of-Ethics/Code-of-Ethics-English
Strom, K. (n.d.). What is moral courage? For Moral Courage. https://www.formoralcourage.com
[1] Exceptions may arise, for instance, when there is a conflict of interest or when there are laws that specifically restrict advocacy activities for people who work in particular positions (e.g., it may be inappropriate for a military social worker to protest publicly against the military’s stance on a current war situation).
[2] Although we are generally free to choose which causes or political parties to support on our own time, we should consider how our personal activities may affect our professional roles and responsibilities (NASW, 2021, ss. 4.03 and 4.04). For instance, if we joined a racist organization in our personal capacity, our employer and clients may not trust us to respect the dignity and worth of all people in our professional capacity.
Allan Barsky, JD, MSW, PhD, is Professor of Social Work at Florida Atlantic University and author of Social Work Values and Ethics (Oxford University Press).
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent the views of any of the organizations to which the author is affiliated, or the views of The New Social Worker magazine or White Hat Communications.