Critical Multicultural Practice in Social Work

New perspectives and practices

Charlotte Williams

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000256680
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

Critical multicultural practice, rather than being a specialism, is integral to Australian social work. Drawing on critical race theory, critical multiculturalism, intersectionality and critical reflection as practice theory, this major new edited collection challenges many of the dominant assumptions of cross-cultural social work and provides instead a new model of transformative engagement. Key concepts are considered, including identity, culture, diversity and superdiversity, how power and privilege shape everyday interactions and what is meant by citizenship in the contemporary context. Part One explores the changing nature of multicultural practice in Australia, including our society's changing demographic profile, the impact of asylum and refugee migrations, race and racism and cultural identity. Indigenous perspectives and the relationship with multicultural practice are examined, together with the ethical and legal basis for multicultural practice. This part concludes with an outline of the editors' framework for critical multicultural practice. Part Two draws on contributions from a range of practitioners and offers new perspectives on diverse fields, including child protection, mental health, disability, ageing, homelessness and rural and regional practice.Featuring case studies and insights drawn from across the spectrum of practice, this book is a vital resource for all social workers practising in Australia today.'[A] rich and nuanced analysis of what is happening at the interfaces of our work and the lives of Australian citizens, [it] articulates ways forward that are genuine, bold and empathetic.'
From the foreword by Professor Kerry Arabena, The University of Melbourne

Part 1 Understanding ethnic diversity

Sharlene Nipperess and Charlotte Williams

1 Australia and its 'others': Multicultural theory, policy and practice

Sharlene Nipperess and Charlotte Williams

Introduction

Australian multiculturalism is heralded as a success story. The 2016 Census has flagged Australia as officially the most multicultural nation on earth, with over half of the population born overseas or with a parent born overseas (ABS 2017). The Census reveals a complex cultural and linguistic diversity made up of over 180 different nationality groups, over 200 languages spoken and a strong foundational Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander presence. This unique combination and the broad spectrum of the population diversity mark Australia out from countries like the United States and the United Kingdom, which are characterised by more substantive clusters of racial and ethnic minority groups. This multicultural melee has become a core element of the narrative of national identity; indeed, as the backlash against multiculturalism rages in Europe, Australia is experiencing a process of re-multiculturalism (Koleth 2010). Political debate and policy documents celebrate Australia’s growing diversity and it is presented as a confident feature of the national portrait.

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that Australians are willing to embrace a greater level of cultural diversity in their everyday lives than many other comparable nations (Brett & Moran 2011; Markus 2017). Australia wants migrants: they are critical to the economy—particularly those who are highly skilled or seeking education and training for the skilled sector. Immigration of this kind is unlikely to abate. In addition, Australia recognises its humanitarian obligations and planned to make available 18,750 places to refugees and people seeking asylum in 2018–19, a slight increase from the 17,555 places provided in 2015–16 (DHA 2017, 2018). Diversity also grows from within, through intermarriage, family reunification, the assertion of new identities and acquisition of legal status. The Commonwealth and state governments are responding to this diversity, developing multicultural policy frameworks aimed to address equitable access and service responsiveness, address issues of racism and discrimination, and enhance cohesion. As global migration increases in scale and complexity, the call is out for a sophisticated multicultural literacy that moves beyond the celebratory aspects of multiculturalism to rise to the challenge of critically engaging with the policy framework at the same time as finding ways to respond innovatively to the increasingly complex nature of contemporary diversity.

The responsibilities of social workers with regard to responding to ethnic diversity have for some time been acknowledged in the Australian Association of Social Work’s (AASW) Code of Ethics (2010), in the Practice Standards (2013) and in the Australian Social Work Education Accreditation Standards (2012). The current accreditation standards, for example, commit social work to ‘address the barriers, inequities and injustices that exist in society’ (2012: 7) and to ‘promote respect for traditions, cultures, ideologies, beliefs and religions among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and different ethnic groups and societies’ (2012: 7) as part of an enduring core value of a commitment to human rights and social justice for all. Culture, identity and discrimination (AASW 2012) are considered core dimensions for knowledge and skill development. Despite this ethical mandate, as yet we know little empirically about the actual practices of multiculturalism in professional arenas; nor do we know much about the implementation of policies aimed at responding to needs in various ethnic minority communities or how these communities perceive and engage with social work. What we do know is that a perceptible gap exists between intention and impact, creating disadvantage from many minority ethnic groups (AHRC 2012).

Multiculturalism is a concept that is easily acknowledged yet it remains deeply contested. Within social work, it has been interpreted with a variety of meanings, variously used as a demographic descriptor, an imperative, an ideology or simply to describe everyday life (Sundar & Ly 2013). As a concept, it has driven the development of a plethora of approaches: cultural awareness (Green 1995), cultural diversity (Thyer 2010), cultural competency (Laird 2008), cultural safety (Lenette 2014) and cross-cultural and intercultural working (Ling, Martin & Ow 2013), to name a few and not without critique (Pon 2009). These approaches, however, are too often discussed in ways that are somewhat divorced from the political context in which they are enacted, and they too often ignore changes in the policy context that inform them as if they are somehow universal and immutable techniques that are applicable everywhere. They defy the ‘contextuality’ and ‘temporality’ of their interpretation in specific places and at specific times (Phillips 2010). As a profession, we have been guilty of this decontextualising, of liberating these concepts from their socio-political mainsprings and assuming them as part of the professional apparatus—as a set of skills to be learned and accomplished. Thus, while a burgeoning literature exists about the associated concepts of cross-cultural working in the Australian context, admonitions about the paucity of writing and research first noted by McMahon (2002) persist, with few attempts to directly consider the interrelationship between multiculturalist policy-making and professional practices on the ground. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that an ever-widening gap exists between theory and practice in addressing ethnic minority disadvantage. There are many reasons for this, as explored in this text, but what we do know is that there is considerable unidentified and unmet need across practice fields for these groups, and considerable vulnerabilities (Sawrikar & Hunt 2005; Sawrikar & Katz 2009).

There is clearly an unprecedented challenge to contemporary practice: to the dominant discourses that inform social work practice, to practice assumptions and methodologies and institutional ways of organising service delivery for a multicultural public. Our contention is that ethnic, linguistic and cultural diversity is a normalised element of everyday professional and organisation practice. Population diversity will be reflected in social work caseloads irrespective of role and specialism, just as this diversity is reflected within the profession. In this chapter, we draw on Pon’s (2009) notion of a ‘call to context’ (2009) in reviewing the relationship between policy, institutional arrangements and practice. We seek to demonstrate how legacies of the past shape and constrain contemporary practice and the dominant social work imaginary. We consider the ways in which new-era multiculturalism articulates a neoliberal agenda, raising particular concerns that should engage the attention of social work. We offer a critique of the conventional paradigm of practice aimed at addressing the needs of ethnic minority groups. We argue that critical engagement with the political, social and economic context of multiculturalism is vital to setting the agenda for a critical and transformative multicultural practice.

Multicultural legacies

Australia’s status as an immigrant nation is unrivalled in the developed world and, alongside Canada, it is considered one of the most successful multicultural nations (Kymlicka 2007). Australian resettlement services are regarded very highly. By implication, Australia is much advanced in terms of its practical interpretation of these policies within social work, being recognised as having a leading edge in issues such as refugee settlement, human rights social work and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social work, and potentially its examination of cross-cultural issues (Bennett et al. 2013; Briskman 2014; Gray, Coates & Yellow Bird 2008; Ife 2012). There is nevertheless a paradox here inasmuch as while these specialisms are indeed well developed, the dominant paradigm guiding practice remains relatively unchallenged. A number of historical legacies shape approaches to ethnic diversity in Australia.

As a settler colonial society, the history of Australia reflects a particular approach to multiculturalism. In van Krieken’s (2012) analysis, this history has produced two distinct models of integration vis-à-vis the Anglo-Celtic majority: those addressing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and those focused on incoming migrants, refugees and asylum seekers. For a variety of reasons— some contestable—these policy streams have travelled their separate ways. In the Australian context, multiculturalism has come to refer to policies directed at the latter groups and their descendants. As a starting point in itself, this has shaped the social work response, defining the institutional structures and funding streams within which it operates and the types of discourse that have evolved around Indigeneity and migrant disadvantage (see Chapter 2). We set this argument aside for the time being to consider policy responses to multiculturalism.

The development of Australian multiculturalist policy beyond the White Australia policy is well documented (e.g. Jakubowicz & Ho 2013; Jayasuriya 2012; Jupp 2007). This story tracks transformations from a period of disavowal, racial engineering and strident assimilationism in the post-war period into more egalitarian and liberal periods of the 1970s and 1980s when multiculturalism emerged most forcefully as a distinct area of policy (van Krieken 2012). The early ideal of creating a racially homogeneous grouping of Anglo Celts was rapidly undermined by the influx of European migrants—notably Greeks and Italians—and meant that the search for racial purity was quickly replaced by the search for a cultural homogeneity. Australian policy sought to assimilate new settlers by assuming they would leave aspects of their culture behind and adopt the dominant Anglo norms and values. In van Krieken’s (2012) analysis, Australia needs no colour bar, as in the United Kingdom and the United States, but evokes a culture bar to differentiate its outsiders; it has no need to speak about race or its associate ‘racism’, as the notion of a superior community culture into which other miscellaneous cultures must assimilate amply does the work. This conflation of race, nation and culture provides the comfortable camouflage in which issues of race are silenced, producing what might be called a sanitised multiculturalism, as noted by Walter, Taylor and Habibis (2011: 12), who argue that, ‘Australian social work appears to remain located within the broader cultural context of avoidance and discomfort regarding race issues.’

From the 1970s, multiculturalist policy sought to embrace and accept the diversity of lifestyles asserted by the early migrants from Europe, but within the context of an undefined Aussie culture. The predominant policy strategy that emerged built firmly on the notion of cultural pluralism—the idea that different groups would retain and maintain their cultural identities and values within the context of a broader culture. This effectively constructed migrant communities as the culturally essentialised ‘other’, imbued with essential and unchanging traits or characteristics within a liberal paradigm that acknowledged the wish of minority individuals and groups to express their lifestyle differences within the private domain. Jayasuriya (2012) argues that Australian policy interpreted the problems of migrants as problems of individual adjustment—largely as a result of the cultural and linguistic baggage these groups carry with them. This baggage was seen as hampering their integration into mainstream society and thus remedial strategies focused on language and communication difficulties and policies aimed at smoothing the transitions of migrants to the Australian way of life. The Galbally Report (Galbally 1981), under the Fraser Coalition government, institutionalised this approach, with migrant rights removed from the mainstream collective contributory rights and devolved to ethno-cultural organisations in the form of grant aid. Galbally sought to recognise and legitimise diverse lifestyles and to promote self-help and community responsibility. Accordingly, a plethora of non-governmental organisations were co-opted and funded to deliver principally settlement services.

This disaggregation of ethno-specific services from mainstream service delivery effectively produced a system of differentiated rights, parallel institutions and targeted service delivery on the ethnic group model (Castles 2000). Groups were not regarded as political stakeholders or equal partners, but as somehow in need of recognition for their cultural and adaptive deficit. Castles (2000) argues that this model has enabled the political incorporation of potentially radical leaders and the subduing of the potential for ethnic group mobilisation. Moreover, this focus on expressive aspects of ethnic identity and culture deflected attention away from substantive social structural disadvantage, and lack of access to and participation in public services; it also ensured little disturbance to the established political power structure.

This legacy permeates mainstream social work practice—its discourses, terminologies, projects and interventions, which speak to the primacy of the cultural subject of its services with remedial services aimed at removing the barriers to their integration and tempering the excesses of lifestyle difference. Thus these groups and communities became labelled cultural and linguistic minorities (CALD). The construction of these categories is not without import (Sawrikar & Katz 2009). The essentialising effect of this labelling fixes the relationship between the mainstream and ‘the other’, and reinforces the notion of majority white service providers servicing deficient ethnic minority groups. It reifies cultural difference, magnifying and fixing it as the orchestrating attribute for intervention, thereby producing an ‘us and them’ binary that the minority group is obliged to traverse.

Moreover, it begs certain questions such as, ‘Culturally and linguistically diverse from what?’, ‘When are you timed out as CALD?’, ‘Are second-, third-and fourth-generation Australians still CALD?’, ‘When does an immigrant become a settler?’, ‘And how does this terminology incorporate issues of religious diversity, specific issues of visible minorities, changing identities, class and other important intersections of difference?’ These are provocative and searching questions for social work, yet the predominant discourse has perpetuated and susta...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Table and figures
• Editors and contributors
• Acronyms and abbreviations
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Part I: Understanding ethnic diversity
• Part II: Fields of practice
• Index