KEY CONCEPTS IN MACRO PRACTICE
This is representing, championing, or defending the rights of others
What is ADVOCACY?
This is ensuring that others have the right to power, ability, and authority to achieve self-determination
What is EMPOWERMENT?
A research method of involving people who are directly affected by a problem in efforts to study the issue, identify and undertake steps to combat the issue, and evaluate the outcomes. It has been used in many countries, with applications for changing aspects of an organization to tackling large-scale problems in a community.
What is PAR?
(Participatory action research)
This can take the form of providing the target system (the one we wish to change) with additional information that may allow the target to make a different decision
What is PERSUASION?
You need to be this when you advocate changing an organization, you are really struggling to change the values, beliefs, and assumptions of the people who make up the organization.
What is reasonable?
This is work on the behalf of individuals and families
What is CASE ADVOCACY?
This refers to groups that experience serious limitations because others in power exploit them
What are OPPRESSED POPULATIONS?
Responsible for helping to ensure that all relevant individuals and groups are involved in the activities. Includes: encouraging all who want to participate, listening to input, soliciting suggestions, and summarizing decisions and educating stakeholders in how to access and assess information.
What is the SOCIAL WORKER'S ROLE IN PAR?
*name some roles of social worker in PAR: facilitator, reporter, teacher, and planner, among others
These are administrative procedures designed to ensure that clients or client groups who have been denied benefits or rights to which they are entitled, get equitable treatment.
What are FAIR HEARINGS, GRIEVANCES, AND COMPLAINTS?
A community organizer and activist, believed in the use of militant social action activities on behalf of the poor. A lasting legacy that was founded by this activist is the Industrial Areas Foundation, which was founded and continues to this day as a network of community and religious organizatons focused on capacity development, training, and citizen-led efforts to improve social well-being.
What is ALINKSY'S SOCIAL ACTION APPROACH?
This is the negative treatment of individuals often based on their membership in some group (such as women) or on some characteristic they share with other (such as a disability)
What is DISCRIMINATION?
These are groups in society most likely to suffer the consequences of, or to be at risk, for discrimination, economic hardship, and oppression
What are POPULATIONS-AT-RISK?
Assessment and problem description
Planning
Intervention
Evaluation
Identifying lessons learned
What is the process of PAR?
Similar to steps in any planned change project:
Begin by identifying and describing the problem (process of assessment).
Once problem is formulated, next step is to consider what steps will be needed to fix or eliminate the problem (planning).
Next, Intervention phase, carry out the actions identified in planning process most likely to produce success.
Move to evaluation phase, which involves determining what worked, what didn't and why.
From the evaluation phase Identifying Lessons Learned decides if process is to continue or be abandoned. This may include a reassessment of the original problem, which has not been resolved, or using the new knowledge gained from the research to tackle another problem.
Publicly pointing out the problems or flaws of an organization for the purpose of forcing change in response to poor public perception.
What is EMBARRASSING THE TARGET OF CHANGE?
1. power is essential to change the status quo.
2. Power is the sum of what you actually have, but rather the sum of the appearance of what you have.
3. You aquire power by taking it from those who have it because power is not given to you. So, the very act of acquiring power is potentially confrontational
4. Use methods familar to you (or the action system) and unfamiliar to the target sysytem. Putting your opponents off guard helps your success.
5. Make organizations lives by their own rules.
6. Organize people around issues that are vital to them.
7. People in power respond to political pressure. Whether it be right, wrong or immaterial. If you know the buttons
8. Most controversial, remember that successfully attacking a target requires a clear demarcation between good and evil, or the haves and have-nots. You paint your opponent as bad and yourself as good.
9. Turn negatives into positives - you will lose some fights, be prepared to salvage whatever possible and learn from the negatives and figure out a more effective strategy next time
10. Prepare yourself to propose an alternative. Ripping at the enemy is fine until the times comes to propose a different solution. Otherwise, you will be identified as a crank or chronic complainer.
What ARE ALINSKY'S KEY PERSPECTIVES ON SOCIAL ACTION?
This is a coordinated effort to achieve institutional change to meet a need, solve a social problem, correct an injustice, or enhance the quality of human life
What is SOCIAL ACTION?
This exists when every individual has opportunities, rights, and responsibilities equal to those of all other members of a society. This includes the opportunity to obtain gainful employment, adequate housing, food, and medical care without experiencing discrimination or other forms of oppression
What is SOCIAL JUSTICE AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE?
Ranges from youth to professionals
Who are those directly involved and affected by the research PAR Model?
the application of political power to force changes that would not otherwise occur.
What is POLITICAL PRESSURE?
What is LEGAL ACTION?
Legal action can be used for a multitude of purposes. Even the THREAT of LEGAL ACTION can be effective. It can force organizations to follow the laws or their own rules, or live up to their promises. Successful lawsuits can help to empower a group. At the same time it can be expensive, time consuming, and unsuccessful. Legal action should only be used when it is the most appropriate way to resolve a problem.
This is work on the behalf of groups of people
What is CAUSE ADVOCACY?
This is macro practice that involves the use of client groups to achieve identified goals, empasizing collaboration and collective planned change.
What is THE STRENGTHS PERSPECTIVE?
1.They are the ones most acutely aware of and affected by the problem. Their views and experiences matter and are central to the research. They are the beneficiaries of the change effort. 2. Involvement with working with others on a project builds confidence in their ability to tackle others. Involving those directly affected by a condition in the process is empowering. 3. Gives the individual a sense of participation with others and hope that changes will occur.
What are the BENEFITS FOR THE ONES WHO CARRY OUT THE RESEARCH?
The act of collecting signatures on a piece of paper that asks an organization or agency to act in a specified manner.
What is PETITIONING?
A social worker might help a neighbhorhood petition the city for better police protection to deal with drug use and gang violence.
Enemies are harder to identify, the high-tech world of today makes the role of the media much more influential in affecting ideas, perceptions and actions. In addition, the tactic of mobilizing one group to attack another typically polarizes people. It's only by connecting people to sources of power inside and outside the community can problems be solved.
What are oppositions to Alinsky's Social Action Approach?