Last week, the New York State Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers posted a graphic on Facebook that read, “Social workers belong in police departments.”
The accompanying post suggested that if more social workers were hired, we could “provide crisis intervention, referrals to human service and other agencies, short-term counseling, follow-up services, mediation” and other services. At publication time, the post had been shared over 1,600 times, received over 950 reaction emojis (all positive), and garnered 135 comments. The large majority of comments were generally in agreement with the sentiment that, yes, police departments do need more social workers.
I was deeply troubled, both because the statement itself is so clearly off-base, but also because the responses to it reveal so much about the broader challenges plaguing our profession.
This strategy will not fundamentally change even one of the myriad harms inflicted.
The statement feels especially offensive and problematic in this current moment. For the past several weeks, protesters and activists around the world have been rising up to denounce racist police brutality and demand systemic change (including making calls for the abolition of policing itself). This month also marks the fifty-first anniversary of Stonewall, a riot led by Black and Latinx trans women in response to ongoing targeting and abuse at the hands of police. So little has changed over half a century later, as we witness all-too-frequent incidences of police violence towards Black cis and trans women with no justice, nor even equal recognition or outcry as when victims are Black men.
The suggestion that social workers should join precincts denies the reality that this strategy will not fundamentally change even one of the myriad harms inflicted, on the very communities we claim to serve, by police. There is little evidence that our presence will reduce their disproportionate use of lethal force against Black, Latinx and Indigenous people; it will not prevent them from patrolling certain communities over others while serving the interests of gentrifiers; it will not demilitarize them; and it will not hold them accountable for misconduct or abuse.
If anything, our alignment with policing would exacerbate our profession’s already fraught role as agents of social control. It would make us even more complicit with yet another system—in addition to prisons and jails, other forms of “correctional control” like probation, or so-called Child Protective Services—that victimizes our society’s most marginalized.
Social workers say we want to end discrimination and injustice. But as a profession, we have not taken a clear stance on the harms of policing, incarceration and criminalization—harms that disproportionately impact communities of color and promote health, social and economic inequities. This is in embarrassingly stark contrast with the allied profession of public health, whose flagship journal, the American Journal of Public Health, dedicated an entire special issue to documenting and addressing the health impacts of carceral systems, including policing, just a few months ago.
What new policies and community systems are needed for social workers to no longer be necessary?
At a time when communities are imagining a world without policing and, in many cases have begun to build their own non-carceral community systems of support and accountability, we should be asking ourselves this: What would it take to work ourselves out of a job, rather than further entrenching ourselves in the harmful status quo of a violent system?
Despite the challenging nature of this exercise, social workers should stop imagining new settings in which to work, and instead consider what it would take to create a world where our profession is rendered obsolete. What new policies and community systems are needed for social workers to no longer be necessary?
So much of the work that many of us do at the individual or programmatic level is often to mitigate and navigate larger policy and systemic failures. Not enough of us are even equipped to engage in making these changes, since community organizing and policy practice courses at the Baccalaureate, master’s and doctoral levels are rare and often have less enrollment than clinical courses.
Our Code of Ethics states that our profession’s mission includes promoting social justice and ending oppression, but much of our advocacy agenda involves reimbursement parity and improving our own employment conditions.
As Mariame Kaba, the abolitionist organizer and writer, has said: “You can’t just focus on what you don’t want, you have to focus also on what you do want. The world you want to live in is also a positive project of creating new things.”
Social work as a profession must engage in a reckoning of its own: What kind of world do we truly want, and what new things could and should we help to create? Because we do have options beyond remaining either passive bystanders or willing accomplices to the carceral state.
The author’s employer, the Drug Policy Alliance, has previously provided a restricted grant to The Influence Foundation, which operates Filter, to support a Drug War Journalism Diversity Fellowship.
Photo of the NYPD 78th Precinct building in Brooklyn by Autopilot via Wikimedia Commons
Show Comments
Jerry Otero
Thank you Sheila for taking an unpopular position, but is one that with which I whole hardheartedly concur. I would add that social service-type diversion programs simply widen the net that often hastens the individual’s contact with criminal justice when one fails to make use of these services – this is so particularly for YOC.
Cogent drug policy should consist of multi-pronged approach that has been shown to be the most effective way to address the complexities inherent in the who, what and why people use drugs in the first place. Harm Reduction (HR) is a term that gets tossed around a lot without an understanding of its very essence. HR is a clunky concept that represents the the collection of policy wonks, drug reform activists, sidewalk psychologists and so on.. it is the most humane and pragmatic approach that places an emphasis on flexibility and acknowledges diverse approaches to practice. It is a lens through which to see, not a thing to do. It should be the foundation upon which police training is under-girded.
Social policy is often predicated on a top-down approach that hasn’t worked for decades and still doesn’t. It’s time for bottom-up approaches, based on the notion that the people most impacted by punitive police policy are considered the expert their own story. Such a view involves an implicit rejection of paternalist motives in which we all too often seek to alter the lives of the poor by improving their moral worth and behavior. The point of a dialogue is that it requires a breakdown in social hierarchies to enable both parties to actively work together. In this way, power is shared in a collaborative dialogue.
The utility of this approach is it brings honesty into the nexus of the clinical relationship, which allows for healing, personal development, and growth. Rather than “the big lie” in which we each share half-truths about drug use and other socially controversial yet common behaviors, harm reductionists emphasize the frank acknowledgment of desire, which helps move the relationship forward. Such a model emphasizes client strengths, rather than viewing people as difficulties or the totalities of their problems. Here, the relationship is key. Those most closest to the problem are closest to the solution, yet furthest from the resources to do anything about it.
So, are we listening? We need to shut up and listen.
Rebecca
Of course social workers–like doctors, public health professionals, educators, psychologists, scientists, etc. etc. etc.–are used as tools of the state, to exert social control and implement abusive, oppressive, unethical policies in a variety of settings. This is no new news. And as you mention, NASW regularly fails the social worker members it represents by not taking a stance on specific injustices. NASW’s “apolitical” stance on issues is obviously extremely political, as well as shameful. But do not mirror NASW in misrepresenting social workers’ work, ideas, beliefs, or wishes: social workers around the country have been imagining a world without policing, developing community systems of support, and striving to work themselves out of jobs for a long time. Radical social workers are among the leaders of these efforts throughout the country. Many organized groups of social workers are actively working to resist “entrenching ourselves in the harmful status quo of a violent system.” Furthermore, it is well-known within the profession that national NASW frequently actively prevents chapter offices from engaging in (often overtly political, but also just broadly anti-oppressive) activities that are consistent with our formal Code of Ethics. As far as I know, NASW membership numbers have been steadily decreasing, perhaps in response to the fact that social workers do not feel represented by the organization. I know I don’t. Since you are a social worker, it seems to me this article might have been more useful as a petition aimed at NASW, demanding an official stance from our profession’s representative body on policing, incarceration and criminalization. I am sure huge numbers of social workers feel as we do, and I would be happy to work on this with anybody interested.
Rebecca
Also see https://m.facebook.com/groups/956718804353169/permalink/4157301970961487/
Rebecca
Of course social workers–like doctors, public health professionals, educators, psychologists, scientists, etc. etc. etc.–are used as tools of the state, to exert social control and implement abusive, oppressive, unethical policies in a variety of settings. This is no new news. And as you mention, NASW regularly fails the social worker members it represents by not taking a stance on specific injustices. NASW’s “apolitical” stance on issues is obviously extremely political, as well as shameful. But do not mirror NASW in misrepresenting social workers’ work, ideas, beliefs, or wishes: social workers around the country have been imagining a world without policing, developing community systems of support, and striving to work themselves out of jobs for a long time. Radical social workers are among the leaders of these efforts throughout the country. Many organized groups of social workers are actively working to resist “entrenching ourselves in the harmful status quo of a violent system.” Furthermore, it is well-known within the profession that national NASW frequently actively prevents chapter offices from engaging in (often overtly political, but also just broadly anti-oppressive) activities that are consistent with our formal Code of Ethics. As far as I know, NASW membership numbers have been steadily decreasing, perhaps in response to the fact that social workers do not feel represented by the organization. I know I don’t. Since you are a social worker, it seems to me this article might have been more useful as a petition aimed at NASW, demanding an official stance from our profession’s representative body on policing, incarceration and criminalization. I am sure huge numbers of social workers feel as we do, and I would be happy to work on this with anybody interested.
Kenneth Anderson
Only in a fascist state do police gas, arrest, and fire rubber bullets at reporters to prevent them from reporting the news. Cops have become brown shirt thugs doing the bidding of a fascist dictator instead of serving and protecting the people and the constitution.
Kenneth Anderson
Funny how everyone applauds when someone suggests putting a band aid on a cancer
AMKrueger
I completely disagree. I’m a clinical mental health social worker with bipolar disorder and chronic anxiety. In my city, police are given training in mental health first aid which is more of a detriment than help. I’ve interacted with the police when in mental health distress. They are terrible crisis counselors. And the police still use military tactics with distressed individuals when crisis intervention is needed. My local police department needs social workers to respond to 911 calls such as mine. When I call 911 in emotional distress, I want a social worker or crisis counselor not a cop.
Luis Quiros
And thank you Sheila Vakharia for the support and article. On the topic of NASW and policy / practice I hope I don’t lose you with another unpopular protest. Forever I have been against celebrating Juneteenth. I can’t figure out why we would admit the lie that we are emancipated. Freedom is a practice. Freedom requires access. If you can’t practice it, or have access to it since, for example, due process is unaffordable, we don’t have it. There is no such thing as a little bit of freedom for some and not those of us known as the Others..
Julian
I fundamentally disagree with premise of this article for several reasons. First, Dr. Vakharia implies that although there is a dearth of evidence, it seems that integrating policing and social work is not beneficial to oppose systemic racism in police work. While there does seem to be few studies on this topic, it appears that most suggest that social workers would benefit the service capabilities of police responding to a call, because such situations normally require the unique skill set that social workers provide. Dr. Vakharia is correct that the impact of integrating social work and policing has been inadequately researched, but the evidence suggests that it in fact can have potential benefits. The opportunity for social work to have a leading role in creating substantive change to combat white supremacy in this country should perhaps warrant a call for increased research and advocacy instead of a complete dismissal of its viability.
Then Dr. Vakharia points to areas that an integration of social workers and police would not have an impact on, such as:
“disproportionate use of lethal force against Black, Latinx and Indigenous people; it will not prevent them from patrolling certain communities over others while serving the interests of gentrifiers; it will not demilitarize them; and it will not hold them accountable for misconduct or abuse.”
Although having social workers’ input into the management and structural policies and practices of policing could have positive impacts on the areas stated, in an absolute sense, one industry or one integration of professions, cannot undo intergenerational systemic racism in this country. We can be sure nothing will change if we are static, and we can fairly certain that Dr. Vakharia is correct that social workers implanted into police departments will be an antidote to racism but don’t social workers have immense potential to facilitate change?
In fact, the larger point of the article suggests that the presence of social workers within occupations that promote social control and perpetuate the violence of systemic racism will only serve to corrupt social work. This is extremely problematic. First, social work is the only health profession whose foundational mission includes the promotion of social justice, it’s a core principle of anyone with a social work degree. Our unique training and values are likely one of the best skillsets to dismantle racism and systemic oppression. While Dr. Vakharia’s call for radical change is absolutely necessary and should be heeded, asking any profession (which social work surely is) to be completely unwilling to approach the areas of our society perpetuating oppression would only serve to further devalue the profession and its values. There is no profession or field of study, social work included, that can begin the process of facilitating the change our society so deeply needs by positioning itself in peripheral opposition. Social work must instead stand true to its values and take action. Divesting involvement as a political stance against overwhelming systemic injustice will only serve to silence actionable change. As a profession social work cannot afford to refuse taking on these issues in communities, organizations, and in government positions. Dr. Vakharia mentions that social work should endeavor to make its services unnecessary. However, if social work chooses only to exist through critiquing the status quo and avoids taking the risk of being involved in changing society in any setting possible, it will become a lost profession, betraying its founders such as Jane Addams who understood the necessity of praxis. If social work is to actualize its goals and render its services “obsolete” then it must actually seek to provide services in as many new venues as possible. The involvement of social work in areas such as policing, policy making, and dare I say, even the private sector, extends the reach of social work’s values, keenly focused on progressing towards a more just world.
In that spirit, it is my firm belief that social work should not remove itself from any field because the mission of social work is pervasive and relevant to nearly every aspect of society. Moreover, the elevation of social work’s status will elevate its values and agenda. If an industry clearly lacks the exact skills that social workers are expert in then social work should not hesitate to take on that challenge with the progressive actionable approaches that only it can provide. Additionally, the idea that social work elevating its employment status, or social capital, is in some way corrupting fails account for what social work is: a profession, whose values are rooted in social justice. We can be sure that the skills social workers provide are incredibly valuable (and deeply undervalued today) but to have those skills fully utilized towards its mission, the profession needs to undertake every opportunity to create an impact. Social work cannot divest from challenging systemic racism, it does not have that luxury, let us instead support social workers to meet the challenges of our times by both calling out injustice and creating the substantive changes needed to eliminate it.