Also by Neil Thompson

Transcription

1 PROMOTING EQUALITY

2 Also by Neil Thompson PRACTICE TEACHING IN SOCIAL WORK (second edition) (with Osada, M. and Anderson, B.) CRISIS INTERVENTION REVISITED EXISTENTIALISM AND SOCIAL WORK ANTI-DISCRIMINATORY PRACTICE (third edition)* DEALING WITH STRESS (with Murphy, M. and Stradling, S.)* THEORY AND PRACTICE IN HUMAN SERVICES (second edition) AGE AND DIGNITY: WORKING WITH OLDER PEOPLE PEOPLE SKILLS (second edition)* MEETING THE STRESS CHALLENGE: A TRAINING MANUAL (with Murphy, M. and Stradling, S.) PROTECTING CHILDREN: CHALLENGES AND CHANGE (co-editor) STRESS MATTERS TACKLING BULLYING AND HARASSMENT IN THE WORKPLACE UNDERSTANDING SOCIAL WORK: PREPARING FOR PRACTICE* LOSS AND GRIEF: A GUIDE FOR HUMAN SERVICES PRACTITIONERS (editor)* UNDERSTANDING SOCIAL CARE (with Thompson, S.) BUILDING THE FUTURE: SOCIAL WORK WITH CHILDREN, YOUNG PEOPLE AND THEIR FAMILIES COMMUNICATION AND LANGUAGE: A HANDBOOK OF THEORY AND PRACTICE* * Also published by Palgrave Macmillan

3 PROMOTING EQUALITY CHALLENGING DISCRIMINATION AND OPPRESSION SECOND EDITION NEIL THOMPSON Foreword by Audrey Mullender Consultant Editor: Jo Campling

4 Neil Thompson 2003 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act First published 2003 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI / This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

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6 CONTENTS List of Figures Foreword by Professor Audrey Mullender Preface to the First Edition Preface to the Second Edition Acknowledgements x xi xiii xv xvii Introduction 1 1 Theoretical Foundations 6 Introduction 6 What is equality? 7 What are discrimination and oppression? 10 PCS analysis 13 Ideology and discourse 20 Anti-essentialism 28 Dialectical reason 32 Structuration theory and beyond 33 Emancipatory practice 40 Conclusion 43 2 Power 44 Introduction 44 What is power? 44 Theories of power 45 Postmodernism and power 57 Postmodernism: an evaluation 61 Beyond postmodernism 68 Language, discourse and power 69 Conclusion 79 vii

7 CONTENTS 3 Discrimination and Oppression 81 Introduction 81 The relationship between discrimination and oppression 81 Processes of discrimination 82 Categories of discrimination 92 Conclusion Health 114 Introduction 114 The social construction of health 115 Health discourses 118 Health inequalities 123 Health, disability and age 128 Mental health 131 Health and social welfare 136 Medicine and social control 139 The Body-without-Organs the ontology of health 141 Conclusion Learning from the Past 147 Introduction 147 Overarching themes 148 Specific issues 161 Conclusion The Organizational Context 182 Introduction 182 Power relations formal and informal 183 Inequality in organizations 186 Continuity and change 191 Organizational culture 195 Human resource management 200 The diversity approach 203 Stress and inequality 206 The organizational operator 209 Conclusion 216 VIII

8 CONTENTS 7 Conclusion: Strategies for Promoting Equality 218 Introduction 218 Steps towards equality 219 Conscientization and politicization 223 References 237 Index 256 IX

9 LIST OF FIGURES 1.1 The personal embedded within the cultural The cultural embedded within the structural The ontological security continuum The subjective objective dialectic The double dialectic of agency, culture and structure Emancipatory vs life politics The interactions of the personal, cultural and structural levels The relationship between personal empowerment and structural change Discrimination and oppression Marx s and Weber s approaches to class The dimensions of health Wider aspects of child abuse Medical discourse and the status quo The health ontological security dialectic The Yerkes Dodson law of adult learning Degrees of influence Using legislation The balance between defeatism and unrealistic expectations The Polo mint approach The subjective objective dialectic within an organization The two-dimensional model of stress The three-dimensional interactive model of stress Promoting positive change in organizations PCS levels of empowerment 221 X

10 FOREWORD It is always good to see a really useful text updated, so that it can continue serving its purpose with a new generation of readers. This book is certainly a case in point. Some considerable time before the words difference and diversity became widespread in sociology, Neil Thompson was working and writing to promote equality. Furthermore, his location in the human services has always made his approach far more than a description and analysis of what is wrong moving, rather, into an active framework for tackling discrimination and oppression in practical ways. The fact that he encompasses complex sociological theory, explaining postmodern concepts of power along the way, is a definite bonus for students, teachers and practitioners who recognize that thinking has presented new challenges but who cannot always quite grasp how this is relevant to their own work in an applied discipline or profession. This book shows that it is possible to think and to act, to understand and to progress surely the fundamental challenge to anyone who seeks to be a change agent in contemporary society. The first edition of this book proved useful beyond the human services, as, in this post-macpherson world, we came to realize that racism and other forms of oppression are endemic in all our public (and private) institutions and that it is down to all of us to take action to combat them. Disability discrimination is now stronger than it was five years ago, when this book first appeared, reaching into educational and other settings and posing a new set of challenges. There is talk of bringing all anti-discriminatory work together into one policy, one Commission, one effort for change. So there are additional external drivers now for developing an overarching anti-oppressive strategy, to add to the internal desire, on the part of professionals and their managers, to get it right for the full range of patients, service XI

11 FOREWORD users and customers. Having this one readable and helpful book available to satisfy this need is a boon. Real change is a slow process. Neil Thompson's work has never been about easy rhetoric. It is about making us stop and think, reexamine our day-to-day work and alter the way we have traditionally done things if it has created obstacles to the accessibility or appropriateness of the services we offer. The most damaging phrase in the English language is political correctness. It has been employed constantly, in a slick backlash reaction against just the kind of thought and effort that Neil Thompson shows is needed to create a fairer context for the organization of all health, social care and related services. It cannot be correct to ignore these imperatives and it is certainly not only for political reasons that people want to engage with these vital issues. Whatever our motivation altruistic, humanitarian, moral, or the pursuit of good, old-fashioned fairness and equity this is a book to challenge the easy dismissal of good intentions and to ensure that we translate them into demonstrable improvement. AUDREY MULLINDER Professor of Social Work University of Warwick XII

12 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION The need to take seriously issues of inequality, discrimination and oppression continues to be a pressing one, as human services workers each day come face to face with the negative effects of such problems. This book will not provide easy answers or formula solutions, but is intended to be of value in terms of the theoretical analysis presented and the constant links between the theory base and the realities of day-to-day practice. It is presented not as a comprehensive theoretical exposition, nor as a cookbook of recipes as to how to practise in ways that seek to challenge inequality and disadvantage. Rather, it represents an attempt to integrate theory and practice by exploring a range of theoretical issues and relating these to the practice context with a view to contributing to high-quality practice informed by clear principles and an appreciation of the complexities involved. Practitioners, managers, educators and policy-makers in the human services face a number of challenges, due to the demanding nature of responding to human problems in a range of settings and contexts. Having to take account of the need to promote equality and recognize the significance of discrimination and oppression in people s lives is therefore an additional pressure in what already tend to be highly pressurized work situations. However, my argument here is that this additional challenge should be seen as a core element of good practice, for to practise without addressing issues of inequality is to run the risk of exacerbating the situation reinforcing existing patterns of disadvantage. A central theme of the book, then, is the importance of addressing issues of inequality, discrimination and oppression in all aspects of theory, policy and practice in order to make sure that our efforts are part of a process of promoting equality, rather than one of adding to or intensifying existing burdens of oppression. Staff in the human services are in a pivotal position as far as dis- XIII

13 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION crimination and inequality are concerned. Whether we are nurses, social workers, teachers, youth workers, police or probation officers, housing officers, counsellors, advisors or members of any other branch of the human services, we are likely to work with people who are discriminated against in one or more ways, and our actions could be of benefit to them in dealing with the challenges their circumstances present, or the steps we take could have the opposite effect of further marginalizing and disempowering already disadvantaged groups, for example by reinforcing negative stereotypes. Human services practice can be empowering or it can, in itself, be a form of oppression. This book is intended as an aid to people involved in the human services to appreciate the significance of these issues and to be better equipped to play a part in making sure that practice contributes to empowerment, and not to oppression. NEIL THOMPSON XIV

14 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION The five years since I wrote the first edition of this book have seen a significant growth of interest in matters of inequality and the related concept of diversity. The theory base has continued to grow, practice initiatives have developed, training courses have proliferated and there appears to be considerable commitment to taking seriously the challenges of inequality and diversity, in certain quarters at least. These are positive developments but, of course, the work that remains to be done to get these issues firmly on the agenda is none the less of major proportions. While there is room for at least a small amount of cautious optimism, there is certainly no room for complacency. During those five years I have worked as a trainer and consultant with a wide range of organizations, trying to help them tackle the complex yet important issues of promoting equality and valuing diversity. In that work I have encountered a range of responses a great deal of enthusiasm and commitment (particularly from people who had felt hemmed in by dogmatic approaches which had left them feeling attacked and undermined, rather than educated and motivated to support change see Chapter 5); a lot of anger about how people had been treated badly on courses they had attended in the past; some discomfort about how complex and sensitive the issues are; a degree of resistance to exploring those complexities and sensitivities; and occasionally, a degree of complacency ( I ve been on a course on discrimination before so I make sure I never discriminate against anyone ). I am pleased to say that, while the initial responses are sometimes problematic, the vast majority of people I have worked with have gone away with a much more positive and committed attitude towards promoting equality once they have a good understanding of the basis of discrimination and oppression, why they are important problems to be tackled and how we can begin to do so. This XV

15 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION book is intended to be part of developing that understanding trying to help people understand that discrimination and oppression are much more common than most people realize, and, moreover, that they are also very detrimental to not only the people on the receiving end, but also the organizations which allow such problems to persist, and indeed for society as a whole. In this second edition I have revised, updated and, in places, extended the points I put forward in the first edition. I have incorporated new ideas and have developed my own thinking along the way. However, the basic message of the book remains the same, as do the theoretical and moral-political foundations on which my work is based. The first edition focused primarily on the work of staff and managers in the helping professions or human services. However, I have received a great deal of feedback since the publication of the first edition that a large number of people outside of these professional groups have also found the book helpful, informative and an important source of food for thought. This edition has therefore been broadened in its scope. While still offering a great deal to people working in the human services (nursing and health care; social work and social care; probation and community justice work; advocacy and advice work; counselling; youth and community work; and so on), it will also appeal to anyone who works with people and their problems, broadly defined (local government workers of various kinds, managers and supervisors in a variety of settings, for example). Indeed, this book should be of value to anyone who wishes to engage with the very real but very important challenge of promoting equality and valuing diversity. NEIL THOMPSON XVI

16 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Many people were supportive of my efforts to produce the first edition of this book, and I continue to be grateful to them for that. I would therefore like to express once again how indebted I am to Colin Richardson, Fellow of Keele University, John Bates of North East Wales Institute, Beth Humphries of the University of Lancaster, Brid Featherstone of the University of Huddersfield and Jane Boylan and Bernard Moss of Staffordshire University. I must also express my gratitude to Professor Audrey Mullender for being so kind in providing the Foreword for both editions. Jo Campling deserves both thanks and credit for her continued support, as does Susan Thompson for the major contribution she makes to all of my work in one way or another. Once again I am indebted to Judy Marshall for the excellent quality of her editorial work and to Catherine Gray and Jo Digby at the publishers for their unstinting support. I would also like to thank the various people I have worked with in a training and/or consultancy capacity since the publication of the first edition of this book. They have provided me with such fertile soil for learning and immense job satisfaction in their predominantly positive responses to the messages I have been trying to put across in that work and indeed in this book. NEIL THOMPSON XVII