The Basic

Concepts of the
Social Work
Profession
 SOCIAL WELFARE
• In its broadest sense "social welfare” covers practically
everything that men do for the good of society.
• Characterized social welfare as an organized concern of
all people for all people. Gertrude Wilson (there is no
exemption)
• The organized system of social services and
institutions, designed to aid individuals and groups to
attain satisfying standards of life and health. Walter
Friedlander
• Social welfare includes those laws, programs, benefits, and
services which assure or strengthen provision for meeting
social needs recognized as a basic to the well-being of the
population and the better functioning of the social
functioning. Elizabeth Wickenden
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 SOCIAL WELFARE
• This provisions may be directed towards strengthening existing
arrangements; mitigating the hardships or handicaps of
particular individuals and groups; pioneering new services;
stimulating a better adaptation of the social structure including
the creation of new programs as needed; or a combination of
all these approaches to social needs. Elizabeth Wickenden
• Social welfare as all the organized social arrangements which
have as their direct and primary objective the well-being of
people in the social context. It includes the broad range of
policies and services which are concerned with the various
aspects of people’s lives- their income, security, health,
housing, education, recreation, cultural traditions, among
others. The Pre-Conference Working Committee for the
XVth International Conference on Social Welfare

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 Society responds to unmet needs or
problems through the following ways:

1. Individual and group efforts – These refer to systematic

and voluntary efforts undertaken by individuals and/or groups
in response to the unmet needs of people in a community.
2. Major Societal Institutions – The family, the church, the
government cooperatives, and labor unions.
3. Social Agency – Whether under public and private auspices,
a social agency is a major provision for helping people with
their problems.

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Two views or conception of Social Welfare:

1. Residual Formulation - Conceives social welfare as

temporary, offered during emergency situation and
withdrawn when the regular system – the family and the
economic system - is again working properly. This kind of
social welfare activities often carry the stigma of “doles”, or
“charity”
2. Institutional Formulation - Sees social welfare as proper,
legitimate function of modern society. That some individuals
are not able to meet all their needs is considered a “normal”
condition, and helping agencies are accepted as “regular”
social institutions.

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 Categories of Social Welfare Program:
1. Social Security – This refers to the whole set of compulsory
measures instituted to protect the individual and his family
against the consequences of an unavoidable interruption or
serious diminution of the earned income disposable for the
maintenance of a reasonable standard of living.
2. Personal Social Services – These refer to the services
functions which have major bearing upon personal problems,
individual situations of stress, interpersonal helping or helping
people in needs, and the provision of direct services in
collaboration with workers from government and voluntary
agencies.
3. Public Assistance – These refers to the material/concrete
aid/supports provided, usually by government agencies, to
people who have no means of income or means of support for
themselves.

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 Social Services
• The collective concern of society for the well-being of its
members, in turn, I expressed in the provision of
concrete social services.
• Refers to the programs, services, and other activities
provided under various auspices, to concretely answer the
needs and problems of the members of the society.

“Social welfare would be a meaningless term unless there

are concrete demonstrations of its “concern for the well-
being of human society”

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 Motivation and reasons for providing
social services (welfare):
1. Humanitarian and Social Justice Goals – Rooted in the
democratic idea of social justice and is based on the belief
that man has the potential to realize himself except that
physical, social, and other factors that sometime hinder or
prevent him form realizing his potential.
2. Social Control Goal – Based on the recognition that needy,
deprived, or disadvantaged groups may strike out individually
or collectively against to what they consider to be alienating
or offending society.
3. Economic Development Goal – Places priority on those
programs designed to support increases in the
production of goods and service, and other resources that
will contribute to economic development.

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Framework
Social Work
Individuals, Groups, Communities
Admin and Supervision
Philosophical Social Action/ Reform Knowledge
Base (What) Base(Why)
Social Research

Philosophy Social welfare policies,

programs and services
Values
Belief about man Human behavior and the
Principles social environment
Ethics

Social Work Practice

(How)
Goal Helping Process
Functions Helping Models and Approaches
Elements Tools in Problem-Solving
Skills 9
Social workers practice at three levels: (a)
micro— working on a one-to-one basis with
an individual; (b) mezzo—working with
families and other small groups; and (c)
macro—working with organizations and
communities or seeking changes in
statutes and social policies.

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 Social Work
• A profession which is concerned with man’s adjustment to
his environment; a person in relation to that person’s social
situation.
• Social work in its various forms addresses the multiple,
complex transaction between people and their
environment. Its mission is to enable all people to develop
t h e i r f u l l p o t e n t i a l , e n r i ch t h e i r l i ve s, a n d p r e ve n t
dysfunction. Professional social work is focused on problem
solving and change. IASSW and IFSW

DUAL FOCUS OF THE SOCIAL WORKER:

1. To mediate the person’s coping skills and
2. The demands from his environment

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 Social Functioning problems are caused by:

1. Personal Inadequacies – Sometimes pathologies and may be

due to physiological factors like poor physical constitution, wrong
attitudes and values, poor or unrealistic perception of reality,
ignorance, and lack of skills.
2. Situational Inadequacies – Other conditions which are
beyond man’s coping capacities. These refer to the lack of
resources and opportunities such as the availability of
employment, but only for highly skilled or trained workers or the
existence of unjust or exploitative situation such as in the
workplace in in the community.
3. Both Personal and Situational Inadequacies

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IN SUMMARY:

Social welfare focuses on the broader

societal well-being, social services involve
specific programs and assistance
provided to individuals and groups, and
social work involves the professional
practice of helping people address
personal and social problems to improve
their lives.

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 QUIZ
(Identification)

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1. He defined social welfare as the organized system of social services and
institutions, designed to aid individuals and groups attain satisfying standards of
life and health.

2. This is where Social Worker or Professionals usually employed weather under

Government Offices or Non-government Offices.

3. This refers to the whole set of compulsory measures instituted to protect the
individuals and his family against the consequences of an unavailable interruption
or serious diminution of the earned income disposable for the maintenance of a
reasonable standards of living.

4. What are the two views or conception of Social Welfare?

5. Social Welfare encompasses the ____________ of all the members of Society

including their physical, mental, emotional, social, economic, and spiritual.

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6. This refers to the programs, services and other activities provided under various
auspices, to concretely answer the needs and problems of society.

7. He sees that the social problems as structural or basically located in the economy
and considers social services as partial compensation for the “socially generated
disservices” and socially caused diswelfare”.

8. This goal is based on the recognition that the needy, deprived, or disadvantaged
groups may strike out, individually and/or collectively, against what consider to be
an alienating of offending society.

9. In what year does the Social Work Introduced as a systematic method of helping
people in the field of public welfare in the Philippines, came to be officially
recognized as a profession with the passage of a law by Congress in 1965, elevating
Social Work to profession?

10. It is defined as the concern with the man’s adjustment to his environment and
vice versa.

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Answers

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1. Walter Friedlander
2. Social Agency/ies
3. Social Security
4. Residual and Institutional
5. Well-being
6. Social Services
7. Personal inadequacies
8. Social Control Goal
9. Residual
10. Social Work

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