Introduction
Society has evolved at different rates throughout its history. Traditional communities, on the other hand, evolve at a glacial rate. Since the New Age, when capitalist economic linkages and free enterprise were firmly entrenched, societal developments have accelerated. Transformation complicates the social environment, the social conditions under which individuals must work and live, and it is difficult to adjust to them. Individual abilities fade quickly, and in order to adapt to a rapidly evolving world, he must constantly seek out and learn new skills and ways of coping with challenging life situations (Vandekinderen et al., 2020).
Even more complex is the situation of the individual who, in addition to the great changes occurring throughout the world, is facing all of the issues and pains associated with his society’s qualitative transformation. Social work and the social worker serve as a bridge builder, bridging the gap between individuals and social institutions. This is especially helpful when the individual is unable to establish new habits and abilities, meet the increased requirements of a changing social environment, seek out individual and social resources, and, as a result, prevent social dysfunction.
Summary of the Mission and Areas of the 13 Grand Challenges
The American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare established the Grand Challenges of Social Work program to connect research with social work ideas and values in order to promote a just and peaceful society. The objective is to create fresh, revolutionary approaches to many of the major obstacles to social work and societal achievement. These 13 big issues, in my opinion, have the potential to help society and people grow. I am certain that if I fulfill the initiative’s aim, my life will improve. Social workers will be able to develop innovative ways and answers to individual problems that will aid in the resolution of global human challenges.
A Discussion of the Grand Challenge
People in the modern world frequently encounter a variety of social difficulties, such as diverse social disputes between individuals or particular groups of people, injustice, social stratification, divergence of political ideas, and gender inequity. However, among all of society’s issues, one of the most widespread is racism in modern society. The Black Lives Matter movement, large protests against police violence in the United States and Europe, and attacks on colonial-era monuments have brought racism back into the forefront. Even if just one loud, marginalized person would dare to label himself racist, numerous activists, journalists, and scholars are demonstrating that deep-seated racism has not vanished and continues to exist at the level of everyday connections, social institutions, and historical memory.
From legally defined forms of exploitation of the black population, forced to the New World as the cheapest labor power, to the openly discriminatory attitude toward black citizens of the United States in modern times, the entire history of the United States is permeated with the evolution of racist ideas. The United States has adopted no genuinely effective steps aimed at completely eradicating racial disparity, simply the change of forms of racism from the most extreme and overt to the darkest, concealed inside public consciousness (Banerjee, 2021).
The battle against “formal racism” has given way to the struggle against racism that is more than real. At the moment, the United States has publicly declared that discriminatory practices are unacceptable (Guul et al., 2019). Despite the de jure formal equality of American citizens and the elimination of the legal basis for the implementation of various discriminatory practices, the problem of de facto infringement of black Americans’ rights has not only not been definitively resolved but is acquiring new forms of expression.
The initiative’s objective is to abolish racism in all its forms. Personal awareness and reflection, as well as the formation of an anti-racist workforce, are being prioritized as part of the solution to this challenge. Significant obstacles include community empowerment, professional modification of social work education, policy actions to abolish racism and white supremacy in organizations and institutions, as well as ongoing assessment and accountability. Efforts include the great challenge to abolish racism, which calls on the social work profession to combat racism and white supremacy in both society and the profession. This great challenge will give both support and responsibility for the profession to move forward and innovate to abolish racism.
Review of the Article
The article “Race and Ethnicity in the Social Work Grand Challenges” was published in response to the lack of clarity on how GCSW emphasizes the importance of RER. The authors investigate how GCSW incorporates RER into its discourse in this essay. To decide their emphasis on RER, the authors used content analysis to investigate all 21 conceptual documents constituting the 12 original GCSWs (Rao et al., 2021). The writers evaluated each manuscript to see if it included any reference to race or ethnicity, if it addressed race or ethnicity as a prominent subject, and if racism was discussed.
The authors discovered that nine GCSWs featured at least one article mentioning race or ethnicity. In turn, seven had at least one piece that addressed race and ethnicity as a central subject (Rao et al., 2021). Five GCSWs had at least one work that highlighted the influence of racism on their present interests (Rao et al., 2021). None of the papers examined in the research defined or filled out the idea of racism. GCSWs are strategically positioned to widen and deepen social work’s attention on RER, and the recent approval of the 13th GCSW on “Eliminating Racism” is a crucial first step (Rao et al., 2021). The authors urge the field of social work to make a more explicit, renewed, and continuous commitment to eliminating systematic racism.
As a result, this text contributes significantly to the understanding of racism and ethnic prejudice. The authors emphasize the need to continue to engage with BIPOC social workers to examine how they have internalized racism, such as colorism, and to discard racist attitudes and practices that affect people in their communities. The findings of the authors demonstrate that the present and future of social work are defined by an unequivocal and continuing commitment to eradicating systematic racism at the individual, interpersonal, and institutional levels.
Personal Reflection
In the perspective of current thought, the social worker is a link between the state and the person. Social workers guarantee the preservation and provision of social balance in society, as well as the smoothing out of social and economic upheavals. The term “help” is important to the work of a social worker. A social worker is also a creative person – it is a continual metamorphosis from one picture to another. In one day, one may become a psychotherapist, a lifeguard, a postal courier, or a hairdresser. In recent years, the social protection system has evolved into a powerful, modern, socially oriented sector. Global social issues are exacerbated by globalization, which is a significant blow to individual members of society.
Systemic racism is a vast and multifaceted problem in American culture. Racists nowadays think that each culture’s bearers have a predestined position on Earth where they should always be and should not depart. Individuals are oppressed as a result of these fundamental inequities. On the one hand, it is related to genuinely existing forms of socioeconomic inequality among the black community, and on the other, with de facto “white racism” and hypertrophied positive discrimination. This confluence hampers the realization of genuine beneficial improvements and leads to even more societal fragmentation.
At the same time, in order to smooth over the serious racial problem, US authorities are not afraid to employ the most unconventional techniques – spreading the sense of their own exceptionalism among the American people. Racism exists, and the need to confront it is acknowledged at the highest levels of government, regardless of political or party allegiance. In this environment, both Republicans and Democrats clearly underline the presence of systematic racism and social inequality in the United States.
Conclusion
I feel that the Grand Challenges for Social Work project can assist in addressing the issue of racial and ethnic prejudice. Social work, as structured help from governmental, social, or community groups, is intended to create solidarity in order to prevent social connections from taking unpleasant shapes that alienate individuals from society and take them out of their social context. It is the well-organized social services that can help the ordinary oppressed members of society today. It is the initiative to eradicate racism that can properly organize the activities of social workers and direct their efforts in the right direction.
References
Banerjee, S. (2021). Race Discrimination: Evolution and Economic Impact. In No Poverty (pp. 731-740). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
Guul, T. S., Villadsen, A. R., & Wulff, J. N. (2019). Does good performance reduce bad behavior? Antecedents of ethnic employment discrimination in public organizations. Public Administration Review, 79(5), 666-674. Web.
Rao, S., Woo, B., Maglalang, D. D., Bartholomew, M., Cano, M., Harris, A., & Tucker, T. B. (2021). Race and ethnicity in the social work grand challenges. Social Work, 66(1), 9-17. Web.
Vandekinderen, C., Roose, R., Raeymaeckers, P., & Hermans, K. (2020). The DNA of social work as a human rights practice from a frontline social workers’ perspective in Flanders. European Journal of Social Work, 23(5), 876-888. Web.