Introduction
Helping professionals need to utilize their competencies and philosophies to provide the best support to their clients. Depending on the nature of the situation, such experts will consider different models since the ultimate aim is to empower more people to lead better lives. Ethical guidelines and codes of conduct are critical to ensure the rights and expectations of the beneficiaries are prioritized. This discussion describes when violence could be acceptable for a helping professional to resolve conflict.
Violence and Social Work
Violence remains one of the most divisive subjects that social workers and human services professionals need to be aware of. Collins et al. (2015) define it as the application of physical force to abuse, damage, or even destroying another person. Sometimes the act could be aimed at intimidating and threatening a targeted group or individual. Helping professionals are required to rely on a code of conduct that dictates how they respect, support, guide, and empower others to overcome the challenges they might be going through. In some cases, the targeted beneficiaries or clients could be going through traumatizing experiences. In worst scenarios, violence could become a reality whereby the individuals could be going through physical abuse.
Helping professionals will have to consider the most appropriate ways to safeguard the targeted individuals and ensure that he or she is out of any danger. A good example would occur when a specific person is being beaten by a specified abuser. This expert should liaise and communicate with the attacker to stop the vice. The professional will go further to consider the best place whereby the victim could be safe (Duman & Snoubar, 2016). If the abuser persists and even tries to attack the professional, the most appropriate response is to remain calm and confront him or her in a professional manner. If the individual still insists and continues to injure or beat the victim, the expert would have no option but to use the minimum violence possible to protect the client.
From this analysis, it is evident that human services professionals should consider the established moral guidelines and apply their competencies to protect their subjects by all means possible. They should consider the importance of protecting the dignity and privacy of the identified individuals (Sobočan et al., 2019). However, some abusers might decide to attack the identified victims and extend the same form of abuse to the professional involved. It is during this moment that the expert should be ready to do what is right and protect the client by all means. Nevertheless, this needs to be the last resort to protect the targeted individuals.
Depending on the nature of the scenario, the human services professional could encourage family members, relatives, and even community members to remain supportive when an abuser threatens to apply violence. Such stakeholders could apprehend the individual to ensure that no additional harm is recorded (Collins et al., 2015). Unfortunately, not all situations will be characterized by the presence of these possible stakeholders. It is during such instances when the services professional would be free to apply minimum force as a way of protecting the victim.
The utilitarianism concept is one of the consequential theorists that guide people to do what would be right and capable of bringing the best or net good for the wider community. This idea supports the use of violence when both the threatened person and the services professional lack an option (Sobočan et al., 2019). In some cases, conflicts recorded in the field of social work could be devastating and capable of affecting the greatest number of the targeted members. If violence would be the final option to deal with such an experience, then the expert would have no other option but to act swiftly.
The ultimate goal of any helping professional is to empower clients to have better life experiences and become successful. The major requirements and guidelines of social work should take precedence to guide such experts to avoid sharing confidential information, abusing their subjects either emotionally or physically, and establishing romantic relationships with them (Sobočan et al., 2019). However, the application of violence would become an acceptable strategy for a helping professional to an ongoing conflict whereby some of the identified beneficiaries could be at risk of death and injury. When such professionals consider this ethical challenge or dilemma from an informed perspective, they will do what it takes to maximize the experiences of the identified beneficiaries.
Conclusion
The use of violence in social work remains divisive since it is unethical and capable of injuring both the identified victims and other community members. However, many scholars and moralists believe that some conflicts could result in numerous challenges and affect the overall effectiveness of the intended human services. This knowledge explains why it would be necessary for such professionals to consider the use of minimum violence to protect victims and ensure that they do not suffer injuries due to the actions of their respective oppressors.
References
Collins, M. E., Garlington, S., & Cooney, K. (2015). Relieving human suffering: Compassion in social policy. The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare, 42(1), 95-120. Web.
Duman, N., & Snoubar, Y. (2016). Importance of school social work in war and conflicts zone. European Journal of Social Sciences Education and Research, 6(2), 191-194. Web.
Sobočan, A. M., Bertotti, T., & Strom-Gottfried, K. (2019). Ethical considerations in social work research. European Journal of Social Work, 22(5), 805-815. Web.