Systemic Thinking and Pragmatic Philosophy in Social Work

1. Systemic Thinking and Pragmatic Philosophy – A New [& Necessary] Approach to Social Work? Steve J Hothersall The Robert Gordon University Aberdeen, Scotland, UK. STEP – Helsinki May 2012 This presentation was held on a conference of the project „STEP“. The project „STEP“ has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

2. The Issues • Welfare and well-being (eudemonia) should be the focus of social work practice. Policy systems ought to be facilitative of this. • We are however increasingly ‘dedicated’ to perceiving the smaller picture rather than the larger one. This is one manifestation of neo-liberal individualism. • We can use systemic principles to understand what policy systems are doing, but also to appreciate what they are not doing. • Rules of and for action ought to be revised based on the lessons from experience and the results of reasoning – rationality is ‘bounded’. • This leads us to consider the relevance of pragmatism as a mechanism for increasing our knowledge

3. Pragmatism as an organizing conceptual framework P. has as its concern the implications of purposive action P. as a means of studying the acquisition of knowledge and its use (action) Everyday life as ‘something in the making’ P. concerned with the emergent, processual & interconstituted relationship between knowing and doing which occurs as people engage with, and in, the world around them Human knowing as intimately connected to human doing (c/f: Vygotsky)

4. Pierce’s Pragmatic Principle • A person will be justified in accepting proposition P as being true if… • …at the time, there is nothing to confirm or disconfirm the acceptance of P as such and… • …there is a real possibility that by accepting P as true (or very likely to be so), it is likely to enhance ‘cognitive or moral’ utility more than if P was not accepted. • Pragmatic Principle = heuristic device

5. Any welfare system should include a [systemic] concern with all aspects of social need: health, education, housing, income maintenance, etc… • But, a welfare ‘system’ does not in fact appear to exist. If there is one, there is little interconnectedness between the parts. • Rather, we have various separate welfare-related ‘strands’ that do not connect seamlessly. Current ‘reforms’ of the social care and health landscape in the UK are testimony to the lack of systemic thinking regarding welfare/well-being. • The search for profit and [financial] efficiency dominate the welfare agenda. • Welfare reform > decrease spending = ‘good’! • ‘Unintended consequences’ often go unnoticed as feedback mechanisms at the policy level are ‘dinosauric’ • Welfare reform = increased need & forced access to other systems – systemically, the issues are at best “recycled” and at worst compounded because people are forced out of the loop

6. Is social work, by virtue of its espoused value system and its location within particular organisational frameworks, doomed to expose itself to all external influences but then forced to control its responses because of unmanageable anxieties entering the system? • Ashby’s Law of Requisite Variety • Minimum number of choices to resolve uncertainties

7. Social work and its systems are low-down on the welfare hierarchy and have tended to be dominated latterly by compulsion, compliance and managerialist conceptions of need. • From a systemic perspective, the basic elements of any system may change without much impact on the system per se. However, if there is poor interconnectedness between the different sub-systems and an ill-defined purpose, the system will collapse or entropy. • Ashby – ‘Law of Requisite Variety’ • We have seen this in relation to child care and protection in the UK, recently highlighted by the death of Baby P.

8. A Pragmatic Solution? • The development of a ‘systemic’ toolkit that encourages the conscious application of core systemic principles into policy consultation, design, delivery, implementation and evaluation. • Utilizing core systemic principles and tools to assist in ‘mapping’ the extent to which policy intentions equate with addressing social need: • Organisational structures • Technology & procedures • Organisational/professional cultures • Strategic plans/approaches • Leadership strategies • Lipsky – ‘Street-Level Bureaucrats’ – a study of pragmatism in policy implementation

9. Practitioners are the key players in relation to policy effectiveness, not policy-makers. • There is a need for a broad-base of systemic thinkers within the practice domain who, in collaboration with systemically-oriented policy-makers and politicians can begin to map the welfare policy terrain much more effectively. • Pragmatism can facilitate our understanding of the possible [emergent] policy outcomes based on the acceptance of Pierce’s Pragmatic Maxim: by approaching it this way, it appears more likely that it will work – as we go along, we will change it if we need to. Ideologies have a role. • Inductive approach to knowledge creation regarding policy. • Pragmatism argues that theory and practice are not separate and distinct entities – rather, that theory is but an abstraction from direct experience/practice and ultimately must return to inform this

10. Reductionism • Myopia • Expediency = suitable at the time, but not necessarily just or right • Pragmatic – properly conceived = ethical • Unintended consequences • The natural ecology of human need > welfare systems > profit > outputs > autopoietic focus

11. Pragmatism as an organizingconceptual framework Dewey: ‘Logical forms accrue to subject matter when the latter is subjected to controlled inquiry’. The findings of inquiry remain indeterminate in that they are open to reinterpretation on the basis of further inquiry, ad nauseum. The determination of a genuine problem is progressive The observation of ‘facts' (perceptions) and their suggested meanings (conceptions) arise and develop in correspondence with each other. Perception >>>>✪<<<<Conception ‘Perceptual & conceptual materials are instituted in functional correlativity with each other’ (p326) ✪ = function Pragmatism = functionality (technician?): must include ‘why?’