Undoing privilege in social work: Implications for critical practices in the local and global context

This chapter argues that critical transnational social work must develop a set of principles to guide progressive theory and practice in the global context. Too much of international social work focuses on the cultural and ­technological differences between countries at the expense of understanding structural inequalities in wealth and power. It is a fundamental requirement for Western social workers who are interested in fostering transnational social work to interrogate their own Western privilege to resist the reproduction of Western professional imperialism in social work. The development of local and indigenous knowledges have been one form of resistance to the hegemony of Western social work. Western social workers need to acknowledge their historical role in ­supporting imperialism in various contexts. Social work is located in white-dominated institutions and racially unequal power relations that shape the theory and practice of the profession in fundamentally racialized ways.