Social Justice Practice in the Context of Asia Pacific Culture
Social justice is identified as a major goal for the social work profession world-wide. Such international organizations, as WFSW and IASSW have adopted social justice as a major goal for all member countries. The professional code of ethics in many countries, i.e., the USA, Japan, contains such value statements as social justice, the protection of human rights, the promotion of equality and human dignity in their respective documents.
However, while it is relatively easy to set social justice as the goal for the profession, it is harder to achieve a consensus on the meaning of social justice. The term, social justice, is more or less a culture-bound, reflecting the fundamental values rooted in each culture, and moreover,the concept is originated in the west. Furthermore,it is much harder to achieve consensus on the selection of appropriate approaches in order to achieve the social justice goals.
This paper examines the three major issues involved in social justice practice:
1) It is to clarify the meaning of social justice in view of Asia Pacific cultures by contrasting the western ideologies of social justice;
2) to review the nature of social justice theories advocated by such scholars as Rawls, Wronka and others; and
3) based on the assumption that some current social work practice theories are more compatible to social justice practice than others, e.g. evidence-based practice and task-centered model, such post-modern practice theories, as social constructivism, solution-focused practice, the Strength Perspective, mutual-aid, and empowerment will be examined.
Finally, in order to achieve the goals for social justice, the paper discusses implications for social work education and research as well as to show possible future directions for social justice practice.