Anti-Oppressive Social Work Ethics

Departing from traditional approaches, this book presents an anti-oppressive model to help social workers make ethical decisions that adhere to professional mandates while pursuing systemic social change.

Licensed social workers must adhere to a code of ethics set by the National Association of Social Workers. But this code is framed within the Eurocentric moral theories that dominate the conventional social work ethics curriculum, which exclude non-Western communities and pay insufficient attention to fighting oppressive power structures. Departing from traditional approaches, this book presents an anti-oppressive model to help social workers make ethical decisions that adhere to professional mandates while pursuing systemic social change. Bibiana D. Koh guides readers through a social justice–centered framework for moral deliberation, understanding ethics as a transformative process that is grounded in challenging oppression. This model is built on five interrelated concepts: positionality, intersectionality, critical reflexivity, decentering, and power. Koh brings these concepts to life through vivid case studies of ethical dilemmas that illustrate how diverse social identity categories interact with systems of power, oppression, and domination and that demonstrate the value of an interdependent, community-based ethics. Written in accessible language, this book will help current and future social workers strengthen their ethical reasoning across all levels of practice and fight oppression together.