Imelda, Michael and his Fairweather Friends

AASW – Social Work People Podcast

Imelda Dodds was in her first job as a social worker when she came across Michael who needed to be protected from his ‘fair-weather friends’. At that time the only way to protect Michael was to place limitations on him, rather than the people who were attempting to exploit him. Now this is a challenge that has run through political and social reform from the earliest days of welfare state, and that resonates today.

That is: in attempting to protect vulnerable people from harm, policies and programs control them, instead of controlling the people who can do them harm. Imelda has been working through many of the world’s most intractable problems since then, and this challenge is one of them. Along the way she has observed instances when protecting vulnerable people means controlling the professionals who are meant to be helping them.

IMELDA’S PUBLICATIONS:

Beyond Welfare: In search of citizenship, ACOSS Congress 1995

Norma Parker Address 1997, delivered at the AASW National Conference, Canberra

https://www.aasw.asn.au/document/item/7635

Time to move to a more equitable and peaceful solution, IFSW News, 3 /2001

http://cdn.ifsw.org/assets/ifsw_32522-9.pdf

Engagement in international practice and policy development in Bywaters, P, McLeod, E, Napier L Social work and Global Health Inequalities, The Policy Press Bristol, UK 2009

IFSW Past President And Social Worker Imelda Dodds, Appointed New Chief Executive Officer Of The New South Wales(NSW) Trustee And Guardian

https://www.ifsw.org/ifsw-past-president-and-social-worker-imelda-dodds-appointed-new-chief-executive-officer-of-the-new-south-walesnsw-trustee-and-guardian/

MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

The proposition that the welfare state is a mechanism for controlling the lives of people in poverty was outlined in:

Regulating the Poor: The Functions of public welfare, Piven F. F. and Cloward R. A., Vintage, 1st edition 1971, 2nd edition:1993.

Biography of Dorothea Dix

https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/dorothea-dix

Professor Maria Harries AM profile; https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Maria-Harries

Recognising qualified social workers:

https://www.aasw.asn.au/information-for-the-community/recognising-qualified-social-workers

Regulation of the social work profession in Australia

https://www.aasw.asn.au/social-policy-advocacy/regulation-of-social-work-in-australia

AASW Code of Ethics: AASW Code of Ethics

The UN’s Millennium Goals https://www.un.org/millenniumgoals have now been replaced by the

Sustainable Development Goals: https://sdgs.un.org/goals

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The AASW respectfully acknowledges the past and present traditional owners and on-going custodians of the lands on which this podcast was recorded. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, their ancestors and families, and to the Elders of other communities who may be listening.

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