Social work and social justice in the neoliberal era

Abstract

Social Work, from its beginnings as a profession, considered social justice as its fundamental ethical goal. However, as from the last two decades of the 20th century, with the advent of neoliberalism and its conversion into the hegemonic ideology of the global world, the idea of social justice will be strongly questioned. Through the so-called New Public Management (NGP), the way of managing public services undergoes a radical change in this direction. These changes will mean a reduction in the Welfare State, also affecting the profession of Social Work. If the Social Work profession wants to contribute, together with other groups and citizens, in order to build a world more in line with human dignity, it needs to recover its ethical essence and to put human rights and social justice back at the center of its activity.