THE ABSENCE OF RACISM AS A FUNDAMENTAL CONCERN IN ETHICS IN SOCIAL WORK BY MERLINDA WEINBERG, PHD, RSW
Social work as a profession has always been a normativebased profession, focusing on ethics as a foundational concept. Ethics refers to a systematic exploration of our relationships to others, paying attention to harms and benefits, and concern for human flourishing and social justice. However, when one looks at the vehicles for evaluating ethics, such as codes and decision-making models, and the texts addressing ethics in social work, the absence of the
12 Connection | Fall 2020
recognition of racism as a fundamental problem in social work ethics is striking. For instance, in the Nova Scotia Code of Ethics, while there is recognition of ‘diversity’ and one mention of ‘discrimination’, a search of the term ‘racism’ does not reveal a single mention. Respect for and celebration of diversity are laudable goals, but they ‘whitewash’ the more troubling and insidious reality of racism in social work in Canada generally, and Nova Scotia in particular.
