WOMEN PRINCIPLE FORUM

Human Rights and the Social Work Curriculum: Integrating Human Rights into Skill-Based Education Regarding Policy Practice Behaviors
Abstract
This article provides a model for social work educators seeking to integrate human rights content in the policy course. Each of the four policy-related practice behaviors (e.g., policy formulation, policy analysis, policy advocacy, and collaboration in policy practice) is examined with respect to the traditional methods used in social welfare policy courses and the ways in which these methods can be expanded to include human rights content. Available literature and multimedia resources are noted and practical human rights applications are presented with the goal of supporting efforts to achieve this integration.
KEYWORDS: Education Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS), human rights, social welfare policy, social work education
During the past two decades, leaders within the social work profession have begun to integrate human rights content into social work literature, positions of professional associations, and educational accreditation standards. The connection between social work and human rights has been firmly established in the literature (Healy, 2008a Healy, L. M. (2008a). Exploring the history of social work as a human rights profession. International Social Work, 51, 735–748.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]; Ife, 2001 Ife, J. (2001). Human rights and social work: Toward rights-based practice. New York, NY: Cambridge University.[CrossRef]; Reichert, 2003 Reichert, E. (2003). Social work and human rights: A foundation for policy and practice. New York, NY: Columbia University., 2006 Reichert, E. (2006). Understanding human rights: An exercise book. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.; Steen, 2006 Steen, J. A. (2006). The roots of human rights advocacy and a call to action. Social Work, 51, 101–105.[CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]; Witkin, 1998 Witkin, S. L. (1998). Human rights and social work. Social Work, 43, 197–201.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]; Wronka, 2008 Wronka, J. (2008). Human rights and social justice: Social action and service for the helping and health professions. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.). Professional associations, such as the International Federation of Social Workers (2012a; 2012b), have integrated human rights concepts into professional definitions and ethical principles. Spurred by these advancements, social work educators have begun to integrate the human rights philosophy into the social work curriculum. This entry into the educational sphere can be seen in the work of both international and national entities representing social work education, namely the International Association of Schools of Social Work (2004 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2004). United Nations Convention against Transnational Crime and the Protocols Thereto. Retrieved from http://www.unodc.org/documents/treaties/UNTOC/Publications/TOC%20Convention/TOCebook-e.pdf) and its American counterpart, the Council on Social Work Education (2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780).
Of most importance to this discussion is the way in which the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) has integrated human rights concepts into accreditation standards. In the most recent version of the Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS), CSWE (2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780) established 10 competencies for social work education. Included in these standards are two competencies relevant to this manuscript. The first is the human rights competency (Educational Policy 2.1.5), which reads as follows:
Advance human rights and social and economic justice. Each person, regardless of position in society, has basic human rights, such as freedom, safety, privacy, an adequate standard of living, health care, and education. Social workers recognize the global interconnections of oppression and are knowledgeable about theories of justice and strategies to promote human and civil rights. Social work incorporates social justice practice in organizations, institutions, and society to ensure that these basic human rights are distributed equitably and without prejudice. (CSWE, 2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780, p. 5)
This human rights content is a natural fit for the policy sequence, which is guided by the following policy competency (Educational Policy 2.1.8):
Engage in policy practice to advance social and economic well-being and to deliver effective social work services. Social work practitioners understand that policy affects service delivery, and they actively engage in policy practice. Social workers know the history and current structures of social policies and services; the role of policy in service delivery; and the role of practice in policy development. (CSWE, 2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780, p. 6)
In light of the natural fit between these two competencies, an examination of methods for integrating the two content areas is warranted.
This relationship between the two competencies is examined best at the ground level where the concepts are applied in practice. Thus, this manuscript goes beyond the conceptual level and focuses on practice behaviors, which are operationalizations of the competency in the practice world. The policy competency (Educational Policy 2.1.8) is operationalized into four basic skill-based elements: policy formulation, policy analysis, policy advocacy, and “collaboration with colleagues and clients” (CSWE, 2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780, p. 6) during the policy process. In this manuscript, we provide social work educators with a guide for presenting and applying human rights content in educational efforts focused on these four policy practice behaviors.
POLICY FORMULATION
The policy formulation process is one of the traditional subjects addressed in policy courses (Barusch, 2014 Barusch, A. S. (2014). Foundations of social policy: Social justice in human perspective (5th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.; Cummins, Byers, & Pedrick, 2011 Cummins, L. K., Byers, K. V., & Pedrick, L. (2011). Policy practice for social workers: New strategies for a new era. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.; DiNitto, 2011 DiNitto, D. M. (2011). Social welfare: Politics and public policy (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.; Haynes & Mickelson, 2009 Haynes, K. S., & Mickelson, J. S. (2009). Affecting change: Social workers in the political arena (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.; Jansson, 2013 Jansson, B. S. (2013). Becoming an effective policy advocate: From policy practice to social justice (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.; Karger & Stoesz, 2013 Karger, H. J., & Stoesz, D. (2013). American social welfare policy: A pluralist approach (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.; Segal, 2013 Segal, E. A. (2013). Social welfare policy and social programs: A values perspective (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.). However, social work texts in the policy field focus almost exclusively on American policy-making bodies. A few authors do include a chapter regarding international policy, but this material is often presented in a compartmentalized fashion. The separation of domestic and international policy content may be one inhibitor to the full integration of human rights concepts in the policy course. Actors in the international level of policy development are well versed in the human rights philosophy and actively use human rights terms in the construction of policy. Further, policy debates at the international level and the international policies themselves have an influence on domestic policies. A more thorough integration of international policy development in the policy course is one way to broaden student awareness of the human rights philosophy, while deepening their understanding of policy development in an increasingly global context.
Human rights content can be integrated into policy courses through the use of examples of human rights policies that develop at the international level and influence policy development at the domestic level. One of the primary ways that human rights content becomes embedded in American policy is through the interactions between the United Nations and the U.S. Congress. When the United Nations adopts a human rights convention, the convention then moves to the national policy-making institutions of the member nations. At this point, the national policy-making institution can ratify or reject the convention. Nations may be required or encouraged to establish national policy that brings them in compliance with the convention. Examinations of this process should also include a consideration of the ways in which national policy may influence international human rights policy. The following section provides an example of this interaction in the development of human rights policy.
Policy Formulation—Human Rights Application
The influence of international human rights policy on national human rights policy can be demonstrated through the formulation of human trafficking law. U.S. policies regarding human trafficking, namely the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Prevention Act of 2000 and its subsequent amendments, are often examined in a narrow domestic context (Bromfield & Capous-Desyllas, 2012 Bromfield, N. F., & Capous-Desyllas, M. (2012). Underlying motives, moral agendas and unlikely partnerships: The formulation of the U.S. Trafficking in Victims Protection Act through the data and voices of key policy players. Advances in Social Work, 13, 243–261.). Though domestic institutions and interest groups had significant impacts on the form that this policy took, the origin of this policy is strongly rooted in the work of international institutions.
In the late 1990s, the United Nations turned its attention to the problem of human trafficking and addressed this issue through the adoption of the Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and an accompanying protocol titled Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children. This effort was initiated following a request by Argentina at the 1997 Session of the United Nations Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice (Gallagher, 2001 Gallagher, A. (2001). Human rights and the new UN protocols on trafficking and migrant smuggling: A preliminary analysis. Human Rights Quarterly, 23, 975–1004.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], [CSA]). The resulting Protocol, adopted in 2000 by the United Nations, established the following conditions for member nations that ratify the Protocol:
adoption of laws that criminalize trafficking;
provision of services to victims of trafficking;
expansion of victims’ opportunities to remain in the country;
facilitation of victims’ safe return to country of origin;
prevention of trafficking activity;
improvement of law enforcement response through training and cross-departmental communication;
integration of border control and trafficking prevention efforts; and
prevention of fraud in the area of identification and travel documentation. (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2004 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2004). United Nations Convention against Transnational Crime and the Protocols Thereto. Retrieved from http://www.unodc.org/documents/treaties/UNTOC/Publications/TOC%20Convention/TOCebook-e.pdf)
The U.S. policy, Victims of Trafficking and Violence Prevention Act of 2000, closely mirrored the United Nations Protocol. The Act established a national task force to facilitate a cross-departmental response to the problem, mandated the provision of prevention programs in both international and domestic venues, expanded victims’ access to benefits and services, expanded victims’ opportunities to remain in the United States, expanded training for law enforcement, expanded definitions of trafficking in criminal statutes, and increased sentencing for these crimes. In addition to these provisions, the U.S. policy established a process by which nations were evaluated with regard to their commitment to prevent and address human trafficking. If a nation failed to demonstrate a sufficient response to the problem, the policy allowed U.S. officials to sever aid to the country (U.S. Department of State, n.d. U.S. Department of State. (n.d.). Victims of Trafficking and Violence Prevention Act of 2000. Retrieved from http://www.state.gov/j/tip/laws/61124.htm).
The relationship between the policy development processes of national and international institutions is evident in the formation of this human rights policy. The United Nations began work on the Protocol following the 1997 request by Argentina. In 1998, President Clinton issued a call to action in his Memorandum on Steps to Combat Violence Against Women and Trafficking in Women and Girls. The U.S. Congress began holding hearings regarding the issue in 1999 (Stolz, 2007 Stolz, B. A. (2007). Interpreting the U.S. human trafficking debate through the lens of symbolic politics. Law & Policy, 29, 311–338.[CrossRef]). While the U.S. policy was passing through the legislative process, the Clinton Administration was engaged in negotiations with the United Nations regarding the details of the Protocol (Defeis, 2004 Defeis, E. F. (2004). Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons—A new approach. ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law, 10, 485–491.). These simultaneous processes should not be viewed as separate and distinct policy formulations, but as interactions between national and international institutions (Stolz, 2005 Stolz, B. A. (2005). Educating policymakers and setting the criminal justice policymaking agenda: Interest groups and the “Victims of Trafficking and Violence Act of 2000.” Criminal Justice, 5, 407–430.). Thus, this human rights policy provides students with the opportunity to examine policy formulation in a multi-level, institutional context.
POLICY ANALYSIS
Policy analysis is the second major area of emphasis in the policy-related practice behaviors advanced by CSWE (2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780). Since the science of policy analysis has a rich foundation with a variety of methods, the social work literature includes several different approaches to teaching this skill. Some of these approaches are technical in nature. Examples include impact analysis and cost-benefit analysis (Caputo, 2014 Caputo, R. K. (2014). Policy analysis for social workers. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.; O’Connor & Netting, 2010 O’Connor, M. K., & Netting, F. E. (2010). Analyzing social policy: Multiple perspectives for critically understanding and evaluating policy. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.). This type of technical skill building is paramount for expanding students’ capacity for critical thought and attention to detail. However, another important aspect of policy analysis is the moral assessment of the actions required by the policy and the impacts created by the policy’s mandates. This second approach to policy analysis relies on a set of standards, typically derived from moral philosophies or professional codes (Jansson, 2012 Jansson, B. S. (2012). The reluctant welfare state: Engaging history to advance social work practice in contemporary society (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.). It is this second approach where human rights content can be most easily integrated into skill-based education regarding policy analysis.
Concepts from international human rights agreements can serve as key standards by which policies are analyzed (Hokenstad, Healy, Libal, & Law, 2012 Hokenstad, M. C. T., Healy, L., Libal, K., & Law, C. K. (2012, July). Teaching human rights in social work education: Global concepts and local applications. Paper presented at the Joint World Conference on Social Work and Social Development, Stockholm, Sweden.; Reichert, 2003 Reichert, E. (2003). Social work and human rights: A foundation for policy and practice. New York, NY: Columbia University.; van Wormer, 2004 van Wormer, K. (2004). Confronting oppression, restoring justice: From policy analysis to social action. Alexandria, VA: Council on Social Work Education.). These core human rights concepts can be found in a variety of forms, such as resolutions, which have been adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, and conventions, which have been signed and ratified by a number of member nations. While there is considerable difference in the implementation process for resolutions and conventions, they both provide standards by which local, state, and national policies may be analyzed. Further, these standards are provided for many areas of social welfare policy, such as child welfare, juvenile justice, and mental health. See Table 1 for a list of select human rights agreements that can serve as frameworks for policy analysis. The next section provides an example of a policy analysis based on standards from human rights agreements.
TABLE 1 Select List of International Human Rights Documents
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Policy Analysis—Human Rights Application
The integration of human rights content in policy analysis can be demonstrated through the evaluation of health care policy. Human rights standards for the field of health care are established in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (United Nations, 1966 United Nations. (1966). International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Retrieved from http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/cescr.aspx). Article 12 of this Covenant reads as follows: “the States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health” (United Nations, 1966 United Nations. (1966). International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Retrieved from http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/cescr.aspx, Article 12.1). The dimensions of this human right are further outlined in a publication of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (2000 United Nations Economic and Social Council. (2000). Substantive Issues Arising in the Implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/disasters/repo/13849_files/o/UN_human_rights.htm) titled Substantive Issues Arising in the Implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Based on this publication, health care policy should ensure availability, accessibility, acceptability, and quality. The concept of availability represents the presence of health services and the concept of accessibility represents the degree to which these services are open to all. Acceptability refers to alignment with ethical standards, whereas quality refers to alignment with technical standards.
These four dimensions of the human right to health provide a framework for an analysis of American health care policy. An example of this type of analysis can be found in the work of Gable (2011 Gable, L. (2011). The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, public health, and the elusive target of human rights. Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 39, 340–354.[CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]), who analyzed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in terms of the human right to health. The Act supports accessibility through several provisions, such as the expansion of Medicaid and the expansion of private insurance coverage for pre-existing conditions. This increase in access can directly affect health, as evidenced by research that links Medicaid expansion to reduced mortality (Sommers, Baicker, & Epstein, 2012 Sommers, B. D., Baicker, K., & Epstein, A. M. (2012). Mortality and access to care among adults after state Medicaid expansions. The New England Journal of Medicine, 367, 1025–1034.[CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]). Though the primary goal of the Act was to increase access, analysts have also assessed the Act using the remaining three standards of availability, acceptability, and quality. Both Furrow (2011 Furrow, B. R. (2011). Regulating patient safety: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 159, 1727–1775.[Web of Science ®]) and Gable (2011 Gable, L. (2011). The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, public health, and the elusive target of human rights. Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 39, 340–354.[CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]) argue that the Act’s quality improvement provisions increase the system’s attention to technical/scientific standards of care. Gable also cites provisions that may ensure availability by increasing supports for those entering health professions. Further, acceptability is enhanced through the Act’s promotion of culturally competent practice (Teitelbaum, Cartwright-Smith, & Rosenbaum, 2012 Teitelbaum, J., Cartwright-Smith, L., & Rosenbaum, S. (2012). Translating rights into access: Language access and the Affordable Care Act. American Journal of Law & Medicine, 38, 348–373.[PubMed], [Web of Science ®]). Though the system created by this Act will not achieve perfect alignment with all four of the human rights standards, the provisions do support improvement in each of these four areas.
POLICY ADVOCACY
Policy advocacy is another component of CSWE’s (2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780) policy-related practice behaviors. Social work has a long history of engagement in both case advocacy and cause advocacy, though the majority of educational materials and activities focus on cause advocacy. Cause advocacy, which involves the advancement of a particular policy, is primarily taught with an emphasis on legislative advocacy (Cummins et al., 2011; Haynes & Mickelson, 2009 Haynes, K. S., & Mickelson, J. S. (2009). Affecting change: Social workers in the political arena (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.; Jansson, 2013 Jansson, B. S. (2013). Becoming an effective policy advocate: From policy practice to social justice (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.). This facet of social work education is supported by a strong infrastructure of legislative materials from Influencing State Policy (n.d. Influencing State Policy. (n.d.). About us. Retrieved from http://www.statepolicy.org/About%20Us/about%20us.html), a network of social work educators who teach social welfare policy. Educators who teach this material often incorporate state-level Lobby Day activities into their courses (Manalo, 2004 Manalo, V. (2004). Teaching policy advocacy through state legislative and local ballot-based advocacy assignments. The Social Policy Journal, 3(4), 53–67.[Taylor & Francis Online]; Powell & Causby, 1994 Powell, J. Y., & Causby, V. D. (1994). From the classroom to the capitol—From MSW students to advocates: Learning by doing. Journal of Teaching in Social Work, 9(1–2), 141–154.[Taylor & Francis Online], [CSA]). Case advocacy, which involves the advancement of a just application of policy to an individual case, receives less emphasis in social work education, but materials are available to support this method (Hoefer, 2011 Hoefer, R. (2011). Advocacy practice for social work (2nd ed.). Chicago, IL: Lyceum.; Lens, 2004 Lens, V. (2004). Principled negotiation: A new tool for case advocacy. Social Work, 49, 506–513.[CrossRef], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®]; Schneider & Lester, 2001 Schneider, R. L., & Lester, L. (2001). Social work advocacy: A new framework for action. Stamford, CT: Brooks/Cole.). In sum, social work educators have access to a wide array of resources for teaching advocacy skills.
These resources extend into the human rights arena. Social work authors have integrated human rights applications in their advocacy-related publications to an extent that is far greater than for any other practice behavior. The social work literature includes guides for advocacy within the United Nations (Healy, 2008b Healy, L. M. (2008b). International social work: Professional action in an interdependent world (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford.[CrossRef]; Healy & Link, 2011 Healy, L. M., & Link, R. J. (2011). Handbook of international social work: Human rights, development, and the global profession. New York, NY: Oxford.[CrossRef]; Pollack, 2007 Pollack, D. (2007). Social workers and the United Nations: Effective advocacy strategies. International Social Work, 50, 113–119.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]). Similar to the state-level Lobby Day events, the United Nations hosts a Social Work Day every spring (Nadkarni, 2013 Nadkarni, V. V. (2013). IASSW and Social Work Day at the United Nations: A proud achievement. International Social Work, 56, 252–256.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®]). Social work students from a wide variety of universities travel to New York to attend this event, meet international human rights leaders, and strengthen their understanding of the United Nations’ structure and process. These resources provide a strong foundation for instruction regarding cause-based advocacy.
While most of the literature focuses on cause-based advocacy, several opportunities exist on the international level for case-based advocacy. Individual complaints regarding human rights violations can be submitted to international entities for review. Some of these entities are connected to human rights conventions, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination; and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. These conventions are connected to a monitoring entity, which is responsible for receiving and reviewing individual complaints (Bayefsky, 2003 Bayefsky, A. F. (2003). How to complain to the UN human rights treaty system. Norwell, MA: Kluwer Law International.). In addition to these entities, there are regional human rights commissions, such as the European Commission of Human Rights (van Dijk & van Hoof, 1998 van Dijk, P. & van Hoof, G. H. J. (1998). Theory and practice of the European Convention on Human Rights. Cambridge, MA: Kluwer Law International.) and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (Davidson, 1997 Davidson, J. S. (1997). The inter-American human rights system. Brookfield, VT: Dartmouth.; Medina, 1990 Medina, C. (1990). The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights: Reflections on a joint venture. Human Rights Quarterly, 12, 439–464.[CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], [CSA]). A case heard before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is featured in an article by Gammonley, Rotabi, Forte, and Martin (2013 Gammonley, D., Rotabi, K. S., Forte, J., & Martin, A. (2013). Beyond study abroad: A human rights delegation to teach policy advocacy. Journal of Social Work Education, 49, 619–634.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®]), who provide a model for integrating both case-based and cause-based human rights advocacy in social work education.
Policy Advocacy—Human Rights Application
The integration of human rights content can be demonstrated in both case-based and cause-based advocacy. This application will focus on case-based advocacy. Please see the fourth section regarding collaboration for an application of human rights content in cause-based advocacy.
Case-based human rights advocacy can be demonstrated through the work of Mental Disability Rights International and the Center for Justice and International Law on behalf of Jorge Bernal and Julio César Rotela. Both of these young men spent years living in the Neuro-Psychiatric Hospital of Paraguay, an institution housing individuals with autism and similar disorders (Hillman, 2005 Hillman, A. A. (2005). Protecting mental disability rights: A success story in the Inter-American Human Rights System. Human Rights Brief, 12(3), 25–28.). They had been “kept for more than four years in solitary confinement in small cells, naked, and without access to the bathrooms” (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, 2003 Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. (2003). Precautionary measures 2003. Retrieved from http://www.cidh.org/medidas/2003.eng.htm, para. 60). “The cells reeked of urine and feces, and the cell walls were smeared with excrement. Each boy spent approximately four hours of every other day in an outdoor pen, which was littered with human excrement, garbage, and broken glass” (Disability Rights International, 2014 Disability Rights International. (2014). Disability Rights International’s work in Paraguay. Retrieved from http://www.disabilityrightsintl.org/work/country-projects/paraguay/, para. 4). Mental Disability Rights International filmed these conditions and joined with Witness to bring these violations to the public’s attention (Witness, n.d. Witness. (n.d.). Paraguay’s mental health system – update: Follow up to the legal petition before the IACHR. Retrieved from http://www2.witness.org/index.php?option=com_rightsalert&Itemid=178&task=view&alert_id=22).
Mental Disability Rights International and the Center for Justice and International Law brought the case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which ruled in favor of the two young men and called for Paraguay to immediately respond to the situation (Disability Rights International, 2014 Disability Rights International. (2014). Disability Rights International’s work in Paraguay. Retrieved from http://www.disabilityrightsintl.org/work/country-projects/paraguay/; Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, 2003 Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. (2003). Precautionary measures 2003. Retrieved from http://www.cidh.org/medidas/2003.eng.htm). This advocacy resulted in improved community-based care for Mr. Bernal, slightly improved institutional care for Mr. Rotela, and a broader effort to improve mental health systems within Paraguay (Disability Rights International, 2014 Disability Rights International. (2014). Disability Rights International’s work in Paraguay. Retrieved from http://www.disabilityrightsintl.org/work/country-projects/paraguay/). A video that summarizes this advocacy effort is publicly available on vimeo (Disability Rights International, 2011 Disability Rights International. (2011). United Nations documentary on DRI Paraguay advocacy. Retrieved from http://vimeo.com/26781518).
COLLABORATION
The last component of the policy-related practice behaviors involves “collaboration with colleagues and clients” (CSWE, 2008 Council on Social Work Education. (2008). Educational policy and accreditation standards. Retrieved from http://www.cswe.org/File.aspx?id=13780, p. 6) during the policy process. This topic is relatively new to the policy sequence and has just recently been integrated into several policy texts. Chapin’s (2011 Chapin, R. K. (2011). Social policy for effective practice: A strengths approach (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.) text provides the most comprehensive treatment of this subject. She guides students in the performance of two key collaborative tasks: eliciting client perceptions and preferences in the analysis and formulation of policy and joining with colleagues in advocacy efforts.
Human rights content is relevant to the practice of collaboration and ultimately strengthens this practice. This connection between human rights and collaboration is expressed in two ways. First, policy practitioners can include human rights advocacy agencies as partners in collaborative efforts designed to change policy. Unfortunately, these non-governmental organizations are often misunderstood, as some believe that they focus only on human rights violations stemming from war and political violence. The reality is that many of these human rights agencies embrace the full range of human rights. Notable examples include Amnesty International’s campaigns to protect Native American women from sexual violence and reduce maternal and infant mortality in the United States (Amnesty International, 2007 Amnesty International. (2007). Maze of injustice: The failure to protect Indigenous women from sexual violence in the USA. New York, NY: Author. Retrieved from http://www.amnestyusa.org/pdfs/mazeofinjustice.pdf; 2010 Amnesty International. (2010). Deadly delivery: The maternal health care crisis in the USA. London, England: Author. Retrieved from http://www.amnestyusa.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/deadlydelivery.pdf). Other important advocacy organizations include Child Rights International Network, Human Rights Watch, and the International Committee of the Red Cross. The second way in which human rights relates to collaboration involves the charge to include clients in the process. Within the international human rights community, this participation has been conceptualized as a human right (Bessell & Gal, 2009 Bessell, S., & Gal, T. (2009). Forming partnerships: The human rights of children in need of care and protection. International Journal of Children’s Rights, 17, 283–298.[CrossRef]; Secker, 2009 Secker, E. (2009). Expanding the concept of participatory rights. The International Journal of Human Rights, 13, 697–715.[Taylor & Francis Online]). Human rights documents explicitly promote the right to participate in decision making at both societal and personal levels. This right is advanced for a wide variety of populations, including children, people with disabilities, and elders. A list of several human rights documents and their statements regarding this right can be found in Table 2.
TABLE 2 Statements Regarding the Human Right to Participation
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Collaboration—Human Rights Application
A model for collaborative advocacy efforts can be found in the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and the Cluster Munition Coalition. In the 1990s, several international human rights advocacy organizations, including Handicap International and Human Rights Watch, joined together in an effort to ban anti-personnel mines. The coalition was involved in the full span of policy development activities: “[composing] its own draft treaty which it submitted as a model, [attending] all preparatory meetings, and [commenting] on every draft written by the Austrian delegation throughout the Ottawa Process” (Cameron, 1999 Cameron, M. A. (1999). Global civil society and the Ottawa process: Lessons from the movement to ban anti-personnel mines. Canadian Foreign Policy Journal, 7, 85–102.[Taylor & Francis Online], p. 92). The movement attained great success in 1997 with the adoption of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, also known as the Ottawa Treaty. Some authors have attributed this success to the collaborative nature of the advocacy efforts, which included nation states, non-governmental human rights organizations, and citizens (Cameron, 1999 Cameron, M. A. (1999). Global civil society and the Ottawa process: Lessons from the movement to ban anti-personnel mines. Canadian Foreign Policy Journal, 7, 85–102.[Taylor & Francis Online]; Peters, 1999 Peters, A. (1999). International partnerships on the road to ban anti-personnel landmines. Washington, DC: Open Society Institute.). In the next decade, many of these advocates joined again in a successful campaign for the adoption of another convention focused on a similar weapon. This campaign successfully ended with the 2008 adoption of the Convention on Cluster Munitions (Borrie, 2009 Borrie, J. (2009). Unacceptable harm: A history of how the Treaty to Ban Cluster Munitions was won. New York and Geneva: United Nations. Retrieved from http://unidir.ch/files/publications/pdfs/unacceptable-harm-a-history-of-how-the-treaty-to-ban-cluster-munitions-was-won-en-258.pdf; Brabant, 2010 Brabant, S. (2010). The ban advocates: Cluster munition victims’ commitment to the implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Disarmament Forum, 1, 1-–12. Retrieved from http://www.einiras.org/Services/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?lng=en&id=114363; Docherty, 2012 Docherty, B. (2012). The convention on cluster munitions. In R. E. Williams & P. R. Viotti (Eds.), Arms control: History, theory, and policy (Vol. 1) (pp. 265–283). Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.).
Survivors of war played a forceful role in advocacy for the 1997 Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention and the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions. Survivors provided testimony at key points during the advocacy process (Borrie, 2009 Borrie, J. (2009). Unacceptable harm: A history of how the Treaty to Ban Cluster Munitions was won. New York and Geneva: United Nations. Retrieved from http://unidir.ch/files/publications/pdfs/unacceptable-harm-a-history-of-how-the-treaty-to-ban-cluster-munitions-was-won-en-258.pdf; Brabant, 2010 Brabant, S. (2010). The ban advocates: Cluster munition victims’ commitment to the implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Disarmament Forum, 1, 1-–12. Retrieved from http://www.einiras.org/Services/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?lng=en&id=114363; Docherty, 2012 Docherty, B. (2012). The convention on cluster munitions. In R. E. Williams & P. R. Viotti (Eds.), Arms control: History, theory, and policy (Vol. 1) (pp. 265–283). Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.). One survivor in discussing membership in this coalition stated:
[M]embership is painful, because to be a member you must suffer true loss … membership also brings strength, because in order to be member [sic] you agree that it is important to go beyond your pain and to strive to make a difference by using your voice and your experience to demand that countries stop using their inhumane weapons. (Handicap International, 2013 Handicap International. (2013). Advocacy with victims: Good practice and lessons learned in influencing policy. Retrieved from http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/Handicap%20international%20-Advocacy%20with%20victims.pdf, p. 22)
Their testimony had a substantial impact, as evidenced by one nation’s representative who previously had opposed the ban and later wrote a letter of appreciation to the survivors who testified. In the letter, the representative writes:
I was unaware of the terrible post conflict effects of cluster munitions … . I hope that the draft convention that we will adopt today and the contribution I have been able to make to achieving this historic goal to ban these arms that cause unacceptable harm will serve to redress the balance; so that in future [sic] civilians will not have to suffer the losses and injuries that you and your families have had to endure. (Brabant, 2010 Brabant, S. (2010). The ban advocates: Cluster munition victims’ commitment to the implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Disarmament Forum, 1, 1-–12. Retrieved from http://www.einiras.org/Services/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?lng=en&id=114363, p. 5)
This participation by survivors provides social work educators with a successful model of meaningful and empowering participation. The advocacy efforts of these survivors are featured in a video that is publicly available to educators and students through vimeo (Handicap International, 2010 Handicap International. (2010). Ban advocates: From victims to champions [Motion picture]. Retrieved from http://vimeo.com/8998329). Nash (2012 Nash, T. (2012). Civil society and cluster munitions: Building blocks of a global campaign. In M. Kaldor, H. L. Moore, & S. Selchow (Eds.), Global civil society 2012: Ten years of critical reflection (pp. 124–141). Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.[CrossRef]), a coordinator of the Cluster Munition Coalition, emphasized the important components of the effort to facilitate participation, which include a “support network, peer-peer support structure or buddy system” (p. 130). A portion of this support was provided by Handicap International (2013 Handicap International. (2013). Advocacy with victims: Good practice and lessons learned in influencing policy. Retrieved from http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/Handicap%20international%20-Advocacy%20with%20victims.pdf), a human rights organization that served as a founding member of both the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and the Custer Munition Coalition. Handicap International published an extensive guide for organizations seeking to support survivors when they are engaged in advocacy efforts. The video and the guide, both available online, can serve as important resources for social work educators seeking to assist students in mastering the EPAS practice behavior regarding collaboration.