Oppression can be defined in the context of the process of social devaluation, resulting in communities feeling powerless to drive change. Community development workers that choose to follow the traditional approach to community development see their role as empowering disadvantaged people and ensuring a better alignment between services and needs (Twelvetrees 2002, 4). Marx’s most resonant critique of Community Development is the method that traditional workers work within. Marxist theorists view traditional development workers as people who work within the existing system and social constructs (alignment between services and needs) systematically oppressing certain groups. An example of this is community workers, educating communities
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Ryant’s 1969 book, The Revolutionary Potential of Social Work, (cited in Payne 1991) summarises the critiques of the system that social work operates within into four key areas. The first was the fragmentation of social work roles resulting in the full scope of the issue not being addressed e.g. Work done at a singular community level, not aligned to a bigger picture resulting in a minimal impact. The second was the impacts of funding that controlled by the state or the ruling class over activities at the community level, e.g. hydropower projects impacting sustainable livelihoods through land dispossession and the creation of cultural change, at the same time creating greater wealth for the capitalists. The third was the lack of appropriate representation on government bodies or committees, enabling them to hinder social change that could adversely affect their interests e.g. Legalisation of logging, impacting the people in power's ability to participate in corrupt activities. The fourth was the effects of professionalising development work, resulting in the conditional programming of community workers to advocate the status quo versus the radical approach of critical …show more content…
Marx has informed community development workers by providing them with the tools to understand the process of social change and the formation of collective action groups. Marx then continued to develop his theory into his revolutionary theory which became the core of Marxist’s theory of social change (Lopez 2014). The Gulbenkian 1968 study, published in the Gulbenkian Report (cited in Baldock 1974) found that from the large community workers involved in their study all were ‘ concerned with affecting the course of social change… with different groups to bring about desirable change’. Baldock (1974) explains that the majority of community workers do not understand the process of social change to be able to forecast the long-term impacts of it (15). Many people may agree with Baldock’s position and although community workers take action based on a desired outcome they cannot foresee the total impacts of the action, whether it will be effective or ineffective. An example of Marx’s theory of social change playing out in this situation is with relation to the Arab Spring uprising in 2011. In this situation multiple countries in the Middle East took revolutionary action against the state, the ‘ruling classes’. These people were seeking to bring down the capitalist system that
Ryant’s 1969 book, The Revolutionary Potential of Social Work, (cited in Payne 1991) summarises the critiques of the system that social work operates within into four key areas. The first was the fragmentation of social work roles resulting in the full scope of the issue not being addressed e.g. Work done at a singular community level, not aligned to a bigger picture resulting in a minimal impact. The second was the impacts of funding that controlled by the state or the ruling class over activities at the community level, e.g. hydropower projects impacting sustainable livelihoods through land dispossession and the creation of cultural change, at the same time creating greater wealth for the capitalists. The third was the lack of appropriate representation on government bodies or committees, enabling them to hinder social change that could adversely affect their interests e.g. Legalisation of logging, impacting the people in power's ability to participate in corrupt activities. The fourth was the effects of professionalising development work, resulting in the conditional programming of community workers to advocate the status quo versus the radical approach of critical …show more content…
Marx has informed community development workers by providing them with the tools to understand the process of social change and the formation of collective action groups. Marx then continued to develop his theory into his revolutionary theory which became the core of Marxist’s theory of social change (Lopez 2014). The Gulbenkian 1968 study, published in the Gulbenkian Report (cited in Baldock 1974) found that from the large community workers involved in their study all were ‘ concerned with affecting the course of social change… with different groups to bring about desirable change’. Baldock (1974) explains that the majority of community workers do not understand the process of social change to be able to forecast the long-term impacts of it (15). Many people may agree with Baldock’s position and although community workers take action based on a desired outcome they cannot foresee the total impacts of the action, whether it will be effective or ineffective. An example of Marx’s theory of social change playing out in this situation is with relation to the Arab Spring uprising in 2011. In this situation multiple countries in the Middle East took revolutionary action against the state, the ‘ruling classes’. These people were seeking to bring down the capitalist system that