Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Contemporary Clinical Practice pp 29–40Cite as

Integrating the Internal and External Worlds of Clinical Social Work: A Philosophical and Political Search

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

Part of the book series: Essential Clinical Social Work Series ((ECSWS))

Abstract

This chapter is a review of concepts from philosophy and psychoanalysis in their application to both clinical social work and our tradition of change agent. Having strayed from earlier values and traditions by stressing our clinical identification with other professions using psychoanalytic theory, we have lost our professional compass to the split. We need to reexamine our historical values and reintegrate them into more relevant responses to relieve the stresses of contemporary life. To recapture what we still prize of those lost values requires a conscious integration of our lives as citizens with our clinical work as they interact within the social environment that Winnicott called “transitional space” (Grolnick, Barkin, & Muensterberger, 1978). This is a complex process that many of us in the profession want to bridge.

Some ideas in this chapter came from discussions with Billie Lee Violette and Jane Rubin.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD   109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Freud did not claim to discover the unconscious but to have assigned a place for the forces of conflict to exist.

References

  • Applegate, J. S. (1997). The holding environment: An organizing metaphor for social work theory and practice. Smith College Studies in Social Work, 68, 7–29.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Auden, W.H. (1940). Collected poems (reprinted 1968). New York, NY: Random House.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barry, B. (1989). Theories of justice: A treatise on social justice (vol.1). Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bion, W. (1922). Common sense in cogitations. London, England: Karnac.

    Google Scholar 

  • Conrad, P. (2007). The medicalization of society: On the transformation of human conditions into treatable disorders. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins.

    Google Scholar 

  • Danto, E. (2006). Freud’s free clinics: Psychoanalysis and social justice. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fraiberg, S. (1959). The magic years. New York, NY: Charles Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grolnick, S., Barkin, L., & Muensterberger, W. (Eds.). (1978). Between reality and fantasy. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

    Google Scholar 

  • Honderich, T. (1995). The Oxford companion to philosophy (pp. 493–496). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • James, C. (2006). Cultural amnesia: Necessary memories from history and the arts. New York, NY: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kristeva, J. (1997). From strangers to ourselves. In K. Oliver (Ed.), The portable Kristeva (pp. 264–292). New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Layton, L., Hollander, N. C., & Gutwill, S. (2006). Psychoanalysis, class and politics: Encounters in the clinical setting. New York, NY: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leonard, P. (1997). Postmodern welfare: Reconstructing an emancipatory project. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lifton, R. (1978). Advocacy and corruption in the healing profession. In C. R. Figley (Ed.), Stress disorders among Vietnam veterans (pp. 209–230). New York, NY: Brunner Mazel.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lindy, J. D. (1989). Countertransference and post-traumatic stress disorder. Sihot dialogue. Israel Journal of Psychotherapy, III(2), 94–101.

    Google Scholar 

  • Miller-Florshein, D. (2002). From containment to leakage, from the collective to the unique: Therapist and patient in shared national trauma. In C. Covington, P. Williams, J. Arundale, & J. Knox (Eds.), Terrorism and war: Unconscious dynamics of political violence (pp. 71–87). London, England: Karnac.

    Google Scholar 

  • National Association of Social Work. (2008). Code of ethics. Washington, DC: Author.

    Google Scholar 

  • Samuels, A. (1993). The political psyche. London, England: Karnac.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Shay, J. (1994). Achilles in Vietnam: Combat trauma and the undoing of character. New York, NY: Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shay, J. (2002). Odysseus in America: Combat trauma and the trials of homecoming. New York, NY: Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, C. (1992). Multiculturalism and “The politics of recognition”: An essay. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weber, M. (1958). The Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism. New York, NY: Charles Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Study Group, AAPCSW, USC and UCLA Schools of Social Work, Los Angeles, CA, 90049, USA

    Rosalyn Benitez-Bloch

Authors
  1. Rosalyn Benitez-Bloch
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rosalyn Benitez-Bloch .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. 16055 Ventura, Encino, 91436, California, USA

    Ellen Ruderman

  2. School of Social Work, New York University, Washington Square N. 1, New York, 10003, New York, USA

    Carol Tosone

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2012 Springer Science+Business Media New York

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Benitez-Bloch, R. (2012). Integrating the Internal and External Worlds of Clinical Social Work: A Philosophical and Political Search. In: Ruderman, E., Tosone, C. (eds) Contemporary Clinical Practice. Essential Clinical Social Work Series. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-4124-3_4

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation