One way to build an underlying consensus can be to develop a shared approach to anti- oppressive practices which seeks to develop social justice. There are many partnership projects which bring different professionals together to work towards social justice or at least to develop social inclusion of marginalised individuals and communities. This was a core approach developed by the Labour government after their election in 1997. Policies
towards communities have been developed to tackle the problems of disadvantaged areas through a ‘joined up’ approach at national and local levels.
The National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal has put in place Local Strategic Partnerships with additional resources through the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund to focus on the 88 most deprived local authority areas. The New Deal for Communities, neighbour- hood wardens and Neighbourhood Management Pathfinders are key community-based approaches to deliver the strategy. Working in partnership the government’s new approach to tackling social exclusion emphasised the importance of joined-up working at all levels, together with a more client-centred approach to designing and delivering serv- ices. This has been reflected in closer working between central government departments, local government and the voluntary and community sector, and communities (Social Exclusion Unit, 2004, p11).
Thus the experience and expertise designed to tackle social exclusion has focused upon partnership working. This approach is designed to achieve some measure of social justice and therefore has the potential to be transferred across to the personal social services such as children’s services and adult care. The recognition that oppression is often multiple and therefore requires a team with a range of different skills is potentially advantageous. The manifestations of multiple injustice can often overwhelm individually placed profes- sionals working out of their own separate teams. Thus teams could collaborate around the principles of embracing diversity to achieve social justice within and through their partn- ership arrangements.
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The multidisciplinary learning disabilities team in which you are one of the social workers has undergone a rapid reorganisation. The team in which you work is being joined by your partner team from the other half of the city. In essence the team is now doubling in size. As a result there have been significant problems in developing working relationships between the new team members. Managers have tried to counter these problems by outlining what support each of the respective professionals would get in terms of supervision, and have clarified the management arrangements of the new team. Nevertheless, despite these extensive arrangements, members of the new team have not worked well together. Both teams tend to distrust the other and there has been a number of arguments between indi- vidual members regarding the style of work. It appears that this is not necessarily to do with different professional cultures but that in your team, the working relationships were well founded and partnership working tended to develop well. Unfortunately, in merging with the other team their working arrangements were not so well progressed towards partnership, and as such their lack of co-operative working has undermined the new team arrangements. This has affected a number of service users where different members of the team have not communicated effectively over different cases, leaving service users con- fused about what service they should be in receipt of and from whom.
Comment
A useful starting point in developing an ethics of partnership would be to take the principles: G comprehensibility;
G truth; G rightness; G sincerity.
These can be applied to the idea of partnership, i.e. using comprehensibility as a starting point:
G How can we speak of partnership?
G What do the different professionals understand by the term? G Can they agree on what it means in the newly formed team?
Secondly, it implies that when we agree to partnership working we are prepared to act truthfully and diligently upon this agreement. Finally, we affirm that our definition of part- nership is one on which we can agree, ensuring that it meets what the different professional groupings want from partnership. We may then talk about what the partnership wants to achieve in delivering social justice to the service users it serves. This will require a further exploration using the above principles to agree upon how social justice is then understood, and how it is seen as appropriate for the team to use as its overall objective.
Although Habermas’s ideas have been criticised for his belief in the possibility of a shared understanding of truth through democratic dialogue, potentially it can enable different partners to engage in a democratic process designed to provide some basic principles through which ‘right actions’ can be developed. For Habermas, only when everyone in a particular society who has the capacity to make a contribution to what constitutes ‘right action’ has participated and given their agreement, can a particular course of action be said to be universal. If certain norms have been only partially agreed upon then this repre- sents a sectional interest. For social work this has many implications in relation to partnership working. It means that a democratic dialogue is a prerequisite of partnership. In turn this requires that service users have access to the dialogue, for example in identify- ing what they require from partnership working. If service users are not given a voice to determine the ethical codes of partnership work then partnership ethics represent a sec- tional interest (Hugman, 2005).
This approach has been called a discourse ethics approach. What this means is that knowl- edge is built upon consensus or a general agreement. This is achieved through open communication in which knowledge is developed as a public understanding and is not the property of any particular individual or sectional interest (Outhwaite, 1994).
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Using the approach suggested by Habermas to develop communicative action within the team, what suggestions would you make to develop partnership working?
As Milley (2002) shows in relation to organisations, discourse ethics can potentially develop beyond individual or sectional interests to achieve a shared understanding of what the organisation, or in our case the multi-agency partnership, is trying to achieve ethically and practically. In relation to partnership working we can distinguish between a partial or sub- jectivist approach to working together which looks at the implications of actions and ideas from a particular professional or individualistic viewpoint, or we can identify a discourse approach which takes a more universal and generalised position looking at the different interests and seeking a consensual view of the actions or ideas under consideration.
Comment
Professional identity
Identity from a subjectivist approach helps us to understand the importance of individual professional identity and its different manifestations among professional groups. A dis- course ethics will highlight the importance of a shared identity within the team that will accommodate individual identities as a process of the mutual exploration of uncovering those aspects which can be shared within the team.
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Banks (2004) in her research has identified the following as most challenging to pract- itioners wishing to work in partnership:
G Professional identity. This refers to how the professional integrates him or herself into the professional role and how the professional role influences how they see them- selves. This is often developed through initial training in the education process which socialises the student and encourages them to see themselves in a certain way.
G Professional values. Used broadly to refer to general principles which inform the pro- fession to think and act in a particular way. It can refer to those principles within different codes of professional practice. It can also refer to more generalised belief sys- tems or ideologies which are said to encompass what certain professionals think, i.e. social workers are seen to work from a social model.
G Professional culture. This refers to a professional way of doing and speaking about things, identifying those within the profession from those outside. Cultures often become visible when they conflict with other professional or non-professional cultures. For example, the development of the service users’ movement has brought into sharp distinction the conflict between professional culture to construct service users as pas- sive receivers of service in contrast to the proactive and independent culture of service user groups.
R E S E A R C H S U M M A R Y
How would a subjectivist approach look at professional identity, culture and values? We will then look at the approach of a discourse ethics.
Professional values
A subjectivist view helps us to understand the particular sets of values and their meanings which the different professionals in the multi-agency team hold. A discourse ethics pro- vides a means to understand the paradoxes of the particular notions of ethical professional conduct and the importance of identifying commonalities between different codes of conduct for a broader based ethics within the team.
Professional culture
Subjectivist views will identify the particular differences between professional cultures and how these inform the particular models of practice while a discourse ethics will emphasise the importance of a shared understanding, which includes different conceptions as a model for a shared understanding to enable the recognition and accommodation of such different professional cultures.
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Look at the following two statements. The first comes from the code of practice for social care workers, the second from the nursing and midwifery code of professional conduct. Identify from each list those statements which both nurses and social work and social care workers have in common.
Code of practice for social care workers
G Protect the rights and promote the interests of service users and carers.
G Strive to establish and maintain the trust and confidence of service users and carers. G Promote the independence of service users while protecting them as far as possible
from danger or harm.
G Respect the rights of service users while seeking to ensure that their behaviour does not harm themselves or other people.
G Uphold public trust and confidence in social care services.
G Be accountable for the quality of their work and take responsibility for maintaining and improving their knowledge and skills.
The NMC code of professional conduct:
G Obtain consent before you give any treatment or care. G Protect confidential information.
G Cooperate with others in the team.
G Maintain your professional knowledge and competence. G Be trustworthy.
G Act to identify and minimise risk to patients and clients.
Comment
If we compare the two lists, both professional groups share many value and ethical princi- ples which can provide the foundation for partnership work. From an ethics of discourse perspective in assessing the respective lists, it is important to identify that it is no easy matter to develop partnership working. For example, the principle of confidentiality is a principle shared by both groups. In terms of their partnership working then it would be necessary for the different professionals to share what they understood confidentiality to mean and to agree under what circumstances they would share information and under what circumstances they would keep confidentiality.
Comment
The rules of confidentiality here are very pertinent. Do we as professionals relax our ethical principles for an imagined belief in partnership work or do we uphold our own profes- sional values while working within the team? Does partnership come with a complete derogation of our own professional ethics or should partnership allow us as professionals to develop those within the context of partnership working?
Within the Youth Justice team the focus is upon preventing offending behaviour, so the question then needs to be posed whether this young man’s problems have anything to do with his offending behaviour. If we can answer that the issue is unrelated, then Neil has a perfect right and duty to maintain confidentiality. If, however, the problem was related to his offending behaviour, then Neil should share the information. Indeed, under section 115 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, information pertinent to criminal activity can be shared between agencies (see Banks, 2004).
Thus for the team to move forward, some general principles developed from pertinent examples to give context to the ethical problem could be used by the team to reach agree- ment as to how and if information will be shared.
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If you were the nurse in Case study 7.3 below, would you feel it appropriate to share this information? Should Neil share this with the other members of the team who are working on this young man’s offending behaviour.
A C T I V I T Y
7 . 7
Neil is a community nurse working within a youth offending team. He is working with a young man who has contracted a sexually transmitted disease and has provided the appropriate initial advice before referring him for treatment.
This chapter has explored the meaning of partnership working from an ethical standpoint. It has discussed some of the barriers to partnership working and emphasised the importance of culture, identity and value as key concerns for pro- fessionals within multi-agency teams. These concerns go to the heart of the problems professionals face in working in partnership. This chapter has identified the priority given in partnership working to management and resource systems which provide the structure to partnership. While these are essential, unless the particular professional identities are then addressed by reconciling different professional cultures that flow from this then partnership will be problematic. In addressing these problems the work of Habermas and the relevance of discourse ethics have been considered as a pos- sible way forward in bringing different professional groupings together to work effectively within a multi-agency team.
Quinney, A (2006) Collaborative Social Work Practice. Exeter: Learning Matters.
This is an excellent introduction for social workers to the different contexts in which partnership working is now taking place.
Carnwell, R and Buchanan, J (2005) Effective practice in health and social care: A partnership
approach. Maidenhead: Open University.
Provides a wide-ranging discussion of the different aspects of partnership working drawing upon a range of perspectives to inform the debate.
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C H A P T E R S U M M A R Y
F U RT H E R R E A D I N G