Papell, C. P. (2006). Remembering Ruth. Social Work with Groups, Vol. 29 (1), 1-9

Papell, C. P. (2006). Remembering Ruth. Social Work with Groups, Vol. 29 (1), 1-9.

Remembering Ruth

This article expresses love and admiration for an influential social worker known as Ruth R. Middleman. She was a remarkable woman who emulated social work’s fundamental human values of caring, respecting, helping, sharing, and giving without expectation of receiving. Ruth was said to have a unique way of observing the world and had a particular vigour for action, fun, play humour, laughter and jokes within her work.

It was the depth of Ruth’s understanding of groups as a human process, both in community and in self that so deeply characterized her stature as a social work practitioner and educator of the 20th century. She was one of the founders of the Association for the Advancement of Social Work with Groups in 1978. At every opportunity during her professional life, Ruth brought together her understanding of people in their urges and needs for grouping and its impact on the learning process. She enjoyed creating and developing group games and group experiences for her students. Ruth worked with families in poverty and had the gift of using simple language to express very complex ideas in an organized manner. Connecting families and groups were skills that Ruth developed as she taught others how to interact effectively in verbal, as well as non-verbal communication.

As I read through this article, I found the content relevant to my interest in working with families and groups experiencing poverty in different countries. Ruth valued community as the source of strength and resources for those in need and mutual sustenance for all people. Her skills and ideas of effective group work inspire me to further educate myself in this area and learn tools to help people communicate, access resources, and work together as a whole to better society. I will use this article to help formulate ideas that will aid those experiencing oppression and poverty to improve the functioning of their lives.

Kiyaga, N. B. (2003). Deafness in Sub-Saharan Africa. American Annals of the Deaf, 18(148).

Africa

Sub-Saharan Africa covers most of the regions of Africa and consists of 54 countries. The author notes that there is a rich supply of humans and materials and a wide variety of cultural diversity, religious affiliation, and ethnicity. “Despite unlimited potential, progress has been uneven in the region;indeed, sub-Saharan Africa includes someof the poorest counties in the world. Violence, disease, and hunger are endemic in many areas.” Parts of the Middle East, Indian subcontinent, China, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa all came under the influence of European Imperialism for several centuries. As a result, many of the cultures and traditions of these countries became repressed. Countries such as Nigeria, Kenya, and South Africa have made substantial progress towards economic development, but the country as a whole is in dire need. There is a lack of drinking water which has led to illness, disease and death across the African Nations. The accessibility of generic drugs, including affordable drugs, is considerably limited. Drought, hunger and starvation are prevalent across sub-Saharan Africa as well as violence. In the face of grief that is faced by the African people, there is some reason for hope. A newly organized African Union is taking great effort to combat HIV, ensue peace among the people, taking action to sanitize the local water supplies.

I found this article to be enlightening and motivating in many areas. The author touches on the poverty and oppression the African people are experiencing. The social issues of starvation, drought, and disease are very real and this is applicable to my topic of Poverty in Third World Countries. I have a desire to serve among the less fortunate people of Africa, as my husband is planning to relocate there in a few years. There is a need for social movements and education of not only academics as well as hygiene that are both applicable to my paper and personal desire. There is much work to be done, in terms of social work, in this part of the world.

Midgley, J. (1990). International Social Work: Learning from the Third World. Social Work, 295-301.

Learning from the Third World

Social Workers in industrial and also in developing countries have established strong professional links. There have been different practice methods exchanged between countries in the world. Social workers have learned that much knowledge can be acquired in studying developments found in different countries. The Charity Organization Society and the settlement house originated in England and were adopted by the United States. Americans influenced Britain in leading the development inclinical social work.

There is a common belief that Third World countries have much to learn from the Western World, but there is much to be learned in the way of social work from the Third World. Throughout oppressive conditions and great poverty, many workers have developed social strategies to reduce costs in meeting needs and making resources more readily available to all. They have endured through resource constraint and have been able to continually offer welfare to meet those in need as well as disabled folk. Much can be learned from studying the way social work has developed in these parts of the world.

I found this article to be informative and a real eye-opener. I approached this assignment with the idea that the Third World was in dire need of ourknowledge and methodologies, coming from a developed country. Poverty is prevalent throughout the world and we can learn strategies and methods from many different cultures. I think that it would be limiting to our profession to rely solely on our experiences and ideals. This article pertains to my topic in helping me gain a greater perspective of the work that takes place in Third World Countries and how we can gain from their endurance of caring for those in need with limited resources available. I am eager to visit other nations in hopes to observe and gain new knowledge that will be influential in my direct practice.

Parker, S. (2000, November 6). Why the Third World Remains Poor. Newsmagazine Alberta Edition, p. 27.

Why the Third World Remains Poor

Parker, the author of this article, touched on major economic factors contributing to poverty in third world countries. These countries are in substantial amounts of debt as they borrowed money from other countries in attempts to establish their economy. As the author noted, Third World countries are struggling to pay their fines and in turn are raising their taxes and reducing services in order to maintain debt payments. This limits the resources they have to build the infrastructure needed to create an economic environment in which they can make money enough to pay back the debt.
The third world countries were loaned money and they had counted on their raw materials to have enough value to make payments on the loans from the western banks they owed money to. The market for natural resources failed shortly after, and political systems of the countries led way to the aid sent to these countries in dollars being wasted.

The author mentions that other times, policies such as closed markets, government monopolies, and lax regulatory methods led to the third world countries being very unattractive to foreign investors.

The article brings up a new theory by Hernando De Soto that to make real progress, governments need to ease the process to register their businesses with the government. Many small businesses fail to do so because of the complex process it entails. By ignoring due process, the citizens fail to legitimize their industry and maximize their capital, as well; they limit the government’s share by avoiding taxes. This leads to further depravation of the countries assets and ensures the countries debt-laden status.

I think it would be interesting to help implement these changes as a social worker. H.D. Soto proposed the theory that if the government were to ease the process of legitimizing small businesses they would be able to tax them and have more funds to pay off the countries debts. There could be incentives made to encourage businesses to do this and as a social worker, in a Third World country, we can be advocates for the movement in bringing about this legislation through education and training the citizens. This idea pertains to my topic of work that can be done, as social workers, towards progress in alleviating poverty in third world countries.

Harper, D. J. (2990). Lay Causal Perceptions of Third World Poverty and the Just World Theory. Social Behaviour & Personality: An International Journal, 18(2), 235-238.

Third World Poverty

In this article, Harper examines the perceptions that common people have of the third world and uses an evaluation given called the “Just World Scale”. This scale categorizes people perceptions of how much the third world “deserves” what they experience. With categories like “people who have met misfortune have brought it upon themselves”, and “many people suffer through absolutely no fault of their own”, the paper presents common people’s views on why the world is why it is.
This use of the Just World Scale divides people’s perceptions of the deservingness of the third world’s poverty into a spectrum. People ranged from very “Pro Just world” – where people believe the third world deserves what they have, to “Anti Just World” – where the common people believe the third world is as such due to no fault of their own.
It was interesting to see how people viewed the third world and the assortment of opinions about poverty. I can’t say for myself if I think the third world deserves any or all blame for their poverty. In fact, I don’t find it needful to take a position on the issue. This article helps me to understand the perceptions of people and how willing people may be in assisting less- fortunate societies. I feel that it is my responsibility and duty to help my fellowmen. This article relates to my topic of Poverty in Third World Countries in discussing different beliefs of the degree of deservingness to help those in poverty.

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Signature: Brittany Low

Brittany Willardson Low

Anti-Oppressive Generalist Practice

November 6, 2007

Annotated Bibliography:

Poverty in Third World Countries

ntThe lack of progress on reducing poverty in Third World countries, and its growth during the 1980s, show that one of the fundamental goals of development has not been met. Addressing the renewed concern with poverty requires knowledge about the factors affecting poverty. The paper uses logistic regression analysis to estimate the effects of variables such as education and employment on urban, rural, farm, and non-farm poverty among households in Costa Rica. The results show the complexity of the issue, and imply policies to expand education through the secondary level, to create more opportunities for rural off-farm employment. While Costa Rica is a middle-income country, gains in poverty reduction made during the 1970s were largely reversed during the early 1980s. The data for the study came from a national household-income survey carried out in 1986 by the Institute for Research in Economic Sciences of the University of Costa Rica. The sample contained 2562 randomly sampled households. The paper provides information on the methodological approach, and the determinants of poverty. Some policy implications are suggested, such that since poverty is multi-faceted, several-pronged approaches are required. This is particularly difficult since although the direction of the influence of the variables was the same for urban, rural, farm and nonfarm settings, the importance of the influence of the different variables was often quite different for each setting lack of progress on reducing poverty in Third World countries, and its growth during the 1980s, show that one of the fundamental goals of development has not been met. Addressing the renewed concern with poverty requires knowledge about the factors affecting poverty. The paper uses logistic regression analysis to estimate the effects of variables such as education and employment on urban, rural, farm, and non-farm poverty among households in Costa Rica. The results show the complexity of the issue, and imply policies to expand education through the secondary level, to create more opportunities for rural off-farm employment. While Costa Rica is a middle-income country, gains in poverty reduction made during the 1970s were largely reversed during the early 1980s. The data for the study came from a national household-income survey carried out in 1986 by the Institute for Research in Economic Sciences of the University of Costa Rica. The sample contained 2562 randomly sampled households. The paper provides information on the methodological approach, and the determinants of poverty. Some policy implications are suggested, such that since poverty is multi-faceted, several-pronged approaches are required. This is particularly difficult since although the direction of the influence of the variables was the same for urban, rural, farm and nonfarm settings, the importance of the influence of the different variables was often quite different for each settingThe lack of progress on reducing poverty in Third World countries, and its growth during the 1980s, show that one of the fundamental goals of development has not been met. Addressing the renewed concern with poverty requires knowledge about the factors affecting poverty. The paper uses logistic regression analysis to estimate the effects of variables such as education and employment on urban, rural, farm, and non-farm poverty among households in Costa Rica. The results show the complexity of the issue, and imply policies to expand education through the secondary level, to create more opportunities for rural off-farm employment. While Costa Rica is a middle-income country, gains in poverty reduction made during the 1970s were largely reversed during the early 1980s. The data for the study came from a national household-income survey carried out in 1986 by the Institute for Research in Economic Sciences of the University of Costa Rica. The sample contained 2562 randomly sampled households. The paper provides information on the methodological approach, and the determinants of poverty. Some policy implications are suggested, such that since poverty is multi-faceted, several-pronged approaches are required. This is particularly difficult since although the direction of the influence of the variables was the same for urban, rural, farm and nonfarm settings, the importance of the influence of the different variables was often quite different for each settingType: