A Social Worker’s Guide to Sustainable Social Change
Many people across the world aspire to transform society for the better. There are change makers working in government, nonprofits, online, and in private industries to solve some of our biggest social problems. At best, these efforts can make major strides to address crises like climate change, housing, substance abuse, education, and much more. At worst, good intentions with poor execution can lead to greater social harm.
The secret to creating effective solutions for social problems is sustainability. A sustainable solution is one that is durable and offers long-term benefits for affected communities. A focus on sustainability ensures that your solutions have a lasting impact and that the risk of backsliding is minimal.
Thankfully, social workers are trained to identify, develop, and implement sustainable solutions that address social problems at their roots. Try out the following three strategies to be more successful at creating sustainable social change.
1. Facilitate Community Participation and Buy-In
When working on solutions to social problems, it is critical to seek out and center the perspectives of direct affected communities. While this may seem like common sense, non-participatory initiatives are an alarmingly routine practice — particularly when decision-makers are removed or disconnected from the experiences of individuals in the community they serve.
To understand why community engagement is so important, remember that people are experts of their own experiences. We spend each and every day gaining unique knowledge and information about our lives. We experience a colorful range of emotions and thought patterns, observe what is happening within and around us, and draw conclusions. It is never good practice to make assumptions about what someone else has experienced — doubly so if you are making assumptions about someone who is a member of another social group.
One tool we can use to draw out and honor the expertise of others is facilitation. Facilitation is the art of guiding a group through participatory and moderated discussion. A strong facilitator will engage and affirm individuals while supporting the group’s work toward goal, such as building consensus or managing conflict. When facilitating dialogue with a community, try asking a series of open-ended questions without sharing or being preoccupied with your personal stance.
2. Target Roots, While Mitigating Symptoms
There are many programs and services today that are designed to treat the symptoms of a social problem rather than its roots. Think about poverty, for example. To address the issue of poverty in our communities, governments and service organizations offer shelter, medical support, and food assistance to those experiencing poverty. While these services are absolutely essential, you can see how they provide bandaid to those in need while doing little to change the conditions that lead people to experience poverty in the first place.
Sustainable change targets the roots of a social problem, while continuing to mitigate the symptoms. It is important to continue to provide short-term essential services because causal factors of social problems can be extremely difficult to identify and address. Efforts to meaningfully transform the roots of a social problem can take years or even decades.
Going back to the example of poverty, a solution that targets the roots of the problem might be the implementation of a more progressive tax code that restructures the economy, decreases wealth inequality, and generates funds for a Universal Basic Income (UBI). Given today’s political environment, this type of policy is unlikely to happen for some time. Therefore, groups working toward sustainable change should advocate for ambitious policies while supporting services that provide resources to those in need.
3. Define and Measure Success
Before implementing a sustainable change solution, it is important to ask one final question: What will success look like?
In the world of social work, “success” is typically defined by the directly affected individual, group, or community. The outcomes of your intervention should improve the lives of people most affected by the problem you are trying to solve. Although each community member will not share exactly the same ideas, change agents should be able to craft a bold vision for the future based on common themes.
Problems that occur on a state, national, or global scale often affect thousands, if not millions, of people. It is impossible to ask for qualitative feedback from each community member. In these cases, the use of well-designed research studies and survey data can help you define success for your population.
