Professional work journal6/27/2023 ![]() Following a brief look at social work in Greece, we discuss the English-speaking literature on ethical dilemmas along with the main ideas and thoughts on the subject. To our knowledge, this is the first study that examines such issues in social work practice as a whole without focusing on a specific professional practice sector or workplace setting. The overall aim of the current study was 2-fold, first to make sense of the ethically dilemmatic situations facing social workers at work and the ways they deal with them, and secondly, to map out real-life examples of ethical dilemmas from the perspective of social workers in order to use them for the development of appropriate ethics training tools for educators, practitioners and students. As a result, ethical dilemmas remain a largely understudied area of social work research in the country, offering a huge potential for scientific exploration.Ĭonsidering the above, this study attempts to fill the knowledge gap regarding the nature of ethical dilemmas faced by social workers in Greece. This is also true specifically for Greece, where ethical dilemmas have not been critically discussed and systematically examined so far, although their importance has been acknowledged in social work education and practice. Despite their apparent importance to ethical professional practice, ethical dilemmas in social work are mostly used as examples for teaching rather than as subjects for research. In social work, as with other helping professions, ethical dilemmas play a vital role in the decision-making process, as they affect the professionals’ ability to make decisions that are crucial in tackling ethically difficult situations in the course of their work. Such ethical difficulties at work are usually understood in terms of ethical dilemmas and can be cause for alarm because they make it difficult for social workers to choose amongst unfavourable alternatives to make ethical and good decisions. These situations at work are especially complicated for social workers and they often raise a variety of ethical difficulties that are no longer simple and straightforward cases to deal with. In some of these situations, social workers should have to individually make an ethical decision, which may involve tensions between conflicting interests and moral values or ethical principles. Due to the demanding nature of the profession, social workers across the world commonly face many difficult situations at work that they must properly address in order to fulfil their mission. Such ethics initiatives are required to remain ethically competent throughout their working life.Įthical decision-making, ethical dilemmas, ethics, ethics training, social worker, social work practice IntroductionĪrguably, social work is an ethical-based profession that aims to promote people’s well-being by standing against inequities and discrimination and advocating for social justice and social change in the society ( Banks, 2012, 2021 Reamer, 2013a Ioakimidis, 2013 Bisman, 2014 International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW), 2014). Further, it shows the urgent need for developing appropriate ethics support activities and training programmes for social workers, as a crucial part of their ongoing professional education and development. ![]() ![]() The study highlights the diversity of ethical dilemmas encountered by social workers in their professional practice, as well as revealing the different strategies, tools and mechanisms used in dealing with them. A total of 835 questionnaires were returned and used for data analysis (response rate 11.13 per cent). For our purposes, we created an online survey questionnaire via Survey Monkey software and distributed it nationwide to all social workers, asking those who had more than two years of work experience at any kind of service providing agency to complete it. This study aims to contribute to the existing literature by exploring ethical dilemmas and related issues faced by social workers in Greece. Globally, ethical dilemmas are a relatively neglected topic in social work research, despite their obvious importance to ethical professional practice.
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