Making Societies Social Again After the Crisis

ABSTRACT

The spread of the COVID-19 virus has triggered a global crisis which has profound social implications. It can be shown that the weakening of social rights and bonds caused by the constraints on welfare spending and a diminishing commitment to equality in recent social policy developments has now exacerbated social divisions. The nature of the polarization behind these cleavages has long been recognized in social work and the knowledge and experience of this profession and discipline can therefore provide essential reference points towards the re-building of social solidarity in post-Corona societies. In this project, the Global Definition of Social Work, ratified jointly by IASSW and IFSW, forms an incentive to strengthen social workers' political role in combination with their inter-personal competencies. Their commitment to practice based on social justice can lead the way towards a new political recognition of the importance of social dimensions of societies. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.