From Social Welfare to Social Work, the Broad View Versus the Narrow View

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2014-09-30 From Social Welfare to Social Work, the Broad View versus the Narrow View

Kuiken, Jacob

Kuiken, J. (2014). From Social Welfare to Social Work, the Broad View versus the Narrow View (Unpublished doctoral thesis). University of Calgary, Calgary, AB. doi:10.11575/PRISM/26237 http://hdl.handle.net/11023/1885 doctoral thesis

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From Social Welfare to Social Work, the Broad View versus the Narrow View

Jacob Kuiken

A THESIS

SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES

IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE

DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

GRADUATE PROGRAM IN SOCIAL WORK

CALGARY, ALBERTA

SEPTEMBER, 2014

Abstract

This dissertation looks back through the lens of a conflict that emerged during the

development of social work education in Alberta, and captured by a dispute about the name of

the school. The difference of a single word – welfare versus work – led through selected events

in the history of social work where similar differences led to disputes about important matters.

The themes of the dispute are embedded in the Western Tradition with the emergence of social work and its development at the focal point for addressing the consequences described as a

‘painful disorientation generated at the intersections where cultural values clash.’

In early 1966, the University of Calgary was selected as the site for Alberta’s graduate

level social work program following a grant and volunteers from the Calgary Junior League.

Initiated in the early 1960s by the AASW, social agencies, representatives from Calgary and

Edmonton and the University of Alberta, to conduct a study led by the Alberta Social Work

Education Research Committee. The Study completed in 1965 concluded with a recommendation to establish a school of social work in Alberta; the University of Alberta, Board of Governors assigned the school to the new University of Calgary.

The Study examines the history of the School of Social Welfare and the controversy surrounding the name associated with the broad view of social work. The critique led to a narrative that its graduates were not prepared for practice. Several efforts were made to change the name; however, AASW aligned itself with the School’s critics to oppose the name change.

Following the appointment of a new Dean in the early 1980s, the direction and vision of the program changed. Although the program increasingly reflected a narrow view of social work, its scholarly work in the form of research and publications established its legitimacy and credibility particularly within the University and created the condition for changing the name to the Faculty

ii of Social Work. The role of ideology and the theoretical framework of new institutionalism include a discussion of agency and structure, emergence, philosophical anthropology and the development of the tendency toward isomorphism as the predictor and explanation for organizations in the same field adopting similar organizational forms.

iii Acknowledgements

Having arrived at this point in my professional development, Keenie I am profoundly indebted to you for this project. We began our life-journey together well before I knew much about social work. As it unfolded and took unexpected turns you supported, encouraged and offered your love and affection. In time, our children Michael and Michelle joined the journey.

In turn, they brought Emi and Alastair. Sophia you joined the journey in 2011 and for six weeks during a hot Washington DC summer, you gave me cause and time for the internal conversation reserved for grandparents as we shared the experience of exploring the streets of historic Capitol

Hill. Samuel, happily you joined this journey in August 2014, as this project concluded.

On a Friday afternoon, Alison MacDonald and John te Linde prompted my curiosity and encouraged me to take this journey. I am indebted to Pam Miller for helping to identify this project over lunch and good wine in Montreal; she did that with her customary intelligence, wit, her endless sense of humour and most of all her support.

Michael Rothery is the explanation for this journey. Mostly out of curiosity, I took his course, History and Philosophy of Social Work. A genuine scholar he challenged and rekindled a long held interest in history and philosophy that in the rush of practice was often dormant. Ann

Marie McLaughlin, a colleague and friend with genuine passion for social justice took on the role of co-supervisor and supported this project to completion.

Many colleagues contributed to my thinking about social work, most notably Margot

Herbert and John Mould. Our dinners at Earls on the Whitemud are part of the conversations I treasure most. The late Gayle Gilchrist-James encouraged this journey during the last years of her life because as she knew better than most; our history is important.

iv Thanks to the archivists who patiently helped me understand the meaning of Stuart

McLean’s November 19, 2011, story about Dave’s search for ‘the lost cup’ and his discovery

that archivists and librarians “are keepers of our collective past.” Thankfully, Dick Ramsay is ‘a

keeper of the past.’ Especially when this project seemed impossible, he located the key to its

success on a bookcase behind a couch in his basement. In moments of doubt, his knowledge of

social work’s history in Alberta provided the hope to believe this was possible.

Many thanks are due to the Calgary Junior League, a remarkable group of women who

on June 5, 1962 decided to fund a Study that led to the establishment of the School of Social

Welfare. In 2011, they gave me access to the story of their contribution to social work education

in Alberta. All who attended the School they helped establish are grateful for their good work.

Writing history is a collective effort. Relationships create memory and it is where

memory resides. Its exposition is inherently a collective effort. My thanks to those who sat through long interviews as part of my efforts to have them recall events of 30, 40 and sometimes more than 50 years ago by daring them to think of those experiences as if they happened yesterday. I am especially grateful to Tim Tyler, Derek Baker and Ray Thomlison; without the

time they devoted to my questions, this project would not have been possible.

For six of the more than 60 who responded with patience and grace to my questions:

Walter Coombs, James Leiby, Hilda Houlding, Gerald Way, Frank Bach and Mari MacDonald; their journey ended before this project was completed. To all, some of whom are noted and a larger number who are not but also contributed, thank you very much!

Jake Kuiken September 2014

v DEDICATION

I dedicate this work to

Keenie

and

My three sisters, only one of whom I knew

Aukje, Anneke and Grietje

vi Table of Contents

ABSTRACT ...... ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... iv

DEDICATION ...... vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS ...... vii

ABBREVIATIONS ...... xii

EPIGRAPH ...... xiv

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ...... 1

A PERSONAL DECLARATION...... 2

THE SCHOOL’S VISION ...... 6

THE QUESTIONS...... 10

FROM ‘SOCIAL WELFARE’ TO ‘SOCIAL WORK’...... 12

TRADITION AND REVOLUTION ...... 13 The Western Tradition and Idea of Progress ...... 15 Canada’s Indigenous Peoples – in Conflict with Progress ...... 18

THE ENLIGHTENMENT ...... 19 Immanuel Kant (1728 – 1804) ...... 20 George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770 – 1831) ...... 22 Auguste Comte (1798 – 1859) ...... 23 Comte’s Influence on English Social Reformers ...... 25 Karl Marx (1818 - 1883) ...... 27 The Industrial or Industrious Revolution ...... 30

OVERVIEW ...... 32

CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ...... 36

SOCIAL WELFARE: INSTITUTIONAL, RESIDUAL AND CONSUMERIST ...... 37

ORGANIZATIONS AND INSTITUTIONS ...... 41

EMERGENCE ...... 44

NEW INSTITUTIONALISM ...... 47 New Institutional Theory: An Overview ...... 47

vii Schools of New Institutionalism ...... 50 Isomorphism ...... 59 Philosophical Anthropology ...... 63 Agency versus Structure ...... 66 Structure, Agency and the Internal Conversation ...... 67

NAMING AND NAME CHANGES ...... 70

CHAPTER 3: METHODS AND METHODOLOGY ...... 77

History as Science ...... 81 Historical Methods ...... 86 The Archives ...... 89 Oral History ...... 92 Capturing Alberta’s Social Work Education History ...... 96 Primary Source Documents ...... 97 Oral History Interviews ...... 98 Integrating Oral History and Primary Source Documents ...... 101

HISTORICAL METHODOLOGY ...... 103 The Historian’s Craft ...... 104 Historical Representations ...... 108 Deconstructing History ...... 112 A Summary ...... 116

CHAPTER 4: THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION ...... 118

SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION IN AN INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT ...... 121 Poland ...... 123 Germany ...... 125 Alice Salomon’s Pre-World War II International Perspective: ...... 127 The Netherlands ...... 128 Onderwijsinrichting voor Socialen Arbeid (Institute for Social Work Education) 129 Great Britain ...... 134 The London School of Economics ...... 136

THE AMERICAN INFLUENCE ...... 139 The Hollis-Taylor Report – 1951 ...... 142 The Boehm Report - 1959 ...... 145 The 1964 CSWE Annual Conference – The Toronto School’s 50th Anniversary ...... 150 XIIth International Conference on Social Work – Athens, 1964...... 155 XIIIth International Conference on Social Work – Washington DC, 1966 ...... 158

CANADIAN SOCIAL POLICY AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL ...... 160 The Division of Federal and Provincial Powers ...... 162

THE ALBERTA CONTEXT ...... 166 Alberta’s Inheritance – An 1834 Poor Law Public Policy Framework ...... 169 viii Early Alberta-Based Advocates ...... 173 An International Event and Its Influence ...... 176 Social Workers in the Alberta Department of Public Health ...... 178 The Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire (I.O.D.E.) ...... 182 The Influence of the I.O.D.E. Report and Charlotte Whitton ...... 184 “Follow the Birds to Victoria” – The 1949 Western Conference of Social Work ...... 187 The Alberta CASW Branches: Calgary and Edmonton ...... 189 Social Work Education: CASW Northern Branch: April 2nd 1959 ...... 202 The Edmonton Social Planning Council ...... 204 Social Welfare Technicians ...... 207 The Junior League of Calgary ...... 215 The Social Work Education Research Committee: ...... 218 A Decision – the Halfway Point ...... 229 The Location ...... 235 Selecting the Director ...... 241 The University of Alberta ...... 242 The University of Calgary ...... 243

THE TYLER VISION ...... 249 Application of group education characteristics in a Farm Forum group ...... 250 Greenwich House for Community Organization and Development ...... 252 Priority Urban Problems: A Social Work Perspective ...... 254 Faculty Members and Students ...... 258 The Influence of Albert Comanor ...... 262

THE CONTROVERSIES ...... 266 The Choice of Names ...... 267

THE ISSUES ...... 276 The Profession: ...... 277 Professionalization of Social Work ...... 278 Professionalization of Social Work in Alberta ...... 281 The College of Clinical Social Work of Alberta ...... 285 Touch Therapy ...... 291 A Final Attempt at Recognition and Cooperation ...... 293 The University ...... 295 The Community Colleges ...... 300 Provincial Departments: - Public Welfare and Advanced Education: ...... 305

THE TRANSITION ...... 310

A NEW DEAN AND A NEW VISION ...... 313 A New Vision ...... 317 A Behavioural Model for Social Work Intervention with the Marital Dyad ...... 318 Something Works: Evidence from Practice Effectiveness Studies ...... 320 Changing the Name ...... 322

ix CHAPTER 5: ANALYSIS AND CONCLUSION ...... 325

Overview ...... 325 Ideology ...... 329 Isomorphism ...... 333 Philosophical anthropology and agency ...... 340 Conclusions ...... 343 Implications for Social Work Education ...... 343

REFERENCES ...... 350

APPENDIX A: ARCHIVES ...... 378

Alberta College of Social Workers ...... 378 Alberta Provincial Archives - Edmonton, AB ...... 378 The Bert Sheppard Stockmen's Foundation Library and Archives - Cochrane, AB ...378 Catholic Family Services of Calgary ...... 378 Edmonton Social Planning Council ...... 378 The Glenbow Foundation Archives – Collections & Research ...... 379 Family Life Education Council of Calgary Fonds ...... 379 The Maude and Harold Riley Fonds ...... 379 Library and Archives Canada - Ottawa, ON ...... 379 Social Welfare History Archives - Minneapolis, MN ...... 379 University of Alberta Archives - Edmonton, AB ...... 380 University of Calgary Archives - Calgary, AB ...... 380 The Albert Comanor Fonds 1937 – 1984 ...... 380 The University Publications - Institutional Reports ...... 380

APPENDIX B: WEBSITES ...... 381

The Alberta Heritage Digitization Project; Our Future Our Past ...... 381 The Alberta Newspaper Collection ...... 381 The Alberta Law Collection ...... 381 The Alberta Medical History Collection ...... 381

APPENDIX C: INTERVIEWS AND ETHICS ...... 382

Interview Questions ...... 382 Ethics Approval ...... 386

APPENDIX D: LIST OF INTERVIEWEES ...... 387

x xi Abbreviations

AASW Alberta Association of Social Workers

ACSW Alberta College of Social Workers

AE&M Advanced Education & Manpower

AFSS Alberta Family and Social Services

AASSW American Association of Schools of Social Work

AIEJI International Association of Social Educators

ASS&CH Alberta Social Services and Community Health

BSSFLA Bert Sheppard Stockmen's Foundation Library and Archives

CASW Canadian Association of Social Workers

CCSWA College of Clinical Social Work of Alberta

CFREB Conjoint Faculties Research Ethics Board

CSWE Council on Social Work Education

DPW Department of Public Welfare

FOIP Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act

GMA Glenbow Museum and Archives

HPA Health Professions Act

ICSW International Conference on Social Work

NAC National Archives of Canada

PAA Provincial Archives of Alberta

PSS Preventive Social Services

U of A University of Alberta

UAA University of Alberta Archives

xii UAC University of Alberta, Calgary

UARC University of Calgary Archives

UCC Universities Coordinating Council

U of C University of Calgary

U of L University of Lethbridge

U of T University of Toronto

xiii Epigraph

Men ziet van de toekomst ongeveer evenveel als het inzight in het verleden reikt.

M. Kamphuis,

Uit de voorgeschiedenis in Helpen als ambacht

One sees into the future about as far as one’s insight reaches into the past

(My translation)

xiv

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This dissertation looks back through the lens of a conflict that emerged during the development of social work education in Alberta. The conflict was captured by a dispute about the name: the School of Social Welfare versus a School of Social Work. The difference of a single word fuelled the clash between the Director, F.H. (Tim) Tyler and the AASW sometimes representing the profession and occasionally a surrogate for social agencies or even a reluctant ally in the form of a government department. While the dispute took place primarily in the late

1960s and early 1970s, the issues are embedded in the profession’s origins in the philosophical,

political and social history of 18th and19th century Europe as realized in the industrial revolutions

of Europe and North America.

The development of this dissertation and the program of study that preceded it, follow

more than 40 years of social work practice in welfare assistance, community development,

public administration, public policy development and management. Concurrently, it also

includes nearly 25 years involvement in several of the profession’s organizations as well as

numerous conferences locally, nationally and internationally.

During the course of those years and experiences, I was often left with perplexing and

unanswered questions about the vision, purpose and identity of the profession. Deeply

entrenched values and beliefs inside and outside the profession structured the social, economic

and political context for practice, raising questions about social work’s role as an

institutionalized response to the complexities of the human condition. David Miller (1999)

succinctly framed the issue, “Very crudely, I think, we are discussing how the good and bad

things in life should be distributed among the members of a human society” (p. 1). Now, at very

different point in my life and career I have the opportunity to pursue an interest in some of the

questions. Foremost among them is the question how the foundations of the past influence, shape and reshape the vision, purpose and identity of the profession. My purpose in pursuing the question is not so much to prognosticate about the future, as it is to contribute to our

understanding of where we are today.

A PERSONAL DECLARATION

In September 1967, I was one of 16 students to enter the University of Calgary, School of

Social Welfare. The ensuing controversy about the name and professional identity was unclear

and barely public; my own recollection is limited to a presentation about the profession by Bert

Marcuse, the Executive Director of Calgary Family Services Bureau. Nevertheless, it was clear

that there was something distinctly different from what I expected and then attributed largely to

the newness of the School and the faculty

Not until two years later as I worked in Victoria Park, a downtown, low-income community and home to 4,000 Calgarians many of whom had lived there for their entire lives, did Tyler’s vision of social work became clear. I arrived at the Victoria Park Family Centre soon after the departure of the Company of Young Canadians (CYC) who had spent several years organizing the local residents to fight City Hall and Stampede expansion (cf. Margaret Daly’s,

(1970), The Revolution Game, p. 76-100).

Over time, with full approval and financial assistance from the City of Calgary, residents were bought-out, their homes and community demolished. The new beneficiaries of the City- owned land were described by one resident as, “the Priddis Cowboys,” i.e., the Calgary

Stampede, and designed for the entertainment of well-off Calgarians (cf. Max Foran (2008),

Icon, Brand, Myth: The Calgary Stampede).

As an observer/participant and City of Calgary employee, the consequences of City

Council’s decision to use public policy and funds to destroy a lively community, brought clarity to my interest in the necessity for a broad view of social work. It became impossible to ignore the disruption and destruction of long-term neighbourly and community relationships, the disruption and dislocation to and between families and friends, the destruction of bonds of trust, a diminished sense of personal safety and a change from co-operative to competitive relationships.

A diminished quality and quantity of public transportation, diminished maintenance of public infrastructure, the decline in maintenance of the housing stock, reductions in education, recreation, public health and social programs, accompanied these developments. As the community’s viability diminished, incidents of interpersonal and property crime as well as child welfare and public assistance interventions increased. The finality of alienation from the political and public life of the greater community became a progressive reality with the focus on removing the residents.

Understanding the complexity of public policy settled my belief about the importance of the values and philosophical underpinnings of Miller’s point about the distribution of the good and bad things of life. An elderly, formally uneducated, thoughtful Jewish-Canadian shoemaker captured the essence of it during one of several conversations in his shoe repair shop in the early

1970s. Angry at Mayor Rod Sykes for City Council’s refusal to deal fairly with its residents, with all the strength his voice could muster and without uncertainty, he declared, “Everything is politics, from birth to death!” In his mind, public policy ruined lives, destroyed a community and redistributed what it had taken to those who already had much.

As a member of the AASW since the late 1960s, I also served as a member of its Council intermittently from 1984 until 1995, when I served as its President to 2003, a period during which the profession finally realized its long held aspiration for full recognition as a health profession. AASW Council made its case for including social work as a health profession in a letter to the Minister of Family and Social Services, Stockwell Day, dated September 23, 1966, by quoting a government definition of health.

A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being; it is also a resource for everyday living, influenced by the circumstance, beliefs, culture, social, economic and physical environments. It is a positive concept emphasizing social and personal resources as well as physical capacity. This view of health emphasizes the role of community/family/individual in defining what health means to them in planning and implementing healthy public policy (cited in the letter by AASW President, Jake Kuiken, from the Calgary Regional Health Authority, Primary Health Care Report April 1996, in author’s possession).

The Minister’s response came the following day, September 24, 1996, announcing that he would

support including social work in what was to become the Health Professions Act.

These aspirations for legitimacy and full recognition began formally in the 1960s with the

first of several significant steps in the professionalization process with registration under the

Societies Act. It was followed nearly a decade later with the Social Workers Act, in 1969 which

established the principle of voluntary professional accountability through registration but without

protecting the title, ‘social worker.” Although the Act established the MSW as the entry-level credential, AASW reluctantly accepted the BSW several years later when the School of Social

Welfare in concert with other educational institutions established the BSW as the entry academic credential.

The change came about as a result of a decision by the Universities Coordinating Council

(UCC) established in the Universities Act with the duty and power “to appraise the adequacy of

the academic qualifications or persons applying for membership” in a professional association

(Consolidated Statutes of Alberta 1970, p. 5636). Likewise, the UCC was empowered to establish a Professional Examination Board for each profession. With the delegated powers of the UCC, the Professional Examination Board in Social Work, (UCCPEBSW), whose membership included the Dean or Director of the professional school, accepted the BSW. It was able to do that under a section of the Social Work Profession Act that included a category for applicants with a combination of sufficient practical experience and the required standard in an examination , i.e., interpreted as the BSW credential (Alberta Bills: 16th Legislature, 2nd Session,

Bill 104, 1969; Dick Ramsey, Personal Communication: August 16, 2010).

AASW attempted to improve this Act on several occasions. However, in spite of encouraging AASW in those efforts, the government rejected each of them until 1991 when the

Legislative Assembly adopted the Social Work Profession Act. While administratively a superior piece of legislation, the government saw fit to submit amendments to mid-way through the legislative process to include community college graduates with a two-year diploma. Like its predecessor legislation, the new Act retained voluntary professional accountability and failed to protect the professional title, social worker, leaving it open for use by any member of the public regardless of education, training or experience.

However, apparently largely because of opposition to the professionalization of social work by Alberta Family and Social Services and its Minister, Mike Cardinal, the Provincial

Cabinet failed to proclaim the Social Work Profession Act until September 6, 1995. Admission of community college diploma graduates followed on December 1, 1995, when the Universities

Coordination Council, Professional Examinations Board for Social Work approved several of the community colleges’ social work programs.

Several additional steps were necessary for the profession before full recognition took place early in 2003. Mandatory professional registration took place in 1998, when the government agreed to its implementation for all social workers not employed in its child welfare program and Aboriginal social workers working on First Nations territory. At the same time, the name of the AASW was changed to the Alberta Association of Registered Social Workers

(AARSW) to coincide with this change.

Further changes were made to the Social Work Profession Act over the next few years.

Most significantly was a one-year window for grand parenting for individuals who were able to demonstrate they were actively engaged in the practice of social work and recognized as such but not otherwise eligible for registration. In anticipation of inclusion in the Health Professions Act, the name was changed, this time to the Alberta College of Social Workers.

In the larger framework of the professionalization process, the final legislative action in

2003, delegated full professional self-regulation to Alberta social workers. In the midst of the

professionalization process, social work education at the University of Calgary, School of Social

Welfare attempted to develop a distinctly different identity and vision for the profession.

THE SCHOOL’S VISION

Alberta’s graduate level social work education at the fledgling University of Calgary

sought to influence the vision, purpose and identity of social work by refocusing its scope and bringing increased relevance to the efforts of social practitioners. Their efforts were directed at reforming the relationships and focus of the dominant social institutions; instead of concentrating entirely on methods of practice, social practitioners were to focus on the problems encountered in Alberta society.

The introduction of a different name signaled the change. Instead of a profession captivated by individual change, social practitioners were to return to the roots of the profession by a strategic focus on institutions, social change and political action directed towards social reform. The School formally and most clearly outlined this vision in the 1970 Accreditation

Report to the CSWE.

The relations of institutions and social reform and social action must be an explicit concern in social work education, contrary to the tradition in recent years, which viewed the world almost altogether from the perspective of the individual. As Charles Lebeaux has noted, most professions, including social work, are concerned with methods rather than with problems, and this results in a preference for service, which is responsive and passive rather than a service, which is preventive and active.

We recognize social work as an agent of social change. An extensive body of literature and several modes of practice have in recent years reflected the movement towards practice on behalf of rather than for client groups. All over the world, social workers are returning to their earlier traditions rooted in conscious engagement in political activity in the performance of their professional functions. Social action, as an honourable and frequently preferred form of practice, is now widely acknowledged. Emerging is a more tough-minded form of practice than was characteristic of recent decades. Social work education and practice are engaged in confronting the basic problems facing society. This awareness of and increasing evidence of skills in political strategy and tactics is associated with our perception of the new priorities assigned to social change compared with individual behavioural change.

More and more social workers are convinced it is the fabric of society that must be changed to accommodate the needs and aspirations of individual citizens. No longer are most social workers prepared to divert hours, days and weeks of their time to individual practice, unless there is evidence that the basic economic and social problems facing the individual can also be accommodated. We join the many voices today who, arguing for relevance, suggest that social work must embrace effective engagement in front-line institutional functions that are required to produce and maintain socially productive human beings (School of Social Welfare, March, 1970, p. 9).

The selection identifies several important themes for the changes envisaged by Tyler: the

focus on the individual versus social reform of institutions, a preference for methods over

problems, a service to persons over a focus on problem prevention with social action and political engagement as the strategies for social change.

In committing itself to social work’s early social reform roots, the School both lamented

“the concept of progress” (p. 3) ostensibly because it alienated Canadians from their values and ideals. However, at the same time, the School committed itself to “progressive social policy, to the advancement of social democratization, [and] to the role of societal change agent” (p.23), i.e., the education of those who Tyler often referred to as ‘social practitioners.’ Regardless of whether the School saw that stance as a problem, or not, it raises an important issue.

Guided and apparently largely drafted by the prominent American social work practitioner, administrator and educator Albert Comanor, the new School presented the broad view of its task to the CSWE in 1970, seeking to be different by creating a new identity for its graduates focusing on prevention, social change, political engagement and social action. As such, it represented a significant departure from the expected focus on social casework by those

who struggled for most of a decade to establish an Alberta school of social work.

Nevertheless, in setting forth its vision, the new Alberta School received the endorsement

of the accrediting body. In 1971, the CSWE responded to the School’s Accreditation Report,

viewing the development of the two-track approach – macro and micro practice – with special

favour, suggesting it held a promise of making an important contribution to social work

education (CSWE, January 27, 1971- in author’s possession). Even AASW, in its Commentary

of October 1970, was generally positive, commenting only “admission criteria should not place

an undue emphasis on academic performance” (In author’s possession).

The difference of a single word, - ‘work’ to ‘welfare,’- came to symbolize a much deeper

conflict and reflected in the ideological issues faced by social work from its earliest roots in

Europe. To be sure, the English phrase ‘social work’ took on its popular meaning in the 19th

century Industrial Revolution in England and in Canada alongside its approximate equivalent in

various European languages (Kristofferson, 2005; Drummond 1988). Frequently it involved

women of leisure (The Daily Globe, May 15, 1871) and the charitable work of Christian groups

such as the Salvation Army (The Globe, February 5, 1895; June 5, 1896), in a context of drastic

changes in the social, economic and political relationships of the mid to late 19th century.

Of earlier origin, the word ‘welfare’ appears in the Early English Books On-Line in the

15th century in conjunction with references to the prosperity and the welfare of the nobility,

(Lefèvre, R., fl. in 1473, Image 260). It is this period, Stephen Toulmin (1990) names as part of

‘Modernity’ and describes it by a commitment to a new way of “thinking about nature in a new and ‘scientific’ way, and to use more ‘rational’ methods to deal with problems of human life and society” (p. 9). The phrase ‘social welfare’ appears in conjunction with the emergence of the democratic nation state and its relationship to its citizens at least as early as the 18th century

(Watts, 1739, p. 49).

A 1950, UN sponsored international survey of social work education programs noted

‘social welfare’ and ‘social policy’ are used interchangeably, and defined it as,

a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the amelioration of specific social evils. The enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of life is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social conditions. The welfare of all peoples is fundamental to the attainment of peace and security and is dependent upon the fullest cooperation of individuals and States (UN Dept. of Social Affairs, 1950, p. 6-7).

Ironically, the name, School of Social Welfare, was itself a compromise arrived at entirely within the University as the initial proposal – The School of Applied Social Science – met with sharp internal opposition. Apparently, the name aroused suspicions about its implicit

vision and the appearance of an ambitious but unarticulated program of expansion well outside the bounds of what was intentionally understood to be a school for educating social workers.

Hence, questions about what Tyler and the School intended were not new. Nevertheless, the response of J.B. Hyne, Dean of Graduate Studies, at the Seventh Meeting of the General

Faculty Council, on December 15, 1966, lacked specificity and confirmed the misgivings when

asked why the name, School of Social Welfare, when the degree was to be a Master of Social

Work? The Minutes of the meeting record that Hyne, explained, “That the area itself was

viewed as being much larger than merely social work.” Tyler attempted to elaborate and clarify

Hyne’s comment by adding, “his concern that University Planning would not consider this

broader concept ...... [and] noted that later this year he [Tyler] would be bringing forward

programmes for undergraduate degrees in social welfare areas” (UARC 66.002.210, GFC #7).

During the first five years, Tyler attempted to change the name several times. In each

instance, the effort failed because of opposition by the AASW as the representative of a different vision and identity promulgated by community agencies and a government department. The change of the name to the Faculty of Social Work finally took place on July 01, 1989, (UARC

2008.052, F.21.03), 23 years later with the emergence of a different vision and a different Dean.

THE QUESTIONS

This brief, broad sweep allows me to advance the principal question for this study,

namely, what vision, purpose and social work identity was Tyler attempting to project with the

phrase ‘Social Welfare’ and the rejection of ‘Social Work’ as the name for a graduate level

School proposed for educating social workers? At the same time, a corollary question

immediately imposes itself by virtue of the objections to Tyler’s choice, namely, ‘What was

vision, purpose and identity of the 1989 change of name to ‘Social Work?’ The significance of

Tyler’s ‘social welfare’ and the profession’s ‘social work’ represented a change from a focus on the well-being of the intended beneficiaries to that of the profession.

The ancillary questions derive from the institutional, cultural, political and philosophical context of 1965 – 1975 that Stephen Toulmin (1990), described as, Humanism Reinvented. His characterization of it as “a revolution waiting to happen” nearly 25 years later seems entirely appropriate as he commented. “And once it [the revolution] began in earnest, all of the issues that had been forged together in the 17th century scaffolding of Modernity, were reconsidered in

rapid succession” (p. 162). Although Toulmin acknowledges that on the surface they appeared

without “intrinsic connections, but once the system of presuppositions and prejudices embodied

in the traditional cosmopolis was taken apart, all of these things came into question, many of the

irreversibly” (p. 162).

Tyler led the School of Social Welfare during this “revolution waiting to happen” in

which his vision, purpose and identity for the profession were a refrain within the profession.

Speakers at the 50th Anniversary of the Toronto School held in conjunction with the annual

CSWE conference challenged the foundations of social work, calling on the profession to deal with D. Miller’s problem. Likewise, the 1964, XIIth International Conference on Social Work in

Athens, Greece challenged the basic tenets of social work and similarly, challenged social work to take on a leadership role in addressing the Miller question. Retrospectively, they represented a collective and direct assault on the individualistic approach then dominating the profession.

FROM ‘SOCIAL WELFARE’ TO ‘SOCIAL WORK’

I owe the focus of the title of the dissertation, The History of a Name Change at the

University of Calgary: From Social Welfare to Social Work: the Broad View Versus the Narrow

View, 1966 – 1989, to Harry Cassidy’s 1933 article in the Canadian Social Worker. Written during the early years of the Great Depression, Cassidy succinctly framed the identity issue for

Canadian social workers, as the “broad view” versus the “narrow view” based on his observations of social work during the Great Depression. Cassidy lamented that social workers were “in the business of caring for the dying and rescuing the perishing. They have been the stretcher bearers of society.” In its place, Cassidy argued that taking the broader view entailed an understanding of the profession’s identity and sense of obligation “to strike at the roots of social problems – to exercise a preventive as well as a curative function – he must wage an unremitting war against the social crime of poverty no less than against other causal factors”

(Cassidy, 1933). His 1943, Social Security and Reconstruction in Canada, represents the broad view in its contribution to Canadians’ social welfare.

This title represents the significance of the name and the effort to instill students with the broad view of the profession. My journey began in earnest as an unclassified student in 2004 in the course on The History and Philosophy of Social Work, with Dr. Michael Rothery. The work of that course led me to appreciate just how many of the unanswered and perplexing questions about a profession barely one hundred year old are deeply embedded in a broadly understood history and philosophy of the Enlightenment (Moffatt & Irving, 2002). Investigating that history and philosophy became necessary to understand the issues embedded in the traditions of the profession and form the foundation for the conflict about the name of Alberta’s graduate social work education program.

TRADITION AND REVOLUTION

My use of the term ‘tradition’ here is comparable to and based on the way the late

Harvard legal historian, Harold J. Berman (1983) used it. Recognizing that earlier and other

‘traditions’ (cf. Kar, R.B., 2012 for Indo-European influences on Western legal, political, religious, language, etc., dating to at least 4,500 BCE ) are increasingly recognized for their influence on the Western thought, I’ve nevertheless restricted this examination to the Western tradition largely because the foundations of the profession are primarily Western in origin.

In two volumes written over a twenty-year time-span, Berman examined what he called the Western Legal Tradition. Its evolution and its several revolutions unfold with the early

Germanic tribal law through the various Protestant revolutions of the 16th Century (Berman,

1983 & 2003). Even though both evolution and revolution brought about important changes, he notes, there remained,

[a lasting] process, an enterprise, in which rules have meaning only in the context of institutions and procedures, values and ways of thought. From this broader perspective, the sources of law include not only the will of the lawmaker but also the reason and conscience of the community and its customs and usages (Berman, 1983, p.11).

A tradition, Berman suggests, is a period of more or less conscious organic growth and development with one generation building on the work of another, typically with both evolutionary and revolutionary periods (Berman, 1983). In his second volume, Berman elaborates on the description of the Legal Tradition as follows. “I mean the sense of an ongoing historical continuity between past and future, and in law, the organic development of legal institutions over generations and centuries with each generation consciously building on the work of its predecessors” (Berman, 2003, p. 3). Referencing the historian and sociologist,

Robert A. Nisbet, Berman (1983) clarified the point with respect to duration, by suggesting, “no one sees a society “grow” or “develop” or “decay” or “die.” These are all metaphors.

Nevertheless, the belief of people living in a society in a given time that the society is, in fact, growing, developing or decaying or dying is a very real thing” (Berman 1983, p. 6).

On the other hand, “a revolution,” Berman suggests, “is a rapid, discontinuous, violent change,” bursting the bonds of whatever constrained it (Berman, 1983, p. 21). Here violence refers to the use of illegal force exerted by individuals against established authority (p. 20). He suggests the use of illegal force is the result of failures to incorporate changes that result from the inherent contradictory purposes of preserving order and doing justice. Order, Berman suggests, comes with its own “built-in tension between the need for change and the need for stability while understanding justice in dialectical terms necessarily involves the tension between individual rights and the welfare of the community” (p. 21). Arguably, a similar kind of tension is reflected in Cassidy’s description of a ‘broad’ and ‘narrow’ view of social work.

Elaborating twenty years later, Berman suggests the significance of a revolution is represented by “a fundamental change, a rapid change, a violent change, a lasting change, in the political and social system of a society involving the fundamental change in the people themselves – in their attitudes, in their character, in their belief system” (Berman, 2003, p. 3). It is noteworthy that Berman modified his understanding and definition significantly. He no longer references the ‘use of illegal force against established authority.’ Instead, he notes it only as ‘a rapid, violent and lasting change.’ It has become an expression of the will of the community rather than the force of authority.

Given the global revolutions that took place in the intervening years, perhaps he realized

that a revolution is in fact, an expression of what he previously suggested, namely, that ‘reason

and conscience of the community’ are a source of justice and law. In Volume 2, Berman’s revolutions reflect a community’s emerging standard of justice and operates in opposition to the oppression of an established order. The historiographical principle Berman appears to adopt at first glance is that of Hegel, which he describes as “the assumption that new ideas grow out of old ideas, more or less independently of political, economic, religious, legal and other social events” (Berman, 1992, p. 313). In contrast, he suggests that with respect to the development of the Western Legal tradition, the revolutions reflect a significant change.

Western religious and philosophical thought, which from the early sixteenth to the late eighteenth centuries moved successively from Roman Catholicism to German Lutheranism, then to English neo-Calvinism, and then to French Deism, interacted with the movement of political and legal institutions at the same times and in the same countries from monarchy to aristocracy to democracy (p. 313).

The movement Berman describes is spurred on by the combined complexities of philosophy, religion, political and social change and conflict. Its movement spurred on by a community’s emerging sense of justice in the context of an unjust social order.

The Western Tradition and Idea of Progress

Although there is some dispute about possible earlier origins, a deeply embedded inheritance the Western Tradition received from Ancient Greece is the Idea of Progress

(Wennersten, 2008; Rist, 2007 & 2002; Burkert, 1997; Edelstein, 1967; Jimack, 1996; Inge,

1920). Nisbet, (2009) defends the integral relationship between time as linearity and the idea of progress in a substantially revised 2009 Introduction. The extent to which these presuppositions are embedded in the Western tradition was illustrated by no less than the Canadian philosopher and political theorist, George Grant, speaking in 1969 in his first Massey Lectures about Time as

History.

In commenting about human temporality, Grant notes the differences in ‘the apprehension of time,’ having lived much of his life as a Westerner with those brought up in the

Sanskrit culture of India. He suggests that even within the Western Civilization these differences in understanding time also emerged between himself as a liberal Protestant and his Catholic

European spouse. They are based on “What is implicitly thought by many who take the pre-

suppositions of their civilization for granted - as granite chunks of faith - is revealed in its intelligibility by the great thinkers who bring out of the granite its form as a statute” (Grant,

2001, Massey Lecture 1, p. 4). As a ‘granite chunk of faith’ the idea of progress is debated, dismissed or ignored, nevertheless its transmission continues from one generation to the next, finding and re-establishing its presence in multiple ways (Khalidi, 1981). They are grounded in

what Werner Jaeger (1965/1939) attempted to describe with the use of the Greek phrase, arête, in

his volumes on, Paideia, or Hannah Arendt’s (1958) discussion, on vita active in, The Human

Condition.

The nascent manifestation of the idea of progress came from the cosmology of the pre-

Socratic philosophers even though there’s no direct record of them using the phrase itself (Runia,

2008; Nisbet, 2009 & 1978; Edelstein, 1967). As Xenophanes writes in one of his few found fragments, “The gods did not reveal to men all things from the beginning, but men through their own search find in the course of time that which is better” (Fr.18, Diels-Kranz in Edelstein,

1967, p. 3).

While there remains some controversy about the precise significance of the Xenophanes fragment, Alexander Tulin (1993) examined the evidence and concluded that even in its brevity, the fragment suggests the idea of agency is at the heart of the human potential for discovering and creating something better. He believes it, “asserts a confidence in the possibility of

progress” and reflects a certain traditional and “primivistic” notions of the origin of human well- being (p. 137). The idea of ‘human agency,’ i.e., ‘men through their own search’ as a starting point for something better beyond what the gods did reveal as a legitimate starting point for the

Western idea of progress and its underlying premise of human perfectibility.

The pathway from the Greek philosophers including Plato and especially the ethics of

Aristotle (Nussbaum, 1988) to the Enlightenment reflects the kind of change and evolution

Berman suggests. Human progress finds its way into and through Augustinian theology (Sweet,

2004) to the philosophy of the Middle Ages and from there into the dominant modes of philosophical reflection beginning with Descartes (Schouls, 1989), leading up to the

Enlightenment (Rist, 2007, Berman, 1983; Van der Dusen, 1990; Mommsen, 1951). It is in the

period of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution where the idea takes hold and visibly

bears its fruits including the early beginnings of what was to become the social work profession

(Moffatt & Irving 2002; Midgley, 1995).

Most recently, under the influence of neoliberalism, an insatiable appetite for growth

driven by the expectation that science represents progress and scholarship, serving both

economic development and consumption. Van Dieren (1995) attributes the contemporary focus

to Hobbes’ emphasis on power while Locke is assigned responsibility for growth and expansion,

i.e., especially colonization (p. 18-21). In a global context, James Midgley points out the idea of

progress holds a central role in development theory in the Third World – the Global South.

Similarly, it continues its role in the development of social welfare and the social work

profession (Midgley, 1997 & 1995).

The Idea of Progress and the role it has played in the development of the Western

Tradition is that of an ‘under-labourer;’ the hope for something better. As a profession

associated with the social, economic and political consequences of the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment, social work, it may be argued, represents an institutionalized response designed to ameliorate ‘the bad’ of David Miller’s succinct attempt to describe and contextualize social justice. This embedded belief in Progress is present in both its individual and structural approaches to addressing personal and social issues.

Particularly in response to the postmodern critics of the idea of progress Charles Taylor’s

(2007), A Secular Age, notes,

. . . that the age of Grand Narratives is over, that we cannot believe in these any more. But their demise is the obviously exaggerated in that the post-modern writers themselves are making use of the same trope in declaring the reign of narrative ended: ONCE we were into grand stories but NOW we have realized their emptiness and we proceed to the next stage. This is a familiar refrain (p. 716-717).

In the eagerness for something better, with its roots deep in the West’s culture, the idea of progress has laboured to justify enslaving and oppressing others. In the late 1920s it led its proponents in the United Farmers of Alberta to pass legislation authorizing sterilization of person’s deemed ‘mentally defective’ while in Canada, as in other colonized countries, governments and religious leaders wracked havoc and death among the indigenous peoples and their cultures, all in the name of progress.

Canada’s Indigenous Peoples – in Conflict with Progress

In the Foreword of, The Song And The Silence: Sitting Wind: The Life Of Stoney Indian

Chief Frank Kaquitts, Peter Jonker (1988), makes the point that the story – a docu-fiction, he calls it – of Sitting Wind, a Stoney Chief is an ordinary one. “The events [of the story] in themselves are rather ordinary, almost trivial, and could have occurred (and probably did) in the lives of many other Canadian Indians.” Continuing with the most salient point, Jonker goes on

to say, “I intended . . .to make it possible for each reader to develop new awareness of the depth at which values are embedded within a culture, and the painful disorientation generated at the intersections where cultural values clash” (Foreword).

The Honourable Thomas R. Berger spoke to the cause of the ‘painful disorientation’ at a

Conference on the Voices of Native People in 1983, by pointing to the necessity of understanding the Western Idea of Progress’ as the basis for comprehending the process of

European colonization (Berger, 1984, p 1). In a similar vein and in the context of challenges faced by Aboriginal economic development, David Newhouse, observes.

Progress is one of the most important ideas of our modern age and one we hold unconsciously and usually unquestioningly. Progress implies there is a pattern of change in human history; that we can know this pattern, and that it consists of irreversible changes in one direction, and this change in direction is permanent, and moves from a less desirable state to a more desirable state of affairs (Newhouse, 2004, p. 36-37).

Finally, Prime Minister Stephen Harper illustrated the consequences of Jonker’s “painful disorientation” in the Government of Canada’s apology to First Nations and Aboriginal peoples of Canada on June 11, 2008, acknowledging that the residential schools were designed to “kill the Indian in the child.” Other efforts to Westernize Indigenous cultures have had similar consequences with social work frequently the profession of choice for remediating the damage.

THE ENLIGHTENMENT

Early in my reading for this study, it became apparent that not only is an understanding of the Enlightenment essential to understanding the development of social work, it is also clearly not a period of uniform thought about important matters. Moreover, the multiple streams of

Enlightenment thought about important matters in the development of Western philosophical

reflection contribute to social work’s difficulties at reconciling the broad and the narrow view.

For the purpose here, I have selected Immanuel Kant, Auguste Comte, George Wilhelm

Friedrich Hegel and Karl Marx. While Hegel is hardly a Kantian, he especially appropriated

Kant’s idea of freedom combining it with the philosophy of expressivism (Englander, 2013,

Taylor 1979). Similarly, the influence of Karl Marx cannot be separated from Hegel whose

expressivism in particular is important to Marx’s development (Taylor, 1979).

Immanuel Kant (1728 – 1804)

On surveying the historical landscape of the 18th and 19th centuries, it’s impossible to ignore the influence of the Idea of Progress on the activity of recording it. Historiography itself felt the influence, especially as the consequences of the Enlightenment and its association with new discoveries of cultures and technology as well as the Industrial and French Revolution left their marks (Outram, 2013; Nisbet, 2009; Collinet & Kaal, 1961). Possibly its most prominent philosopher, Immanuel Kant developed the idea of progress and expressed it in the context of a universal history, or what Kleingeld (1999) suggests was an effort to, “defend a teleological view of history,” i.e., its purpose or goal (p. 59). Elaborating later on, Kant’s problematic use of the terms “nature” and “providence,” Kleingeld goes further, to suggests "Nature "decides" to give humankind certain predispositions, she "wants" these to be developed, and she "knows" what is best for humans (2001, p. 201).

In The Idea of a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View, (1963/1784) Kant

expresses the view that,

“. . . human actions, like every other natural event are determined by universal laws. However obscure their causes, history, which is concerned with narrating these appearances, permits us to hope that if we attend to the play of freedom of the

human will in the large, we may be able to discern a regular movement in it, and that what seems complex and chaotic in the single individual may be seen from the standpoint of the human race as a whole to be a steady and progressive though slow evolution of its original endowment” (Kant, 1963/1784).

The highest purpose of Nature is the realization of those human capacities within a

society that recognize the necessity of external laws as a condition for the creation of a freedom

that is consistent with the freedom of others (Kant 1963/1784). Further, it is “the realization of

Nature’s secret plan to bring forth a perfectly constituted state as the only condition in which the

capacities of mankind can be fully developed” (Kant, 1963/1784).

Charles Taylor (1979) Hegel and Modern Society, suggests not only was Kant a central

figure in the Enlightenment, his influence in the present context continuous the emphasis on the

struggle for human freedom, autonomy and self-determination. Taylor comments that,

Kant sets out his notion of moral freedom in his second Critique [of Practical Reasoning]. Morality is to be entirely separated from the motivation of happiness or pleasure. A moral imperative is categorical; it binds us unconditionally. But the objects of our happiness are all contingent; none of them can be the ground of such unconditional obligation (p. 4).

In Hegel (1975), Taylor suggested that Kant’s unconditional obligation is to be found in

the will itself as, “something that binds us because of what we are, i.e., rational wills and for no

other reason” (p. 31). The result is that for Kant, the moral law binds us a priori; it doesn’t

depend on the objects or actions we desire. It is a duty or obligation and forms the basis for the

current debate about ethics (cf. Kamm, (2013) - for a discussion of consequentialism and non- consequentialist ethics, Kamm’s 2013 Tanner Lectures at UC Berkeley, or her interview with

Alex Voorhoeve (2009), on ethics and intuition).

Taylor suggests that Kant’s argument regarding this moral law has been disputed because it is essentially caught up in a complex self-contradiction. However, the lasting component of

Kant’s argument is the idea of freedom. Taylor explains it as an effort to liberate the moral subject drawing moral precepts out of the will, rather than some external source, thus leading to self-determination. He writes, “I am free in a radical sense, self-determining not as a natural being, but as pure, moral will” (1975, p. 31). It is this moral freedom, Taylor suggest, that lies at the heart of the Enlightenment; moral freedom meant being engaged in a perpetual struggle with the desires and inclinations of human nature and even nature itself. It is this notion of freedom

that is taken over by the German philosopher Hegel.

George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770 – 1831)

George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel entered the scene late in the 18th century, during the

upheavals of revolutions in the American colonies and France. In Germany, similar but less

violent developments took place in literature, music and theatre known as the Sturm und Drang,

Charles Taylor characterizes as ‘revolutionary and decisive for German literature’ (1975, p 13)

by opening up the freedom of expression. This development in philosophy opposed the

rationalism of the Enlightenment and coalesced in the work of Johann Gottfried Herder (Berlin,

2000). Taylor (1975), borrowing a phrase from Isaiah Berlin, named the new freedom,

‘expressivism’ and characterizes Herder’s view of human life as an authentic ‘expression’ of an

idea with a purpose, breaking with the traditional view of the person as a rational animal.

Consequently, “[t]he expressivist anthropology thus sharply breaks with the modern scientific

objectification of nature, at least as far as human nature is concerned” (1975, p. 17).

As a young student, Hegel’s expressivism combined with the Kantian idea of radical

freedom and in keeping with expressivism, his Christianity turned toward a ‘living piety [a]s the

great source of motivation towards the good for the whole man” (p. 53). As the early Hegel

matured and changed, these three themes, expressive unity, rational freedom and a demand for a personal piety continued to exert their influence. Taylor suggests that expressivism rebelled against other of the Enlightenment’s central ideas, particularly as it related to its view of human nature as rational, divided into body and soul; “against a calculative notion of reason and divorced from feeling and will” and its place Hegel focused on categories of expression as defining his theory of man (p. 13).

Taylor connects Hegel’s expressivism to Karl Marx, suggesting it is combined there with the sham of an old hierarchical cosmic order of an earlier era ordered by God and nature. “This radical critique of inhumanity” constitutes the “principal justifying myth which he denounces as the alibi for exploitation and oppression, is not the old religion but the new, atomistic utilitarian

Enlightenment philosophy itself” (1975, p. 548) and in particular it is the theories of the classical economists at whom Karl Marx takes aim. The injustices of the 19th century that gave rise to

social work, largely as charitable efforts of the old hierarchy, is similarly confronted by a radical critique of these efforts.

Auguste Comte (1798 – 1859)

Although the connections between Immanuel Kant and Auguste Comte were already contentious in the latter’s mind, Comte’s biographer Mary Pickering (1993), notes that the parent

of modern sociology clearly benefitted from Kant’s work most of a generation earlier. She

notes, in spite of Comte’s later objections, he initially appreciated Kant’s work, especially the

attempt to create a universal history. However, he soon came to resent the suggestions that Kant

had made ‘positive’ contribution to his own work. At best, Comte was apparently able to

acknowledge a “certain analogy between the tendency of my works and that of the most general works of Kant” (Pickering, 1993, p. 293).

At the same time, Pickering also suggests that Comte, at least partially misunderstood some of Kant’s writings possibly because of an absence of suitable translations. Nevertheless

Comte went on to suggest that he completed Kant’s work by the development of the law of the three stages: namely the Theological (fictitious), Metaphysical (abstract) and the Scientific

(positive) stage. The importance of these three stages is that regardless of whether Comte owed a debt to Kant, the stages follow inexorably, one after the other as a natural law of historical development and progress.

Leslie Sklair (1968), writing specifically about Comte’s idea of progress, suggests it reflects, “a gradual amelioration of some fundamental Order through a series of modifications gradually tending to the completion of one design” with three distinct elements.” The first of these is a natural and inherent tendency towards improvement in each of the three stages. The second element involves the development a single design with the various sciences ordered and developed individually toward becoming a genuine positive science. Sklair makes use of the epigram, “Progress through the development of Order” to define the third element and it is this that constitutes the proper study of sociology as a science (Sklair, 1968, p.323). In effect, Comte views the development of the sciences as dependent on each other and so, Sklair concludes as follows.

There is no doubt, whatsoever that Comte approved of this inevitable and iron law of progression of the human mind and of societal types that it necessarily engenders. For Comte, industrial and scientific society follows from theological society as surely as communist society follows from capitalist society for Marx (p. 322).

Sklair goes on to point out that, Comte claimed the idea of progress as his own and that it belonged to his positive philosophy. Whether he was correct or not, he developed and distinguished between three kinds of progress; Practical Progress with Activity as its agency;

Theoretical Progress with Intellect as its agency; and, Moral Progress with Feeling as its agency.

Of the three, Comte regarded Feeling as “the spring of true progress but also its main end, since our Moral amelioration is of much more importance, public as well as private, than any advance in either Speculation or action” (p. 324). Pickering notes that Comte’s early views shaped in the context of the French Revolution, were “reinforced by the Enlightenment ideas of progress, reason and the perfectibility of man” (1993, p. 13).

Comte’s Influence on English Social Reformers

Writing in her autobiography, My Apprenticeship, (1979/1926) Beatrice Webb reflects on her youth while in, Our Partnership, (1948), her reflections focused on her relationship with

Sydney Webb, her husband and partner and their mutual interest in the public and political issues of the day. Those interests developed early in her youth, a time during which her reading included the Confessions of St. Augustine, as well as Rousseau’s autobiographical Confessions and the works of Auguste Comte many of whose views she later rejected. As she observes later, her experience and observations of the mid-Victorian period included the realization that the scientific method of reasoning had become a means to an end. In contemplating the ends, she suggests it might be the American ideal that all men are born free and equal, or the life, liberty and fraternity of the French Revolution.

By this time, she similarly realized that the Kingdom of Man had replaced the Kingdom of God of an earlier era and adopted the duty of seeking the greatest good for the greatest

number of people. The latter appears as the influence of J.S. Mill’s utilitarian philosophy who readily acknowledged a life-long indebtedness to Comte, although he later rejected Comte’s views on social and political organization. Apparently, it was Comte’s view that a religion with humanity at the centre, a non-theological approach, would fill the metaphysical void created by

the positivist stage that led to the rejection of God (Raeder, 2002).

Norman MacKenzie, writing in the Introduction to Beatrice Webb’s autobiography notes

that in contrast to the individualistic Charity Organization Societies, Webb was a collectivist of

the Fabian socialist variety (p. xxxvii). Similarly, he notes, she was also greatly influenced by

the Religion of Humanity devised by Auguste Comte. As a doctrinal matter, the Religion of

Humanity “taught that society should be governed for the common good by enlightened elite” (p.

xxxvii). Webb herself directly acknowledges that already early in life she read Comte’s “learned

tomes” in the family home (p. 56). However, it wasn’t until later and apparently influenced by

Comte’s clever, if not brilliant English disciple, Frederic Harrisons (Webb, 1979/1926, p. 144)

that she discovered the Religion of Humanity had captured her thinking without ever having

joined the Church of Humanity (p.149).

At this point in her still young life, Webb joined a London Charity Organization

Committee to take on the role of a social investigator, i.e., friendly visitor to the slums of Soho to

further her interests in sociology. In this context, Webb first met several founders of the London

Charity Organization Society including Octavia Hill, Samuel Barnett, and C.S Loch. The latter

was to become an important source of influence for Mary Richmond (Agnew, 2003; Richmond,

1907). Although initially, Webb readily acknowledged that initially she was enamoured with the

work of the philanthropists and the Society, later, as doubts arose she referred to them as “my

friend the enemy” and fought them to the death because of a fundamental disagreement (p.195).

The social reformer, Beatrice Webb shared the discontent Asa Briggs (1983) described in detail in his Social History of England. Webb saw it directly as the ravages of hunger, disease, filth, pauperism, housing, sewage and factory work (1979/1926). It was her response to these conditions during the 19th and early 20th century that eventually influenced her decision to

investigate the Co-operative Movement.

The decision came with encouragement of her friend, economist and social reformer

Alfred Marshall (Caldari, 2004), as part of her effort to find her own way. “Every day my social

views take a more decidedly socialist turn, every hour reveals fresh instances of the curse of gain

without labour; the endless perplexities of the rich, the never failing miseries of the poor”

(Webb, p. 409). It was as if becoming a socialist was an expression of her belief in the idea of

progress. Being a socialist in combination with Comte’s religion of humanity appears in Webb

as a belief in the perfectibility of the imperfect. It’s a view that undoubtedly contributed to the

Webbs’ motivation in 1894 to establish what is now the London School of Economics where E.

J. Urwick became the first Dean of Social Work and later, in the 1920’s, the Dean of Social

Work, at the University of Toronto.

Karl Marx (1818 - 1883)

Karl Marx was a Hegelian before he was a Marxist according to Sidney Hook

(1994/1950), an early Marx scholar. Isaiah Berlin (1996), likewise suggests that the influence of

Hegel is “the deepest and most ubiquitous of all” (p. 11). Allen W. Wood (2004), in the Preface to the Second Edition, similarly acknowledges Marx’s connection to Hegel. While the connection and dependence on Hegel is widely acknowledged, it is primarily based on the influence of Marx’s early alliance with a group of young Hegelians. However, as circumstances

on the Continent changed and the opposition to Hegel intellectual idealism grew in the face of the changing reality of the industrialization and capitalism, rather than further development of

Hegel’s view, opposition grew with Marx as one of the most outspoken critics.

Taylor (1979) suggests that Hegel’s idea of man, not as an individual but rather as a

“generic essence,” was taken over by Marx as a ‘natural being,’ but without Hegel’s idealism.

Accordingly, Marx’s natural being’s constant interaction with nature inevitably leads to taking over nature as an expression of the new natural being. By engaging in the capacity of self- expression, man becomes truly man. In responding to the need for production to satisfy human need, an inevitably division results in re-ordering the social conditions. Taylor comments, “by a cruel irony the first step towards a higher life, the true realization of man takes men out of paradise of primitive communism to the pain and cruelty of class society” (p. 143).

Wood suggests that what uniquely distinguishes Marx is his historical materialism, all too often confused with economic determinism. Materialism is classically defined as a view that only matter is real and exists. It removes ideas, all forms of intelligence, purpose or final causal explanations from its repertoire. Runes, (1963) suggest that epiphenomena, mental activity etc., have no causal effect whatsoever (p. 189). Determinism, on the other hand, holds that all human activity is dependent on and conditioned by its cause (p. 78).

Wood, in turn, goes on to explain that Marx’s historical materialism relies on the productive relations of a society as the determined by its productive powers (p. 75) and suggests it explains the economic structure of society as well as the changes that take place in the economic structure of society over time. In this context it is noteworthy that Wood acknowledge, Marx has very little to say about “norms, standards or the values he employs in deciding that capitalism is an intolerable system (p. 127).

In a similar vein, David Miller (1999) suggests that at least initially, Marx was highly critical of the idea of social justice, because liberals and progressives embraced it enthusiastically (p. 3). Wood suggests that Marx’s idea of justice is bound up with the exploitation inherent in the capitalist structure of production. Peter Baldwin (1999), points out that the phrase often cited in support of Marx’s idea of justice, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need,” is only used once by Marx and even then is generally misunderstood and originated with Lois Blanc, (Baldwin, 1999, p.32). Blanc was an influential

French socialist in the post-French Revolution period, who unlike the rampant selfish

individualism of the Revolution, intended and defined the phrase as a form of “unrestrained self-

assertion” (Swart, 1962, p. 80).

Likewise, Marx inherently ruled out that kind of exploitation in his ideal or utopian view

of the radical change in the economic order. The revolution that Marx deemed necessary

required the capitalist order to be completely abolished (p. 261-162). In the context of Marx’s

conception of justice, Wood cites from Capital as follows,

The justice of transactions which go on between the agents of production rests on the fact that these transactions arise out of the production relations as their natural consequences. The juristic forms in which these economic transactions appear as voluntary actions of participants, as expressions of a common will or as contracts that may be enforced by the state against a single party, cannot, being mere forms, determine this content. They only express it. This content is just whenever it corresponds to the mode of production, is adequate to it. It is unjust whenever it contradicts it (p. 132-133).

As Wood points out, the idea of justice in this conceptualization of it requires an

understanding not only of the individual transaction but also equally of the mode of production,

to which Engels apparently suggested the addition of the science of political economy as the

means for determining the material facts of production and exchange. The social justice or

injustice is thus a matter of rightly employing science in the process of production (p. 133).

Unlike, the individualism of classical liberal ideas of social justice, Marx’s notion is inherently social in nature.

Similarly, Mishra (1975) points out, Marx does not have an explicit or developed theory

of welfare; the 1834 Poor Laws still dominated England’s public policy at the time Marx was writing. Likewise, in Germany, Bismarck’s social legislation was only barely underway during

this period. Consequently, Mishra suggests Marx’s empirical analysis was largely grounded in

the English experience and forms the basis for his concerns with the entire capitalist system of

production and its injustices. Marx’s overriding interests and concerns were with the full range

of public policy and transforming the capitalist system and not merely the compensatory role of

charity or social policy (p.289).

The Industrial or Industrious Revolution

The development of new technology both before and after the period commonly named

the Industrial Revolution, enabled and encouraged a dramatic increase in patterns of public

consumption. Following the patterns of consumption rather than production led historian Jan de

Vries (2008), to name it the Industrious Revolution. Simply put, de Vries’ argument is that

increased consumption of goods drove the increases in production. In the end, whether the

revolution was industrial or industrious, this was a period of tremendous change and disruption

in the lives of ordinary people, simultaneously producing unprecedented wealth and abject

poverty and a change in established patterns of provision of goods and services.

De Vries’ designation reframes the revolution presenting it as a contested description

based on a change in the focus of the revolution from the pre-occupation with the methods of

production to the increasing consumption of goods. His analysis adds to the confusion since neither the accuracy of the name, the dating of the event, its significance and causes, whether or not it was ever a revolution, the association with Arnold Toynbee’s (1956/1884), The Industrial

Revolution, of which he was not the author, has not undermined the lasting upheavals of the 18th

and 19th century. In spite of the disagreements, an underlying agreement exists about the reality

of something deeply significant precipitating major changes in the Western world minimally

foreshadowing the development of consumerism.

Joel Mokyr examined the relationship of the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution

and Modern Economic Growth in his 2007 Max Weber Lecture. Although he acknowledges it

began in England, Western Europe followed almost immediately with similar developments.

According to Mokyr, the Enlightenment was a multifaceted event, and at its deepest level was

“the belief in the possibility and desirability of human progress and the perfectibility through

reason and knowledge” with the Industrial Revolution forming the manifestation of its belief

that, “the growth of useful knowledge would sooner or later open the doors to prosperity”

(Mokyr, 2007, p. 5).

The English social historian, Asa Briggs (1983) critiques several attempts by authors to

explain the causes and consequences of the industrial revolution particularly those who view it

from the narrow perspective such as the economic historians who view it as a success story and

others who attribute the revolution to mechanization, or inventions. Even the historian A.J.

Toynbee fell short because he interpreted this period of English history as a change from

medieval regulations to competition.

To make his own point, Briggs (1983) examined industrialization as a highly multi-

facetted process pointing out that the early beginnings paralleled the French Revolution. But, in

contrast to France, the English government “set out to uphold them [the principles of authority and hierarchy] with the full force of law” (p.178) especially in the face of deep-seated political, religious and economic discontent that frequently resulted in riots in London (Briggs, 1983).

In the late 19th century in Germany Alice Salomon encountered Asa Brigg’s summation of the difference between the French and the British response to the Enlightenment and the

Industrial Revolution. In Salomon’s case, it came in the form of a personal confrontation with the feminist and the recently converted socialist author Lily Braun, over Salomon’s decision to

establish a Working Girls Club, the forerunner to the first German School of Social Work.

Salomon reflected on the encounter by asking

From then on, I asked myself what she had asked me: Can social work help bring about a better world? Is it not merely palliative, a compromise? Should not the social system be radically changed? Reform or revolution? Where should we go? I had not arrived at an answer (Salomon, 2004, p. 30).

OVERVIEW

Although modified by the circumstances of the day, Cassidy’s question about social workers and the ‘broad versus narrow’ came in the midst of the Depression of the 1930’s while

Tyler’s desire to refocus the efforts of social work towards social change and social reform came in the late 1960s. Cassidy, who was Dean at the Toronto School of Social Work (1945-1951), used his experience of the Depression to influence public policy in the development of the post

WW II welfare state. Tyler, who was a student in Toronto during Cassidy’s tenure as Dean following the War, attempted to redirect the development of social work education as he envisaged it in the School’s first submission for accreditation. At the Annual AASW Conference on March 13, 1997, Tyler commented that he encountered two obstacles soon after his appointment on August 16, 1966 (UARC, Accession 2008.052. file #01.01), the University itself

and the professional association, the AASW. Consequently, the literature review that follows in

Chapter 2 is focused on the theoretical insight related to the development and influence of institutions, particularly emergence, agency versus structure, philosophical anthropology and the tendency towards isomorphism.

In pursuit of my interest in looking back at selected events in the history of social work, a review of the relevant historical and archival methods and methodological approach follows in

Chapter 3. As will become apparent, matters of method and methodology for historical writings are dominated by a wide range of debates about the nature of history, its truth or not, representation, memory or imagination, or even whether it is anything more than a historian’s version of a painting on a canvas (Jenkins, 2009, p. 4).

Likewise, in an effort to establish its legitimacy, the debate on whether history is a science or something less, remains a periodic feature among those who practice the craft. On a more practical scale, it is deemed to be like the effort of a commander writing the summary of a battle based on the observation of those who were trusted to lead the encounter. The oral history of those who lived through the experience and particularly its integration with documentary history obtained from such customary sources as archives, challenges the significance of

‘accuracy’ with the importance of ‘meaning.’

Chapter 4 surveys some of the events in development of social work and social work education internationally and nationally, followed by the development graduate social work education as it was realized at the University of Calgary, School of Social Welfare, on April 1,

1966. While the controversy about the name developed soon after the School was established, the context of the disagreement was established much earlier in Alberta’s public policy history.

The primary thrust behind development of social work education came from the membership of

CASW, organized as the Northern and Southern Alberta Branches, the University of Alberta,

Faculty of Arts, the Calgary Junior League, the Principal, University of Alberta, Calgary, and

several senior, professional staff in the Department of Public Welfare.

The incorporation and formalization of the AASW under the Societies Act on December

18, 1961, established the requisite local professional infrastructure. At the same time, a renewed

and parallel effort to establish an autonomous University of Calgary also ensured a competitive

tension between two major centers of political power. It was uniquely expressed by Father Pat

O’Byrne in an interview with Karen Hill (1985), as a competition between the two cities,

equating it to the hockey rivalry (V. 3, p. 15).

The first President of AASW, Isabel Munroe and later, the Dean of Women at the

University of Alberta, along with Dr. Malcolm Taylor, Principal, University of Alberta, Calgary,

representing the two organizations, cooperated to persuade the Calgary Junior League to fund a

critically important step – a study on the need for social work education in Alberta. James C.

Mahaffy Q.C., became the Chair of the Social Work Education Research Committee; he was the

legal counsel for the 1947 Royal Commission on Child Welfare, intended to counter the

Charlotte Whitton led study of Alberta’s Public Welfare Department.

The fifth and final chapter brings together the various elements of the dissertation,

through an analysis of the significant events in the history of the Faculty initially in the context

of an emerging welfare state especially as that played out in mid-60’s Alberta. Similarly, I

examine later events in the context of the declining welfare state and the ascendency of

neoliberalism. In that context, the significance of a name change may be limited to a mere

identifier with a profession. On the other hand, a name is equally capable of energizing and

identifying a value-based mission with an intentional focus that resides in a desire and capacity for something better.

The questions I pose deal with Cassidy’s comment, namely, whether a deeply embedded belief in the Idea of Progress in Western culture defines the identity of social work. Is it within the profession’s capacity to retain its belief in social justice as the foundation for defining its identity? Are Sanford F. Schram and Basha Silverman at Bryn Mawr College correct in asserting that neoliberalism and marketization threaten to end social work? Does Bruce Thyer’s observation about evidence-based practices eliminate the boundaries between social work and cognate professions? If social work defines itself narrowly as Cassidy lamented during the Great

Depression, can it survive as an autonomous professional program in a university where research

is driven by market forces and not so much by a vision of a just society in which the full

spectrum of life flourishes?

CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

This chapter examines the theoretical literature related to organizations and institutions

from the perspective of new institutionalism as an aid in clarifying the complexity of the

structure and agency issue in the context of what appears as a rather mundane matter, i.e., a

change of name. As noted earlier, Tyler became aware of the two major challenges facing him

within a few months into his appointment - the university and the professional association.

Within the University, the challenge came in the form of resistance to his view of the

foundations for professional graduate education and the status of the established professions

(Tyler, Personal Communication: February 20, 2014). At the same time, opposition from the

Alberta Association of Social Workers (AASW) reflected both his vision for the profession and a personal element ostensibly wrapped up in his appointment.

Although from the late 1960s to the early 1970s, Tyler tried several times to capture his vision for social work education by changing the name, the School of Social Welfare, initially itself a compromise, nevertheless came to represent his vision. Likewise, it defined as he cryptically explained over the course of several interviews and conversations, ‘social work’ had forgotten, if not sacrificed the meaning of the ‘social’ in social work with its emphasis on the individual casework method.

This review begins with the contributions of Wilensky and Lebeaux’s (1965) classic,

Industrial Society and Social Welfare. Although it deals primarily with the US and the policy framework of its social welfare programs, it was an important text during the early years of the

School of Social Welfare, and provided a framework for faculty and students alike. Even though it now represents the “old” institutionalism, Abrutyn, S. & Turner, J.H., (2011) have proposed it continues to offers insight with respect to the integration within and between institutions, e.g.,

love and kinship in families, and the generalized symbolic media of exchange, e.g., money, knowledge, power, etc.

Critical realism, an under-labouring philosophy of science, forms the theoretical context for the concept of emergence as developed by British philosopher Roy Bhaskar and for the purpose here, especially by the British sociologist Margaret Archer. Their work on structure and agency along with that of the American sociologist and critical realist Christian Smith’s contribution to the question, ‘What is a person?’ i.e., philosophical anthropology, represents an issue at the core of social work regardless of whether the efforts focus on individual, social or structural change. In this instance, it pitted the Director/Dean against established traditional social welfare institutions and a developing profession.

The frequently cited paper by Paul J. DiMaggio and Walter W. Powell (1983), entitled,

The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational

Fields, contributes broadly to the development of organizational and institutional isomorphism.

The chapter concludes with a selective review of literature dealing with the significance, purposefulness and effect of a name change related to corporations, disabilities and public services organizations.

SOCIAL WELFARE: INSTITUTIONAL, RESIDUAL AND CONSUMERIST

The two-fold typology developed by Wilensky and Lebeaux (1965), in Industrial Society

and Social Welfare: the impact of industrialization on the supply and organization of social

welfare services in the United States held a prominent place in the early curriculum of the School

of Social Welfare. Particularly during its formative years in the late 1960’s and 1970’s, the

typology established a framework for the analysis and development of social policy. By

employing the terms, ‘residual’ and ‘institutional,’ to capture the distinct ideological positions,

the two-fold typology described provision by the state and its agencies, or by the family and

participation in an individualistic free-market system.

Wilensky and Lebeaux described the ‘institutional’ model as a systematic provision of programs based on life-course events and established as part of the public policy landscape reflecting the ideals of “security, equality and humanitarianism” (p. 138). They suggest the institutional model is “typically [sponsored by] the society as a whole acting through government

(city, state, federal) or a smaller collectivity operating through a private social agency” (p. 141).

In contrast, the ‘residual’ model relied on the traditional American approach, using the family and market as the primary source for social provisions as a reflection of individual responsibility

and freedom. In the residual approach family or market-failure, was a necessary pre-conditions

to social provision, but only until the restoration of family or market capability.

Developed by Wilensky and Lebeaux largely in an American context, James Midgley

(1997) suggested it as possibly the most important typology developed to reflect models of state

provision. However, more recently, he suggested the Wilensky and Lebeaux typology was

rather “static,” lacking the capacity to account for change (Personal communication: February 3,

2011). Nevertheless, in the context of the ‘old institutionalism’ its influence established an

analytical framework for understanding the development welfare state. At the same time,

Midgley’s comment about its static nature is consistent with the general critique of the old

institutionalism for its fixed and descriptive character without adequate attention to change and

refinement.

It is noteworthy that, writing alone Wilensky’s (2002), Rich Democracies, Political

Economy, Public Policy and Performance, examined 19 rich democracies concluding that even

with significant differences, their public policies began to convergence. Moreover, even with differences and escalating concern about the welfare state’s retrenchment as countries became richer, “they all mounted seven or eight clusters of social policies as a matter of a social right, not charity” (p. 60), but retained “government protected minimum standards” (p. 211).

Introduced, without elaboration, is the concept of a ‘social right.’

Elaboration on a ‘social right’ took place ten years later. In his life’s concluding publication, Wilensky’s (2012), American Political Economy in Global Perspective, shifted his position further. It begins with the familiar phrase “as a matter of a social right, not charity” retaining the American institutional definition of the welfare state, but this time as “government- protected minimum standards of income, nutrition, health and safety, education, and housing assured to every citizen as a social right and not a charity” (p. 3). While Wilensky continues the association of the social welfare institution with government, a change begun in the Rich

Democracies, from ‘public provision’ to a ‘government-protected minimum’ has taken hold, apparently based on the notion of a ‘social right.’

However, Raymond Plant takes Wilensky’s idea of a ‘social right’ substantially further back in western history in the Foreword to the Connelly and Hayward’s (2012, Eds.), The

Withering of the Welfare State, Regression, by pointing back to the origin and development of national sovereignty in the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia. Also known as the Peace of Westphalia,

Plant suggests it represented a progressive development based on non-interventionism and the value of a shared citizenship. The development of the liberal state in the 19th century replaced

non-interventionism with the Enlightenment values of freedom and democracy aligned with the

idea of citizenship including the assumption these values represented universal human

aspirations. The development of globalization is an extension of these same liberal, i.e.

individualistic, values even to the extent that refusing to accept them is now the legitimate basis for international intervention in the internal affairs of states that based their autonomy on

‘individual rights.’

In a subsequent chapter Jack Hayward (2012), recognizing the increasing dominance of economic capitalism, takes it a step further and suggests the welfare state was a “citizen- solidarity corrective action to the market indulgence of inequality” and believes the welfare state was undermined by three myths: “perversity, futility and the creation of jeopardy” (p. 7) threatening freedom and economic progress. These three myths, that: collective actions to help the poor actually have the opposite effect; that the middle class rather than the poor benefitted most from government transfer payments; and, that government expenditures associated with the welfare state actually jeopardize economic progress (p. 7 - 9).

In his chapter, Edward Page (2012) adds to the discussion by pointing to the dismissal state of public administration, pejoratively considered as the bureaucratic vehicle of governments responsible for resource allocation. Page suggests that bureaucratic resource allocation has altered dramatically with new public management models that rely on a market- based resource allocation models that emphasize performance targets and performance pay and rely on “a post-hoc audit as opposed to a priori instructions” (p. 106). He argues, “It

[bureaucracy] is often an inefficient allocator of resources and that markets not only offer greater individual choice, but are also able to match supply and demand of goods and services more efficiently than top-down fiat” (p. 107).

The introduction of the private market into the provision of former publicly sponsored programs and services, marks a transition into a new and very different phase of the welfare state. Citizens become market-based consumers and with the advent of social bonds, their

personal growth, development and enjoyment, are commoditized, monetized and profitable. In this scenario, the system of social welfare services are no longer structured according to the

Wilensky and Lebeaux categories. Without naming the new, emerging identity in the contemporary array of social welfare programs, Connelly characterizes this new social welfare identity as an institutionalization of “inequality and insecurity” with both “increasing at the expense of solidarity and social justice” (p. 216).

Writing about the European Union context, Hans van Ewijk (2010), suggests the private for profit, non-profit and freelancers are already making a range of services available in various parts of Europe. Moreover, increasingly some specialized services are geared, marketed to the well off, and wealthy. It involves such services as childcare, elder care and mental health services. As one wit has apparently suggested, “Health for all, becomes health markets for all”

(p. 27) inadvertently affirming a new type of social cooperation and bifurcated institutionalized services based less on a social right than on the avarice of an institutionalized market free to pursue its own goals. Moreover, the context for both the two-fold typology and much of the current Western public liberalized policy context has changed from a need driven response life-

course events as articulated by Wilensky and Lebeaux, to the introduction of rights and publicly

funded programs to a guarantee of minimum standard for public services and consumer driven

market-based standard.

ORGANIZATIONS AND INSTITUTIONS

Cameron Fincher (1987) illustrates the development of an institution in the response of

higher education to financing and funding issues for institutional research in an article simply

entitled, Associations, Organizations and Institutions. Spurred on by the development of

centralization of statewide funding in the US, institutions of higher education responded with a need for a wide range of data to support their funding and development needs.

The process Fincher (1978) describes began with the changes in the funding

arrangements for universities in the 1960s during which campus agencies demonstrated their usefulness to their organizations by bringing together information for a variety of internal and external uses. The sophistication of the agencies grew from intermittent voluntary meetings to formal national organizations. In turn, that development precipitated the need for additional structure, increased formality, established committees and a larger membership base. In due course, a formal process for leadership selection and development, clarification of roles, paid staffs and a fixed location soon followed. As newly formed associations clarified their mission,

memberships expanded and grew, bringing new challenges. The result was a further increase in

staffing, inevitably followed by differentiation in the leadership functions; increased revenues

not only from membership but also from the sale of goods, services and value added products,

broadened their scope of activities. However, in contrast to earlier stages of development, direct

membership participation in the organization declined.

Fincher describes the formation of an institution as involving changes “in purpose,

membership, leadership, funding, control and functions that should be appreciated as well as a

temporal dominance of horizontal and vertical dimensions” (p. 330). This new institutional

form, he suggests, is typically characterized by traditional values and norms, diverse purposes,

moreover, its existence is not challenged and membership is replaced by multiple and diverse

constituencies and partners. The development of institutions as described by Fincher and in the

following by Mikael Holmqvist, reflects what critical realist philosopher Roy Bhaskar Margaret

Archer and Christian Smith intend with the concept of emergence.

The purpose of the Mikael Holmqvist (2008) study, The Institutionalization of Social

Welfare, A Study of Medicalizing Management, is the “explor[ation] of the process by which a social welfare organization becomes an institution” (p. 1). Holmqvist studied a Swedish sheltered workshop organization (p. 43). However, given his interests in the development of theory, the immediate and first question focused on the distinguishing between an organization and an institution. His study proceeds to focus on formal organizations as “consisting of formal plans, routines, rules, instructions and program for generating, interpreting, and governing behavior that are jointly managed by two or more individuals” (p. 1). Institutions are very different creatures and even though Holmqvist suggests they emerge from organizations as they seek “to accomplish certain ideas, goals, and aims, eventually the organization becomes valued for itself. Borrowed from P. Selznick (1984), Holmqvist adopts the following definition.

[Institutionalization] involves the taking on of values, ways of acting and believing that are deemed important for their own sake. From then on self- maintenance becomes more than bare organizational survival; it becomes a struggle to preserve the uniqueness of the group in the face of new problems and altered circumstances (Holmqvist, 2008, p. 3).

Perhaps not immediately obvious in the quote, but certainly as Holmqvist continues, the reach of what he has cited leads to several other observations about the nature of institutionalization. First, Holmqvist cites Max Weber, to suggest, “the true member of a bureaucracy is chained to his activity in his entire economic and ideological existence” (p. 3).

Further, he makes the point that,

The process of infusing organizations with value beyond the technical requirements at hand makes the commitment and loyalty among organizational members central to the process of institutionalization. It is not surprising that the concept of ‘total institution’ (Goffman, 1961) or ‘totalitarianism’ (Arendt, 1968) is often used to describe this phenomenon (Holmqvist, 2008, p. 4).

As part of the institutionalization process, Holmqvist notes that the “actors contribute to create the institution to which they subsequently respond” and with whom they effectively

“share a definition of social reality” (p. 5). In the context of the study, he suggest that the client

and the agency, i.e., the organization, collaborate to create a reality in which the client readily

accepts the medicalization of his or her condition and consequently the need for the

organization’s services are required to address the issues.

EMERGENCE

C. Smith, (2010), a critical realist sociologist asks the question, “What is a person?” in his book by the same name and points out that the human body is composed of 27 elements, without which there would be no human body or being. The question he confronts is presented

as a challenge to create a theoretical concept that explains how to move from those 27 elements

to the complexity of the human creature in all of its manifestations.

Smith introduces the concept of emergence with the following example first used by

John Stuart Mill. Hydrogen and oxygen are both very common elements which, acting

independently feed a fire or if not act, as an explosive. In apparent contrast, water is composed

of two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen and is commonly employed to extinguish those same

fires. The implied question is what has happened to change the characteristic of these two

elements such that there is a dramatic difference in the effect of these elements.

As the initiator of the critical realism, Roy Bhaskar’s (1979), first effort to explain the concept of emergence is somewhat ‘lost’ in the complexity of Bhaskar’s thought, style and in

The Possibility of Naturalism: A Philosophical Critique of the Contemporary Human Sciences,

. . . the processes of the formation of the higher-order entities are reconstructed and explained in terms of the principles governing the elements out of which they are formed, is compatible with synchronic emergence, on which the higher-order principles cannot be completely explained in terms of lower-order ones (p. 125).

Smith, in turn, develops the concept of emergence within the context of addressing his question about the person as follows.

First, two or more entities that exist at a "lower" level interact or combine. Second, that interaction or combination serves as the basis of some new, real entity that has existence at a "higher" level. Third, the existence of the new higher-level entity is fully dependent upon the two or more lower-level entities interacting or combining, as they could not exist without doing so. Fourth, the new, higher-level entity nevertheless possesses characteristic qualities (e.g., structures, qualities, capacities, textures, mechanisms) that cannot be reduced to those of the lower-level entities that gave rise to the new entity possessing them. When these four things happen, emergence has happened. The whole is more than the sum of its parts (Smith, 2010, p. 26).

Dave Elder-Vass, (2010) a British critical realist succinctly defines the term ‘emergence’ as “the idea that a thing . . . can have properties or capabilities that are not possessed by its parts.

Such properties are called emergent properties “(p. 4). According to Elder-Vass, the emergent properties of human interaction and relationships are constantly creating new entities with emergent properties that are distinct from those interactions and relationships.

Although his reservations about the concept prevent him from adopting it, the Canadian theoretical physicist and philosopher, Lee Smolin (2013), describes emergence as “an important term in a relational world,” and defines it as, “a property of something made of parts, is emergent if it would not make sense when attributed to any of its parts” (p. xxx).

Roy Bhaskar attributes his early interest in the idea of emergence to Michael Polanyi

(Bhaskar & Hartwig, 2010), while he was a student at Oxford. Apparently, Polanyi’s use of the term was not particularly rigorous in a philosophical sense. However, it was immediately significant for Bhaskar as he suggests.

If you took a human being seriously and if you wanted to defend the possibility of social science, as I certainly did, it was clear you would have to argue that human beings and social science are somehow emergent from nature. So you needed a conception of emergence” (p. 57).

The prominent American philosopher, Thomas Nagel (2012), against a background of

the limitation of the physical sciences, notably evolutionary biology, the methods of scientific

investigation and the Weltanschauung that has harbored them, challenged the principle of unification, i.e., the theory of everything. A theory characterized as the philosophy of reductive materialism claiming that all phenomena is ultimately explained and understood as physical, chemical and possibly biological processes. Over against the view of material reductionism as

well as idealism at least by implication, Nagel explores emergence but almost reluctantly finds it

inadequate as an explanation. The reasons for his less than outright rejection of emergence is

unclear beyond finding it unsatisfactory in resolving the subject object relationship because, as

he suggests, we are unable to observe ourselves observing ourselves. In the end, he is certain

that a new paradigm will come, only because “the human will to believe is inexhaustible (p. 128)

Andrea M. Maccarini (2013) claims the concept of emergence has gained increasing

acceptance, related to the field of complexity sciences and unfolds in three distinct veins. In

philosophy, it seeks a new interpretation of the world; in interdisciplinary science, it discovers

similar networks with similar properties at different levels of reality; and, at a global level, it has

produced unpredictable facts and new forms of social life.

Maccarini offers the following four characteristics to clarify his conceptualization of

emergence:

1. Ontological monism, meaning that reality is ultimately constituted by one kind of ‘stuff’;

2. The novelty of properties emerging from less complex and/or less organized layer of reality;

3. The irreducibility of emergent phenomena and properties to the elements they emerged from – that is, to any of their properties and interactions;

4. Downward causation of emergents (p. 25).

Margaret Archer’s morphogenetic approach developed the concept of social emergent properties, which are in turn characterized and succinctly summarized by Maccarini as follows:

1. Emergent properties are dependent upon components at a lower level of complexity (persons and their interactions);

2. They are irreducible to those elements;

3. The have causal influence (p. 25).

This characterization of emergence and emergent properties represent only part of the critical realists’ explanation of its theory of emergence and Archer’s theory of morphogenesis and its opposite, morphostasis. The former characterizes morphogenesis in the context of linking structure and agency as, she puts it, “without sinking one into the other” (Archer 1996, p.

65). She asserts that it requires an ontological view in which structures and agents are analytically separate, i.e., analytical dualism. Further, that they are also temporally distinguishable; one can speak meaningfully about their pre-existence and posteriority (p. 66).

NEW INSTITUTIONALISM

New Institutional Theory: An Overview

Writing in the context of the political science discipline, B. Guy Peters (2012), suggests the study of institutions dates back at least to Aristotle’s writing on the body politic. More recently, the concept of “institutions” apparently dates to its usage in 1725 by Giambattista Vico

in Scienza Nuova (Hodgson, 2006). Nevertheless, both Peters and Hodgson appear to agree that the immediate roots of the new institutionalism are in the development of modern sociology in the 19th century and its early study of institutions (Krier, 2009; Brinton & Nee, 1998). At the

time, “old” institutionalism was recognized as a part of the new science of sociology and Peters

suggests it was largely based on a methodology he describes as a requirement for “intelligent

observers” (p. 3).

Peters suggests that James March and Johan Olsen first named the movement in 1984 in

The New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in Political Life. However, Arthur J. Cordell

(1972) an employee of the Science Council of Canada apparently examined a number of

introductory economic textbooks before and after 1933. In the report that that followed and

named Imperfect and Monopolistic Competition: The Role of the Robison-Chamberlin Theories

in the Demise of Institutionalism, he suggests otherwise. His conclusion, refers to the

development in some post-1933 texts and a brief discussion of how new theories were handled.

In that context, Cordell observes:

However, the cycle of relevance rolls on and a new institutionalism has arrived on the economic scene. The new institutionalists are spearheaded by J. K. Galbraith and others who point out that the failure to recognize widespread existence of external costs and benefits (so widespread that they are the rule and not the exception) has led to and is at least a partial explanation of poverty, air and water pollution, highway congestion and urban blight (Cordell, 1972, p. 42).

In this early phase, the reach of analysis appears limited to acknowledging the existence

of institutions accompanied by the recognition that they were influential in social and economic

activity and incurred costs/benefits outside of their own domain (Nee, 1998). Not infrequently, the individualism of psychological behaviourism provided the methodological basis for the studies by the old institutionalists (Peters, 2012; Wilson, 2005).

However, as DiMaggio & Powell, (1983), point out, the rejection of behaviourism provided the impetus for developing a new approach to the rejected ‘epiphenomenalism’ of behaviourism. The latter had taken the view that institutions were no more than the sum of the individual choice behaviours of those engaged in institutional behaviour. The authors suggest the reductionism of the behaviourally oriented scientists led them to ignore the institution’s broader social context and its longevity. However, their own question “to provide fresh answers to old questions about how social choices are shaped, mediated, and channeled by institutional arrangement” (p. 2) should alert a reader; the authors imposed their own boundaries on the reach of analysis and research.

Not surprising, defining an “institution” became and remains a much-contested issue in each of sociology, economics and political science. In fact, so much so it led some to abandon the effort altogether. Likewise, the development of the new institutionalism has not been without controversy. Some have suggested it is not new at all, proposing instead that at best it represents the logical development of what has now become the ‘old institutionalism’

(Rutherford, 1994).

Regardless of the various controversies, the importance of the renewed emphasis on institutions gained prominence in the last several decades of the 20th century, this time more or

less independently in each of sociology, political science and economics resulting in

substantially different approaches. Some have suggested that the reawakening resulted from a

growing trend towards more inter-disciplinary studies. In any case, along with the definitional

issues and different theoretical approaches, the ‘structure versus agency’ issue, has continued to

play prominently in the various debates (Peters, 2012; Heugens, & Lander, 2009; Hodgson,

2007; Hay & Wincott, 1998). Hence, the relevance of that particular issue in this context, and one to which, critical realism proposes a unique response.

Emirbayer & Mische (1998) trace the structure versus agency issue back in its contemporary secularized meaning, to the work of Immanuel Kant and the Enlightenment and to the free will, i.e., freedom versus determinism issue in religious and theological debates of

earlier centuries. Fredric G. Reamer (1983), declaring the free will versus determinism debate

“remarkably relevant to social work practice,” points out its association with the early Greek

philosophical debates of the of the Pre-Socratics and the later Stoics (Reamer, 1983, p. 627).

However, Reamer’s illustrations of a practice context, demonstrates a distinctly individualistic

interpretation, apparently without the recognition that the practitioner is subject to the structural

influence and constraints of an American or Canadian public policy and its social welfare institutions.

Schools of New Institutionalism

Before considering the agency versus structure issue, the different interpretations of new

institutionalism require some clarification. Without some form of typology or classification, the

frequently contradictory theoretical formulations and claims made under the rubric of new

institutionalism, create a morass of confusing concepts.

B. Guy Peters (2012) and Hall & Taylor (1996) have each in their own time created a

framework for categorizing the various approaches. Peters agrees with three of the Hall &

Taylor classification, however, he identified eight different groupings of assumptions and the

related theoretical structure in the Third Edition of Institutional Theory in Political Science: the

New Institutionalism. In the Preface to the Third Edition, Peters notes that the field has

developed, advanced and changed through critique over the last several years explaining that the second Edition (2005), included seven variations.

Peters’ first two, the normative institutionalism and rational choice theory institutionalism, are of particular interest because the basic assumptions of each are directly contrary to the other. In fact, Peters suggest they are the antithesis of the other with the rational choice theory currently dominating the field. At the level of principle, its highly individualistic

underpinnings confront the normative or collective choice theorists in their efforts to explain the role of political institutions largely undifferentiated from the economic institutions.

The Nobel Laureate, James M. Buchanan and co-author, Gordon Tullock (1962),

Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy receive credit for the development of a conceptual framework for analysis of public choices based on the principles of rational choice economics, a rational utility-maximizer theory based on the efficiency norm.

Buchanan initially recognized that individual utility or interests varied greatly and accepted that collective choices were represented by aggregating individual choices including the full-range of varying self-interests all seeking to maximize their utility.

However, later in his career, referring back to the Calculus of Consent, in which he and

Tullock developed the principle of aggregating varied self-interest claims as the basis of collective choice, Buchanan, (1999), noted he now feared he might have moved to a social choice position. The latter he suggests is erroneously “constructed . . . on the presupposition that the alternatives for collective choice are “out there” as a menu from which selections are to be made, for the most part through a sequence of pairwise comparisons” open for use by political entrepreneurs. In contrast to the earlier position, he suggests collective choice should

be determined within a framework of established rules (Buchanan & Tullock, 1962, p. 6-7;

Buchanan, 1999, p. 152 -154).

Peters’ third school bears the name of historical institutionalism and rests on the premise that, “The basic, and deceptively simple idea that the policy choices made when an institution is being formed, or when the policy is initiated, will have a continuing and largely determinate influences over policy far into the future” (p. 70). The phrase ‘path-dependency,’ the view that the initial assumptions of an organization or program at its initiation, constrain the organization’s capacity for change and represents the major critique of this approach (p. 70). To accommodate change, theorists with this orientation developed the concept “punctuated equilibria” (p. 78).

The concept intends to retain the influence of the originating assumptions and policies associated with path-dependency while at the same time acknowledging the effect of “punctuation” as a new and different set of assumptions and policies take effect and alter earlier ones. Multiple

‘punctuations’ are also possible, enabling change to take place.

The fourth school Peters identifies as empirical institutionalism, an approach he readily acknowledges as problematic because of the inherent methodological difficulties in conducting research into the effects of institutional structure over time and its close identification with the old institutionalism. The fifth, he names the discursive and constructive institutionalism, both of which focus on ideas as the shaping influence on both institutions and the behaviour of individuals. The constructivist school, he suggests is primarily focused on international institutions and largely overlooks domestic institutions. The discursive school, Peters suggests, is the dominant of the two, and “represents a particular variant of a more general approach emphasizing the significance of political ideas” (p. 113).

Sixth is the Sociological School, with several different and sometimes rather vague approaches or models: the population ecology model, institutionalization and isomorphism, sedimentation (the idea that the present is built on layers of the past), organizational archetypes and discursive institutionalism. Peters also points out that the sociological literature “is very rich but is also somewhat perplexing” (p.127) and points out the failure to make clear distinctions between ‘institutions’ and the ‘institutionalization process’ as well as a failure to clarify the distinction between organizations and institutions.

Of particular interest is Peters’ rather brief discussion of institutionalization and isomorphism and the suggestion that the latter is a development of Max Weber’s idea of the Iron

Cage. At the same time, his view of DiMaggio & Powell’s (1983) efforts to develop the concept of isomorphism is considered an extension of the convergence principle, an idea that dominated the field of organization and institutions. The concept of convergence also shaped Wilensky’s analysis of rich democracies and the tendency of their social welfare programs to converge towards a similar set of programs, e.g., social security or a national health care system. In both isomorphism and convergence, Peters suggests, there is a tendency for institutions and organizations to move towards a similar form even though circumstances and context may well vary significantly

Peters’ seventh school is identified as focused on ‘institution of interest representations;’ an approach that examines the relationships between networks, communities of interests, social movements and institutions, e.g., the political parties, systems of parties and ideologically rooted parties as a way of understanding how these entities relate and position those relationships in the political process to gain effective representation.

The focus of the eighth and final school of institutionalism is on the international arena and relationships. Peters expresses a measure of surprise at this development since setting rules at an international level is extremely difficult at best. However, in the context of globalization, participants in the formation of these international agreements, organizations and institutions, ranging from the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the World Trade

Organization (WTO) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) negotiated and agreed upon the terms. Now in most instances these organizations function with a high degree of independence from the governments that created them. Moreover, these institutions are capable of exercising considerable power, influence and advantage over the participating states.

The following represents a brief summary of the three Hall & Taylor (1966) schools and their major distinguishing features beginning with the historical school defined by four distinct characteristics: a broad conceptualization of the structure versus agency relationship, asymmetric power relationships, emphasis on path-dependency and unintended consequences, and finally, a broad integration of institutional analysis with other factors and ideas.

The rational choice school similarly characterized by four distinct features: the assumption of rational self-interest, the attainment of personal preferences, individual behaviour characterized by a calculated manner including expectations of the likely actions of others and finally, the view that an institution arises from the expected functions it will serve and the value those functions have for others.

The third and final school bears the name, sociological institutionalism and is distinguished by three features: a definition of institutions that includes such cultural qualities as systems of symbols, frames of meaning and moral templates, a distinct cultural view of a broad

structure versus agency perspective, and a view that practices are most frequently driven by desire to enhance institutional legitimacy.

Although the article is entitled, Political Science and the Three New Institutionalisms, a fourth, relatively new school is emerging in economics and identified in a footnote. Identified as

‘sociological institutionalism, it depends heavily on the influence of the rational choice school and treated within the framework of that model (Hall & Taylor, 1996, p. 936). Its distinguishing

feature lies in the emphasis on ‘strategic interaction’ rather than on such specific issues as

property rights, rents and competition.

In terms of the definitional issues, Geoffrey M. Hodgson (2006) faced that question

directly in “What are Institutions?” a paper in which he considered the contributions from a

variety of authors in different fields and disciplines including such notables as Polanyi, Hayek,

Wittgenstein, Archer, Bhaskar, Weber and Marx among them. Even though he acknowledges

his indebtedness to M. Archer in particular, Hodgson is critical of what he regards as an

incomplete explanation to the question of how individuals are influenced or changed by the

structures.

To address this issue Hodgson develops the idea of “downward causation” which he

takes to mean that institutions have the capacity and power to constrain and enable individuals to

develop habits that are subtle but essentially brought into conformity with its own expectations

(Hodgson, 2007). His definition of an institution is relatively brief and after noting that much of

human life, activity and social interaction is structured by rules, he offers the following

definition, “. . . we may define institutions as systems of established and prevalent social rules

that structure social interaction” (p. 2). It is noteworthy that in commenting on “rules” Hodgson

suggests that regulation via rules “is not always the antithesis of freedom; it can be its ally” (p.

2). In effect, he suggests that the rules of an institution broadly defined may equally act as an enabler of change as a constraint on change.

Looking back briefly, one of the other important contributors to Hodgson’s view of institutions is that of Douglass C. North, a 1993 Nobel Prize winner in Economic Science. Their interaction illustrates the developing nature of the discussions within new institutionalism particularly with respect to the role and nature of rules. The latter in particular are important for understanding the complexity of the many debates about agency versus structure. For instance, what are the consequences for agency if rules are seen entirely as constraints? Similarly, what are the consequences if rules can be both an enabler and a constraint?

North (1991), defined institutions as, “. . . the humanly devised constraints that structure political, economic and social interactions. They consist of both formal and informal constraints

(sanctions, taboos, customs, traditions, and codes of conduct) and formal rules (constitutions, laws and property rights). Throughout history, institutions have been devised by human beings to create order and reduce uncertainty in exchange” (North, 1991, p. 97). The focus on this definition is clearly on the constraint imposed by institutions as a means towards order.

In his 1993 Nobel Lecture North dealt with “institutions and time” the purpose of which he suggested was to provide “the initial scaffolding of an analytic framework capable of increasing our understanding of the historical evolution of economies and a necessarily crude guide to policy in the ongoing task of improving the economic performance of economies”

(North 1993, p. 2). In his quest to establish such a framework, North moved well beyond the earlier definition and increasingly explored the relevance of political science, sociology and the cognitive sciences to develop an understanding of economic systems. Although with limitations,

North’s interdisciplinary approach brings him increasingly towards the sociological school

outlined earlier and a position that moves his view towards that of Hodgson as noted in the following passage from his 1993 Nobel lecture.

Institutions form the incentive structure of a society and the political and economic institutions, in consequence, are the underlying determinants of economic performance. Time as it relates to economic and societal change is the dimension in which the learning process of human beings shapes the way institutions evolve. That is, the belief that individuals, groups and societies hold which determine choices are a consequence of learning through time – not just the span of an individual’s life or of a generation of a society but the learning embodied in individuals, groups and societies that is cumulative through time and passed on intergenerationally by the culture of a society (North, 1993, p. 93).

Considerable agreement exists between Hodgson and North at the level of acknowledging the importance of institutions. However, at this stage the agreement remains incomplete in the way they each regards the role and importance of rules, how they influence and are influenced and still more so when distinctions are made between formal rules and informal constraints, conventions, habits and laws.

At the conclusion of Hodgson’s 2006 paper is an Appendix that contains several extracts of correspondence with North dating back to 2002. The exchange clearly reveals that North is more interested in the macro aspect of institutions than their internal organization while

Hodgson’s focus is on the legitimacy of studying the internal characteristics of the organization.

After settling on the significance of the clarification, Hodgson and North agree substantially.

Hodgson summarizes the definitional issues in a series of hierarchal statements that

appear to allow for the incorporation of some of North’s distinctions. The Hodgson summary

follows.

• Social structures include all sets of social relations, including the episodic and those without rules, as well as social institutions.

• Institutions are systems of established and embedded social rules that structure interactions.

• Rules in this context are understood as socially transmitted and customary normative injunctions or immanently normative dispositions that in circumstances X do Y.

• Conventions are particular instances of institutional rules

• Organizations are special institutions that involve (a) criteria to establish their boundaries and to distinguish their members from non-members (b) principles of sovereignty concerning who is in charge, and (c) chains of command delineating responsibilities within the organization.

• Habituation is the psychological mechanism by which individuals acquire dispositions to engage in previously adopted or acquired (rule like) behaviour (Hodgson, 2007, p. 17-18).

The Hodgson hierarchy begins broadly and is all encompassing, gradually narrows and finally arrives at individual behaviour. Beginning at the bottom, each is nested in the one immediately preceding it. What is not altogether clear is whether social structures and those that follow ultimately are an extension of individual behaviour or, whether each is its own ontic entity.

I explored Harold Wilensky’s nearly 900 pages of, Rich Democracies, Political

Economy, Public Policy and Performance, (2002), in which he conducts an exhaustive analysis of the world’s 19 richest countries. The theory Wilensky employs to explain the major finding, namely the growing similarity in how these states deal with a range of public policy issues and programs, is convergence. Like isomorphism, convergence theory attempts to explain why these

rich democracies develop a range of structural similarities. In the case of these countries after an

exhaustive analysis, Wilensky concludes as follows.

Convergence theory has a lot going for it. As our 19 rich democracies got richer and passed the threshold of development they all reached by the mid- 20th-century they developed several structural similarities. Ignoring differences in timing and occasional exceptions in short-cycle variations already discussed

and concentrating on the amount, pace and direction of change, they all converged in nine dimensions of modern society (Wilensky, 2002, p. 70).

The idea of convergence holds a tantalizing possibility for understanding the influence of the changes in the broader international and national social, economic and political context of the post-WW II period and the development of the welfare state. Particularly during this period of Alberta’s history, the Social Credit government also sought to change its traditional approach to public policy as illustrated by the 1966 Preventive Social Services program, the 1965

Manning White Paper and support for establishing an Alberta graduate social work education program in concert with similar developments in Canada.

Isomorphism

According to some of the principal proponents of new institutionalism, DiMaggio &

Powell, the concept of “isomorphism” entered the study of organizations through the work of

Amos Hawley in the late 1960s on human ecology. Apparently, Hawley’s initial framing of the concept suggested isomorphism acted as a constraining process compelling organizations to adopt similar structural patterns, at least to the extent they are also engaged in similar kinds of activities in similar environments. DiMaggio & Powell (1983) were struck not by the diversity of organizational forms but rather by their similarities and go on to argue that this kind of organizational homogenization is best described by isomorphism, a term referring to a one to one relationship in the mathematical sciences.

Although other authors have contributed to the development of the isomorphism concept, the 1983 work of DiMaggio & Powell remains a classic in new institutionalism. Their prominence reflects the extent to which their analysis led them to develop two types of

isomorphism: a competitive type that assumes the operation of a rational market and the institutional model that is mainly concerned with legitimacy, political power and access to the necessary resources to maintain it.

In response to the question, ‘why is there such homogeneity of organizational form and practices? DiMaggio & Powell suggest that instead of looking for an explanation of the difference, they looked for an explanation of the similarities. The unit of analysis for responding to the question is the organizational field. The field is defined as “those organizations that, in the aggregate, constitute a recognized area of institutional life: key suppliers, resource and product consumers, regulatory agencies, and other organizations that produce similar services or products” (p. 64-65). The influence of the state and the professions, are the primary rationalizers in the last half of the twentieth century (p. 64).

In addition, DiMaggio & Powell identify three principal mechanism for enabling isomorphism to take place; coercive isomorphism – formal and informal pressure to conform; mimetic isomorphism – arises primarily from conditions of uncertainty in operational matters; and normative isomorphism – the influence of professionalization, the collective effort of a professional or occupational group towards gaining control of organizational processes. It should be noted that these are what the authors refer to as “analytical categories” and consequently acknowledge that they may well be relatively indistinguishable empirically, and in addition, may well overlap. In addition, they point out that each of the mechanisms has its own antecedents, which when they occur together, are likely to produce their own distinct outcomes

(DiMaggio & Powell, 1983).

DiMaggio & Powell developed a series of organizational level predictors for the likely occurrence of isomorphic change, divided into the following categories – organizational-level predictors and field-level predictors.

1. The greater the dependence of an organization on another organization, the more similar it will become to that organization in structure, climate and behavioral focus.

2. The greater the centralizations of A’s resource supply the greater the extent to which organization A will change isomorphically to resemble the organizations on which it depends for resources.

3. The more uncertain the relationship between means and ends, the greater the extent to which an organization will model itself after organizations it perceives as successful.

4. The more ambitious the goals of an organization, the greater the extent to which the organization will model itself after the organization it perceives as successful.

5. The greater reliance on academic credentials in choosing managerial and staff personnel, the greater the extent to which an organization will become like other organizations in its field.

6. The greater the participation of organizational managers in trade and professional associations, the more likely the organization will be or will become, like other organizations in its field (DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p. 74 – 76).

The field-level predictors are the expected results of the organizational characteristics:

1. The greater the extent to which an organizational field is dependent upon a single (or several similar) source(s) of support for vital resources, the higher the level of isomorphism.

2. The greater the extent to which the organizations in a field transact with agencies of state, the greater the extent of isomorphism as a whole.

3. The fewer the number of visible alternative organizational models in a field, the faster the rate of isomorphism in the field.

4. The greater the extent to which technologies are uncertain or goals are ambiguous within a field, the greater the rate of isomorphic change.

5. The greater the extent of professionalization in a field, the greater amount of isomorphic change.

7. The greater the extent of structuration of a field, the greater the degree of isomorphism (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983, p. 76 – 77).

While its effectiveness in accounting for social change is contested (Gorges, 2001), some theorists suggest path dependency adds an additional level of analysis to new institutionalism.

For example, Bonoli and Palier (2000), point to new institutionalism as a helpful way of

understanding the difference in the resistance to change by welfare state institutions in France

and England because of the differences in the paths each has taken with respect to commitments

to specific institutional issues.

D. M. Ryfe, (2006), suggests that from the perspective of newsgathering and reporting

organizations, new institutionalism provides a common framework around which there is

substantial agreement with respect to a framework of five principles for understanding social

action.

1. Institutions mediate macro and micro level action

2. Institutions develop in path-dependent patterns

3. Path-dependency implies timing, sequence of events and processes as crucial

4. Timing and sequence imply periodization

5. Institutional orders will reproduce in the absence of a shock to a system (p. 137-138).

Philosophical Anthropology

If C. Smith is correct that “there is no social science analysis that does not at least implicitly assume some model of the human to help underwrite its explanation” (Smith, 2010, p.

2) then it is difficult to overestimate the importance of philosophical anthropology to social science and social work in particular. J. Jeremy Wisnewski (2008), places philosophical anthropology directly in the context of The Politics of Agency. Charles Taylor ‘s (1985),

Philosophical Papers, Volume 1, Human Agency and Language, introduces his contribution to a discussion about agency with the following comment. “If one had to find a name for where this agenda falls in the geography of philosophical domains, the term ‘philosophical anthropology’ would perhaps be best, although this term seems to make English-speaking philosophers uneasy”

(p. 1).

Smith suggests the agency versus structure question raises the issue of what is a human person. In fact, given the critical realists position on social ontology, in this context the philosophical anthropology question is as critical to understanding the agency versus structure issue as asking, ‘What do we mean by the phrase social structure?’ Alternatively, ‘What is an organization or an institution?’ It is noteworthy that a search of the premier social work databases for the phrase, ‘philosophical anthropology’ produced few returns, confirming

Taylor’s observation. It is not surprising then that Smith prefers the question, what is a person?

To put the question, “What is a person?” as succinctly as possible, how does one get from the following elements, oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, sodium, magnesium, copper, zinc, selenium, molybdenum, fluorine, chlorine, iodine, manganese, cobalt, iron, lithium, strontium, aluminum, silicon, lead, vanadium, arsenic, bromine, to a saint or a villain? While a materialist, such as Marx, might suggest, ‘That’s it!’ (p.

37). Smith’s answer to the question relies on the concept of emergence to account for

complexity. It’s the process he defines as, “a new entity with its own particular characteristic’s

through the interactive combination of other and different entities that are necessary to create a

new entity, but that do not contain the characteristics present in the new entity” (p. 25-26).

Smith has several additional, what might be called, principles. First, at least two entities at a

lower level interact in such a manner as to create an entirely new entity. Second, the new entity

is able to interact with other entities at the same level, to create yet another new entity. Third,

that entity remains fully dependent on its constituting entities for its continuing existence.

Fourth, the characteristic of the entity so formed, does not have the characteristics of any of its

lower level constituent entities. In other words, emergence has created something entirely new

with different characteristics and even greater complexity.

So where does the person come in? By a person, Smith means the following:

. . . a conscious, reflexive, embodied, self-transcending center of subjective experience, durable identity, moral commitment and social communication who – as the efficient cause of his or her own responsible actions and interactions – exercises complex capacities for agency and intersubjectivity in order to develop and sustain his or her own incommunicable self in loving relationships with personal selves and with the non-personal world (p. 61).

The appearance of congruence between Smith’s capacities and the capability

theory advanced by Amartya Sen (2009) and Martha Nussbaum (1999) is unavoidable

and although Smith does not discuss Nussbaum to any significant degree, he notes the

parallel several times. As Sen and Nussbaum suggest, being able to decide to do, or not

to do, are acts of agency by a person capable of doing so. In terms of agency, Smith’s

focus is on the causal powers of higher-level capacities of which he identifies 30. Lower level capacities include conscious awareness, understanding quantity, quality, time and

space, etc. Higher-level capacities include, for instance, interpersonal communion and love, aesthetic judgment, moral awareness, truth seeking, etc. Smith suggests it is these

higher-level capacities that possess causal powers, in effect, the capacity to act.

While this is a necessarily a very brief and incomplete explanation, the idea of

personhood develops in Smith’s critical realism, as “self-transcending” meaning, persons are

able to relate outside of themselves to other persons and to non-personal objects (p. 64-65).

Smith goes on to suggest that persons are ontological centers of experience. As the first of four,

the “center of subjective experience,” encounters the wholeness of the world around them.

Through their senses “they encounter events, states, situations, and interactions that impress

upon them various sensations, thoughts, feelings, and other mental and bodily responses that

awareness” (p. 65). A second center is a “durable identity” meaning that “persons as self-

reflective and as subjects can also understand themselves as objects” (p. 66). Third, is the

center of “moral commitment, . . . an ineliminable feature of human personhood is possession of

a moral orientation that creates moral differentiations in the world through beliefs and judgments

about what is good and bad, right and wrong, just and unjust, worthy and unworthy” (p. 67).

Finally, Smith suggests that persons are “self-governing centers of social

communication” (p. 67). It is especially at this point that Smith relies on the personalism he

attributes to Charles Taylor (1989), developed primarily in the latter’s, Sources of the Self: The

Making of the Modern Identity. In describing the purpose of the book, Taylor suggests it is

examination of the, “selfhood and the good, or in another way, selfhood and morality, turn out to

be inextricably intertwined themes” (p.3). Moreover, Taylor suggests these themes, or moral

intuitions are so deeply part of our human nature that he is “tempted to think of them as rooted in instinct” (p. 4-5)

The brief comment by Taylor reflects his concern with “respect for life, integrity and well-being and even flourishing of others” (p.4). Although said differently, Smith supports a very similar view with the idea of “communion, as a type of shared human existence and reciprocal action that advances human fulfillment” (p. 68).

Agency versus Structure

As noted earlier, new institutionalism raises the important question about the relationship of human agency versus structure. The basic issue can be summarized in a series of related questions with a focus on the ubiquitous question of change. How does structure influence the agent? How does an agent influence structure? What are the means by which change can take place?

Smith answers the question, ‘how do social structures emerge from the confrontation of human capacities and limitations?’ by suggesting that human’s capacities “propel persons into world-engaging activities of bodily actions, subjective experience, moral evaluation and social interaction” (p. 339). At the same time, confronted by the human limitations, continuity becomes a necessity through forms of cooperation and the emergence of social structures.

Human persons, create social structures that acquire their own ontological existence with a tendency to demand compliance and exercise control while also encountering resistance. It is the tension between the emergence of social structures to satisfy the need for continuity and the exercise of resistance to control, that exemplifies the exercise of human agency.

In describing social structures, Smith notes they possess causal powers. People implicated in them engage in operating in certain ways, they are capacitated by resource allocation, motivated in part by normative and moral valuation; they are culturally defined and reinforced through bodily practices, they develop their own history and are reproduced through social interaction (p. 347-353). Following through on the earlier point about resistance, Smith ask the question, ‘How do social structures change?’ In response, he suggests social structures may be transformed by new relationships, by newly accepted cognitive categories, by a reduction in the allocation of resources, by changes in moral and normative beliefs, by changes in traditionally sanctioned practices, by changes in basic patterns of communication and by disruptions of normal patterned behaviour (p. 369-371).

Margaret Archer suggests the problem is embedded in the sociological micro and macro designation for the two related areas (Archer, 1996, p. xi). In a particularly succinct statement,

Archer summarized the problem as “part and parcel of daily experience to feel free and unchained, capable of shaping our own future and yet confronted by towering, seemingly impersonal, constraints” (p. xii). Archer’s trilogy, begun in 2003 and completed in 2012, represents her primary and most elaborate focus on the agency versus structure issue. However, her interest in the problem and related issues, date from 1988 and continue to the present. The following summary offers some illustrative highlights of her thought as outlined in the first book of her trilogy, Structure, Agency and the Internal Conversation (2003).

Structure, Agency and the Internal Conversation

Archer’s analysis begins with the proposition that emergence is a superior concept to the

suggestion of others who have proposed replacing the search for some mechanism or causal link

with the idea of “transcending the divide between objectivity and subjectivity” and replacing it with an “ontologically inseparable” starting point in which “each enters into the other’s constitution.” Ontologically, she suggests, both agency versus structure are “distinct strata of reality.” Hence, they are not reducible to the other and the question to be examined, she suggests, “entails examining the interplay between them” (p. 1 - 2).

A central thesis for critical realists is taken from Roy Bhaskar’s Transformation Model of

Social Agency (TMSA) suggesting, “the causal power of social forms is mediated through social agency” (Archer, 1995, p. 195). Archer suggests a failure to accept structural and social factors as emerging from people, necessarily results in their reification. Hence, she suggests, accepting

Bhaskar’s thesis results in accepting that cultural and structural emergent properties have (a) temporal priority, (b) relative autonomy, and (c) they have causal efficacy for the members of a society (p. 2). As noted earlier, Maccarini suggests that the characterization of emergence by critical realists includes the ‘downward causation,’ the idea that higher levels of reality exert their influence downward on prior levels of reality, in this case, on people.

On the other hand, as Archer points out, agents, people, possess distinct powers not possessed by social forms such as structures or cultural system, in this case, the powers of

“thinking, deliberating, believing, intending, loving and so forth;” (p. 2). It is the capacity to be engaged in acting, similar to Hannah Arendt’s (1958) vita active the basis for The Human

Condition’s fully encompassing active life. These reflexive powers are unique to human beings and subject to the extent to which humans are free to decide their own course of action, enable humans to evaluate and plan strategically about how they might achieve the outcome they desire

(p. 6 -7).

The capacities and the reflexive powers that Archer speaks of refer to, “What is advanced through this book is a concept of the ‘internal conversations’ by which agents reflexively deliberate upon the social circumstances that they confront” (p. 130). Archer goes on to suggest that, although we know very little about these internal conversations (p. 153), they reflect what agents believe and expect from their social circumstances and that outcomes must be understood as the “agent’s project in relation to her social context” (p. 131).

Encountering enabling or constraining conditions in the structural and cultural properties of a given context, limit the predictability of the outcomes. In terms of mediating the agent and structured relationship, Archer summarizes the trajectory of internal conversations as follows,

Concerns-> Projects -> Practices ->. It is important to note that the only way in gaining any knowledge about the internal conversations, is through the ‘practices’ that follow in the form of what agents actually do in particular circumstances.

Of similar importance is Archer’s following observation: “Primary agents do this for themselves, corporate agents pool their intra-personal deliberations and then subject them to inter-personal scrutiny” (p. 133). Archers explains the difference in a footnote. “Primary agents are defined as collectivities sharing the same life chance, which makes everyone an agent. They are distinguished from corporate agents, which have articulated their aims and developed some form of organizations for their pursuit (p. 133).

As critical realists and both primarily engaged in the social sciences, Smith has dismissed his apparent differences with Archer, commenting that he is actually much closer to her views than generally recognized (Smith, 2014). However, beyond suggesting a similar view of social ontology and perhaps an affinity with her views about pre-linguistic or pre-symbolic knowledge, he has not elaborated (Smith, 2014).

NAMING AND NAME CHANGES

The corporate world has long recognized that a name change has an economic dimension and under the right conditions it is a profitable and tradable asset even though it has only an intangible value (Tadelis, 1999). While name changes are likely to have an immediate and generally positive effect on stock values, the effect is small unless accompanied by corporate restructuring (Bosch & Hirsch, 1989). On other occasions, a change of name occurs because of re-organization and an effort to establish a new culture (Bright, 2004). Others have pointed out that a name change can even be profitable for otherwise poor performers. In these instances, it is a signal to investors that the corporation has recognized its performance is inadequate and the change may enhance its performance in the eyes of its investors, i.e., greater profitability

(Horskey and Swyngedouw, 1987).

In still other instances, an organization’s members may perceive a name change as “a drift away from its roots” designed to establish a new identity already underway (Flett, Gorman,

Hughes & Herbert, 1995). New research may warrant a change of name even though the popular familiarity and understanding may resist or prevent a change (Zwaigenbaum, 2012). In still other occasions, a name change following a merger projects a change in focus and the organization’s greater accountability to its members (Ghitelman, 2002).

The editors of a historic national professional journal argued for a name change by reflecting on the development and changes in a profession’s conceptual and the philosophical factors (Faden, 1978; Campbell, 1978). A change of name by an educational program may reflect an incomplete change in ideology and practice, thereby confounding the development of a coherent professional identity, (Kalkman, 2009). In other instances, the change represents a profession’s strategy to broaden its scope as represented by the change in Faculties of Physical

Education to Kinesiology (Gabriella, T., Personal Communication: January 11, 2012). It may also be the result of a reassessment the mission of a School of Social Work, “to become the preeminent institution of higher education devoted to efforts to advance human welfare, promote resiliency among disadvantaged populations, and provided an international model for other schools, centers and programs that share these core values and goals” (Lloyd, 2008, p.170).

In a single paper, M.A Glynn and R. Abzug (2002) report on two distinct empirical studies, the first of which examines 1,587 name changes during the period 1982-1987, while the second study reports the public response to a categorized sample of 10 name changes and a sample of 612 respondents. The results provide support for what the authors call ‘symbolic isomorphism,’ clarifying it broadly as the representation of a close similarity of two or more symbolic entities. More specifically, it is defined as “the resemblance of an organization’s symbolic attributes to those of other organizations within its institutional field, increases organizational legitimacy” (p. 267).

Citing, Asforth & Gibbs, (1990, p. 181) Glynn & Abzug add that, “it is through a choice of name that organizations identify with other actors, values or symbols that are themselves legitimate (p. 267). Their work offers a “focus on demonstrating that symbolic isomorphism affects the attributes that organizations encode in their names and, in turn, affects their legitimacy” (p. 267) with the latter a reference to compliance with the social norms, values and the expectations of the organization’s constituents.

As new institutions and organizations develop, the same authors suggest naming is increasingly subject to the influence of professionalization of the field and eventually leads to what they term as the homogenization in organizations’ names. Furthermore, Glynn and Abzug, referencing the work of M.T. Dacin (1997) suggest that “the institutional perspective affords a

lens with which to view identity patterns at industry or sector levels, which, presumably, embed socio-cultural, historically developing norms” (p. 268).

With the focus now on symbolic isomorphism Ashforth and Gibbs (1990), suggest the degree to which an organization’s features reflect those of others in its field, enhanced legitimacy for itself is the likely result. The level of agreement and consistency with other like- organizational entities involving values, symbols, the manner in which boundaries are designed and constructed to codify its identity, aids in its own acceptance and legitimacy by its constituents. Especially for organizations and institutions dependent on public funding, the constituency’s goodwill is important for its continued viability, if not its existence.

In an effort to illustrate their view of the dynamics of legitimacy, Ashford and Gibbs also make the point that every successful organization endeavours to obtain and extend its own legitimacy, to maintain whatever legitimacy it has and as necessary, ready to defend itself. It is not surprising then that the authors suggest legitimacy is always problematic and the status quo is unlikely to be permanent.

In order to obtain legitimacy, organizations essentially have two roads for acquiring this elusive quality. It involves a choice between a substantive and a symbolic one. The former requires organizations to deal with the reality and as necessary material changes in such things as its goals, structure and its various organizational and operational processes. On the other hand, management of symbolic legitimacy does not require material changes. Rather, it does require a change in the organization’s move towards a position consistent with the values and expectations of its significant constituencies, e.g., a professional association, competitors, the employers of its graduates, other academic institutions, other faculties, accrediting agency, etc.

Decisions made by organizations and institutions about naming reflect a symbolic action designed to increase its legitimacy in the eyes of its significant constituencies. The following three examples illustrate the significance of naming and involve a different situational and historical context: the history of public health physicians, the change of ‘Negro’ to ‘Black’ to

‘African-American,’ and the naming and re-naming of Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder

(ADHD). These examples reflect an attempt to bring about significant transformation in the status quo in the practice of a profession, the continuing emancipation of a particular ethno- cultural-racial group from slavery, and an effort to change the name of a disabling condition. In two instances, the name change achieved a notable measure of change and success while the status quo was maintained in the third example.

The phrase ‘public health,’ finds it origins in ancient Greece where physicians of the day attempted to improve the public ‘Hygeia’ or the ‘hygiene,’ a term still used in the form of

‘mental hygiene.’ At least in the English language, the designation changed to ‘social medicine’ in 1848, notably during the height of the Industrial Revolution and the beginning of widespread concern about the health of the working class. That designation eventually led to the establishment of ‘social medicine’ as the name for a new medical specialty and became part of the academic training of medical doctors (Holland, 1994).

Rene Sand, a Belgian medical doctor, was one of several prominent figures in the early development of social medicine and incidentally held a prominent position in Belgian and

European social work (Anciaux, 1988). The influence of Sand and others of like-mind was the result of their “concern with the relations between health and the social conditions of existence” as the basic definition of social medicine. In Sand’s case, it also led to a long term alliance with social work as the Chair of the first International Conference on Social Welfare in 1928

(Holland, 1994). From 1946 to 1953, Sand was also the President of the International

Association of Schools of Social Work (Healy, 2008), effectively maintaining his connection to a fledgling ‘social’ profession and ‘social’ medicine, foreshadowing the determinants of health.

The recognition of the connection between health and social conditions, i.e., the social determinants of health, Sand described that the internal debates within the larger medical fraternity, moved the discussion to the use of “community medicine.” That phrase also did not last. Further changes took place largely because of a continually changing conceptual focus, external institutional factors and professional pressures. In the middle of the 20th century, the term ‘public health’ gained increasing favour in England, in response to the apparent role

ambiguity of ‘community physicians,’ their relationship to institutionalized medicine, the

medical profession and medical training programs. The introduction of a focus on a broadly

conceived prevention agenda led to the adoption of the term ‘public health (Holland, 1994).

The second example examined the change from “Negro” to “Black” and following the

December 1988 announcement by Jesse Jackson that a change to African-American was

preferred. Each of the names was associated with the continuing emancipation from a long

history of physical, social, economic and cultural slavery and oppression. Making the point that

names are capable of evoking powerful imagery, is illustrated by the ready acceptance of both

changes, but in particular the announcement of a change from a racial identity, i.e., “Black,” to

that of an ethnic identity, i.e., Afro-American.

This symbolic change signalled that Afro-Americans were no different from Irish-

Americans, Jewish-Americans, etc. At the same time, the underlying reference to a historic land-base and cultural origins also served as a poignant reminder of the Afro-American

entrapment and their historic experiences with oppression and their current experiences and place in the US (Martin, 1991).

The third example involves frequent name changes. This time, without a marked change of any other kind, it involved Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) and its consistent underlying assumption of a neurobiochemical etiology. According to the author of this study, B.

N. Seitler (2006), the frequent name changes of this condition has not resulted in any significant improvement in the treatment outcomes over the past 70 years.

Meanwhile, the name changed from ‘minimal brain damage,’ to ‘minimal brain dysfunction,’ to ‘minimal cerebral dysfunction,’ to ‘minor brain dysfunction,’ to ‘minimal cerebral insult,’ followed by ‘hyperkinesis,’ ‘attention deficit disorder’ and most recently, the

ADHD designation. Each time the name assumed a neurobiochemical cause and without a

challenge to the basic etiological assumption, ADHD treatment led to self- imposed limits on researchers and treatment specialists (Seitler, 2006).

The example is instructive to the extent that a symbolic name change alone is apparently

insufficient to bring about real change. Collectively the examples illustrate name changes can

have real consequences, intended or unintended as in the case of ADHD because of the

underlying neurobiochemical assumptions. Similarly, the examples illustrate that changes may

be exogenous or endogenous or even contain elements of both.

In the context of a meta-analysis of three decades of institutional research, Pursey

P.M.A.R. Heugens &Michel W. Landers (2009), summarize the role of three major issues, namely, agency and structure, organizational conformity and isomorphic forces. With respect to the agency and structure issue, they suggest institutional theorists can reasonably accept the

“homogenizing effect of isomorphic pressures” (p. 76), however, doing so has two distinct implications for future research.

First, testing DiMaggio & Powell’s hypotheses is no longer necessary and second, developing new avenues of research should be a priority. Accordingly, Heugens & Landers note, “the number of available quantitative tests of the structure hypothesis is large, if not

overwhelming, the processual dimension of isomorphism – how organizations experience

pressures, interpret them and manage them over time – is rarely explored” (p. 76). The authors

also acknowledge that “qualitative process work especially ethnographic and grounded theory

studies could make a profound contribution to scholars’ present understanding of institutional

processes” (p. 76).

As specialists in the field of organizational analysis, summarizing their view of

institutional theory development over these several decades involves two concluding and salient

observations.

Most of the contributors to this perspective share two broad views. First, they are generally skeptical of atomistic accounts of social processes such as those provided by neoclassical economist or rational choice political scientists. In their view, these accounts provide an “undersocialized” conception of organizational behaviour that ignores the influence of social forces on organizational action and decision-making (Granovetter, 1985). Second, institutional theorists tend to view the source of organizational action as exogenous to organizations themselves (Wooten & Hoffman, 2008). The environment is not merely seen as a source of contingencies and disturbances to which organizations must rationally adapt, but rather as a socially constructed context of action that crafts and grooms the very process of organizational decision making itself (Scott, 2001) (Heugens P.M.A.R. & Lander, 2009, p. 61).

CHAPTER 3: METHODS AND METHODOLOGY

Clio, Zeus’s daughter and the ancient Greek muse of history, has produced a prodigious

array of spoken, written and published work along with an innumerable quantity of relics much

of which is perplexing and contentious. With, the significance of these works and relics lacking

a consensus, determining their individual and collective importance remains an unending challenge. On the other hand, it is entirely possible that the efforts to record and retain the multifaceted and multilayered narrative characterizing the human conditions, explains both its longevity and contentiousness.

Historian Hayden White, writing in an early issue of Clio, about, The Politics of

Contemporary Philosophy of History, (1973), notes “it might be said that one of the most striking features of Western thought during the last generation is its apparent rediscovery that history might be a problem and not merely a set of puzzles” (White, 1973, p. 35). If White’s intention was to refocus the attention of historians on the ‘problem of history,’ he clearly succeeded. To a neophyte in the issues historians consider foundational to their craft, the challenges are as daunting as fascinating.

In stating its editorial policy the journal, Clio defined its concern more precisely by reflecting on “the relationship between history and literature without defining what one means with those slippery terms” (White, 1973, p. 3). In part, the ‘slippery’ nature of these and numerous other terms refers to the use of imagination by both historians and novelists in developing their respective narratives. In the same Journal, Clio, David A. White explored the use of imagination and suggests, “. . . the historian “enters into” an image for purposes of establishing descriptive continuity, he is open to the coining of new words, phrases, etc., to

“bring out” the particular image” (White 1973, p. 25).

So what is the difference between a novelist and a historian entering into a new image?

There is still a difference between novelist and historian at this level but it is one of emphasis - the historian will imaginatively treat an image only to the extent that it fleshes out an already-conceived explanatory framework, while the novelist is more free to develop the image purely for the effect that it would have independent of his own fictional “argument” (p. 25-26).

White’s discussion on imagination was also an issue for Paul Ricoeur (2004) three

decades later in his book, Memory, History, Forgetting. Ricoeur elaborated on the historical

context of the problem beginning with the Greek philosophers. However, according to

Genevieve Lloyd, Ricoeur looked to the 17th century’s arch rationalist philosopher Spinoza to set

the stage for his own development of a theory about imagination (Lloyd, 1997). Lloyd suggests

that in spite of his reputation as an extreme rationalist, Spinoza also directed efforts at finding

“new unities of reason, imagination and emotion” (p.11).

A similar strategy occurs early in Ricoeur’s effort to articulate the relationship between

memory and imagination. While suggesting a clear distinction between them he also acknowledges an intrinsic relationship between memory and imagination especially when contiguity ties them together each in turn evokes the other (p. 5). Ricoeur noted that

imagination, “considered in itself, is located at the lowest rung of the ladder of modes of

knowledge” (p. 5). However, like memory, imagination also produces an image as the recall of

things absent in the present. In the case of memory, the image comes with the “anteriority of

affection” of something that has been and is now in the past. It is an essential discussion for the

distinction between the history and the novel. Perhaps, even in the context of oral history, or as

the phenomenologist Ricoeur asks, “Do we not speak of what we remember, even of memory as

an image we have of the past?” (p. 44).

In the end, Ricoeur acknowledged that his journey to discover the distinctions and the

connections between memory and imagination is one of perplexity, a labyrinth that arrives at the

idea of a “pure memory that has not yet been put into images” (p. 51).

Recognizing that “imagination lays traps for memory it can be affirmed that a specific search for truth is implied in the intending of the past “thing,” of what was formerly seen, heard, experienced, learned. This search for truth determines memory as a cognitive issue. More precisely, in the moment of recognition, in which the effort of recollection is completed, this search for truth declares itself. We then feel and indeed know that something has happened something has taken place, which implicated us as agents, as patients, as witnesses. Let us call this search for truth, faithfulness” (p. 55).

Summarizing these of Ricoeur’s thoughts, it can be said that memory, however obtained, in whatever form it takes, represents a search for ‘truth.’ Faithfulness to memory enables the search for truth to pass on the results of memory. Further, for truth to emerge faithfulness

demands trust, without full reciprocity both trust and faithfulness are doomed to a short life span.

So important is “trust” to the work of historians that the American Historical Association

standards state, “Our collective enterprise depends on mutual trust” (Mortimer, 2008, p. 471).

Editor, Terry Crowley (1988), on introducing Clio’s Craft, A Primer of Historical

Method, with a focus on Canadian historiography implies as much, reflecting an awareness of

the past even as he acknowledges the inevitability of each generations finding new meaning.

Aware of what has been written before, but seeing the past afresh, each generation finds new meaning in the evidence that was suggestive in different ways to previous historians. The past is immutable; history is constantly changing. Therein lays the allure of Clio, the muse of history in classical mythology (p. 7).

The generational change Crowley envisages is clearly not some abstract arbitrariness or a

creative exercise that takes place on “a blank canvas or screen onto which the historian can paint

or project any history to suit” (Jenkins, 2009, p. 4). It is the recognition that each generation

mediated by its own time and experiences, creates ways to understand its own immutable past.

A perennial issue for historians engaged in historiography involves the question, what is it that is written and re-written about Crowley’s immutable past? In so far as the question applies to broad scope of Canadian historiography, editors Christopher Dummitt and Michael

Dawson, introducing, Contesting Clio’s Craft: New Directions and Debate in Canadian History

(2009), suggest several new and promising avenues of research are emerging that may also relate

to social work and social welfare historiography. The appearance of these new avenues of

research in the early part of this century respond to a decade of numbing debates about

Canadians’ ignorance of their own history based on the Dominion Institute Canada Day Quiz

and J.L. Granatstein’s (1989), Who Killed Canadian History?

In an effort to chart this new direction in Canadian historiography, Dummitt and Dawson

invited several prominent historians to discuss important questions both old and new. The

selected authors proposed questions about historiography as well as specific questions of history.

Among the questions are: Quebec’s past, apparently avoided by most English speaking

historians, the increased prominence of oral history and the relationship to public history, the

international view of Canada’s ‘success story,’ comparative histories and international

relationships and finally, the isolationism that often marks Canadian historiography.

Canadian social work historians might well extract some relevant questions from the

broader Dummitt and Dawson effort. Aside from the numerical differences, what are the implications of US social work’s domination of Canadian social work and its historiography?

What is the influence of French Quebec social work on Canadian English social work? How has public policy shaped and re-shaped social work’s identity? How has individualistic American public policy influenced a Canadian social work identity? Does the American influence reflect an uncritical and implicit acquiescence to American Exceptionalism? How has post-graduate

education at US institutions influenced Canadian social work academics and their students?

While these questions are generally beyond the scope here and not a focus of this dissertation, some make an unobstructed appearance early in the development of social work in Alberta.

History as Science

The discussions about history and historiography also takes place in the context of a broader issue, namely whether history is a science or an art or another form of intellectual activity. Brian Faye (2011), in the Editorial for the fifty-year celebratory issue of History and

Theory, looks back briefly before looking ahead to the next fifty years. In his comments on the question, Faye notes it is a recurring issue and, while the debate has been somewhat subdued recently, he suggests it is likely to take on new life once more during the next fifty years.

In fact, the early signs have already appeared. In the concluding essay of the same celebratory edition of History and Theory, Aviezer Tucker, (2011), a realist, perhaps even baiting his colleagues raises the issue in a discussion about the scope of historiography and the commonalities among what he names the historical sciences phylogeny, evolutionary biology, comparative historical linguistics and cosmology. All of these he suggests rely on a general inference model for understanding the fragments and traces from the past. “These are the historical sciences, sciences that attempt to infer on a rigorous basis descriptions of past events, processes, and their causal relations from their information-preserving effects” (Tucker, 2011, p.

76). His more specific proposals about ‘inferences’ are outlined in, Our Knowledge of the Past

(2004) and represents a well-developed realist’s view of the issue.

Hans-Jȍrg Rheinberger, a Director at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science also contributes to the discussion albeit from a different perspective. Rheinberger writes

primarily as a specialist in the history and philosophy of science. Moreover, in contrast to the customary meaning of epistemology as a theory of knowledge, Rheinberger historicizes the term and uses it to “reflect [in] on the historical conditions under which, and the means with which, things are made into objects of knowledge” (Rheinberger, 2010, p. 2-3). As a result, his focus is on the process of generating new scientific knowledge. Henceforth, he suggests, understanding the history, is a precondition to understanding the epistemological matters.

To his point, Rheinberger’s (2010) essay entitled, On Historicizing Epistemology: An

Essay, outlines the development of a crisis within the Vienna Circle, precipitated years earlier by

Du Bois-Reymond, an electro-physiologist. Du Bois-Reymond challenged the ‘mechanical explanation’ of a Comtean unified science that would eventually reduce all “phenomena down to the movements of their smallest parts and to the forces acting between them” (p. 5). Du Bois-

Reymond saw the ‘mechanical explanation’ as one with “no ultimate foundation for the basic concepts with which the mechanical paradigm of scientific knowledge operated.” In his mind it was “a surrogate account, one he liked to call an “extremely useful fiction” (p. 6).

In making these comment, Du Bois-Reymond challenged the orthodoxy of the mechanical view of everything. He did so based on two fronts, first on its inability to explain some of the basic and essential concepts such as force, matter and movement. Second, the mechanical view was “powerless before the phenomena of perception and consciousness.” In the end, he argued positivism could not defend the “reduction of consciousness to matter” (p. 7) would one day be possible, setting the stage for Du Bois-Reymond’s ignoramus et ignorabimus,

(that which we do not know and will not know) (p. 6-7) an idea he apparently proclaimed with success at every opportunity.

Albeit half a century later, members of the Vienna Circle did not receive Du Bois-

Reymond’s critique well and in spite of it, they kept their commitment to the Comte’s ideal of a

unified science “without internal borders” (p.7). Rheinberger writes the following about the

Circle’s response to Du Bois-Reymond’s critique, namely, “He met with violent, ontologically motivated resistance from the mechanically minded monist side” (p. 7).

The physicist, Ernst Mach, proposed what must have seemed a clever solution to the Du

Bois-Reymond problem as it steadily gained prominence. In what Rheinberger refers to as, “a distant echo of Auguste Comte, Ernst Mach also distinguished three epochs,” (p. 7), but with a clever difference. Rheinberger characterizes Mach’s first epoch as animistic mythology. The second epoch transitioned from the initial mechanical cosmology underwritten by theology, to one that freed itself from those strictures and developed into a mechanical mythology that in the end, “was overcome by a more considerate age” (p. 8). The final stage emerged, according to

Rheinberger when even an enlightened look for how “the result of long and painstaking research” might develop into some speculation about the future. However, in Mach’s proposal, speculation, or even the act of anticipating the future, would invariably, “be mythology, not science” (p. 8). Henceforth, the Du Bois-Reymond ignorabimus was nothing more than mythology.

Du Bois-Reymond’s intended or unintended bifurcation of the unified science ideal and

Mach’s response meant that,

by positing the non-reducibility of consciousness to matter, had taken a step away from the narrow path of mechanical thinking; on this basis a dichotomy of knowledge in the form of a firm distinction between the natural and human sciences could increasingly take shape (p. 7)

As a staunch positivist, and member of the Vienna Circle, Mach initially rejected a return to Cartesian dualism by positing the unity of science and holding to the potential for a mechanical explanation of everything. However, Rheinberger suggests, the three epochs recreated the conditions for the development of a rejuvenated Cartesian dualism.

Philosopher Peter Schouls (1989), injects the view that Cartesian dualism had hardly been silent. Instead he offers that Descartes prepared the Enlightenment and “afford[ed] the proper soil for Kant” who is described by Schouls as a revolutionary who delivered freedom from the “confinement imposed by our physical and cultural contexts” (p. 13); forwarding the

Enlightenment’s central concepts – freedom, mastery and progress with the idea of freedom as the dominant core.

. . . mastery presupposes freedom from prejudice and oppression and consists in having the liberty to shape one’s own destiny. Progress, in turn, is measured in terms of the extent to which mastery has been achieved (Schouls, 1989, p. 3).

With the dominance of ‘freedom’ as an antithesis to a mechanically fixed pathway in which mastery shapes the idea of progress, Rheinberger offers an analysis and historical explanation of the break in positivism’s hold on to the idea of science. In combination with

Schouls’ point about the revolutionary nature of the idea of freedom as the core of the

Enlightenment, it creates a philosophical framework in which the debate about history as science takes place.

John H. Zammito (2011), in reviewing Rheinberger’s point of the split precipitated by the Du Bois-Reymond comments that the bifurcation of the natural and the human sciences

“always meant the subordination, if not trivialization” (p. 390), of the human sciences, including history. In an effort to re-establish the connection, and legitimacy, Zammito relies extensively on Rheinberger’s efforts to bring philosophy, history and science “so inextricably interwoven

that none can make sense outside their nexus” (p. 407). The eventual goal Zammito shares with

Rheinberger, is a full reconciliation between the human and natural sciences by rejecting the reductionism that is characteristic of both postmodernism and the positivists delusions of what science must be (p. 412). The stage was set for debate Brian Faye predicted would likely arise in the next fifty years. This time historians and philosophers of the natural sciences initiated the discussion with the realization the ‘natural sciences’ are engaged in an accelerated process that is part of the larger human drama unfolding in the social and cultural affairs of the 20th century

(Rheinberger, 2010).

The history as science question is by no means the only possible re-entry into the broader discussion about history and historiography. Michael Bentley, for instance, suggests that the focus since the 1970’s has been largely on epistemological issues. “The past-in-itself became an absence, nothingness, a page on which to write, a place for dreams and images. A constructed factuality announced itself as the past’s sole presence, representation it’s only strangulated voice, colligation its distant tyrant” (Bentley, 2008, p. 349). He suggests that the focus of historians on ideas of the past as “presence” has preoccupied historians to the exclusion of reality. For a variety of reasons, Bentley believes historians and historiography are on the cusp of a significant change and will begin “reconceptualising the ontic because of [the direction of the last few decades]” (p. 350).

Whether it helps determine an answer to Brain Faye’s question remains an open issue.

However, it’s an area where critical realism, as the under labouring philosophy of science and particularly its argument for a social ontology that is no less rigorous than that of the physical science and remains to be examined in more detail.

Historical Methods

Editors, S. Gunn and L. Faire (2012) writing in the Introduction to Research Methods for

History, comment that, “In planning and writing the book we have been very conscious of the fact that research methods have all but disappeared as a component of historiography and the subject of debate among historians” (p. 1). In an equally direct fashion, M.C Robyns (2001),

notes in, The Archivist as Educator: Integrating Critical Thinking Skills into Historical Research

Methods Instruction that, “the level and quality of historical research methods training for

students in higher education, particularly graduate students in history, has long been a matter of

concern for archivists and historians” (p. 364). Hui Wu (2002) in a discussion about writing

women into rhetorical history, references Sandra Harding’s (1987) definitions of method and

methodology to clarify the consequences of traditional epistemological and historical accounts

limiting the theoretical basis for rhetorical women’s research and excluding a feminist

viewpoint.

Sandra Harding makes an important distinction between methodology and method. “A

method is a technique for (or a way of proceeding) in gathering evidence. A methodology is a theory and analysis of how research does or should proceed; it includes accounts of how ‘the general structure of theory finds its application in particular scientific disciplines” (Harding,

1987, p. 2 – 3). Any research method relies on at least one of the three techniques for gathering evidence in support of a research project: “listening to (or interrogating) informants, observing behaviour, or examining historical traces and records” (p. 2). A similar view is expressed by

Giddings (2006), commenting about mixed methods research.

John Lewis Gaddis, a noteworthy historian, reports asking Wm. H. McNeill, the

Canadian-born, American, “global historian,” or as he preferred to be identified, as a historian

with an interest in “world history” (2005, p vii), to explain his method of writing history to a group of social, physical and biological scientists during a 1994 Conference at Ohio University.

McNeill, apparently reluctant at first, eventually relinquishes and responds as follows.

I get curious about a problem and start reading up on it. What I read causes me to redefine the problem. Redefining the problem causes me to shift the direction of what I am reading. That in turn further reshapes the problem, which further redirects the reading. I go back and forth like this until it feels right, then I write it up and ship it to a publisher (Gaddis, 2002, p. 48)

McNeill’s explanation was not well received by the assembled scientists. Derision and disappointment characterized the comments: it was not a method, it did not have dependent and independent variables, it wasn’t ‘parsimonious,’ and it confused induction and deduction. The

audience did not consider McNeill’s reluctant explanation worthy of the designation.

Nevertheless, Gaddis continues. “But then there came a deep voice from the back of the room.

Yes, it is,” it growled. “That’s exactly how we do physics!” (p. 48).

As a supporter of McNeill’s explanation of historical methods, the physicist with the

deep growly voice remains unidentified. Nevertheless, Gaddis references the work of the

physicist John M. Ziman in support of McNeill’s comment.

The validation of a theoretical model by appeal to experiment is not a mechanical process whose outcome can be determined by simple logic. It hinges on the expert judgment of physicists, who must decide for themselves whether there is an adequate fit between theory and experiment, given the uncertainties of the data and the unavoidable idealizations of the mathematical analysis. The skill to make such judgments comes from experience (Ziman, 1978, p. 36).

Sandra B. Lewenson (2008) illustrates McNeill’s comments in a chapter entitled, Doing

Historical Research, in Capturing Nursing History: A Guide to Historical Methods in Research,

by proposing a pragmatic six-step process: (1) identify the area of interest, (2) raise the

questions, (3) formulate a title, (4) review the literature, (5) interpret the data and (6) write the narrative (p. 26).

In the same book, Joy Buck’s contribution entitled, Using Frameworks in Historical

Research, i.e., Harding’s ‘methodology’, suggests a framework is essential for guiding historical research. The framework, Buck suggests, determines “which questions will be asked, which data will be used for analysis, the processes by which such analysis will be conducted and how these analyses will be contextualized in space and time” (p. 45). A social framework, she suggests places the focus on grass roots and a bottoms up approach rather than the “great white men” of the 19th century or the “great white women” of early nursing history.

The cultural framework of the early 20th century placed the focus on cultural history, anthropology and the non-elite with the meaning behind the events and practices taking precedence over behaviour. Buck’s third framework looks at the issues through a policy framework lens. The idea developed during the 1970s by a group of American historians proposed that, “the study of social movements and the study of politics should not be mutually exclusive” (p. 47). Despite an initial enthusiasm for this approach, the use of the policy approach subsided and according to Buck, no reversal took place until 2005, citing Julian

Zelizer’s enthusiastic opening proclamation in the Journal of Policy History, that, “The state of

policy history is good!” (p. 47).

Zelizer (2012), Governing America: the revival of political history makes an important

point in the discussion about the changing character of political history. Against the immediate

background of cultural historians and a focus on the study of the construction of ideas (p. 2),

Zelizer references a 1986 speech by the president of the Organization of American Historians,

who predicted that a change was about to take place that recognized the power of institutions in

resisting change. Zelizer suggests that Harvard sociologist, Theda Skocpol, was among the earliest authors leading and designing the change.

[by designing] an approach to studying politics that was fundamentally historical. Focusing on the development of institution, they were interested in the structural constraints faced by policymakers. Some of the analytical strategies for the new political history emanated from the social sciences. These scholars were writing about how the foundational structure of American institutions shaped the evolution of national politics. They were particularly interested in the limits of change given the power of institutional structures to constrain policies (Zelizer, 2012, p. 3)

The Archives

Pragmatically, for a novice at historical research, the essays in the publication edited by

S. Gunn and L. Faire (2012), Research Methods for History, were the most succinct publication on historical methods. In five parts, the several authors discuss archives, researching the history of individuals and groups, quantitative and qualitative analysis of historical data, deciphering meanings and rethinking categories. Julie Marie Stranger’s discussion about language as systems of meaning that structure and order reality featured the ongoing debate about language, structure, agency and freedom. Her key point is that language itself has become the subject of study as traces of the past both in its written and oral forms particularly in reference to elites as it

they whose records are most often found in archives.

Evidence of this appeared several times in the unprocessed records dealing with the

School of Social Welfare in the Alberta Provincial Archives. In several instances, drafts of

documents were revised, even multiple times apparently at different levels of the organization.

In his U of A doctoral dissertation, Erick Schmidt (1975), Morphology of Bureaucratic

Knowledge, a consultant and the first Secretary of the Executive Council during the E.C.

Manning administration, examined in detail the transfer and shaping of information in the

context of a crisis at the operational and the political level. Schmidt illustrates his argument with the resignation of a psychiatrist who reported on the state of mental health services at the

Edmonton Guidance Clinic to a Ministerial Committee that contradicted the Public Health

Department’s reports to the same Minister. Schmidt points out that the Department bureaucratic structure consistently minimized or even denied service performance issues, management problems and staffing issues in its reports to government even though the issues were well known at lower levels of the organization.

In her discussion about working with and in archives, M.T. King (2012), notes that modern archives have their origin in the French Revolution and “in their idealized role as egalitarian institutions, both free and open to the public . . . Access was . . . guaranteed as an essential right of all . . . citizens”( p. 15). As became evident in this experience, as King notes referring to both Foucault and Derrida’s analysis, archives are also “a locus of authority” (p. 17); a point well established and worth remembering in Alberta.

On a broader scale, the problem of ‘methods’ appears to be more than just an observation limited to general historical research. Barbara L’Eplattenier, a specialist in the history of rhetoric, records the following observation in response to a request to deliver a guest lecture on archival research methods.

We were the “archivist historians.” Asked to supply supplemental class readings, we poked around in our files, reread some articles, and with few exceptions, what we were looking for – practical articles to orient and guide people new to archival work, articles that described the methods of historical research – didn’t exist. Aside from short descriptions of how the researcher found or stumbled upon a topic, the doing of history was seldom discussed (L’Eplattenier, 2009, p. 67).

Her subsequent questions were a reprieve; they confirmed I had not missed what was thought must surely exist, somewhere. For instance, her question, “Why do we not have articles

about finding aids? (p. 67) occurred frequently in this study along with the question, should the

government departments forward records to archives with a classification system and finding

aids to facilitate access.

The question was asked of several archivists, Where are the finding aids? How are they

organized and structured? What standards are used to select items for retention? In some

instances, the system of classifying documents on the Alberta Provincial Archives website was

inconsistent with the system used to store records. In another instance, the archivist at a

different Alberta archive was unable to find documents known to be in the a collection until he

recalled that the classification system changed several decades earlier, but without consistently

applying the new system and relocating the records, the documents I had asked for were

apparently eventually found more by happenstance than design.

L’Eplattenier similarly asked why typical historical research documents do not include

information about the organization and use of sources, searches of databases, verification of

documents and information as well as methods of organizing archival information. Part of the

answer may be in the McNeill response to the question about his method. Alexis E. Ramsay

offers a concluding observation related to accessing and searching archives under the heading of

Viewing the Archives: the Hidden and the Digital (2010), pointing out that documents are

frequently deposited in an archive without regard to their historical value. In some instances,

these “unprocessed” records may receive a cursory initial review and designated as, “partially

processed records.” The full processing of records may not take place for years and

comprehensive finding aids are likely only available after the records are fully processed. With

the notable exceptionally well-organized records of CASW in the National Archives, the search

for records at the Alberta Provincial Archives for this study was often a matter of ‘good luck’ mixed with persistence.

Oral History

In the debate about the value of oral history between the archivists and the oral historians, oral history often falls short because of an assumed bias on the part of those

interviewed (Portelli, 1981). However, oral historians effectively rebuffed the argument by

pointing out that archivists also make decisions about what to preserve and what to discard. In

fact, decisions about discarding and retaining documents, creates an historical account in itself

about what is deemed of historical value and importance, and what is not so important. The

challenges are exacerbated in an era when ‘documents’ are often digital records both easily

preserved and easily discarded.

Paul Thompson, (2000, Third Edition), the widely recognized oral history specialist,

readily acknowledges that if he were to do it over, he would have provided a definition of oral

history in the earlier editions of his classic, The Voice of the Past: Oral History. Even the

attempt to do so in the Third Edition, relies on the definition from the 1990’s New Shorter

Oxford as “tape-recorded historical information drawn from the speaker’s personal knowledge;

the use or interpretation of this as an academic subject” (p. xi). As became evident in this study,

the interaction between an interviewer and interviewee, compounded by both informal and

informal documents added to the complexity of the interpretation. Furthermore, knowing the

interviewee, as in this case, renders itself subject to influence.

As a dedicated socialist, Thompson “was committed to a history which drew upon the

words and experience of working-class people” (Perks & Thomson, Eds., 2006, p. 2) and as such

his work represented the first of four paradigms in the post-WW II development of oral history.

Conservative and positivist historians were quick to critique the oral historians fearing faulty memories would lead to a politicized history. The second paradigm saw oral historians take the offense and in turn, took the critique to the critics, suggesting that the flaws in memory were also oral history’s strongest feature because subjectivity gave meaning to the history, a feature previously ignored by historians. The third paradigm involved a shift to recognizing the importance of the relationship between the interviewee and interviewer as narrator. Interest in interdisciplinarity, internationalism and the relationship with feminism represent the highlights of this phase. At present, Thomson suggests oral history is in its fourth paradigm but with the focus still unclear outside of the influence of electronic technology and social media (Perks &

Thomson, 2006, p. 1 - 13).

Ellen D. Swain (2006), in Oral History in the Archives, notes that in the last ten years, discussions between the archivists and oral historians appear to have lost momentum. Initial discussions in the 1960’s between the two groups were characterized by some mutual suspicions, with oral history accepted by archivists as a plan for filling in the blanks for the more traditional records. That phase passed, and in the 1970’s and beyond, archivists began writing about the place of oral history in the archives. Swain suggests that neglect set in because of technological developments such as electronic access to archives and library collections, dominated the librarian and archivist profession. Moreover, the alignment of these professions changed from

an affiliation with historians to one with the technologically oriented professions, e.g.,

information specialists. As a result, oral history and oral historians were no longer on the

cutting-edge of new developments (Swain, 2006, p. 243 – 361).

Lynn Abrams (2010) is somewhat more precise in her definition, “Oral history is a practice, a method of research. It is an act of recording the speech of people with something interesting to say and then analyzing their memories of the past” (Abrams, 2010, p.1). She regards it as much more than “just gathering facts” (p. 18) and considers it as dealing with the range and depth of meaning that results from the interaction of the person and the historian. It is a narrative, a story that aids in interpreting a person, or an event; it is not a formal question and answer interview. It may be structured, semi-structured or even unstructured. Like all sources, these traces of the past whether in the form of documents, relics or oral history, they all represent a particular point of view, that is, they represent the view point of the subject. Each oral interview historicizes the story.

Valerie J. Janesick (2010), writing with the qualitative researcher in mind, suggests, “The power of oral history lies in the power of storytelling. Whether an oral history project embraces and describes the story of one person’s life or a collection of individual stories told together, the power resides in the meaning made of the storytelling and what we learn from the stories”

(Janesick, 2010, p.1). It’s noteworthy that several sentences later, Janesick suggests that

“Because oral history captures the lived experience of a person or persons, the social justice goals become more definite when the stories are of those left on the periphery of society” (p.1).

These authors (Thompson, Janesick and Abrams) have a distinct purpose in mind for their book, namely, sharing the issues faced by historians and summarizing them includes the following: credibility, memory, evidence, subjectivity, power and empowerment. While oral history as practiced today is of post-WW II vintage historians increasingly accept it as a legitimate form of history for use as a research tool and as a way to empower oppressed individuals, groups, ethno-racial communities and nations. The Truth and Reconciliation

Commissions in South Africa and Canada are among the examples of oral history as the strategy for redressing wrongs. The examples raise an important question, namely, whether oral history, is in fact, the voice of the past as Thompson suggests, or whether it is, a technique used to create a better future. Both Janesick and Abrams seem to fit more comfortably with the idea of oral history as a technique.

Finally, it is noteworthy that not one of the three authors, Thompson, Janesick or Abrams enters into a direct discussion about methodology as a theory of analysis with other historians.

Only Abrams attempts to explain the difference of oral history from written history by referencing the work of Alesandro Portelli (1981) on orality, narrative, subjectivity, credibility, objectivity and authorship to which she suggests others have added performativity, mutability and collaboration (p. 19).

Orality requires going beyond the collection of information and examines the speech act itself and its cadence and rhythm among others with the prospect of identifying unique features particularly as it relates to culture. The narrative nature of oral history “translates knowing into telling” the story (p. 21). Subjectivity is not unique to oral history suggests Abram, it is a characteristic of all historical writing. She cites Portelli, “oral sources tell us not just what people did, but what they wanted to do, what they believed they were doing, and what they now think they did” (p. 22).

While the failure to remember events is readily apparent in developing an oral history, the way in which a respondent compensates for those moments, may well reveal something of the collective memory of a family or group. Only the transcribed oral history is immutable, before that oral history is constantly undergoing changes in the form of new and different words, additional or lost memories and the interaction with the oral historian changes the content,

subject and process of the oral history. The ultimate ‘product’ of oral history, is a collaborative project between the historian and the person telling the story. Particularly in an unstructured interview, objectivity and neutrality move to the side as the oral history unfolds as a product of collaboration (p. 19 - 25).

Janesick (2010), adds ‘social justice’ to the many reasons for engaging in work of developing oral history particularly in regard to individuals and groups who lived the experience of systemic exclusion and deprivation of human dignity. In effect, Janesick argues that engaging in oral history has a liberatory effect. Several times after the formal interviews I conducted, remarks affirmed this as an opportunity “to get it off my chest.” On the other hand, in one instance, apparently the personal weight of some painful but untold experiences prompted an abrupt end to an opening discussion about a possible recorded interview and an outright refusal to discuss participation in this study.

Capturing Alberta’s Social Work Education History

With an apology to S. B. Lewenson and E. Krohn Herrmann (2008) for borrowing from the title of their book, Capturing Nursing History: A Guide to Historical Methods in Research, the search for evidence and reconstructing the past is aptly described by efforts to “capture” the significance of the past. Several authors have characterized that kind of activity with the metaphor of a ‘detective’ in search of evidence (Triolo, 2009; Levine, 2005). In this instance, the effort to locate the evidence took the form of a search for primary documents and key persons for interviews. The applicability of the phrase became particularly evident in the search for primary source documents created during the early history of Alberta’s first social work education program.

Primary Source Documents

The loss of several decades of records at the University of Calgary, Faculty of Social

Work related to the early history of the School of Social Welfare exacerbated the difficulties in locating the expected primary source documents (Sieppert, J., July 3, 2012, note in possession of the author). Consequently, comprehensive records reflecting internal discussions among faculty that may have provided greater insight into the debates that surely took place in the development

of a new social work education program no longer exist.

Similarly, the rigid application of Alberta’s Freedom of Information and Protection of

Privacy Act especially at the Alberta Provincial Archives, the volume of unprocessed records

and the impoverished state of finding aids made searching for provincial records uniquely

challenging and largely precluded review of internal discussions among provincial staff in the

Department of Advanced Education and the Department of Public Welfare. Even the scope of

the authorized access to the early University of Calgary records remains unclear since it is also

subject to the Alberta Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FOIP).

Since FOIP legislation came into force in 1995, irrespective of the date a record was

created, the Act’s provisions apply effective the date the documents arrived at the Archives.

Consequently with some exceptions, large quantities of documents some of which are potentially

relevant to this study were not accessible, or in some instances only at an indeterminable cost

and even then with potential limitations on their use.

Fortunately, someone in the Faculty had the foresight to excerpt key sections from

reports, letters and memoranda covering much the period 1967 – 1989. Unfortunately, the

excerpts focus almost entirely on issues related to funding, high-level program development and

the Faculty’s “provincial mandate” to deliver social work education across the province. Hence, exclusive reliance on this document created its own problems and limitations for this study.

Professional colleagues and several retired faculty members provided copies of documents from their personal records that included memoranda, letters, minutes, reports and letters. Some of these documents dealt directly with the subject matter at hand while others were invaluable in creating a context, background and identifying key individuals for interviews.

Citations from these documents are followed with ‘In author’s possession.’

A substantial number of documents were obtained from the various Archives listed in

Appendix A. The Alberta Provincial Archives does not permit documents to be photographed

and as a result, standard photocopies were obtained. With some exceptions, documents from the

other Archives were photographed, most notably those of the U of A, the U of C, the U of L and

National Archives of Canada,. Likewise, documents from the Junior League of Calgary, the

Alberta College of Social Workers and Calgary Catholic Social Services were also

photographed. A small number of duplicate documents were obtained from the Social Welfare

History Archives in Minneapolis, MN. Finally, the Bert Sheppard Stockmen's Foundation

Library and Archives documents were photocopied by the on-site librarian.

Oral History Interviews

Aside from such obviously significant persons as former Deans and faculty members, identifying and locating key individuals for interviews presented the expected challenges with several having scattered around the country with an address no more than an identifiable region, e.g., somewhere in BC. In total, I interviewed 64 individuals, nine of whom I interviewed more than once; all citations are referenced as part of the initial interview. All of the interviewees

were asked and signed a release, approved by the University of Calgary, Conjoint Faculties

Research Ethics Board on July 10, 2010. All interviews were transcribed and citations from the interviews were reviewed against the recording for accuracy and context. Editing was limited to changes for readability and coherence.

In addition to the individual interviews, I also participated and recorded a daylong discussion with a German and two local colleagues about the history of social work in Europe and in North America. Finally, I corresponded with the Dutch political science graduate who wrote a Master’s dissertation on the development and early history of the first full-time school of social work in Amsterdam to clarify the conflict and struggle among the Board Members about the name of the School.

The initial interviews were conducted with a semi-structured questionnaire to set the stage for more specific and detailed questions about particular events, decisions and issues.

However, early on it became clear that a more satisfactory and meaningful process involved introducing areas of interest and allow interviewees to establish the conversation and subsequently guiding it through questioning and by providing information to clarify and stimulate their memories. All of the interviews with social workers began with the question,

“how did you get into social work?” Appendix C: Interviews and Ethics, provides questions addressed in an interview with a former faculty member.

Subsequent areas focused on their experiences with the U of C School of Social Welfare as faculty, student, agency or government employee. Areas of interest included familiarity with the development of social work education in Alberta, the U of C, School of Social Welfare, the issues and the development of the social work profession in Alberta. While the name and efforts at name changes were the central issue, the broader context of public policy development,

relevant personal recollections of the major figures, including the Deans and several other faculty members. Because of this approach, many of the interviews added to the broader social and political context in which the development of social work education and the profession took place.

In several instances, post-interview comments were offered that proposed other persons

for possible interviews. Only one person refused outright to consider an interview, another feared the possibility of legal action. While three of the 64 persons interviewed asked to see how their comments might be cited, only one of the three was quoted and advised accordingly.

As noted, the opening question for most interviews was, “how did you get into social work? A

typical concluding question asked, “Is there anything else that comes to mind that I haven’t

asked about?” The response to these two questions varied widely; some were even amusing and

led to the recognition of personal transformation. Invariable the opening question led to a conversation about their career, professional education followed by their familiarity with the

development and history of the School of Social Welfare and the issues faced by the

Universities, the School, the profession, social agencies and government departments, most

notably the Department of Public Welfare and its successors. In several instances, I was asked to clarify some of the early development and history of the School including a belief by some that Tyler, who they believed did not have a social work credential, was appointed to the

position through less than an open process. Appendix B, presents a list of typical issues and

questions prepared for an interview with a former faculty member.

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Integrating Oral History and Primary Source Documents

The primary source documents I eventually located generally reflect an institutional view of the issues especially those written by and in some cases for the senior officials in organizations, government departments, university administration and senior members of faculties. In several instances, I also located draft documents prepared by professional staff and subsequently vetted, revised and officially authored by senior officials prior to distribution.

These official versions generally used language that introduced concern about the perception of the department and institution’s public image in contrast to the original versions that expressed what appear to be personal observations or opinions. Informal comments such as marginal hand-written notes on circulated documents occasionally included overtly hostile comments.

Similarly, during several interviews personal comments reflected deep professional and personal

disagreements about the focus of social work education. In several interviews with individuals

who held senior level government positions, comments sometimes reverted to what I described

as the institutional sanitized ‘talking points.’

These types of comments demonstrate some of the differences between the two methods

of gathering evidence: the formal communications between institutions and the informal

communications between and among individuals in the same institutions. The former appeared

more concerned about public image, the appearance of institutional integrity and the exercise of

positional power to ensure compliance with bureaucratic institutional expectations.

The examples reveal rules, stated and unstated, governing acceptable institutional behaviour and expectations contrasting the lived experience of the persons responsible for furthering the purposes of the organizations they represented. Theoretically, they give credence to Margaret Archer’s discussion on internal conversations and reflexivity (2003, 2007, and

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2012). The incidents are likely examples of what she calls, “contextual incongruity,” reflecting a “fractured reflexivity,” (Archer, 2012, p. 16). This form of internal conversation, she suggests, is incapable of “leading to purposeful courses of action but intensify personal distress and disorientation resulting in expressive action” (p, 13).

In the final analysis, integrating oral and documentary history into a coherent and meaningful narrative represents a matter of best judgment and Ricoeur’s ‘faithfulness.’ The guidelines used here, are not primarily for fact-checking, filling gaps created by lost records or lost memory, or even supporting the authenticity of one over the other or jointly reinforcing a third point even though in the end, they may do so. Rather, given the character of oral history, whether subjective, reflecting the lived experience, or even a difference of understanding or meaning, Marc Bloch suggests with the example of the Commander in the field, the goal is to record what is important as viewed through institutional eyes and through the eyes of those who experienced it.

Gaddis (2002) suggests, “We make the past legible, but in doing so we neither lock it up in a prison from which there’s neither escape nor ransom nor appeal (p. 136). Thus, in writing as a self-described young historian of oppressors of the Cold War, Gaddis comments about the eagerness of those still alive, wanting to know how they would be regarded by history, found his work fell short of what they believed had been accomplished.

While I respected their recollections, I’d had to balance these against those of others, and all this against what the archives had shown. They, in turn, acknowledged the necessity of such a procedure, but still found ways, at once plaintive and condescending, to pose the following question: ‘How can you know what it was really like? After all, I was there, and you, I believe were five at the time” (p. 135-136).

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HISTORICAL METHODOLOGY

William Sweet, the Canadian historian, begins the Introduction of The Philosophy of

History: A Re-Examination, (2004) with the comment that, “Critical discussion in and about

history is lively today, but – at least at first glance – there is little agreement not only about the results of this discussion, but also about what questions may be asked” (p. 1). In a similar vein, the English historian John Tosh (2006) begins his book, The Pursuit of History, with a similarly

disconcerting comment, “Historical awareness is a slippery term. It can be regarded as a

universal psychological attribute, arising from the fact that we are, all of us, in some sense

historians” (p. 1).

In response to Sweet’s ‘critical discussion’ or Tosh’s ‘slippery term,’ I focus on three of

the many who have ventured into the methodological discussion and debate. The French

historian, Marc Bloch, begins his book, The Historian’s Craft, (1953) with a question from a

young child, simply put, or so it seems, “Tell me Daddy. What is the use of history?” (p. 3).

Frank Ankersmit compares his view of the historian’s work to that of a psychoanalyst noting,

“We do not know who we are unless we have an adequate understanding of our past”

(Ankersmit, 2001, p.1). Alun Munslow (2006), begins Deconstructing History, with the intent

“to navigate through the central debate to be found in history today, viz. the extent to which history as a discipline, can accurately recover and represent the content of the past, through the form of a narrative” (p. 1).

The views of these three authors quickly diverge on the question whether any historical narrative is able to capture what actually happened in the past, moreover, even if it does, what it means. To varying degrees, all accept some form of ‘social construction.’ Among the other authors I considered, was Keith Jenkins (2009) and particularly his book, At the Limits of

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History: Essays on Theory and Practice. Any title, suggesting there might be limits to history, warrants consideration, however, after an Introduction of some twenty pages and Alun

Munslow’s Afterword, as a defense of Jenkin’s views (but not agreement) the following captures his position.

. . . the past, now conceived as an absence, a nothingness, a blank canvas or screen onto which historians can paint or project any history to suit, means that all meanings the past ‘might be said to have’ come from the outside. In addition, once intrinsic meanings (and values) have been evacuated from ‘the past’; once everything is opened up to, the influence coming from extrinsic sources then there is no stopping . . . the outside simply goes on and on . . . (p. 4).

On the other side of the discussion, I considered Aviezer Tucker’s (2004), Our

Knowledge of the Past; A Philosophy of Historiography, as a self-proclaimed realist. In addition

to his realist approach, Tucker is a notable philosopher of history, whose methodological

contribution to historical research is the application of the Bayes-Theorem and its apparent

origin in probability theory. The Theorem, Tucker suggests, allows “historiography [to] aspire

for . . . increasing plausibility, never absolute truth” (p. 258). However, in the end, Marc Bloch

and the Annals offered a more seasoned understanding of complex issues, offering the

understanding that what is written is the work of human beings who diligently applied

themselves in attempt to understand the complexity of what happened in the past and its

influence in the present; it met Ricoeur’s test of truth as faithfulness.

The Historian’s Craft

Marc Bloch’s (1953) book, The Historian’s Craft, is his last work and an incomplete

product. Bloch wrote the book while fighting with the French Resistance against the German

Nazis during WW II, up to the point they captured, tortured and executed him in a farmer’s field

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near Lyon on June 16, 1944 (Fink & Bloch, M., 1989). It ended a remarkable career during which Bloch and his colleague Lucien Febvre challenged established journals with the 1929 publication of Annals d’Histoire Economique et Sociale, which, with some name changes, has

published continuously since then (p. 130).

In my own McNeill-like readings, appreciative references to this scholarly work occur

with notable frequency. It represents a remarkable undertaking under unimaginable conditions,

without access to the customary resources necessary for historical work and hence much of it

from memory. As a book apparently planned with seven chapters in mind, its end comes

abruptly, seven pages into the fifth chapter.

Bloch’s continuing currency as a well-recognized historian and guide to historical

methods and methodology are attested to by no less than Paul Ricoeur (2004), who suggests,

“Let us follow the historians into the archives. We shall do so in the company of Marc Bloch,

who was the historian who best delineated the place of testimony in the construction of the

historical fact” (p. 169). John Tosh (2006), In Pursuit of History, suggests Bloch, along with his

colleague, Lucien Febvre, working together in the early part of the 20th century broadened the

scope of history and to the present day, he suggests, the followers of Bloch and Febvre “probably

command greater international prestige in the academic world than any other school” (Tosh,

2006, p. 126).

The subtitle of Bloch’s book provides an indication about the scope of his intent:

Reflections on the Nature and Uses of History and the Techniques and Methods of Those Who

Write It. The chapter outlining what historians actually do in the course of their work and

entitled, Historical Observations, points out historians seldom write about what they observe

directly. At best, their direct personal observations of the past are likely to form only a small

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part of what they write. It is not surprising then that as a Commander in WWI and again WW II

in the French Resistance, that Bloc uses those experiences to illustrate his point.

As an active military commander, Bloch sought to employ his role and position as a

metaphor to illustrate the role of a historian. He asks the reader to imagine a commander who

has just won a major battle and now wants to know what happened in order to record his

success. As a commander he witnessed and was part of the battle and observed some of it

directly but is able to claim only limited direct and personal observation of the events. In writing his report he is likely to have access to, and is necessarily dependent on the observations of others. In many instances, this involves the reports of his trusted lieutenants, or that which

Paul Ricoeur refers to as the ‘testimony’ and ‘traces’ of all that is recorded. The Commander’s final report of the battle, written for his superiors will ultimately include the things he deemed important in attaining the victory. By necessity, it includes what he observed directly and many of the things he considered important in the reports of his subordinates for which there is evidence and has been carefully subjected to cross-examination (Bloch, 1953, p. 60-69).

Bloch also makes the argument of being an ‘indirect’ observer of the past; he also argues that the historian can be a ‘direct’ observer of the past. Again, he makes his point through an illustration that speaks to Harding’s point about ‘historical traces.’ In this instance, Bloch references a discovery made some years earlier by archaeologists involving a number of Syrian pottery urns filled with the bones of children dating back before the current era (BCE).

While historians were not present at the gruesome events that led to the bones placed in the urns, the urns and the bones are directly observable by the historian. Moreover, through a careful examination of the evidence, elimination of specious and unsupportable explanations, and ultimately through careful reasoning, the historian’s understanding of the event is based on

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having been directly confronted by the remains of human sacrifices. Granted, only the traces of events confront the archaeologist and the historian on discovery of urns filled with bones of children. Nevertheless, they are direct observers of events that happened thousands of years ago

(p. 52). Similarly, because the urns and bones are traces of something that actually happened in the past, it permits historians to make reliable statements about the past.

Implicit in Bloch’s outline of historical observation is the importance of evidence followed by assembling that evidence and transmitting its significance. Bloch once again makes his point through examples. In this instance they involve what appears to be relatively simple, namely the availability of archives, bibliographies, manuscripts, etc. In each case, these too are fraught with difficulty in so far as merely knowing of their existence, their incompleteness, specializations and access. As noted earlier, even though archival research is fraught with complex problems, like the bones in the urn, it is possible to make reliable statements based events they describe.

Likewise, even as a historian of economics, Bloch suggests that he is dependent on the observation of others. He clarifies the comment as follows.

Because the individual, narrowly restricted by senses and power of concentration, never perceives more than a tiny patch of the vast tapestry of events, deeds and words which form the destinies of a group and because, moreover he possess an immediate awareness of only his own mental state, all knowledge of mankind, to whatever time it applies, will always derive in large part of its evidence from others (p. 50).

The earlier referenced suggestions by Harding as well as Giddings (2006), appear to

agree with much of what Marc Bloch had to say, in so far at it concerns historical methods,

observation appears to be largely indirect, through the eyes and reports of others. Even where it

includes direct personal observations, the location of the historian limits the experience.

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Grasping the wholeness of such an event typically requires looking into the past either through listening to others or by an examination of the available historical evidence in the form of the traces and residue of the past. In doing so, it appears to confirm what the physicist with the growly voice said as he aligned himself with McNeill’s explanation of his historical and

scientific method to the group of assembled social scientists.

Historical Representations

In keeping with McNeill’s suggestion that reading about a particular issue invariably

leads to new questions and in a renewed search for answers, I turned to Frank R. Ankersmit’s

book on Historical Representations (2001). A recently retired historian at the University of

Groningen, Ankersmit, as noted earlier, sets the stage by a comparing his view of a historian’s

work to that of a psychoanalyst who emphasizes the importance of understanding of the past

(Ankersmit, 2001, p.1). In Ankersmit’s terms, that understanding is located in the juste milieu, a

place between “the linguistic innocence of traditional historical theory and the hyperbole of

some postmodern theorists” (p. 21).

That past, however is known through representations which “will give us access to its

ontological properties; we may re-present something by presenting a substitute of this thing in its

absence (Ankersmit, 2001, p. 11). He goes on to propose that, “the represented and its

representation have the same ontological status.” By way of example, Ankersmit repeatedly

draws on “the paradigmatic example: the sitter for a portrait and the portrait itself have the same

ontological status” (p. 11, 13, 42, 43, 83 and 84). The repetitious and empowered metaphor re-

appears to re-enforce the point that the representation is one with the represented. It is a point

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that is at odds with Paul Ricouer’s warning against the mischievous role played by imagination that as a form of memory, he placed at the bottom of the ladder.

In order to find that place and know the past, Ankersmit suggests historians should turn away from linguistic theory to literary theory because as an instrument for historians it has a great deal to offer them about historical writing. However, he acknowledges that literary theory does not address the problems with which historians typically struggle and in spite of his apparent support, he admits to a certain cautious wariness because the two are theoretically asymmetric. At the same time, he notes the limits of linguistic theory and acknowledges its contributions to understanding the past because of its focus on the language used by historians to describe the past. Implicit in Ankersmit’s discussion is that the variability of language, both syntactically and semantically can vary significantly from one culture to another, i.e., the relativity hypothesis.

As J. Lucy (1997) suggested in Linguistic Relativity, the theoretical challenges for the

‘relativity hypothesis’ which was initially developed in the early 20th century by E. Sapir and B.

L. Whorf, continues to be daunting because the hypothesis continues to be controversial.

Nevertheless, some recent research confirms some of the elements of the hypothesis in so far that language has implications for patterns of thought about the nature of reality. The three key elements include the idea that some properties of language have consequences for thoughts about reality; patterns of thought may be related to perception and attention to personal and social-cultural systems of classifications; and, language contains an interpretation of reality as well as influencing our perception of it (Lucy, 1997, p. 294; Kay P. & Kempton, W., 1984).

In a discussion about ‘truth’ as understanding the meaning of evidence from the past,

Alun Munslow seeks support from Ankersmit’s comments about the epistemological position he

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took in a debate with an empiricist. It is an important issue because it is, and has been at the heart of many debates over recent decades. Likewise, Munslow’s reference to Ankersmit is significant because it suggests that in spite of differences, there are areas of basic agreement about fundamental issues. Ankersmit develops his position by distinguishing ‘description’ from

‘representation.’ The latter is necessary because of the constraints presented by the nature of language as outlined earlier. Munslow comments about the ‘truth’ issue, referring to

Ankersmit’s contribution to a debate between objectivism [empiricist] and relativism as follows.

“Unfortunately, [for the empiricist] as Ankersmit and others have pointed out, the context and language conventions deployed in a text, rather than simple authorial intentions, usually govern the meaning of a text” (Munslow, 2006, p. 84). Apparently, the author is no longer in charge of what is written; intention does not trump meaning.

In a second related point, Munslow again seeks out Ankersmit. This time, the question is directly about a comparison of ‘past reality’ and ‘history.’ The response is interesting because in this instance, Munslow implicitly suggests there is no such thing as knowing the past; there is only a comparison of one text with another. After dismissing footnotes, etc., he goes on to suggest, it’s “like lawyers in this respect, we can only compare accounts of what happened for a basic agreement that someone isn’t inventing what went on” (Munslow, 2006, p. 84). As an aside, those ‘basic agreements’ by the lawyers on opposing sides are generally called ‘Statement of Facts’ or just ‘Facts’ and routinely have the potential for serious consequences.

Ankersmit’s apparent appreciation for some aspects of literary theory initially appears as an interest in its instrumental value in focusing on the meaning of a text. However, with such a focus, he acknowledges that meaning potentially introduces a problem of ‘representing,’ precisely the reality the historian is attempting to describe. In response, he suggests that while

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‘meaning’ and ‘representation’ intersects they are not necessarily mutually exclusive of each other. Rather, the historian must be acutely aware of and attend to the interference of one with the other (p. 68).

In the Epilogue to the book, Ankersmit provides both a summary and a defense of his idea of ‘truth’ and representational theory’s ability to aid our understanding of the past. Clearly, in an effort to understand the condition humaine, ‘truth,’ he declares, as noted earlier, is not to be

found in the idea of a true description. Ankersmit rejects that proposition out of hand and

returns to a discussion of literary theory, acknowledging that the great novels sometimes get it

right, i.e., the Truth about the condition humaine. However, that theory too falls short especially

because it failed to examine the relationship between the text and reality. To investigate that

kind of ‘truth, Ankersmit suggests, “Would inevitably involve literary theory in the difficult

problems of philosophical anthropology and of philosophy of life” (Ankersmit, 2004, p. 282).

Apparently, it’s not an avenue he wished to explore even though it skirts the edge of literary

theory.

Literary theory is both a disappointment and a source of hope. The latter is its

willingness to examine the text for historical representations and hence, the philosophy of

language and the philosophy of history find common ground in the examination of the text to

arrive at something akin to historical representation. In the philosophy of language, it has three central ideas – reference, meaning and truth. In this context, Ankersmit suggests reference is

“about” and refers not to what it represents, but is, about it. “Intertextuality” replaces meaning, defined as an examination and comparison of a particular issue as described in various texts dealing with representations of the same subject. Finally, representations are not about ‘truth.’

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In fact, they are neither true nor false. At best, intertextuality makes representation more or less plausible and the idea of developing a plausibility test leads to two criteria

(1) the best representation is the one that succeeds in achieving a maximum unity in a set of maximally diverse historical phenomena, and,

(2) The best representation is also the most original one.

In addition, the two requirements can be taken together in the claims that the best

representation is the most metaphorical one (Ankersmit, 2001, p. 285). The plausibility test,

particularly as it relates to intertextuality as described by Ankersmit is not dramatically different

from realist, Aviezer Tucker’s view about achieving consensus among historians as the basis for

genuine historical knowledge. Tucker’s proposal requires a “consensus on historiographic

beliefs in uncoerced, heterogeneous and sufficiently large groups of historians is indicative of

knowledge of history” (Tucker, 2004, p. 23). Both Ankersmit’s ‘plausibility’ and Tucker’s

‘consensus’ rely on an informed group of some size to make a judgment on an important issue

to which Ricoeur responds, “ Let us call this search for truth, faithfulness” (p. 55).

Deconstructing History

Alun Munslow represents the broad view of postmodernism with a focus on the theory of

deconstructivism. In this context, he and several others are briefly considered because of a

similar interest in developing deconstructivism’s approach to several issues. To begin, Munslow

suggests he takes the meaning of ‘deconstruction’ from Jacques Derrida, the French cultural

theorist, but varies his meaning from that of Derrida. Accordingly, he suggests Derrida uses the

term in reference to “the process whereby we grasp the meaning of texts without reference to

some originating external reality” (Munslow, 2006, p. 3). It appears as a different if not

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implausible interpretation of Derrida himself, especially in light of what he had to say for himself.

In The Villanova Roundtable: A Conversation with Jacques Derrida (1994), Derrida apparently addressed the question, “Well, could you tell me, in a nutshell, what is deconstruction?” A journalist had put this question to him while looking for a short and presumably quotable answer at an earlier occasion (Caputo, 1997, p. 31). While the answer was not recorded at the time, Derrida addressed the question at the ‘Villanova Roundtable.” The

‘Roundtable’ took place in October 1994, and participants engaged Derrida in a discussion about his life-long interest in Plato and Aristotle and the Western inheritance of Greek democracy to which he attributed the capacity to self-deconstruct.

Briefly, Derrida suggests that the idea of ‘brotherhood’ originated with the Greeks, subsequently transformed by Christianity and even as it was transformed into something new, the new was potentially already inscribed in, and remained Greek. He goes on to suggest that to understand where we come from, it is necessary to return to the Greeks, but not to protect the origin or the philosophical basis from whence it came. Instead, analyzing and deconstructing historical change in this way by this kind of process, we understand that our current world, i.e., our idea of brotherhood came out of Greece, out of Christianity by breaking through and transforming these origins (Caputo, 1997, p. 10).

Caputo suggests that Derrida’s idea of history “is not a course set in advance headed towards its telos as in the case of a future-present, a foreseeable, plannable, programmable, anticipatable, masterable future. History means, rather, to set sail without a course, on the prowl for something ‘new’” (p. 117). Derrida’s conceptualization of ‘deconstruction’ is bound to some

‘originating’ external reality. Both democracy and the idea of brotherhood, Derrida points out,

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have a long history. As the deconstruction process unfolds over time, it transforms, inaugurates, breaks, and so, something new emerges. The new may already be inscribed or embedded in the past; thus, to understand where we have come from, returning to the past becomes a necessity, but not to protect it for its own sake. It is not intended to be static; this then is to engage in deconstruction.

In developing his own view of the nature of history, Munslow considers four important questions and the historic answers, particularly those of the eighteenth and nineteenth century as well as his own. It is important to note, that in differentiating his answers from those of his predecessors, Munslow historicizes his own as temporally caught up in a particular cultural and intellectual milieu.

Munslow’s four questions deal with the legitimacy of empiricism for an epistemology of history; the character and function of historical evidence; the role of the historian, the use of social theory and explanatory frameworks for historical understanding, and; the significance of historical explanation in its narrative form. These questions, he suggests, as well as the answers, lie at the root of the crisis besetting history (historiography) today (Munslow, 2006, p. 3).

On the question of discoverable truth, Munslow suggests that most mainstream historians generally operate on the basis that the past once existed. Therefore, by applying themselves diligently to the task of evidence gathering, they are able to make statements close enough to reflecting the past that functionally, they are able to make true statements about the past. His response to this kind of empiricism suggests that his search for the truth about the past is based on the Baconian idea of the scientific method, i.e., the inductive inference approach. It represents an attempt to ‘reconstruct’ the past, hence his description of this approach as

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‘reconstructionist’ and thereby opposite to deconstructing’ the past or ‘deconstructionism’

(Munslow 2006).

Munslow points out that the divide is not as stark as the names suggest. Rather, he notes, there are active debates ongoing with positions that draw from the other. His own conclusion on the matter of evidence is unambiguously clear, “I do not doubt that the past once existed, and that evidence of it remains in our present.” However, as he moves on to explain,

the intractable epistemological problem of never knowing the past as it actually was, because all we can do is infer meaning through its traces, emphasizes the need to readdress the mainstream working assumption of an adequate correspondence between evidence and truthful knowledge of the past (Munslow, 2006, p. 180).

Thus, he suggests, a narrative, by a reconstructionist historian about some past event which actually happened and for which there are traces that remain and are known in the present, are truthful as far as they are based on “correspondence to past reality via the mechanism of referentiality and inductive inference . . .” (p. 180). However, the resolute deconstructionist

Munslow has a different view. The historical narrative is not an attempt, as such, to construct, or reconstruct the past. It is not an attempt to order the traces of the past in a manner that attempts to reflect what happened in the past or to construct and test hypothesis in an effort to create facts that correspond to what happened. For Munslow the historical narrative is a story with a plot supported by known historical events and give meaning to the past. Here, in his own words he summarizes the historical narrative.

I have argued in favour of narrative as history’s primary cognitive device working in the mind of the historian as he/she imagines, shapes and represents the past. The emplotment of history as a story, with its supporting arguments and ethical strategies of explanation, is a highly complex form of explanation of historical change, but it is not history as it actually happened. How the past is configured hangs on the historian’s capacity to match a type of emplotment with the historical events that he/she wishes to furnish with a meaning of a particular

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kind. Narrative explanation is more than recording a flow of events in their order of occurrence (Munslow, 2006, p. 187).

The introduction of the term ‘emplotment,’ combining historical events into a narrative with a plot - into historiography, or historical writings, clarifies Munslow’s position; literary theory and the craft of writing seems to have taken on the risk of becoming a novel and perhaps not so far removed from painting on Jenkin’s blank canvas.

A Summary

This study combines the oral history of 64 individuals with an extensive collection of primary source documents from archives, several related secondary source documents at various archives and from several individuals. Initial interviewees were selected and contacted based on their known familiarity with the development of social work education in Alberta and the School of Social Welfare. As the research progressed, the importance of interviewing others became apparent, frequently suggested by those already interviewed.

Although a format was developed prior to beginning the interviews, it became apparent

early on that modifications were required to address each person’s unique experience. The

change led to interviews with others. In several instances, former faculty members and others

associated with the development of the School of Social Welfare used the opportunity to reflect

on the experience and meaning for themselves and the profession.

The destruction of internal records from the early years of the School of Social Welfare, created significant problem. However, it was possible to locate copies of some documents in the records of other officials within the University and other organizations. Unfortunately, I was unable to locate more than a few documents circulated to, and among faculty members thus

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creating a vacuum of unknown scope. Likewise, the limitations imposed by Alberta’s legislation perversely known as, the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, on access to records from the Departments of Advanced Education and Alberta Family and Social Services similarly created a vacuum of unknown scope. On the other hand, a number of individuals readily made personal copies of important documents available to assist my research.

Integrating, the documentary history with the oral history has sometimes filled a gap, changed assumptions, added information and enriched the narrative through the personal lived-experience of those who were there.

In an effort to understand the issues facing historians, the work and theoretical contributions of three well-recognized historians and historiographers Marc Bloch, Frank

Ankersmit and Alan Munslow were briefly examined. Others, such as Paul Ricoeur, Jacques

Derrida, Paul Jenkins and Aviezer Tucker were also among acknowledged. A primary issue for historians and historiographers deals with the question, what is history? Knowing that the past actually happened, is not a sufficient reason for concluding that a language can accurately depict what actually happened in the past with the result that the several views presented, essentially represent distinct responses to the question, “What is history?” In this case, Bloch’s approach, recommended by no less than Paul Ricoeur, making judgments based on faithfulness to memory enables the search for truth to pass on the results of memory, is the approach I’ve attempted to emulate.

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CHAPTER 4: THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION

In her preface to, Social Work Education: its Origins in Europe, Katherine Kendall,

(2000), who spent her early years on an Edmonton area homestead, (Katherine Kendall, Personal conversation circa, 1997), remarked “It is important for a profession to know and savor its beginnings and to see how its destiny unfolds in the experiences of the past” (Kendall, 2000, p. v). While social work’s roots are scattered broadly, its origins as a Canadian profession are primarily in Europe and for reasons of language especially in England. However, as American influence increased and began to dominate Canadian social work development, conflict about foundational issues emerged (Graham, 1996). Those influences and conflicts were well known to Tyler and the new School’s faculty (School of Social Welfare, Accreditation Report, 1970).

On looking back through the lens of the conflict that developed in the early years of the

School of Social Welfare, this Chapter begins with an examination of selected events in Poland,

Germany, the Netherlands, Great Britain and the US, where similar struggles took place, unique to their respective social, economic, culture and political dynamics. It continues with an examination of significant events in Canada and Alberta followed by the development of graduate social work education leading to the establishment of the School of Social Welfare at the University of Calgary.

My interest in doing so is to broaden the scope of events and issues faced by the School of Social Welfare in its early years. The purpose of doing so is to illustrate and confirm that in spite of the differences and elements of uniqueness, social work is inherently an international profession because it resides at the intersection of deeply held beliefs widely shared in the

Western Tradition.

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Over the last several decades, significant publications have appeared contributing to the development of a distinct narrative of social work as it developed in Canada. Most recently, the

Jennissen & Lundy (2011), One Hundred Years of Social Work: A History of the Profession in

English Canada 1900-2000, represents the first and remarkably comprehensive history of

English Canadian social work especially as the profession developed in central Canada

Karen Hill’s (1985), three volumes of interviews with Canadian social workers is an

important contribution to the profession’s oral history through the memory of those who

experienced it. John Graham (1996) explored the history of social work education at the

University of Toronto, School of Social Work while Beverley Scott (2004), did much the same

at the University of British Columbia, School of Social Work. Marlene Shore (1987, especially

in Chapter 2), examined the development of sociology at McGill and the University of Chicago,

pointing out that sociology developed out of the Department of Social Study and Training

established in 1918. During the first three years of its existence, the program engaged in training

social workers, but brought to an end when the University replaced the administrator, a social

worker, with a theoretical sociologist who held a divinity degree from Chicago (p. 25).

Sara Z. Burke’s (1996), Seeking the Highest Good: Social Service and Gender at the

University of Toronto, 1888-1937, took a more expansive approach examining the history of the

University of Toronto and its involvement in social services, and the development of what she

calls the “Toronto ideal” (p. 4). Burke’s contribution in this regard represents an examination of

the 1910 challenge presented by the University’s President, R.A. Falconer to students and

faculty to become engaged in “find[ing] the highest good by serving your fellows through your

intellect, your wealth, your position, or whatever talent you may possess” (p. 3).

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That ‘ideal’ incorporated the philosophy of British idealist T.H. Green whose philosophy held a prominent place in its moral and ethical basis including the ideas of political obligation, human progress and reason as the source of progress through the common good (McKillop,

2001; Green, 1986; 1883). As such, Green’s philosophy claimed a major role in the reform- minded Torontonians late in the 19th century (Burke, 1996, p. 63). Green’s view of the

‘common good’ includes the idea of ‘rights,” and are interpreted in the context that these rights

exist only to the extent they serve the common good (Gaus, 2006, p. 209-235).

Several Canadian historians have examined the influence and participation of various

branches of Protestant Christianity in the social reform movements in the late 19th and early 20th

Century. They include R. Allen, (1971), The Social Passion: Religion and Social Reform in

Canada in 1914-1928; B. J. Fraser (1988), The Social Uplifters: Presbyterian Progressives and

the Social Gospel in Canada, 1875-1915; N. Christie and M. Gauvreau, (1996), A Full-Orbed

Christianity: The Protestant Churches and Social Welfare in Canada 1900-1940, and, M.

Valverde, (2008), The Age of Light, Soap and Water: Moral Reform in English Canada, 1885-

1925. Each of these authors view the events of the late 19th and early 20th century through the

eyes of different denominations and historical perspectives, however, they acknowledge the

crucial role of faith communities and the social gospel in the development of social work and

social welfare services in the early 20th century. McKillop (2001), in turn points out that the

pervasive influence of idealism on the social gospel resulted in it replacing the gospel with the

‘ideal’ in dealing with the events and circumstances of the day.

Ken Moffatt’s (2001), A Poetics of Social Work, Personal Agency and Social

Transformation in Canada, 192 –1939, examined the events and work of four persons whose

views and the scope of their influence as social workers reached beyond traditional social work

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and in doing so, influenced a nation (Meynell, 2011, p. 63 & 65). The importance of Moffatt’s examination is that it goes well beyond the events of the day to examine the underlying assumptions and their values - Whitton and Urwick were the idealists while Livesay and Dawson

were modernist in their views of science (p. 103).

Claiming that her work attempts to balance the historical account, Gale Wills (1995),

examined the history of the relationship between business and social work in Toronto to reflect

both the social reform and social casework tradition with its focus on the individual. The

development of financial federations with the primary interests of raising funds and coordinate

services, created an alliance of professional social workers and members of the business elite.

However, the efforts inevitably led to conflict as each pursued their respective goals.

The gendered nature of social work practice, social agency roles and the male dominated

business interests complicated the nature of the conflict such that typically women found

themselves assigned the counselling and caring role, while men became their supervisors and

agency administrators. The consequence of this alignment, Wills suggests, led to funding

allocation processes that dominated and favoured agencies with acceptable services and

standards, resulting in opposition to social reform, political advocacy, social policy and planning

with the result of an effective separation between earlier forms of integral practice into a

separation of casework and community work (p. 135-142).

SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION IN AN INTERNATIONAL CONTEXT

English history dominates much of the early written history of social work and social

welfare primarily because of colonization. Continental European developments often receive

little more than a passing reference. Moreover, it is not unusual to regard the Continent as a

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coherent whole rather than disparate group of cultures, ethnicities, languages and religions each surrounded by unsettled boundaries and engaged in what Harold Berman characterized as the

17th through 21st century transition of governance from monarchies to aristocracies to

democracies.

Over a relatively brief period, primarily in the post-French Revolution period and near

the mid-point of the 19th century, the fledgling European movements toward democracy also

enabled the growth and development of contemporary capitalism. The development of

capitalism during the industrialization of the economy had a dramatic impact, disrupting the

established social, economic and political fibre throughout Europe even as it arrived at different

times and to a different degree in different places. The multi-faceted upheavals throughout

Europe varied, based on national cultural, social and political factors also contributed to a disjointed awareness and understanding of European social work history for much of a century after WWI.

For the former Eastern bloc, regaining access to the archives of the countries dominated by Russian and Soviet occupation, suggest social work and social work education developed throughout these countries in concert within the social, political and intellectual developments of the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution. In spite of the variations, there were also common themes, the significance of women and women’s organizations, the influence of the Christian faith particularly with its evangelistic view of charity and a broadly based democratic emancipatory commitment to human freedom and progress. In commenting on their examination of the developments conducted after the period of Russian occupation, Sabine

Hering and Berteke Waaldijk (2006) characterized it as complex, varied and diverse, an observation that applies to much of Europe.

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Poland

The Flying University of Poland stands our as among the earliest institutions to offer

social work education. As a secret university, it offered social work courses to females during

the 1880’s. Hering and Waaldijk, referring to the Polish historian Szczepaniak, suggest that

Polish political struggle for national liberation during the 19th century (p.78) is the context for understanding the Polish developments in social work and social work education. Hanna

Buczynska-Garewicz (1985), points out that clandestine universities were part of Polish history, particularly during the partitioning of the country in the 19th century. Following WWI, the

Treaty of Versailles once again revised and enlarged the borders of Poland. However, Germany

and Russia both annexed major parts of Poland early into WW II. Following WW II Poland

once again fell under Russian control as part of the Soviet Union until the late 1980s. Although

the development of social work did not fare well in many of the other countries that fell under

Russian/Soviet political, economic and cultural dominations, a distinct tradition of Polish social

work, i.e., social pedagogy, survived.

Kornbeck & Jensen (2009), suggest social pedagogy is “situated at the intersection of

social work and education [and] is an original and dynamic academic and professional tradition

[that] can be found across most European countries.” Moreover, it distinguishes itself by virtue

of its connections to regional and national “cultures and structures” (p.1). Although the focus

appears to be on what these authors summarize as the “early years” of human development, it

has a much broader base in professional practice.

Helena Radlińska, the founder of the first school of social work in Poland in the second

decade of the 20th century (Kantowicz & Wilińska, 2009; Wieler, 2008; Szmagalski, J., 2004). and recognized as equally influential as Alice Salomon and Mary Richmond by Kantowicz &

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Wilińska, initiated the development of social pedagogy. Moreover, the authors suggest that the survival of social pedagogy in Poland first in the face of German and followed by Russian oppression was possible because of an established tradition such that with the 1989 independence of Poland, rather than beginning anew with schools of social work, social pedagogy was able to reinvigorate the education for the social professions.

Kantowicz & Wilińska suggest the International Association of Social Educators (AIEJI), attempts to distinguish its definition of social pedagogy from that of IFSW’s definition of social work by reference to the historical origin and the diversity of its tasks.

Social educational work has its historical roots in work with children and young people. The profession comprises education and conditions of childhood and adolescence in a broad sense, and in some particular contexts it includes treatment. Today, social education aid targets disabled children, adolescents and adults as well as adults at particular risk: the mentally disordered, alcohol or drug abusers, homeless people, etc. Social educational work is constantly developing with regard to various forms of measures, target groups, methods, etc., (2009, p. 222, citation from AIEJI, 2005, p. 5 cited).

Kurt Schilde & Dagmar Schulte (2005), in Need and Care: Glimpses into the Beginnings of Eastern Europe’s Professional Welfare, offer a series of case studies by national historians who for the first time examined the archival records of eight countries released after the end decades of Russian oppression. A particularly relevant feature of their research here brought together the two methods of historical research: the traditional primary source documents and the oral history of contemporary witnesses (p. 275).

Schilde & Schulte report that the primary finding of their collaborative research with

Eastern European historians reflects the same broad themes as the development of social work elsewhere in Europe.

. . . women’s organizations, whether they were feminist, religious, philanthropical, or political, were often the first, most often the widest spread, generally those with

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the broadest spectre of projects and last, but not least the relevant promoter in implementing professional training. Often they combined different spheres of social life, such as women’s movement, religious or political engagement, social work professional training and often enough, work inside state administration in order to promote their ideas (p. 279).

Although Walter Lorenz (2006) examined the development of European social work recognizing both an early and remarkable diversity of traditions (cf. AIEJI, (2011), The

Profession of Social Education in Europe: Comparative survey), contrasted the diversity with a more recent coming together in the development of national systems of welfare. Lorenz goes on to suggests these developments in social work and social policy reflect the convergence of

European welfare systems re-shaping themselves as they promote and subject themselves to the influences of globalization and neoliberalism. In turn, Lorenz’s observations are consistent with those of Wilensky’s (2002), convergence theory, or perhaps an isomorphic tendency, for comparable developments among globally rich democracies.

Germany

Late in 19th century Germany, Alice Salomon began a training school for young women that led to the establishment of Germany’s first full time school of social work in 1908

(Salomon, 2004). Salomon’s initiative took place in a context Helene Lange, editor of Die Frau, described as a “callous[ed] hand brushed across the domestic hearth and directed millions of women out into the world” (cited by Catherine L. Dollard, 2009, p. 1, in The Surplus Woman,

Unmarried in Imperial Germany, 1871-1918). As the result of the industrial revolution, this calloused hand ensured the condition of women in Germany had forever altered (p. 2). At the time, the cause of surplus women was attributed to emigration and the disproportionate early death of men. During the Kaiserreich (Imperial Germany) period, the issue precipitated public

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debate about the changing nature of society and the status of women without a home or husband

(p. 4) but it came to an abrupt end with WWI. Dollard suggests women viewed their condition from within their own particular bias. It included moderates, radicals, socialists and religious leaders followed by the suggestion that the surplus women offered Germany something unique,

“be it via the professions; through maternal influences; as exemplars of the abuses of capitalism; or as living emblems of Marian purity” (p. 13).

Salomon’s solution for the dichotomy and to prevent discord among young women involved preparing them for both profession and marriage, the former as a just in case proposition. Her own history became an example of what she proposed. Salomon was never to marry and in 1908, she established the Soziale Frauenschule, now the Alice Salomon

Hochschule, Berlin (The Alice Salomon University of Applied Sciences, Berlin). As the first school of social work in Germany, it was restricted to women. In that same year and with the

encouragement of a friend, Salomon was also the first woman to obtain a PhD in economics from the University of Berlin (Dollard, 2009). Her 1908 dissertation examined the causes of wage inequality in Germany, Ursachen der ungleichen Entlohnung von Männer und

Frauenarbeit - Causes of the pay gap between men and women's work, (My translation).

From Salomon’s perspective, both the individual woman and the greater German society would be the beneficiaries of the Frauenschule. However, some have suggested her perspective fits in the analytical category of maternalism, explaining why she began the Girls Clubs in the

late 19th century. Moreover, it contributes to understanding the complexity of Lily Braun’s

feminist criticism and challenge to Salomon. At the end of their protracted conversation,

Salomon found herself faced with the classic dilemma for many social workers.

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Alice Salomon’s Pre-World War II International Perspective:

By the late 1930’s, Alice Salomon’s research for the International Committee of Schools of Social Work published before the Nazi’s expelled her from Germany where certain death

awaited her in a concentration camp, reported that 179 schools of social work had been

established in 32 countries. In summarizing her analysis of the various programs, Salomon

repeatedly notes that “the purpose and problems of education for social work are more or less the

same everywhere; yet the way in which each country approaches them varies according to the

foundations of its national existence” (p. 102). Elaborating on her comment, Salomon notes,

. . . the national schools of social work are an outgrowth as well as of the national systems of education as of the national systems of social services, which both are influenced and shaped by deep-seated national forces, by the culture peculiar to each nation. They bear the mark of the religion, the political structure, the economic conditions and the ideals of each nation regarding the distribution of wealth, power, opportunity, of its attitude towards the weak, the unfortunate and the incompetent; the mark of the relationship of the individual to the state (p. 102- 103).

In more contemporary terms, but with little difference in meaning, Salomon effectively

placed the purpose of social work education in the context of national culture, political

institutions and public social welfare policy as articulated, or sometimes not, by the state on

behalf of public and private institutions and the social welfare of the citizenry.

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The Netherlands

Similar to developments elsewhere in Europe, the late 19th century industrial revolution

represented the historical setting for the development and recognition of social work in the

Netherlands. The industrial revolution came late to the Netherlands, uprooting large numbers of

families in a mostly agrarian society, creating many of the same issues as elsewhere. M. Grever

& B. Waaldijk’s (2004), Transforming the Public Sphere, examined the significance of the 1898

Dutch National Exhibition, Women’s Labour, including its contribution to the social work of

women in the Netherlands. Employing Jurgen Habermas’ concept of the ‘public sphere’ they

utilized Nancy Fraser’s critique of it to suggest that in the late 19th century Netherlands, there

were more than a single public sphere.

Rather, Grever & Waaldijk suggest several instantiations of the public sphere already

existed some of which were opposed to others and not part of the mainstream dominant

bourgeois variety. In fact, the authors suggest the 1898 National Exhibition held in the dunes of

the North Sea, outside the Hague, was itself a counter-public event and because of new

participants, organizers were influenced significantly by working-class women and perhaps most

of all because the combined efforts successfully changed the public agenda. The Exhibition was deemed a significant success by Grever & Waaldijk, because it “allow[ed] for more than one interpretation, send[ing] multiple messages . . . putting women’s labour on display, they radically innovated the representation of women. Yet they also perpetuated traditional notions of women’s public role.” While the Exhibition focused internationally, and copied elements of earlier exhibitions it also “deliberately copied Dutch women’s exhibitions,” and “referred to national role models and authors who had promoted women’s interests before 1898” including the Dutch colonies (p. 222).

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Waaldijk suggests that the conferences during the Exhibition held the “first public discussions about the need for training schools for social world” (Waaldijk. 2012, P. 90).

Because she was well known and widely respected throughout much of Europe, Alice Salomon apparently initiated those discussions. There were numerous suggestions and examples of efforts already underway. For instance, Waaldijk refers to comments by an unidentified woman who was familiar with the Women’s University Settlement in London while others spoke about

the British Fabians, Octavia Hill and the training she offered for those working in housing

(Waaldijk, 2012).

While the 1898 Dutch National Exhibition of Women’s Labour may not have been a directly responsible for the development of the Dutch social work education program, some of its supporters participated in the Exhibition and its conferences. With much of the focus on women’s labour, i.e., the charitable work known as social work, the Exhibition brought together a diverse group of individuals some of whom were already engaged in social work.

Onderwijsinrichting voor Socialen Arbeid (Institute for Social Work Education)

With a significant display of women’s social work at the National Exhibition, it is not entirely surprising that the development of social work education in the Netherlands began to take shape even before the Exhibition was over. Maarten van der Linde, a historian of social work at the Research Centre, Hogeschool Utrecht, (University of Applied Sciences) notes that the first full-time school of social work was established in Amsterdam, the Netherlands opening its doors to 14 women students in September 1899 (Van der Linde, 2011).

While there were others who contributed to the work, Hélène Mercier, a determined social activist introduced ‘Toynbee work’ to the Netherlands and Marie Muller-Lulofs, a

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determined advocate for addressing poverty formed the primary initiative behind the school.

Emilie Knappert, influenced by John Ruskin and William Morris, published extensively while engaged in social work practice. Arnold Polak Kerdijk, a lawyer, social reformer, trade union leader, politician, liberal and publisher, actively supported development of the full-time, 2-year school of social work as one of its leaders.

Others who were instrumental in supporting the School in its foundational years include,

Maria Willem Frederik Treub, a progressive liberal, supporter of universal suffrage, and experienced administrator, interested in the ‘social question,’ who believed social provisions should be limited. Christian W. Janssen, an Amsterdam philanthropist used his personal wealth to support the school throughout the first twenty years of its existence. After hearing about

Octavia Hill’s methods Louise van der Peck-Went, accompanied by Johanna ter Meulen, had travelled to Great Britain in 1893 to study Hill’s work (Van der Linde, 2011; Kalkman, 2009).

Recounting her early experiences, Went recalled, “I remember how day after day we went through the London slums and how I was struck by the way she responded to those she met, friendly, completely respectful, interested and always radiating warmth” (Kalkman, 2009, p. 11

– My translation).

As a journalist, Kerdijk was involved in establishing two separate progressive newspapers late in the 19th century with a goal of developing a broader base of an educated

public including the social work program. Although sometimes thought to have been associated

with socialist, Kalkman suggests Kerdijk was more of a progressive 19th century liberal. His two

terms in the national Parliament of the Netherlands provided the opportunity to participate in

“The Social Question” debates and in terms of social work education, he believed

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The truth is that if you want to engage in social work in a way that it is performed well, a very serious preparation is needed. A preparation that is partially scientific, because general sociological development, familiarity with several laws and historical review of different social questions is necessary. But the most important part of the preparation consists of practice and participation in the specific part of social work a student wants to dedicate its life to, with proper guidance (Personal communication: Famke Kalkman, August 8, 2012 – Kalkman’s translation).

Kalkman suggests that Mercier, who counted Aletta Jacobs among her friends, was the primary force behind the development of the school. Jacobs, a prominent physician, was the first woman in the Netherlands to obtain a medical degree, an early suffragist, a 19th Century

international advocate for birth control and a pacifist who as President of the Netherland’s

Association of Woman Suffrage, invited Jane Addams to Chair the Women’s Peace Congress in

The Hague during WWI (Waaldijk, 2012; Jacobs, 1996). Mercier also established ‘Ons Huis,’

as the centre for ‘Toynbee work’ – at the time, the Netherlands’ term for settlement work. As a

prolific writer, Mercier wrote about London’s Women’s University Settlement in the 1890s

(Grever and Waaldijk, 2004). She was adamantly opposed to the International Congress of

Women only because she believed that men and women were equal (Famke Kalkman, Personal

Communication: August 8, 2012).

Located in Amsterdam, the Onderwijsinrichting voor Socialen Arbeid opened its doors to

male and female students on September 15, 1899. However, on opening day, twenty-three

female students at least twenty-three years of age and twenty part-time students began the two-

year program (Waaldijk, 2012; Kalkman, 2009, Van der Linde, M., 2011; Leeuwarder Courant,

June 13, 1899). Note: Kalkman has a higher number of students than Van der Linde; the reason

for the difference is unclear.

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The development of this program is important because of a decision by the Board of

Governors in 1905 to change the name to School voor Maatschappelijk Werk, (School of Social

Work) in the face of ideological struggles, 6 years after it began (Kalkman, 2009). In the

Netherlands’ national context, the 1903 railway strike, the political advances of the democratic socialists, the fear of socialism and the reality of a declining enrollment, led to focus on the identity and name of the School. As both Kalkman and Waaldijk point out the name changed from, Onderwijsinrichting voor Socialen Arbeid, to the more acceptable, De School voor

Maatschappelijk Werk because of the association. Kalkman records the decision in some detail.

In 1906 werd besloten om de naam van de school te veranderen in School voor Maatschappelijk Werk. Het idee van deze naamsverandering hing al een tijdje in de lucht. Het was erg onrustig in de maatschappij. Na de spoorwegstakingen van 1903 was angst ontstaan voor het socialisme. ‘Socialen Arbeid’ werd geassocieerd met de socialistische beweging en de bestuursleden dachten dat het lage aantal leerlingen deels te wijten viel aan de angst van ouders om hun kinderen in de armen van de socialisten te drijven. Daarom is de naam van de opleiding op 30 Juni 1906 officieel veranderd in School voor Maatschappelijk Werk (Kalkman, 2009, p. 35-36).

The 1906 decision to change the name to “School voor Maatschappelijk Werk” followed after the idea had already been around for some time. Following the railway strike of 1903 Dutch society feared and was anxious about rise of socialism. ‘Socialen Arbeid’ was associated with socialist movement and the Board believed that the decline in the number of students was the result of parents’ fear that they were sending their children into the arms of the socialists. As a result, on June 30, 1906 the name officially changed to the School of Social Work (Kalkman, 2009, p. 35-36 – My translation).

Also pertinent here is the difference in the meaning and interpretation of the two key 19th

century Netherlands’ phrases: - ‘Socialen Arbeid’ and ‘Maatschappelijk Werk.’ The current

English translation of both phrases is “social work” however, as Kalkman points out, in the late

19th and early 20th century context, the name Socialen Arbeid was understood through its association with the fear of socialism. Consequently, a more meaningful translation of the

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phrase to current English is represented by “socialist labour” or ‘socialist work,’ conveying the meaning and spirit of how the name was interpreted and understood at the time and a rationale for its change. Moreover, it is even offered as such by some on-line translation services.

Finally, course work in the School included the history of socialism and social democracy

(Kalkman, 2009).

As Kalkman points out, the timing of the decision to change the name was strategic as the idea had been around for some time, however, Kerdijk and Mercier in particular opposed the decision. With Kerdijk’s death and Mercier’s failing health, the pressures to change the name took hold (Famke Kalkman, Personal Communication: August 8, 2012). In the end, the initial name had the support of those principally responsible for the program’s beginning but their departure from the Board changed the dynamics and support for its continuation was lost. The name change was a pragmatic accommodation to the multiple motivations and beliefs about the purpose of the school to ensure its survival. The fear of socialism, the influence of maternalism and feminism and 19th century progressive liberalism, nevertheless suggest the School

represented an unclear continuation of the underlying emancipatory belief inherent to its

multiple ideological positions. Kalkman concluded that throughout the period of her Study, the

Board remained unclear about the purpose of the school.

The change of identity coincided with changes in governance. The Board acted from their own experience in Dutch society. That meant that the first, the older board members had a very different view in mind than the younger members that followed. The advent of new and the departure of older board changed the ideological composition and explains the changes in identity. While the emancipation of women remained important, the focus of the training was to be in social work (Kalkman, 2009, p. 51 – My translation).

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Commenting on the name change Neij & Hueting (1989), comment that “during the subsequent decades as new schools were established the name they adopted in 1905, became a generic name for a new type of school” (p. 32, my translation).

Great Britain

Octavia Hill is likely among the earliest to provide training for staffs hired to help with her efforts to house the impoverished residents of London in the last half of the 19th century.

Her book, Homes of the London Poor, (2006/1875), is largely devoted to anecdotes illustrating

her method for addressing the complex housing issues in the London slums. A feature of her

methods as she used them personally and taught her staff involved a relentless pursuit of

collecting rents and ensuring repairs. She was not at all averse to using housing simultaneously

as a carrot and a stick to achieve her overall purposes.

The plan which she devised was based upon the reciprocal rights and duties of landlords and tenants. As one of her followers summed it up: The keynote of the whole movement lies in the good old-fashioned word ' Duty.’ Mutual obligations mutually discharged - that is the bedrock upon which Miss Hill has founded her system (Annie Hankinson, Charity Organization Review, July 1912, cited by Peter H. Mann, 1952).

Hill’s efforts sought to help families deal with the ravaging effects of industrialization

and the rapid expansion of London’s lower class (Briggs, 1983). Moreover, she was generous in

giving time and sharing her knowledge and experiences with both her staff of volunteers and

others elsewhere in Europe and America. Kendall notes Hill began the training sessions for her

fellow workers - volunteers and housing managers as far back as the 1870’s, (Kendall, 2000),

after her former art instructor, John Ruskin, quietly offered to support her purchase of a home in

early 1864 (Bell, 1942/43). His support continued throughout his life, and enabled Hill to

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increase the number of houses and families she and her workers managed. Hill’s austere methods of inspections and kind but firm visiting practices were developed in dealing with her tenants and were widely copied elsewhere in Britain as well as in Europe (Bell, 1943). Even in

North America, Hill’s methods where of significant influence in the development of Mary

Richmond’s work with the Charity Organization Society. Hill’s book about the poor of London was on Richmond’s list of recommended readings (Agnew, 2003). In contemporary terms, Hill first used the ‘housing first principle’ to organize her response to abject poverty and deprivation.

Hill was not without opposition, most notably Beatrice Webb. As noted earlier, Webb declared Hill and others of like mind, as ‘my friend the enemy’ after volunteering briefly in the charity movement. In turn, Hill did not think well of the settlements. When a settlement for women encroached on an area of London she regarded as her own, Bell (1943) commented, ”she was not predisposed in its favour, for she believed so passionately in family life, that a collection of women, living together without family ties or domestic duties, seemed to her unnatural if not positively undesirable” (p. 212).

Programs in England specifically known to educate students as social workers and associated with some university settlement houses existed as early as the late 19th century

(Chapman, 2007; Kendall, 2000). The international survey of social work education programs

conducted by Alice Salomon (1937), Education for Social Work, A Sociological Interpretation

Based on an International Survey, supports Chapman’s (2007) point that some kind of social

work education existed in England in the late 19th century. Salomon records that formal

“training schemes for social work were devised . . . as early as 1894” (Salomon, 1937, p. 36).

Although there is some confusion about the dates, it appears she had the Women’s University

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Settlement program in mind. Salomon’s 1937 Report notes the LSE social work program grew out of the courses initially offered at the Women’s University Settlement program.

The London School of Economics

The Fabian socialists Beatrice and Sydney Webb together with their friends, George

Bernard Shaw and Graham Wallace, made the decision to establish the London School of

Economics and Political Science over breakfast on August 4, 1894. A prominent figure and friend, who assisted them, was Viscount Haldane, later to become influential in the development of Canadian law (Webb, 1948). The opportunity came on the news of an inheritance the Webbs

received, allowing them to use the funds to further the cause of Fabian styled socialism.

Establishing a university program to help further their aim seemed like a strategic opportunity

not to be missed (McKernan, 2004). Consequently, the LSE was envisaged as addressing the

plight of London’s poor by means of permeation rather than confrontation. Permeation

suggested a strategy of persuasion rather than a revolution and reflected the Fabian’s Five E

campaign: Education, Economics, Efficiency, Equality and Empire all of which were

summarized in the maxim, “Educate, Agitate and Organise” (McKernan, 2004, p. 3-4).

In 1903, the London School of Economics established the first formal university British social work education program under the rubric of the School of Sociology and Social

Economics, led by Edward J. Urwick (McKernan 2004; Burke, 1996; Dahrendorf, 1995).

Urwick had already taught at the London School of Ethics and Social Philosophy with such notables in the Charity Organization Movement as the British Platonists (Idealists) Bernard and

Helen Bosanquet. Consequently, when that attempt to emulate the LSE failed, Urwick was a logical choice to take the remnants of the program and establish a School of Sociology and

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Social Economics. The School, like the LSE, was made possible by a bequest, in this case by

Martin White who earlier established the Sociological Society that moved to LSE in 1904 and soon began to exercise its influence there (McKernan, 2004).

Richards A. Chapman in a discussion about the Joint University Council (JUC) created at the London School of Economics in 1918, designed to train civil servants, he notes that

Elizabeth Macadam along with E.J. Urwick and Sidney Webb, were present at the creation of the Committee. Macadam, who was born in Glasgow, lived in Canada for a time attending schools in Strathroy, Ontario and in Quebec City. After graduation, she received a Pfieffer scholarship to study social work at the Women’s University Settlement in Southwark. Macadam remained for four years until 1902, suggesting the program existed at least as far back as 1898

(Chapman, 2007; Pederson, 2004; Williams, 1994; cf. Pedersen, S, 2004, Eleanor Rathbone and the Politics of Conscience, especially Chapter 5, for Macadam’s influence on the development of

English social work).

Macadam’s writings about social work include The Equipment for the Social Worker

(1925), comparing schools of social work in Great Britain with those of Canada and the United

States among others. The primary finding of her comparison speaks to the focus on “technique of social treatment” in American programs (p. 188). In addition, she suggests the US experienced a much greater demand for social workers as the schools were “influenced, if not actually controlled by powerful voluntary social organizations” (p. 189).

In 1924, Urwick moved to Canada for reasons of health and with the intention to retire

(George, 2011; Innis, 1945). However, he was willingly drawn into a temporary appointment to the University of Toronto, School of Social Work. His rise to Dean several years later ensured

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the presence and influence of British idealism and its opposition to the growing influence of the new behavioural sciences from the US (Graham, 1996).

Moffatt suggests that the Urwick’s opposition rested on the belief that “social science could not define human facts and social facts and that the sciences did not deal adequately with humanity’s dynamic inner life” (p. 35). Urwick’s use of the phrase ‘inner life’ is an integral part of his idealism and social philosophy articulated repeatedly in, The Social Good, (1927), The

Philosophy of Social Progress (1920) and The Platonic Quest (1920/1983). It represents the

source of the human capacity for change and progress. As a Platonist would have it, the exercise

of the inner life allows the idealist to reflect on the ‘idea’ as it “exists antecedently to all human

experience” (1927, p. 7-8). Urwick illustrates his point by means of the Idea of the Good and

suggests that judgments are based on values that are much more than mere personal prejudice.

“We are drawing upon our common knowledge implicit in every decent and reasonable mind,

and upon the common experience of such minds; our basis indeed, is the sifted experience of

countless individuals transmitted to us, not by physical heredity alone but as part that social

heritage on which our life depends” (p.8).

Although Urwick does not appear to have had a worked-out view of social justice, possibly because, in The Plantonic Quest, he suggest the “justice” is to narrow a concept both politically and socially. Instead, he relies on a Vedic interpretation of life and employs

‘Dharma’ as a foundational concept that is even more than the moral imperative, “duty and the right performance of duty.” Instead, Urwick suggests Dharma is similar to Plato’s use of the word “Dikaiosune’ in The Republic, which he interprets as righteousness – the duty to act rightly or “doing the right thing rightly” (p. 38).

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At the same time, Urwick also employs ‘reason,’ ‘reasonable’ and ‘reasonableness’ and

requires “social members . . . as a whole [to] be reflective and reasonable enough to guide their

conduct by the motives of accepted purpose and understood reasons,” as the basis for progress

while making it clear it replaces “the old control of habit and tradition” (Urwick, 1920, p. 98).

That emphasis also linked Urwick’ to the 17th and 18th century intellectual developments

described by Sophia Rosenfeld’s (2011), Common Sense, A Political History, suggesting

‘reasonableness’ gained prominence as a response to the “bloody disputes associated with the triumph of various enthusiasms” (2011, p. 29) taking on the form or likeness of a populist democracy. With this in mind, it is not difficult to understand Urwick’s opposition to the

American behaviourism he encountered during his tenure at Toronto. Instead, Urwick’s views on social philosophy and social work placed the Toronto School in the larger drama of Platonic

and British Idealism and the Western tradition of progress (Moffatt, & Irving, 2002).

THE AMERICAN INFLUENCE

The American influence on Canadian social work and social work education is undeniable and was particularly contentious during the tenure of E.J. Urwick at the University of

Toronto, School of Social Work. The idealist, E.J. Urwick, struggled with the American

influence, (Moffatt & Irving, 2002; Moffatt, 2001; Graham, 1996), and led him to discontinue

the School’s formal participation in the American Association of Training Schools for

Professional Social Work, later known as the American Association of Schools of Social Work,

(AASSW) in 1929.

The Toronto School did not rejoin the American accrediting agency until 1938 (Graham,

1996, p. 114) and formally restore American standards to Canadian social work education.

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Urwick’s objections to the AASSW were based on what he considered ‘fundamental principles’ but which the AASSW had reduced to mere ‘orientation courses.’ For Urwick that meant the

AASSW standards focused on casework as a technique for treatment, excluding the principles and ideas of prevention behind it. (p. 80 - 81).

Although from a different perspective, Urwick’s issue with casework was not unique.

Katherine Kendall (2002) describes in some detail the issues faced by the AASSW from the social sciences and the traditional social work education programs established by private charitable organizations rather than universities. P. Lengermann and G. Niebrugge (2007) on examining the historical relationship between American developments in sociology and social work (sometimes called practical sociology), conclude both shared many characteristics among them their respective origins in social reform, tension between advocacy and professional objectivity and methodological issues. However, they also point to the different paths in their early development with sociology increasingly an intellectual enterprise while social work became concerned with increased human needs (p. 66).

AASSW’s orientation to casework was not the only or universally accepted development even in the US. In 1931 and for the next decade as Dean of the School of Social Service

Administration, University of Chicago, Edith Abbott spoke out and in 1942 published a collection of essays and papers under the title of, Social Welfare and Professional Education.

Notably, Abbott defined ‘social welfare’ as “a broader term emphasizing the public aspects of social service and the development of social policies as well as methods of social treatment” (p. vii). Abbott’s 1942 definition reflects a perspective similar to that of Cassidy’s challenge to

Canadian social workers in the early years of the Great Depression urging them to focus on the

‘broad view’ as part of fighting the crime of poverty.

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Abbott’s friendship with the British social reformers, Beatrice and Sidney Webb and a stint at the London School of Economics that began with a scholarship she received in 1906.

The time in London apparently acquainted her with British Fabian socialism. Costin (1983) suggests that Abbott’s personality was compatible with elements of Fabian socialism and in

describing it suggests it was consistent with Abbott’s own view.

Fabian socialism was intellectual, yet practical. It never deviated from outrage against the ever-present suffering of people who live in poverty and squalor. It rested on a moral responsibility of men and women to bring about a better social order through a two-way channel of duty – the state to the individual and the individual to society. Its primary strategy was not revolution; its leaders carefully distinguished themselves from the militants of the day. Research and education were primary aims . . . Fabians sought to permeate all existing parties and organizations and to use existing governmental machinery to legislate against poverty and other social ills (Costin, 1983, p. 32).

On returning to the US, Abbott lived with others of like mind at Hull House and for a time held

the position of its Assistant Director.

Linda M. Shoemaker (1998), Early Conflicts in Social Work Education, examined the

conflict between an academic and technical education, the latter associated with private control

of social work training programs. As Shoemaker describes, Abbott had engaged in a “palace

coup” by taking over the privately controlled School of Civics and Philanthropy and transferring

it to the University of Chicago, Graduate School of Social Service Administration. It’s likely

that helped set the stage for the Deanship at Chicago and led to a remarkable career as a social

work scholar and educator (Costin, 1983; Wisner, 1958) with a vision that not only “social

workers needed the social sciences, but that social work was a social science, which she called

“the social science of social welfare” (p. 189). Abbott’s biography on the University of Chicago

website understates her contribution, noting she was responsible for “linking casework and

classwork.”

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The massive unemployment and widespread social dislocation of the Great Depression lent itself to the ideas of the Fabians and as Abbott outlined in her collection of essays, charity

and philanthropy were simply not up to the task of dealing with the scope of issues precipitated

by the Depression. Public programs based in law, administered by well-educated professionals

who were well versed in administrative law and able “to safeguard the rights and interests of the

poor” (p. 96) apparently satisfied Abbott’s view of what social workers ought to be doing to

complete the link between casework and classwork.

James Leiby (1978) writes that the Social Security Act (1935) was the highpoint in the

development of American social welfare programs, and that by 1938, popular political support

for major legislation had ended. Because of the social security legislation, the need for private

poor relief agencies ended. At the same time, the need for what Leiby named ‘direct services’

increased significantly. Consequently, the professionalization of American social work

continued and attested to by the establishment of the Council on Work Education (CSWE) in

1952 as the accepted standard-setting agency for social work education. At the same time, the

consolidation of seven specialized professional groups and associations into the National

Association of Social Workers (NASW) in (1955), established a unified professional

organization. Combined, these organizations hastened the professionalization process in the US.

The Hollis-Taylor Report – 1951

Although the Hollis-Taylor Report represents a unique response to a series of complex

issues in the US, its development occurred in the broader context of post-WW II international

developments in social work in which the United Nations played a significant role. In the post-

WW II period, it is not surprising that the 1950 UN Report was based on a decision four years

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earlier, in 1946. In reflecting on the widespread devastation and dislocation the Report had as the overriding goal “the improvement of services to promote the well-being of the individual and of the community” and added, that doing so would “depend essentially on the existence of specially trained staff to administer these services” (p. 1).

In summarizing the efforts of more than 30 countries with more than 200 schools of social work, the Report drew several conclusions. Among them, it sought to summarize the work carried out by social workers. As a result, it noted social workers were engaged in three distinct activities: helping – giving assistance that enable individuals and families achieve an acceptable standard of living; social – without profit, men and women performed public service through numerous forms of organizations and associations; and, liaison – connecting people to resources (p. 88).

In summarizing its review and analysis, the UN Report noted the importance of acknowledging the conflicting views about social progress and development.

Finally, it should be recognized that a distinction must be drawn between two possible lines of development, each appropriate to a particular type of socio- economic system. On the one hand, in those countries whose socio-economic system are based on private initiative, social work activities tend to be oriented towards the individual, and to be conceived in terms of ministering to the individual’s unsatisfied needs. On the other hand, in those countries whose socio- economic systems are based on co-operative endeavours, social work activities tend to be regarded as a single aspect of a collective effort to create the environmental conditions appropriate to a more or less planned society (p. 88-89).

Officially commissioned by the National Council on Social Work Education in 1948, the

Hollis-Taylor Report stated its intent “to establish some benchmarks in the field of social work education that the profession and university officials can use in charting a course for the next two or three decades” (p. xi). In exploring the likelihood of an expanded role for social work, and social work education, the authors note US demographic trends, the expanding role of

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government into entirely new areas of meeting human needs and the changing social habits and patterns, particularly the beginnings of what would become the Civil Rights movement. The

Report also pointed out the single most important factor fueling the demand for social workers.

The widespread character of belief in the potentialities of science as applied to human problems. Over the last twenty years this growing confidence in the scientific approach has been especially evident in those aspects of life concerned with the growth and development of the individual and with human relationships” (Hollis-Taylor, 1951, p. 128).

Commenting on the CSWE Policy Statement that followed the Hollis-Taylor Report by a year, Katherine Kendall, then the Educational Secretary of CSWE, suggested that the Policy

Statement reflected the goals of the schools, but that “It would be a stretching the truth, however, to say that it accurately reflects the current educational practice” (Kendall, 1953, p. 15). Kendall recognized the dilemma schools of social work faced often resulted from an agency’s need for skilled staff and thus remained outside the ambit of universities. Curricula, she notes, were often geared to training staff for sponsoring agencies. Kendall suggests the CSWE aspired to more, in fact, she wrote it wanted,

the total educational experience distilled from the learning in class and field and in research, from the learning in the use of oneself as a professional person, from the philosophical climate of the school, and from the identification with a faculty that has strong convictions about the significance of the social work profession in advancing human welfare and promoting social progress (Kendall, 1953, p. 25).

In spite of affirming the importance of the Report, Kendall acknowledged its confusion and contradictions. Particularly problematic were the claims that the generic social work processes for accreditation were primarily associated with and geared to individually oriented casework thus presenting a problem for schools specializing in group work, community development, etc.

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As Kendall pointed out, the generic accreditation standards presented a dilemma for schools that offered specialized programs in group work, medical social work, or for those who offered a specialized curriculum on group work, community development, etc. Having met the generic standards based on the submission of a specialized program or curriculum, these schools were then expected to seek approval as specialized programs or a specialized curriculum. In

1955, common sense prevailed; CSWE acknowledged the confusion and appointed Werner

Boehm at Rutgers as Director to undertake a comprehensive study of a social work curriculum.

The Boehm Report - 1959

Published in 1959, the 13 Volume Final Report, known as the Boehm Report, set out to become the total curriculum, for all schools and departments in the US and Canada (Boehm,

1959, V. 1, p. xv). In doing so, the Study also assumed social workers and the public in the two countries held the same values, practiced within a similar political and cultural context and held similar aspirations.

Werner W. Boehm, the Study’s Director was a well-respected social work academic at the University of Minnesota when asked to undertake this study. His personal background included a PhD in law from France and like many Jewish-German educators and intellectuals it also included expulsion from his country of birth by the German Nazis prior to the start of WW

II. He obtained an MSW in 1941 from the University of Tulane and, following the Curriculum

Study, served as the Dean at Rutgers from 1963-1972 (Joachim Wieler, Personal communication: June 17, 2013; Home News Tribune, Obituary, October 20, 2011).

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Two Canadians, J.S Morgan from the University of Toronto, School of Social Work and

Joseph W. Willard, the Deputy Minister for the Department of Health and Welfare were on the

Study’s Technical Advisory Panel. Possibly as a result, the Boehm Report, focused on “offering

guides to individual schools rather than presenting them with a ready-made curriculum”

(Boehm, 1959, V1, p. xv), including Canadian schools.

However, I was unable to find a single significant reference to Canada in either the text

or Index of Volume I, The Comprehensive Report of the Curriculum Study. Similarly, the

bibliography for Volume XII, Social Welfare Policy and Services in Social Work Education,

does not include references to the recognized contribution by Canadian social policy experts

such as Leonard Marsh, Harry Cassidy or Charlotte Whitton. Nevertheless, the Boehm Report’s

curriculum guidelines had a significant influence on the development of the US CSWE

accreditation standards and the development of US and Canadian social work education

programs, including the initial accreditation standards for the University of Calgary, School of

Social Welfare.

The Study engaged Ralph W. Tyler, a widely acknowledged expert on curriculum development and included him as a member of the Technical Advisory Committee. Tyler’s

1949 book, Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction, brought him almost instant recognition and a lasting legacy as one of the foremost experts on matters related to curriculum

(Simpson, 1999). Even now, his 1949 book is in its 37th printing and remains an important

resource for curriculum studies and “remnants of his thinking are scattered throughout the

curriculum and are so embedded that they may not be recognized as coming from his work”

(Parks, 2011, p. 81).

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Undoubtedly, Tyler contributed significantly to the development of a much sought after, unified curriculum guide for social work education. The guidance Tyler offered to educators for many decades is directly relevant to this context because his observations and starting point argues, that an education system represents an extension of society and values in this instance

reinforcing the role of education in perpetuating the idea of progress.

This means that whatever we do in the name of education in this country should serve the need of democracy, freedom and justice and should manifest a general belief in an open enterprise system of thinking as well as economics. Furthermore, our country is one that has embraced science and technology as a way of searching for the truth as well as improving the quality of life for everyone (Simpson, 1999, p. 86-87).

Moreover, with respect to the development of the social work curriculum guidelines,

Tyler’s proposal called for a response to the following questions, taking on the public policy

framework and teleology, as understood in the US.

1. What educational purposes should the school seek to attain?

2. What educational experiences can be provided that is likely to attain these purposes?

3. How can these educational experiences be effectively organized?

4. How can we determine whether these purposes are being attained? (Tyler, 1949, p.51).

In applying the guidelines to social work education, the Boehm Report outlines its

questions for social work education.

1. What are the desirable objectives for professional education of social workers?

2. What learning experiences should be selected and what should be their organization to meet the objectives?

3. How can it be determined whether or not the educational objectives have been attained? (Boehm, V.1, 1959, p. 23).

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The opening chapters of the Study acknowledge the influence of Tyler’s views on

curriculum issues however, it is unclear why the Study participants were unable to come

together on an ideological framework, or philosophy screen for social work education (Boehm

V.1, 1959). What the Study was able to do instead, helped lead to the development of a

pragmatic framework formed from a series of ‘ideas and aims’ including an attempt to identify

the underlying assumptions, values and goals of the curriculum.

In a telling section, the Report articulates a view of social works underlying assumptions.

“In sum, the responsibility of a profession derived from its sanction by society is to ensure that

its goals are compatible with the values of society, while its functions are held to professionally

determined standards and controls” (Boehm, 1959, V.1, p. 42). The Report continues, and

suggests because social work is an “organ of society,” “. . . the goals it seeks must not be

incompatible with the values held by society” (P. 42). With apparent haste, it adds an attempt to

clarify “that the responsibility of social work to society as a whole by no means endows it with a

set of values identical at every point with those predominating in society” (P. 42). However, in

the absence of the ideological framework, it is difficult to determine which values social work education sought to espouse.

The Report identifies the goal of social work as “the enhancement of social functioning wherever the need for such enhancement is either socially or individually defined” (P. 46). By social functioning, the Report intends to convey that it is essentially the “performance of several roles which each individual by virtue of his membership in social groups is called upon to carry out” (P. 46).

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In response to the preliminary question, “What is the nature of social work?” (Boehm,

1959, V.1, p. 38), the Study defined it in a distinctly individualistic fashion without reference to the influence, interaction or constraints of social and economic structures or public institutions.

Even though Boehm acknowledged the link between “the economic and political context for social work and its programs, services and method” (p. 9), functionally it fell short. Service providers and a plurality of social, economic, political institutional structures collapsed into an amorphous and undifferentiated environment. Social relationships were reduced to interactions while the activities of social workers were designed to repair, provide and prevent individual dysfunction in the context of those interactions.

Social work seeks to enhance the social functioning of individuals, singly and in groups by activities focused upon their social relationships, which constitute the interaction between man and his environment. These activities can be grouped into three functions: restoration of impaired capacity, provision of individual and social resources, and prevention of social dysfunction (Boehm, V. 1, p. 54).

A year before the publication of the Boehm Report, Harriet M. Bartlett (1958) published a landmark article, in the NASW Journal, Social Work, in an effort to provide a working definition of social work she hoped would influence the Study. Although substantially more expansive, both definitions espouse the primacy of individuals and the interaction of individuals as the foundation for groups. As Bartlett made it clear, “the individual is the primary concern of this society” (p. 5). Ipso facto, the individual is also the primary concern of social work and a rationale for social casework and a social ontology of classical individualism.

Although subdued, permeating through the discussion is an unstated belief that carefully constructed definitions, clearly outlined values, a well-stated purpose and development of a curriculum built on scientific research and thoughtful studies with the result that the teaching of methods of intervention will enhance the credibility of the profession and improve the lives of

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clients. As such, the thirteen volumes are devoted to a mixture of fields of practice and methods: casework, administration, correctional work, public social services, rehabilitation, research, group work, social welfare policies, services in education and finally the teaching of values and ethics.

Following the publication of the Boehm Report’s thirteen volumes it is not surprising social work educators wanted something less voluminous. By mid-June 1960, CSWE arranged a

National Curriculum Workshop, attended by 58 graduate programs from the US and Canada.

Katherine Kendall’s Foreword to the publication that followed notes, “an effective professional curriculum in each of the graduate schools of social work has been a central concern of the

CSWE and it member schools” (CSWE, 1961, p. vii). Ralph Tyler, the curriculum advisor and member of the Boehm Technical Advisory Committee engaged the representatives of the 58 graduate programs in what was an edited examination and restatement of his four prime questions along with an extensive and highly pragmatic Question and Answer session.

Reading it some fifty years later one is left asking the question; what purpose did

Boehm’s thirteen volumes serve? This five day event generated enthusiasm as reported by

Kendall who, in turn, used the words of Reverend Shaun Govenlock to describe the response –

“consternation, admiration and appreciation” (p. viii) without a single readily identifiable reference to the Boehm Report throughout the record of the proceedings.

The 1964 CSWE Annual Conference – The Toronto School’s 50th Anniversary

A reading of highlights from the Report of the 1964 Annual Conference of CSWE, five

years after the publication of the Boehm Report, suggests a significant shift had taken place

among social work educators. The change is characterized by the announcement of the title of

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the paper delivered by S.M. Miller & Martin Rein, that, “Our new world requires new ideas. If those who ignore history are doomed to repeat the past, those who lack a sense of the future cannot escape from the clichés of the present” (1964, p.3). To make the point of a new and different social work world even clearer, the authors propose the following.

In defining social problems, such as economic dependency, juvenile delinquency, and fatherless families, as individual ills for which special kinds of services are needed, the helping professions run the danger of serving as the ‘policemen of the unconscious,’ concerned with infected individuals rather than infected environments (p. 13).

Miller & Rein echo Cassidy’s view of the 1930s that social work’s purpose is to be

engaged in ‘fighting the crime of poverty.’ At the same time, they clearly reject the staid

definition of the profession offered by the Boehm Report. Alternatively, perhaps it is merely a

wistful reflection for the return of the days of Mary van Kleeck and the Rank and File movement of the Great Depression era (Reisch & Andrews, 2002). Whatever the case, citing broadly from the social work literature, Reisch & Andrews made their case in front of more than 1,000

Canadians and Americans that the 1960s required a more radical approach to social work (Globe

and Mail, February 1, 1964).

Conferees, simultaneously celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Toronto School with its

Director, Charles Hendry suggesting “the need for a radical reorientation in the community’s

social services” (Globe and Mail, January 29, 1964). Not to be outdone, the Dean of the UCLA,

School of Social Work, Dr. Eileen Blackey, suggested that “bureaucratic structures surrounding

social welfare practice and education should be ‘demolished and schools of social work

restructured’” (Toronto Star, February, 1964). For a relative neophyte from Social Credit

Alberta, where the need for social work education of any kind remained an unknown in 1964

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and at best a highly contested and dubious enterprise, this could have been an eye-opening experience for what possibly lay ahead.

Counted among the prominent attendees at this Conference was Dr. Walters H. Johns,

President, University of Alberta, (Globe and Mail, January 29, 1964). At the time, Johns was still safely on the public record as committed to a veterinary program having suggested that perhaps social work education program should go to Saskatchewan (Letter to Mrs. Sparling,

March 21, 1963, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602).

On the other hand, the efforts by the University of Alberta, Calgary, to obtain the long sought after autonomy, may well have occupied and taken precedence in Johns’ thinking. After all his preferred vision for the future was for a slow and gradual strategy and only for increased responsibility within the framework of a single provincial University of Alberta, overseen by one President and led by a single Board of Governors, (Peter Krueger, Personal

Communication: February 25, 2011; Johns, 1981).

Nevertheless, Johns accepted an invitation by J.S. Morgan, a Toronto School of Social

Work faculty member, to participate on a panel possibly because of the well-known movement in Alberta to establish a school of social work. Morgan’s letter to Johns dated December 17,

1963, also pointed out that the invitation would give him an opportunity “to pick the best brains in social work education and meet people directly involved from the whole of North America.”

Morgan added to that comment in a January 7, 1963 letter to Johns, informing him of the other members of the panel and described Chernin as “one of the ablest and wisest of dean, I think”

(UAA Accession 69-123, Item 688, Box 39, School of Social Work). James Leiby, a faculty member at the Berkeley, School of Social Welfare during Chernin’s tenure concurred with

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Morgan’s assessment as Chernin was highly regarded not just by his faculty but also by his peers at the University of California (James Leiby, Personal Communication: April 25, 2011).

Although the provincial government had not made a commitment, Johns’ was well aware of the work and influence of the Alberta Social Work Education Research Committee and particularly its Chair, James Caven Mahaffy. Johns would have known Mahaffy, a well-known

Calgary lawyer, a former member of Calgary’s City Council, a former MLA and a Manning appointee to the first Alberta Crown Corporations, Alberta Gas Trunk Line. In the early 1940’s,

Mahaffy ran for provincial political office because he disliked Premier William Aberhart, his former Crescent Height High School principal (Cameron, n.d., p. 111).

As an independent MLA that included a brief period as the Leader of the Official

Opposition, Mahaffy also developed a good relationship with E.C. Manning. Above all, they trusted each other with the result that soon after William Aberhart’s death in 1943 and following

Manning’s selection as the Premier, Mahaffy resigned as MLA and returned to Calgary to practice law (Cameron, n.d., p. 111).

In 1947, Manning appointed Mahaffy as legal counsel to the Royal Commission on Child

Welfare (Royal Commission Report, 1947). In that capacity, a review of the CASW files in the

National Archives indicates Mahaffy exchanged correspondence about the social work profession and social work education with Joy Maines, the CASW Executive Secretary on several occasions. Ironically, those same records indicate that Charlotte Whitton was also seeking information and advice from Maines at the same time, as were several CASW members in Alberta.

In 1954, Manning appointed Mahaffy to Alberta’s first Crown Corporation engaged in the energy industry, Alberta Gas Trunk Line. Still later Mahaffy was appointed to the U of A,

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Board of Governors (Johns, 1981). Preston Manning described Mahaffy as a lawyer with a broad range of knowledge and interests, someone well known to his father especially after the

Premier appointed him to take the lead role with the Alberta Gas Trunk Line in 1954, and to whom senior officials and Premier Manning listened. “. . . he would have had I would think, numerous occasions to see the Premier on half a dozen things and if that was one of the bees in his bonnet, he would have had ample opportunity to express it (Preston Manning, Personal

Communication: May 17, 2011).

Consequently, with a thorough understanding of the Alberta political landscape, Johns’ interest peaked with the receipt of Morgan’s invitation and the opportunity to speak about in- service training for social work staff at an international conference. Unfortunately, because of

another commitment, he was disappointed and unable to attend the celebratory dinner with

Phillip S. Fisher, Chair of the Southam Company Board, who spoke about social work education

in his capacity as the Chair of the Commission on Education and Personnel, of the Canadian

Welfare Council.

In spite of his absence, Johns acquired a copy of Fischer’s speech that spoke at

considerable length from the Toronto platform about the serious shortage of personnel in the

broad social welfare field along with the challenges of social work education to meet the

growing demand for professional education. Echoing Alice Salomon’s self-reflection, Fischer

observed that, “If the curricula are to be broadened from ‘treatment’ orientation as it has been

called to ‘social structure’ orientation, how far should this be carried?” (Fisher, 1964, p. 8). In a

similar vein, he suggests, “I have heard some teachers in their enthusiasm talk as if they wanted

the Schools turned into Schools of Sociology” (p. 8). Likewise, he notes that one of his greatest

concerns is “I have had the feeling that many of our Schools are not fully integrated,

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sentimentally as well as practically, into the lives of the Universities of which they are a part” (p.

8). It is followed by the following suggestion, “Sometimes I think it is because the Schools have not defined clearly enough the philosophy of the profession and the role they should play in the overall framework of the University” (p. 8).

Accepting the invitation and keeping his commitment, required Johns to take an overnight flight to Toronto, arriving early in the morning and returning to Edmonton late the same evening. Meanwhile he made his presentation as part of a panel discussion that included

Dean Milton Chernin from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Social Welfare, where he had succeeded the founding Dean, Harry Cassidy.

Although it appears to have been Johns’ only in-person meeting with Chernin, the two

impressed each other. Following approval of a school of social work in Alberta, Johns wrote

Chernin on June 10, 1965 and based on their relatively brief meeting on the panel and their

lunch hour conversation at the Royal York Hotel coffee shop, Johns asked Chernin to consider

the position of Director of Alberta’s school of social work. Chernin, in turn, gracefully declined

Johns’ invitation. However, likely at Johns’ urging, U of C President Armstrong invited Chernin

back to Alberta in May 1966, to meet with an Advisory Committee for advice on the selection of

a Director to lead the school of social work at the University of Calgary.

XIIth International Conference on Social Work – Athens, 1964

The same year as the Miller & Rein remarks at the Toronto CSWE meeting and five

years after the Boehm Report, the XIIth International Conference of Social Work, in Athens, also

signaled a different vision for social work. This time it took place under the theme of, Social

Progress through Social Planning – The Role of Social Work. The Proceedings of the

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Conference report the event brought together delegates from 66 countries and included social workers, economists, urban planners, sociologists, demographers, educators and diplomats

(ICSW, 1965). Even now, in 2013, reading the Proceedings, it is difficult to imagine the certainty and triumphalism of the welcome addresses by national and international speakers would find a similar place and response.

A sense of future certainty in the Reports of the Working Party that met prior to the main

Conference, defined the idea of social progress in terms of “value judgments which cannot be separated from beliefs as to the causes and objectives . . . [it] . . . is dynamic and needs to be itself progressive (ICSW, 1965, p. 14). Among the specific elements included in the progressive view are peace, human rights, elimination of poverty, preservation of health and the promotion of education (p. 14 – 15) and the broad view of social work and social welfare.

Planning and particularly social planning were considered essential with a strong institutionalized base of operation as well as a more defused public process including an important role for the voluntary sector. Even though schools of social work poorly prepared students for the challenges of integrating social, economic, political, technical and physical planning, they were to be part of a comprehensive proposal for development of measures to combat the social ills of the day, e.g., fighting the crime of poverty.

That same lack of preparation did not deter the Conference participants from engaging in a wide-ranging discussion about the role of social workers and of social work education; both received considerable attention during the Conference. As a result, Study Groups outlined in considerable detail the new requirements for social work schools around the world. The

Conference went further, identifying social workers as community leaders, taking responsibility

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for helping integrate a broad spectrum of participants in planning and related them to elements of

a progressive view (see especially Study Groups 7, 8, 9 and 10, p. 311-331).

In broad terms, there was widespread agreement that social workers could only be

successful if their education included the study of local neighbourhoods, communities, health,

education and urban development issues in a social, economic and political context. Social work

was to take a much broader view of its assignment in extending the scope of social welfare and

wellbeing to take into account in the growing trend towards urbanization.

As noted by Lucien Mehl, (France) Director of Practical Training, National School of

Administration and Chair of the Pre-Conference Working Party, “First of all, it seems to me that the evolution of man is now conceived as a progressive process in spite of difficulties, dangers and unresolved problems” (p. 47). On behalf of the Working Party, Mehl went on to discuss the

role of the social worker in the context of planning and social planning. He envisaged a central

role for social work not so much as the expert in all things but rather as the profession to “assure

the relevance and coherence of the plan as far as values and ends are concerned, to promote its

realization with the maximum effectiveness and to encourage participation of individuals and

groups” (p. 56). In terms of social work education, Mehl had an expansive view and in a word,

Mehl’s suggestion amounts to a form of reconciliation among varying interests.

Our view of social work must be enlarged. In fact, social work must not only cooperate in planning, but in addition, it must itself be a specific and essential factor in social progress. While social work operates with and in a plan, it must also work outside of and beyond a plan.

For it must be emphasized, a plan is not a panacea. It cannot foresee everything or promote everything and, more generally, the state cannot nor should do everything (p. 57).

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The proposals for social work education at this Conference from a wide-range of international academics with diverse professional backgrounds differed dramatically from the direction set by CSWE on behalf of Canadian and American schools of social work seeking accreditation based on the Boehm Report and the CSWE efforts barely five years earlier.

XIIIth International Conference on Social Work – Washington DC, 1966

With significantly less triumphalism, the XIIIth gathering of ICSW, this time in

Washington DC, nevertheless took a similar stance towards the scope of social work practice by

exploring the urban environment and the full range of its implications for human social welfare.

Recognizing that the process of urbanization had profound implications for the parallel processes

of enhancing social welfare, this Conference also participated in a wide-ranging discussion about

the role of social work with presentations from Europe, Africa, Brazil, Germany, Israel, and

Italy.

The scope of issues included matters that are more traditional: shelter, income

maintenance, employment and unemployment, schools, family life, government structures,

children, persons with disabilities, health care, etc. The public policy questions that emerged

from these discussions included neighbourhood, community centres, citizen participation,

recreation, urban planning and development, social planning and the role of social workers as

members of interdisciplinary professional teams and the interrelatedness of urban and rural

development; little about life in the mid-1960’s was left out of the discussions.

As part of the International Conference of Social Work, Robert A.B. Leaper of

University College of Swansea reported the highlights from the earlier International Congress of

Schools of Social Work. The theme of that conference, Education for Social Responsibility and

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the Contemporary Role of the Social Work Profession, resulted in a series of question that recurred throughout its proceedings.

1. Recognized the need for a reassessment of their role and their present methods of social work education

2. Accepted that they and the students whom they prepare for their profession have to be aware of, and involved in, social reform and cannot accept a merely passive role as charitable workers who collect the human mistakes left over from an unjust society

3. Recognized, nevertheless, that there is now a large repository of knowledge about social work and its implications which it would be foolish to ignore

4. Welcomed an expansion and an upgrading of social work education and a closer relationship with those trained in related disciplines (p. 318)

Dame Eileen Younghusband is quoted as suggesting, “If social work students are simply

taught to become faithful retriever dogs for administrators, they will hardly fulfill social work’s

role as a precipitator and shock absorber of social change and its more fundamental role in

humanizing social relationships” (p. 315).

While the educators did not take a definitive position on the question, the focus of

responsibility for learning and personal development shifted to the student. Leaper suggests,

Perhaps, there has been too much exposition of methods as if they were unquestionable. We are not concerned with turning out well-drilled automata who never question the assumptions of their profession, but full educated people who know the background and history of social work and are encouraged to be critical and well-informed without falling into the juvenile error of rejecting all the past simply because it is past (p. 316-317).

This places this Study in the larger and international context in which the School of

Social Welfare, at the University of Calgary was established. Social work education in North

America, led by developments in the United States was in a state of disarray, unclear about

where it should go. The accreditation stamp of professional approval, while perhaps somewhat

more certain, was essentially a reflection of American society, namely highly individualistic and

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accordingly focused on applicable methods. The continental European inheritance had slid into the background, while the English history, at least in so far as it applied to social work, was at best a remnant of itself particularly as manifest in the idea of the common good and the idealism espoused by Urwick.

CANADIAN SOCIAL POLICY AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL WORK

Richards (Dick) Splane’s (1965), Social Welfare in Ontario: 1791-1893, A Study of

Public Welfare Administration, continues to be among the most comprehensive analysis of the earliest efforts to address a wide range of issues experienced by Canadians living in Ontario during the pre-Confederation period. Initially, Splane had intended to limit his examination to the development of child welfare programs. However, with H. Cassidy and J.S. Morgan as his supervisors, he soon realized child welfare services came rather late in the development of the broad array of public services under the general rubric of social welfare programs (Splane, 1965,

Preface).

Instead, his examination takes a journey through Upper Canada, the Constitutional Act of

1791 and the development of elite groups known as the Family Compact and the development of unelected local governments designed to retain British control over the colony. Lord Durham’s

1839 Report, triggered by the excessive power and influence over Upper Canada by members of the Compact, proposed establishing a single Province of Canada by unifying Upper and Lower

Canada. The Durham Report also proposed strengthening municipal governments but failed to include them in the Act of Union of 1841 until an amendment passed by both Upper and Lower

Canada established the powers of municipalities before the Act of Union became law. However, while the Municipal Corporations Act created municipalities with “an enduring structure of

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municipal government for the province, it did not carry social welfare provisions forward beyond the point of institutional care” (P. 30).

During the Union period of 1841 – 1867, the Legislature strengthened the provincial administration substantially in several areas dealing with the social welfare of the Province of

Canada. Splane comments that in spite of a lack of co-ordination between provincial goals, hospitals and asylums and grants to charities and private hospitals, for its time the progress,

“must, in the context of its times, be regarded as truly remarkable” (p. 31).

The administrative mechanism to address the issues associated with the Union involved the appointment of a Board of Inspectors of Prisons, Asylums and Public Charities. The Board was given broad authority for the dual task of what it defined early in its existence as inspection:

“finding out what was taking place in institutions” and administration: “the formulation of regulations and standards” (p.37). Although the Board had the authorization to inspect public institutions, it was also authorized to examine “private charitable institutions receiving provincial grants” . . . “at the request of the governor-general’s request, it would appear that this request was not made and there is no evidence that the inspectors sought the right to bring the voluntary institutions under their scrutiny” (p. 39 – 40).

Grants to some private institutions were also problematic during the Union period.

Splane notes that governments of the day found it difficult to refuse grants because of the makeshift and piecemeal nature by which the government distributed those grants. Furthermore, he notes there were substantial differences in the number of grants to institutions in Upper and

Lower Canada where the presence of the Roman Catholic Church held sway allowing it maintain a dominant role in social welfare programs.

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As a result, by the time of Confederation, the task of integrating and creating an efficient public administration remained incomplete. Moreover, even though Ontario rejected adoption of the English Poor Laws, the bifurcation of responsibility for social welfare, reflected a structure with notable similarities to that of the English Poor Laws. As Splane suggests, by 1867, when the British North America Act received approval from the English Parliament, many of the structural questions for addressing social welfare issues were already resolved. Consequently, it is not surprising that after a search of the records of the debates, Splane was unable to locate any suggestion that a serious debate about the role question had even taken place.

In accepting the organizational and administrative structures of the Province of Canada

and especially those of its predecessor, Upper Canada, it is no surprise the drafters of the British

North America Act accepted the practices of Upper Canada and the Province of Canada as

guidance in drafting Section 91 and 92 of the BNA. However, their division of powers between

the federal and provincial governments left municipal governments as the impoverished

creatures of provincial legislation.

The Division of Federal and Provincial Powers

Frederick Vaughan (2010), in Viscount Haldane, The Wicked Step-Father of the

Canadian Constitution, suggests that the division of powers in the Canadian Constitution suffers from the influence of Viscount Haldane’s view of expanding provincial powers at a cost to the

federal role. At the same time, Vaughan notes the difficulty in showing “how his [Haldane] abstract philosophical influences have come to shape the moral life of the Canadian polity through the judgments of judges” (p. 239). He suggests the German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel shaped Haldane’s philosophy of history and interpretation of constitutional law and reflects a

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deeply embedded relativism now embedded in Canadian constitutional law as the ‘living tree” doctrine (Clark, 1989; Edwards vs. A.G. of Canada).

Effectively the living tree is a metaphor, or as Vaughan prefers, a mask for “modern liberalism, modernism, or progressivism. But he believes that at the core lies Hegelian historical relativism, more frequently than not in tandem with social Darwinism” (p. 240). The consequence, he suggests is that natural rights are transformed into historical rights. That conclusion in particular, puts him at odds with David Schneiderman (2012), who suggests

Vaughan offers his readers a faulty, if not misleading interpretation (p. 626).

Nevertheless, Haldane’s position as a Judge of the Judicial Committee of the England’s

Privy Council that served as Canada’s highest Court until 1949 meant he created and influenced the interpretation of federal/provincial powers laid out in the British North America Act of 1867.

According to Vaughan, even the Peace, Order and Good Government Clause of the BNA, was limited to national emergencies, suggesting Viscount Haldane contradicted the views of those who drafted the Act.

S. Wexler (1983), made essentially the same point in The Urge to Idealize: Viscount

Haldane and the Constitution of Canada, about the impact of Haldane’s constitutional decisions with respect to Articles 91 and 92 of the BNA. While acknowledging the influence of Hegel,

Wexler also suggests there were two other sources of influence, namely, English Imperialism in the form of self-governing colonies and Irish Home Rule, the struggle between a central government Parliament and those of the provinces. In case of the latter, provinces were seen as struggling for freedom in much the same way as the Irish quest for Home Rule, an issue in which

Haldane apparently had personal involvement.

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Similarly, Schneiderman (2012) acknowledged the influential role of Viscount Haldane in shaping the interpretation of the BNA, reducing federal powers while strengthening provincial powers. Moreover, he similarly views Haldane as Hegelian Idealist, but because of his friendship with the young political pluralist Harold Laski, Schneiderman views Haldane’s decisions in the context of a ‘functional federalism’ as a form of ‘pluralism.’ It’s a view shared by D.R. Cameron and J.D. Krikorian (2002) in their review of academic journals between 1960 -

1999.

Somewhat parenthetically, both Vaughan and Schneiderman note Haldane, Harold Laski,

Beatrice and Sidney Webb along with several other well-known Fabian socialists, were frequent dinner companions and avid supporters of the London School of Economics. Webb (1948) in fact, comments extensively about a friendship with Haldane, the reciprocal nature of the influence meant each exercised influence on the other, including regular and frequent debates about the virtues of collectivism. Moreover, Haldane appears to have supported the Webbs at various points in their efforts to repeal the Poor Laws replacing them with the Fabian’s proposals for a national social minimum.

Even as Haldane was assisting the Webb’s, engaged in the development of the London

School of Economics and numerous political endeavors (Webb, 1948), he articulated the relativist doctrine in the Creighton Lecture of March 6, 1914, entitled, The Meaning of Truth in

History. Although Hegel is mentioned in passing, the essential point made in a discussion about history as art and so in an idealized fashion, he writes:

It does not detract from the truth of the work of the artist that the cottage and the figures in his landscape never existed exactly as he has painted them, or even at all. What is important is that they should suggest the deeper and more enduring meaning of what is actual, in the fullest and most important sense. The expression which the portrait painter has put on canvas may be a rare one - the expression,

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perhaps, of an individuality seized at a unique moment of existence. But all the more does that expression stand out as the truth about the real life of the man whose portrait is there (Haldane, 1914, p. 290 - 291).

It is necessary to look beyond what is painted to find a deeper meaning that ultimately forms the truth about the real life of the person that is portrayed. Vaughan suggests that the

Hegelian version of the truth lies deep in the historical process of a dominant “thesis but within that thesis itself resides a restless countervailing force or antithesis which in time begins the restless struggle to oust the prevailing thesis with the promise to expand the enjoyment of a greater political and moral freedom” (p. 240).

According to Vaughan then, this basic idealist principle also lies at the heart of the

Viscount Haldane constitutional decisions during the early part of the 20th century. Moreover, he argues, the principle is currently so deeply embedded in Canadian constitutional law that the current Supreme Court has continued with that analysis of the decisions it is compelled to make.

Although Haldane died in 1928, the legacy of his rulings also significantly influenced the

‘persons’ case brought to the Privy Council by the Famous Five. Vaughan, quoting Lord

Sankey’s judgment introduced the ‘living tree’ metaphor by suggesting that the “exclusion of women from all public offices is a relic of days more barbarous than ours,” and went on to describe “the British North America Act as a ‘living tree’ capable of growth and expansion within its natural limits” (p. 215). The ‘living tree’ concept has since been used in a wide-range

of the Canadian Supreme Court decisions among them the Eagan case that ‘read in’ the rights of

gay and lesbian persons into Section 15(1) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The overall effect of the Haldane decisions, Vaughan suggests has been to limit

significantly the scope of federal powers particularly during times of economic upheaval.

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Vaughan appears to suggest that Haldane’s aversion to supporting a strong federal government was likely based on his dislike for the federal system of the British North America Act.

However, Haldane’s adoption of Hegelian idealism has also been, as Alisa M. Watkinson points out, the source for some of the progressive liberal Supreme Court decisions. Thus, rights enumerated in the Charter were extended, as noted above, to include analogous grounds for non- discrimination. Watkinson details several examples from child welfare cases to illustrate the point that the Charter has expanded the scope of provincial social policy and affected social work directly (Watkinson, 1999, p. 74-77).

The Haldane philosophy and associated legal precedents constrained the federal role in the development of national social policy as reflected in the disputes regarding the development of national programs, e.g., unemployment insurance, old age pensions and national health care.

Nevertheless, there were also significant efforts at national cooperation such as the Canada

Pension Program, the 1966 Canada Assistance Plan, funding for post-secondary education and health care through the Established Programs Financing Act of 1977.

The expansion of provincial jurisdiction through the decisions of the Supreme Court and the rights of ‘individuals’ through the Charter of Rights and Freedoms represents a double-edged

sword for social work. In the case of Alberta and some other jurisdiction, it has embedded in

both the public mind and in the legislative history, a public policy framework that predates its

1905 entry into the federation.

THE ALBERTA CONTEXT

Alberta inherited its public policy framework for addressing social issues from the

Northwest Territories when the Parliament of Canada passed the Alberta Act in 1905. For nearly

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the next 40 years, responsibility for addressing those issues was at best a patchwork of charities, provincial and municipal government programs with RCMP officers often left to enforce whatever legislation was available in rural areas. Established in 1919, the Department of Public

Health the Annual Report for 1921 is the first now readily available on-line. Child welfare clinics provided nursing services related to childhood illnesses and ‘charity’ received a single sentence of recognition for an expenditure of $11,196.39. The 1923 Annual Report contains a summary of the operations of an Edmonton based institution responsible for ‘mental defectives.’

The recognition of Charity and Relief waited to 1927 before recognition as sufficiently worthy for its own line in the Table of Contents.

In the early aftermath of WW II Alberta expected to experience many of the same issues as the rest of Canada. The return of thousands of soldiers, the reorientation of the economy, the fear of a return to the Depression, rising prices, federal price controls, labour unrest in many parts of the province and the fear of global communism all weighed on Albertans. The necessity of reconstructing and re-industrializing large parts of a devastated European economy, the

simultaneous re-orientation of the North American economy from production of war materiel to

a peaceful pursuit of consumer goods concerned the public. The effect of returning soldiers with

limited peacetime skills and out of the labour market for much of a decade, the withdrawal of

women from the war-based economy and the arrival of large numbers of European immigrants,

introduced new expectations and presented new issues for public policy and new expectations for

professions.

Decisions by the Aberhart/Manning Social Credit government during the war period

established the framework for the development of the tar sands in ‘the North’ without more than

a dim awareness that the cost and benefits were to be realized well into the future. Even the not

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so distant discovery of oil at Leduc was largely unanticipated. Rather its focus was on addressing the short-term fears of Canadians and particularly those living in Alberta (Alberta

Journals, 1944 – Speech from the Throne, p. 8 – 9).

The establishment of the Department of Public Welfare in 1944 was at least in part the result of some forward thinking as the tide was turning in the European theatre. The new

Department was in part established with the prospect of returning soldiers and families, “for the purpose of safeguarding the rights and best interests of returned men and women and of the dependents of those now absent” (Alberta Journal, February 10, 1944, p. 8). Imbued with the spirit of the Social Gospel, an acceptable political rationale existed to consolidate child welfare and financial assistance in its own department albeit with a minimalist mandate and operational jurisdiction limited to areas outside the province’s major municipalities.

For social welfare programs in Alberta, the decision would eventually successfully demonstrate the effectiveness of cost-shared cooperation between the three orders of government, enabled by the Social Credit government’s 1966 Preventive Social Services Act.

The developments of a wide range of local social service programs funded by municipal

governments contributed significantly to demand for professional social work education in both

the public and charitable sector.

The discussion to establish this legislative framework for cost-shared funding began in the late 1950s, with a series of informal interprovincial meetings. The Western Provinces held their informal meetings at least as early as the mid to late 1950’s. Alberta was a major participant in those discussions, initially led by Deputy Minister Ray G. Hagen, of Public

Welfare, (Annual Report, Department of Public Welfare, 1957/58), and grandfather to Ray

Thomlison, later to become the Dean of Faculty of Social Work.

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Alberta’s Inheritance – An 1834 Poor Law Public Policy Framework

Dick Splane (1965), has pointed out that Upper Canada, or what is now Southern

Ontario, formally rejected the English Poor Laws in its enactment of English civil law. It did this, in contrast to most other North American jurisdictions at the time. Although there is no record of why this was so, Splane suggests three possible explanations: idealistic expectations about the future prospects for Upper Canada, a way to reinforce local municipal responsibility for the poor, and finally, for the practical reasons that England’s class structure produced different expectations (p. 66). On the other hand, it is also possible that all three explanations played a role in rejecting the Poor Laws.

In contrast, the early history of Alberta’s public policy framework for social issues is forgotten, overlooked or even dismissed. For instance, Dennis Guest (2003), The Emergence of

Social Security in Canada, offers a detailed account of the influence of the English Poor Laws and suggests the four western provinces, unlike New Brunswick and Nova Scotia were never subject to the structure of those laws. Moreover, these four provinces, he suggests, adopted Poor

Laws as a ‘look-alike’ framework mostly as a function of colonial habit and more as a matter of convenience (p. 16), then by direct inheritance of legislation.

The history of the Poor Laws also appears in the late 19th century legal development of

the Northwest Territories and Rupert’s Land with its consequences for what are now the Yukon

Territories and the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and parts of Manitoba. John Blue

(1924,V.1), Alberta Past and Present, as well as the more recent, Family Law Project:

Overview, Report for Discussion No. 18, by the Alberta Law Reform Institute, (1998), offer a succinct summary of the legislative history of the Northwest Territories as it relates to Alberta.

Both Blue and the Law Reform Institute point out that “in 1886, the Parliament of Canada

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declared the laws of England as of July 15, 1870, to have been received in the Northwest

Territories, except insofar as they are excluded by competent legislation” (Alberta Law Reform

Institute, 1998, p. 13; Blue, 1924, p. 375).

This application of English law became necessary to avoid legal conflicts when Rupert’s

Land and the NWT transferred to Canada and compensated the Hudson’s Bay Co. for its loss of the NWT. As the Alberta Law Institute points out, the public law of England at the time

included the well-known 1834 English Poor Laws. In Alberta, its basic structure and categories

remain in place imposing its historical burden on the development of social work, social work

education and the social welfare and well-being of Albertans.

Confirming the inheritance, the Alberta Act of 1905 included an express provision

carrying the Poor Laws forward into Alberta law until it was repealed, revised or replaced by an

Act of the Legislatures. In establishing municipalities, the Government of the Northwest

Territories adopted an Ordinance stating, “the Council of every Municipality may pass bylaws

for the relief of the poor” (Revised Ordinances of the North-West Territories, 1888, p. 63). In

practice, the permissive nature of the legislation meant that local charitable organizations took

the lead in providing relief for the poor, supplemented as needed by contributions from the local

municipality (Calgary Family Services, 2010).

Thus already in the late 19th century and into the early 20th century, the framework for

addressing poverty and child welfare were primarily the responsibility of local charities and

somewhat later to a limited degree, local governments. An examination of the Annual Reports

of the Alberta Department of Public Health well into the 1920s, suggests unnamed local charities

apparently assisted the poor while the Department provided some kind of unspecified oversight

and summarized its observations in the Department’s Annual Reports.

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The 1926 Department’s Annual Report notes that a Branch, responsible for Charity and

Relief was established on November 15, 1926, to serve residents of Improvement Districts and

Transients – the latter were exclusively men, often travelling around while looking for work. It is unclear whether this was the result of a failure by charities, or an act of government generosity

to provide food, clothing, housing, hospitalization and medical services in the remote and

sparsely populated regions. At the same time, the Report suggests that close scrutiny of

applicants was likely to reduce the overall costs of the program.

During the WW II period and for some time following, the fear of returning to pre-war

social and economic conditions was visceral for the public and for all governments. Alberta was

no exception with post-war prospects for social and economic dislocation a worrisome matter.

In March 1943, the Social Credit government established its post war reconstruction committee

to plan for the return of the armed services personnel, the re-orientation to the realities of a

peacetime economy and the prevention of the fear and possible reality of repeating the pre-war

social dislocation (Meyers, 2006). Among the preparations was the creation of the Department

of Public Welfare with one of its functions to assist returning soldiers and their families.

However, it would not be until the late 1950’s and early 1960’s that the government attempted to

modify the basic policy structure of the Poor Laws with the introduction of needs tests (Dave

Stolee, Personal Communication:, December 20, 2010).

The development of the Preventive Social Services program, a unique Alberta program

followed a decade of efforts, begun during Ray G. Hagan’s term as the Deputy Minister,

(1958/59 Annual Report, Department of Public Welfare, p. 13) to engage the federal government

in cost-sharing provincial social welfare and social assistance costs. The realization of that

initiative came in the form of the 1966 Canada Assistance Plan Act, a cost-sharing measure by

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the federal government for provincial and municipal social programs. The 1966 Preventive

Social Services Act not only contained a provision allowing the Minister to establish the qualifications for positions in funded programs as a condition of provincial funding, but its benefits were ostensibly intended to prevent the need for statutory program interventions.

In the late 1970’s, 35 years after the establishment of the Department of Public Welfare, the provincial government assumed full responsibility for all welfare services. Thus, by 1978, the responsibility for Alberta’s statutory social programs was firmly established with a marked division between the role of local charities, non-profits and the major municipal governments and the statutory responsibilities of the provincial government. Nevertheless, during the same period, federal, provincial and municipal funding under the 1966 Canada Assistance Act increasingly crossed the boundaries to augment the role of charities and not-for-profit organizations, arguably beginning a reversal back to the policy structure of the Poor Laws.

Leslie Bella (1978) describes a level of conviviality among Deputy Minister Duncan

Rogers, John Ward and Minister Leonard Halmrast that contributed to the development of

Alberta’s social programs. Halmrast, a sheepherder before becoming a Social Credit MLA, and apparently inclined to use his background to explain social programs as Bella (1978) notes, not infrequently confused ‘prevention’ with ‘rehabilitation.’ On the other hand, Duncan Rogers,

John Ward and John Smith wanted the PSS program to focus on the development of local prevention programs and were successful in persuading Halmrast to support their proposal

Even though Deputy Minister Duncan Rogers, primarily responsible for development of the Preventive Social Services Act, did not want the statutory funding going “to support the crumbling foundations of established agencies, . . . that’s where a lot of the money went”

(Samuel E. Blakely, Personal Communication: February 24, 2011; Finkel, 2006). What initially

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began as a preventive community participation and development program, designed to prevent social issues from gaining a foothold, turned into a federal, provincial and municipal funding program largely for charitable and non-profit programs oriented to the social casework model of social work practice.

Early Alberta-Based Advocates

Persons known as “social workers” and in some instances those thought or known to possess the requisite academic credentials came to Alberta much earlier than generally recognized. Kay Sanderson & Elda Hauschildt’s, (1999), 200 Remarkable Alberta Women, provides some insight into the lives of these remarkable women and their commitment to various social causes that led some of them to be recognized as ‘social workers.’ Sanderson, who appears to have done the research for the book, deposited her research notes at the Bert Sheppard

Stockmen's Foundation Library and Archives in Cochrane, AB, sharing space with the records of

Alberta’s legendary Wild West ranches and the progeny of select bulls and their brands.

Sanderson’s notes include the background to the suggestion that Marion Coutts Carson

was known as a “pioneer social worker.” In support of that designation, Sanderson notes the 37- year-old Carson came to the 14 year-old town of Calgary in 1898, in the Northwest Territories, some 7 years before Alberta became a province of the Dominion of Canada and before a social work education program was established anywhere in Canada or in the world for that matter. In that respect, Carson might well be considered a social worker not unlike Octavia Hill, Jane

Addams or for that matter, Harry Cassidy. Certainly, she appears to have displayed the same qualities and interests in a town of approximately 5,000 residents (City of Calgary Handbook

2013 – online).

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Following her arrival in Calgary, Carson was soon engaged in a variety of local community issues. Among the many activities that attracted her attention was the first iteration of the Local Council of Women which Lady Lougheed organized in 1894 (GMA, Finding Aid,

Calgary Local Council of Women). Although not identified as a ‘social worker’ by Sanderson,

Lougheed is noted as “active in the Calgary Children’s Aid Society, the VON and the I.O.D.E.”

(p. 12). Historian, David Bright (1998 & 2006), notes Carson, along with her sister, leaned towards socialism (1998, p. 113), and together they were part of group of women and men in

Calgary, numbering more than 3,000, who held a range of views but nevertheless shared an interest in the social issues of the early 1920’s. The group held public debates and engaged in political and social action in pursuit of their aims (Bright, 2006, p. 434).

Among the other groups in which Carson participated involved working with TB patients and the eradication of TB, then a leading cause of death (Norris, 1995). In 1912, this group of women in which Carson played a key role, established a small hospital in Calgary for TB patients, located at 12th Ave and 6th St. SE, (Sanderson, 1999, p. 15; BSSFLA, Kay Sanderson

Collection, Coutts Research Notes).

Dorothy King is likely the earliest social worker with the requisite academic credentials

known to have come to Alberta. King came from England to Alberta in 1918, to lead

Edmonton’s Board of Public Welfare (Reichwein, 2009). King was a graduate of the New York

School of Social Work, a BA and MA at New York University (MacLennan, 1984, p. 107). In

1933 in the early stage of the Depression, the Montreal School of Social Work recruited King.

The School was the abandoned child of McGill University and operated on student fees, gifts

and King’s sheer dedication to the task (Jennissen and Lundy, 2011).

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Jessie Louise Purves Church came to Calgary in 1919 as a welfare officer for the federal

Department of Pension. Kay Sanderson’s research notes identify her as the 1912 recipient of a

Certificate in Social Work from Macdonald College at McGill University (BSSFLA, Sanderson

& Hauschildt Collection; Research Notes). The fact McGill didn’t offer social work education until 1918, led to additional inquiries at Macdonald College only to learn the College’s early student records are now incomplete. Nevertheless, the current Macdonald College Dean

Chandra Madramootoo, suggested it might be possible that Jessie Church attended as reported and may have taken courses related to social work in the teacher’s program offered by the

College at the time, (Chandra Madramootoo, Personal Communication: February 23, 2012).

A review of highlights of the 1913 Report by the Royal Commission on Industrial

Training and Technical Education, chaired by James W. Robertson, a former Macdonald

College Principal, suggests early 20th century education issues were directly related to the changing social conditions Canadians faced as the consequence of the industrialization process taking hold in Canada (RCITTE, 1913). Lady Aberdeen (1910), in a collection of reminiscences in Our Lady of the Sunshine and Her International Visitors, lent some credence to

Madramootoo’s suggestion. Frökrn Gina Krög, the President of the National Council of Women of Norway, referenced a meeting with Principal Dr. James W. Robertson of MacDonald College at Ste. Anne de Bellevue and wrote the following comment. “This is a school in the best sense of the word, where the youth of Canada may be trained in special studies and go out as teachers”

(p. 71). In the same context, Krög notes that in Canada, unlike European cities, churches are engaged in social work (p.71).

With Ricoeur’s comment in mind that imagination “is located at the lowest rung of the ladder of modes of knowledge” it’s imaginable that MacDonald College graduates became

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engaged once having taken the College’s special studies and were subsequently known as ‘social workers’ well before institutions formally charged with social work as its educative purpose were established in Canada.

An International Event and Its Influence

Several noteworthy points in the early history of Alberta are best described here as an interruption, a Foucault-like discontinuity (1972), in that they appear as unrelated events to the development of social work in Alberta. Nevertheless, the events and their significance fit well within the larger social reform context of the late 19th and early 20th century that in due course

also led to the formation and legitimacy for social work. Among the earliest of these events was

a July 1909 visit to Alberta by a group of 100 women from the International Congress of

Women following their Quinquennial Conference in Toronto in late June travelled across

Canada at the urging of Lady Aberdeen, the wife of the Governor General of Canada (1893-

1898).

Aberdeen served as the President of the International Congress of Women for nearly a

decade in the late 19th century and became a staunch supporter and friend of Alice Salomon, its

Corresponding Secretary, Jane Addams and likely, Henrietta Muir Edwards of the Famous Five.

Moreover, while in Canada, she helped establish the National Council of Women, the Victorian

Order of Nurses. During her husband’s term as Canada’s Governor General, Lady Aberdeen,

the President of the National Council of Women, was the guest speaker at the inaugural meeting

of the Calgary Local Council of Women in 1895. Marjorie Norris (1995), A Leaven of Ladies,

described the Council as “mothering society.”

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Aberdeen’s (1910), Our Lady of the Sunshine and Her International Visitors, presents a series of impressions written by the women of the Congress and created at her request about the experiences travelling across Canada in a private Pullman train. As Alice Salomon points out in her autobiography, it really wasn’t necessary to point to the moments of the train experience.

With 100 women in a train of 4 Pullman cars for three weeks with little opportunity to wash personally or their clothing, inadequate bathing facilities and infrequent stops for washroom breaks while travelling through the summer heat of the Canadian prairies, left little need for imagination (Salomon, 2004, p. 81-88).

Nevertheless, Frau Marie Stritt, First Vice-President of the Congress and President of the

German National Council of Women wrote, “I do not know who first thought of the idea, but the project of combining an unofficial tour of pleasure with a semi-official missionary expedition proved a happy one (p. 10). Frökrn Gina Krög, the President of the National Council of Women of Norway, comments that even “during a short visit is noticeable, is that in Canada the churches seem to undertake much of the philanthropic and social work which in most European countries is done by the municipalities and the governments” (p. 71).

The Toronto Globe of June 26, 1909, reported on an interview with Dr. Alice Salomon during which the newly elected Corresponding Secretary of the Congress discussed her election, her views on poverty and the opening of the Soziale Frauenschule in Berlin, Germany, a year earlier. Salomon commented that the Frauenschule was expected to attract only a few girls, however, 85 students were introduced to political economy, domestic economy, hygiene and literature including the works of Thomas Carlyle and John Ruskin.

The Calgary Daily Herald of July 8, 1909 recognized the women as part of the group of

100 special visitors, to the Alberta Fair, on July 7, 1909 on a day designated as both Citizen Day

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and American Day. The Edmonton Bulletin of July 9, 1909, records the visit of the 100 women to that city for an opportunity to discuss developments in their homelands. Apparently, an update on international developments and women’s right to vote were among the topics discussed that day on Mrs. E. V. Hardisty’s lawn at 5th Street in Edmonton (p. 3).

While it’s well beyond the scope of this study, one might reasonably speculate that to a

Hardisty, distantly related to the already prominent Lougheed family, discussions about a wide range of issues with a visiting group of approximately 100 privileged women following an international Conference in Toronto, held a special interest to the similarly, locally privileged women in Alberta’s capital. Even more so, since Lady Aberdeen initiated the tour, it ensured the

reports of those conversations likely resonated and remained of great interest in other areas of

Alberta. Moreover, it suggests Western Canadian women especially those of privilege were interested in and aware of developments elsewhere adding an international context to the issues affecting them and their communities.

Social Workers in the Alberta Department of Public Health

The earliest reference to a social worker hired by an Alberta government occurs in the

1925 Annual Report of the Department of Public Health, during the first term of the United

Farmers of Alberta. The Annual Report of that year notes the hiring of a social worker in the

Institutional Branch of the Department, however, it quickly adds the social worker “for reasons

of economy did not function as such during the year” (p. 44). It seems that government funding

for the Red Deer Provincial Training School for the ‘feeble minded’ was inadequate and hence

unable to meet the need for institutional care so funds were diverted to remodel balconies as

rooms.

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The 1928/29 Annual Report references a social services worker responsible for interviewing persons suspected of being a carrier of a venereal disease (p. 28 - 29). Although the

Department’s legislation allowed it to enforce a requirement to examine and treat a carrier, most of the individuals came forward voluntarily including those found not guilty of prostitution. The social services worker’s responsibility involved taking “a careful social history” to identify “the source of the infection” (p. 28 -29). Although limited to less than half a page, the same Annual

Report records for the first time some limited activities of the Charity and Relief Branch, noting

149 person received care at Homes for the Incurables (p. 27).

The 1929 -1930 Annual Report designates the same social services worker as a ‘social worker’ (p. 49). At the same time, this Annual Report announces the Provincial Mental Institute,

Oliver, established two mental health clinics with medical and social services supplied by this institution, one located in each of the two major cities, Calgary and Edmonton. Further, with the

cooperation of the U of A, the Edmonton Clinic took on the additional task of “training social

workers and teachers, etc., who are taking courses at the U of A in psychiatry, mental deficiency

and problem cases” (p. 71). Perhaps for the time with some justified pride, the Clinics were the

first established in Canada under provincial auspices and the recipients of “favourable

comments” because of their progressiveness (p. 71).

For the first time, the 1930 Report by the Department of Public Health, Mental Health

Division, named two social workers: Stuart Jaffary and E. J. Kibblewhite (p. 59). Jaffary was

appointed to the Provincial Mental Hospital at Ponoka while a part-time Kibblewhite received an

appointment as a social worker in Edmonton, along with several other unnamed temporary social

workers from the U of A. Apparently, Dr. J.M. McEachran, a psychologist and Chair of the

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Alberta Eugenics Board, and Dr. H.E. Smith from the Department of Philosophy at the U of A, were advisors to the Clinics.

Although the Annual Report does not directly establish that social worker Stuart K.

Jaffary worked of the Eugenics Board created by the United Farmers of Alberta, the activities

following the appointment in June 1929, include “a large number of psychometric examinations”

(p. 61). The same Eugenics Board Report also chillingly notes that in connection with “this

preventive work . . . the Government has initiated a valuable activity which should materially

lessen the problem of the propagation of the feeble minded” (p. 74). It notes, the problem of

propagation has been addressed, however, much work remains to be done to prepare the newly

sterilized for independence and “This of course, can only be done by providing additional

training facilities for high-grade adolescent girls and young women” (p. 74).

The Report goes on to suggest Jaffary should take on more social work at the Red Deer

School and other institutions as “a step forward in extra-institutional work” to which the

Minister adds, “much more valuable work could be done by a social worker strictly under and

being responsible to the Red Deer Institution alone” and proposes:

1. He would give his whole time to the investigation of mental defective subjects.

2. The co-ordination of such findings would in time enable the Superintendent of the institution to more fully evaluate these findings, that is, he would in time get a more fairly accurate census of the feeble-minded population of the Province and, at the same time, get a knowledge of the areas in which the greatest incidence of feeble-mindedness is found (p. 76)

However, in September 1931, Jaffary took a leave of absence, accepting a fellowship at the University of Chicago. Jaffrey did not return to Alberta, rather, he went on to become a

CASW President followed by a brief period as the Director of the Toronto School of Social

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Work. In 1933, Kibblewhite returned to Edmonton to take charge of all social work for the province. In 1937, R.R. MacLean, & E.J. Kibblewhite, published an article in the Canadian

Journal of Public Health, espousing the virtues of sterilization and the beneficial impact that followed a1937 legislative amendment by Social Credit government, removing the necessity of obtaining consent is certain cases. Consequently, social work apparently first established itself in the Alberta as government agents responsible for implementing provincial government policy, in this instance cast as part of the administration of Alberta’s Sexual Sterilization Act.

By 1932 in the Eugenics Board’s Report, the Chairman, Dr. J. M. MacEachran proudly

observed that the sexual sterilization legislation was working with follow-up reports suggesting

general satisfaction with the program. Moreover, he observed, there “is no indication of the fact

that sterilization has resulted in any increase in immorality. In fact, due possibly to the fact that

cases were under somewhat greater supervision, there has been a distinct improvement in this

respect” (p. 61).

In a rather harsh judgment about Alberta’s sterilization program, Justice J. Viet’s 1996

decision condemns the government’s actions as follows.

Moreover, the evidence establishes that the conduct of the government in labelling Ms Muir a mental defective was high-handed and oppressive. The evidence proves beyond a doubt that the government did not follow its own legislation, practices and procedures when it labelled Ms Muir a moron. It ignored advice from an expert that Ms Muir's problems were emotional, not mental; it ignored the services of social workers and psychologists who might have assisted in obtaining information about Ms Muir's background; it failed to require compliance with the minimum safeguards which it had established -- signature by a physician attesting to the validity of admission information -- and psychometric testing (Muir v. Alberta, 132 D.L.R. (4th) 695, Court File No. 8903 20759 Edmonton, January 25, 1996).

Between the mid-1930’s and the final report of 1950 from the Department of Public

Health, it is clear that social workers including those designated as psychiatric social workers,

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were increasingly employed by the Alberta government in the delivery of public health services.

It is incomprehensible, that during much of the same time, the Department of Public Welfare established in 1944, diametrically opposed hiring social workers. The Department not only refused to hire social workers, some of its employees went on without shame or evidence, to ridicule the idea of hiring social workers at all.

The Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire (I.O.D.E.)

The earliest efforts to employ social workers in child welfare date to the first half of the

1940s as several Committees charged with reviewing child welfare practices offered recommendations for professional education. However, it wasn’t until 1947 with the I.O.D.E.

Report, prepared by Charlotte Whitton and Premier E.C. Manning’s Royal Commission Report that some change began to unfold. The Manning appointed Royal Commission specifically suggested the Child Welfare Branch should hire social workers (p. 47).

P.T. Rooke & R.L. Schnell (1987) examined these events in, No Bleeding Heart:

Charlotte Whitton, A Feminist on the Right, and although Whitton twice sought but failed to obtain the Premier’s cooperation in conducting a study of Alberta’s child welfare services, she went ahead. Rooke & Schnell point out that Whitton’s employment prospects at the time were bleak, and so she accepted the I.O.D.E. offer to proceed with the study.

Several important developments followed from the Whitton Report and Manning’s Royal

Commission. The first of these appointments was James C. Mahaffy as the legal counsel for the

Commission. As noted earlier, Mahaffy succeeded in running as an Independent and gained a

seat in the Alberta Provincial Legislature. His dislike for Aberhart, his former Crescent Heights

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High School Principal, was countered by his respect for Manning. The Premier reciprocated the respect and as a result appointed him as the Legal Counsel for the Royal Commission.

Although the 12 or so Alberta members of CASW were largely silent in public during the controversy Whitton created in Alberta, behind the scene several of them were actively engaged in assisting both Whitton and Mahaffy with information about social work and child welfare

(CASW, MG 28, I 441, Container 5 File 3). Mahaffy typically directed his enquiries to Joy

Maines of CASW in an effort to obtain information about the preparation, qualifications and number of social workers. The information apparently helped him write the following in the

Commission’s Report to the Premier.

In Alberta, we have set up standards of proficiency in a wide range of human endeavours. Training and standards of proficiency are required in all the professions. In the craft trades we find hairdressers, barbers, plumbers, carpenters, electricians and motor mechanics, to name only a few, required to satisfy public authority of their proficiency before they are allowed to work. Our government, in all its branches, uses the services of professional teachers, engineers, accountants and so forth. In the Department of Health, we find doctors, dentists, nurses, trained stenographers, and many other classifications. It would seem strange that if the most difficult, tangled and intricate field, that of human relationships, no training would be required save that furnished by experience on the job. Yet, that seems to be the position taken by the Child Welfare Branch in relation to its employees.

The evidence given by the Study Group consisted to a large extent of lectures on child welfare, and gave some good ideas as to the carrying on of welfare work. There are at least seven universities now giving training in this special class of work. . . . We must come to the conclusion that out of the welfare training and work in Canada there will emerge a new learned profession of welfare workers. The evidence discloses that most of the provinces either (a) engage graduates from such schools to staff their Child Welfare agencies, or (b) utilize the techniques and knowledge of the schools to train their employees on the job. Most provinces do both of these things (Alberta Government, Royal Commission Report, p. 44 -45).

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The Influence of the I.O.D.E. Report and Charlotte Whitton

As part of a larger national effort, the U of A began its long-term preparation for the return of Armed Services members in 1942. However, following the end of the War, the rate of influx of returning veterans surprised the administration and short term planning became a necessity. Apparently, during one of her visits to Edmonton Charlotte Whitton spoke about her work in child welfare to a group of U of A students. Whitton’s audience on that occasion included veterans, among them a former Flight Instructor who had spent most of his war service training new pilots to go overseas to fight the Nazis.

A final test for new pilots was to take their aircraft to an appropriate height and then deliberately stall the plane. Once having lost control of the airplane, the pilot had to regain control and, if with mere seconds left to go, control was not re-established, it was Flight

Instructor, Tyler siting in the backseat, who had to takeover control to stabilize the aircraft and prevent it from crashing. Unknown to Tyler at the time, pilot training and especially training new pilots was probably good experience in learning risk-taking behaviour for what was to come later in his career.

At the time, listening to Whitton about child welfare and the tour through the Juvenile

Detention Centre changed the trajectory of Tyler’s career. He described the experience of listening to Whitton.

It was quite shocking from my point of view and then she took us to the Juvenile Detention Centre in Edmonton and that was awful. I was finishing a degree in commerce and my two uncles thought I should become a banker. But Charlotte went and persuaded me I should become a social worker (F.H. (Tim) Tyler, Personal Communication: August 6, 2010).

Born as Frederick H. Tyler and re-named as Tim by his Royal Canadian Air Force colleagues for no particular reason, listening to Whitton that day resulted in a year at the UBC

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School of Social Work, with a year-end recommendation that the U of T would be a better fit for

a compatible MSW degree. Tyler explained the recommendation, suggesting he was one of the

veterans in the class several of whom had seen and experienced the war first hand; these

veterans, many of whom had seen and faced death asked challenging questions that were not

always appreciated by faculty members. Following his MSW from Toronto, Tyler completed

two years of graduate studies in Industrial Relations and Adult Education at the University of

California, Los Angeles before completing his Ed. D. at Columbia University, Teachers College.

Although Whitton’s impact on Tyler redirected his career, the effect of the I.O.D.E.

Report and Charlotte Whitton’s style on the development of social work and social work

education in Alberta is difficult to assess. For instance, Betty Farrell came to Edmonton in 1946

with a social work degree from the University of Manitoba and witnessed the effect of Whitton’s

work. Her comments on Whitton’s work focused on the much needed public attention it brought

to child welfare and the increased profile for social work (Betty Farrell, Personal

Communication: November 18, 2010). Sam Blakely’s comments, on the other hand focused on

Whitton’s impact on the development of social work, suggesting she “was an obstacle to

professional social work” (S.E. Blakely, Personal Communication: February 24, 2011).

Although Whitton sought Premier Manning’s cooperation for the I.O.D.E. Study, it was

not forthcoming. Likewise, Charlie Hill, Director of Child Welfare for the Department of Public

Welfare, a frequent object of Whitton’s scorn for his authoritarian style, propensity for secrecy,

control and complete denial of Whitton’s critique of Alberta’s child welfare system, similarly

refused any kind of co-operation with Whitton. Moreover, any suggestion he should hire social

workers brought scorn; social work was a profession was cavalierly rejected out of hand. Kay

Feehan experienced the scorn first hand in the early 1950’s.

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When I was working in Prince Albert and realized I was going to get married and move to Edmonton, I was of course interested in getting a position here in Edmonton. So I already – by the time I applied – had two years’ experience in the Saskatchewan Provincial Social Welfare Department and I did have my BSW. And so I applied to the Department in Edmonton, fully expecting to get a very positive response, and I received a letter, which was very blunt, and the letter said, ‘I am sorry, but we do not employ professional social workers in our department of social work.’ I think it was actually called Social Welfare then. That was it. I was rejected because I had the BA, BSW. It was indeed a shock. I couldn’t quite understand and still don’t. But it goes to show the kind of unprofessional atmosphere that there was here. They seemed to be afraid of anybody with any experience at all (Kay Feehan, Personal Communication: November 21, 2010).

Kay Feehan also had the opportunity to meet with Charlie Hill personally sometime in the early 1950’s while still working for the Saskatchewan government.

While I was in Prince Albert, I had an opportunity to repatriate a child who had run away and turned up in Prince Albert and when I brought this ward back, I had a chance to meet the then director, that is Charlie Hill, of course. And so at that time I talked to him about possibilities you know, he was right at the top and he gave me the same kind of answer as I had received officially. He said that they had, you know, nurses and other people with different backgrounds and that’s what they wanted, so that was then the end of my career; it never started (Kay Feehan, Personal communication: November 21, 2010).

Karen A. Balcom (2011), points out that with the complicity of the Federal government and soon after the public focus on Whitton’s Report diminished, the DPW and Charlie Hill in particular, resumed exporting Alberta babies to the US, much to the annoyance of State officials in Utah, Missouri, Kansas, Texas and Minnesota (p. 129). However, in retrospect and in the context of the development of social work and social work education, the Whitton Report and the Child Welfare Royal Commission Report are inseparable. The events that unfolded in the

DPW during the 1950’s were at least partially the result of the two Reports.

Even though there is no apparent record of an immediate decision to implement the

Royal Commission recommendations, the move towards formal social work education was

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incremental and slow, but it had become inevitable. Aside from any notion of inevitable historical momentum, Premier Manning was faced with recommendations from the people he trusted and appointed to the Royal Commission. Politically, he could not reject the recommendations out of hand. He could on the other hand, delay the implementation, choose a

slower pace by attaching them to developments taking shape in the post WW II era and wait for an opportunity to make the necessary changes.

In the broader national and international context, the stage had already been set for the development of a Canadian version of the welfare state. As provincial policies and programs began to take shape, the demand for professionally qualified social workers increased dramatically. The mounting pressure on social work education came from charitable and non-

profit agencies as well as the two orders of government – the provincial and municipal

governments. The influx of European immigrants began in the late 1940s, at the same time as

the post war boom in population created a burgeoning demand for the professional education and

skills of the new profession of social work.

“Follow the Birds to Victoria” – The 1949 Western Conference of Social Work

The purpose of the theme of the 1949 Western Conference of Social Work in Victoria

remains unclear; however, for the development of social work education in Alberta, it marked a

milestone, a clear beginning point in building the necessary infrastructure. Joy Maines, the

Executive Secretary for CASW made it a point to meet with social workers in both Calgary and

Edmonton. The small group of Alberta social workers in the two cities apparently knew each

other, perhaps through the Schools of Social Work they attended. On the other hand, during the

previous two years of upheaval with the I.O.D.E. sponsored Whitton Report and the Manning

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Royal Commission, social workers in private agencies were in touch with each other. However, outside of CASW, a recognized formal structure to enable the conduct the profession’s business did not exist in Alberta; decisions were made on an ad hoc basis, perhaps with some nearby consultation. Communication generally used the mail service while overnight telegrams appeared in urgent situations. The visit to both cities by CASW’s Executive secretary Joy

Maines appears to have triggered a change as she encouraged local social workers in each city to establish local CASW Branches.

Having completed the arduous task of scheduling her trip by train from Ottawa to

Victoria and back in early April 1949, Maines wrote to Mary Livesay, the Executive Director,

Calgary Family Services Bureau and to Isabel Munroe in Edmonton in an effort to meet with local social workers. By late May, having returned to Ottawa, Maines wrote her contacts in

Alberta once more to thank them for their hospitality including the standard mandatory tour of

Banff and Lake Louise. Her other comments in those letters to Isabel Munroe in Edmonton and

Mary Livesay and Moira Stewart in Calgary reveal Maines’ efforts to establish local Branches of

the Canadian Association of Social Workers in both major cities (Board of Directors, Western

Regional Conference on Social Work (1) n.d., 1948-1949, MG 28, I 441 38 22).

To Moira Stewart, May 19, 1949, she suggested there was something short of “wild

enthusiasm” in Edmonton, and comments, “if your group in Calgary went ahead and formed a

branch of your own, Edmonton would follow suit.” She adds “Confidentially, I think Miss

Bishop and Miss Munroe are so discouraged about the general state of welfare in Alberta that

establishing one more organization is almost more than Miss Bishop can face at present” (MG

28, I 441 38 22, CASW Board of Directors, Western Regional Conference on Social Work (1)

n.d., 1948-1949,).

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However, by the March 31, 1951 Meeting of the CASW Board, the Executive Secretary,

Joy Maines reported the receipt of the appropriate documents from the Southern and Northern

Alberta Branches; moreover, they appeared to be in good order. Over the lunch hour that day, the CASW Board met with Eileen Younghusband from the London School of Economics. While the Minutes do not report the discussion, a review of the Minutes over a longer period, suggest the Board regularly engaged in a wide range of professional conversations on social issues with

guests, a benefit that was subsequently shared with the Branches through visits by CASW

Presidents and others of prominence in the profession.

The Alberta CASW Branches: Calgary and Edmonton

Albertans were first involved in the Canadian Association of Social Workers in the late

1920s with three persons nominated on March 20, 1928, to represent Alberta: Margaret E.

Brown, Rev. A. D. McDonald and Elizabeth W. Wedick. While a Mrs. A. Harvey also appears

to have been nominated initially, she dropped-out as a nominee and became the seconder.

Although not entirely clear, it appears Alberta representatives attended the April 30, 1930,

meeting as a letter dated April 21, 1930, by a Calgarian named, Margaret E. Brown living at

1801 2nd St. W., informed the CASW President, she was unable to attend the Board Meeting.

Moreover, it was now too late for appointing a proxy to replace her at the April 30, 1930 meeting (MG 28, I 441, CASW, Container 8, File 10, Nomination for Council, n. d. 1930).

Two years later, in 1932 CASW first cast its vision for social work education during

Canada’s Depression in conjunction with the Canadian Council on Child and Family Welfare

(CCC&FW) of which Charlotte Whitton was then the Executive Director. In a jointly authored

1932 publication entitled, Professional Training for Social Work, the Report carved out a view

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of professional education based on the principle of “learn by doing” and shaped by the following observation.

Since sound case work is the basis of modern social work, it should be recognized that the minimum personnel requirement for any recognized training school or department should be, in addition to a full-time head (qualified as above suggested), one qualified full-time assistant, who in addition to the necessary academic qualifications should be thoroughly trained and experienced in actual case work principles and practice (p. 12).

The reference to the qualifications of the ‘full-time head’ is significant because it refers to comments by Edith Abbott, Professor of Social Economy and Dean of the Graduate School of

Social Service Administration, University of Chicago. Abbott likened the position of dean to that of a medical doctor, suggesting such a person “must be prepared to assume the grave responsibilities of interfering with the lives of human beings,” requires both character and education, and thus “trained for the responsibility of action.” However, as employed by the

1932 Report, the quote is misleading.

To be precise, the quote is taken from a Convocation Address by Abbott at the University of Chicago and entitled, ‘The University of Social Welfare.’ The Address is Chapter 1, of her

1942 book, Social Welfare and Professional Education. Abbott’s speech contextualizes the

comments about social welfare very differently. In place of casework, Abbott recognizes the importance of employing a full range of social sciences in effort to address the social issues of

the day. Moreover, she makes it clear that universities must assume responsibility for social

welfare education to improve the quality of social work education. Further, she notes, “The

academic curriculum of most professional schools is now poor and slight and covers in many

schools, only the various aspects of a single field – case work” (p. 12). With respect to non-

university schools, Abbott observes, “the student too often becomes a routine technician –

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sometimes a clever technician but still a technician and not a scientific person with the love of knowledge and the use of the tools of learning” (p. 12).

Consequently, the following quote precedes the division of Abbott’s social welfare education into an “(1) an academic curriculum, (2) clinical social work or fieldwork and (3) social research” (p. 12). With respect to the Joint Committee’s quotation about clinical social work, Abbott writes, “The second division of the work of schools, which is clinical social work or field work, is very imperfectly understood and used at the present time” (p. 13).

Nevertheless, the Joint Committee’s citation about modern casework in context becomes the

‘now poor and slight’ combined with a ‘very imperfectly understood and used’ casework approach. However, it was heralded by CASW and the CCC&FW as the proposed standard for

Canadian social work education and social work practice.

Perhaps with this in mind, it is unsurprising that the three Universities – Toronto,

Montreal and Manitoba, were notably absent from participation on the Joint Committee. Even as the Committee proposed schools of social work should be part of a university, it wanted “a fair proportion of bona fida representatives of social work selected from persons actually engaged in practice” (GMA M 8401, The Maude Riley Fonds, File 55, p. 9 &12).

It is also not surprising then that during this same time period, economist social worker

Harry Cassidy published a very different vision for social work and social work education,

affirming the presence of social work’s two themes. His lament about social casework and

charity based organizations, targeted the sound casework of modern social work with his

comment that social workers were primarily “in the business of caring for the dying and rescuing

the perishing. They have been the stretcher bearers of society.” In its place, Cassidy argued for

the broader view that would engage the profession in “strik[ing] at the roots of social problems

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– to exercise a preventive as well as a curative function – he must wage an unremitting war against the social crime of poverty no less than against other casual factors” (Cassidy, 1933).

However, formal action towards developing social work education in Alberta waited for nearly twenty years before the establishment of the necessary infrastructure.

Edmonton’s initial meeting of CASW eligible members took place in the Board Room of the Council of Social Agencies with five members in attendance. Among the several issues discussed was the formation of some kind of local group for social workers. However, the decision to become a Branch of CASW was delayed until November 27, 1950, when 16 eligible members were present to support the proposal. A motion by Stewart Bishop, seconded by Con

Ashby resulted in a request to CASW for approval of a Branch included the proposed name of

Northern Alberta Branch of CASW. The motion passed and a decision was made that the membership fee for the remainder of the year would $0.25 (ACSW, CASW Northern Branch

Minutes, November 27, 1950).

While Calgary's initial meeting of 23 CASW eligible members took place on February 5,

1950, at the Calgary Board of Trade, now the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, the decision to become part of the CASW as the Southern Alberta Branch of CASW waited to October 7, 1950 when 17 eligible members were present to make the decision. The first significant step and reference to social work education at the Northern Alberta Branch took place on March 6, 1951, when member Con Ashby was appointed to the National Committee on Education for Social

Work. At the February 12, 1952 meeting of the Northern Alberta Branch, Cons Ashby introduced Miss Joy Maines, the CASW Executive Secretary who, along with other subjects spoke about the efforts of the National Committee on Social Work Education to develop entry standards for three types of social work education – MSW, BSW, or an agency based In-Trainee.

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Two separate groups of Committee members were engaged in a discussion about the three types of entry standards, one for private agencies and the others for public agencies.

At the September 28, 1953, Southern Alberta Branch meeting, President Herb Allard

read a letter and presented a questionnaire from the CASW Executive Secretary, Joy Maines on

the topic, “Social Work Education,” to the nine members present. With only a small number of

members, the group decided to devote October 27, 1953 to the topic. The Minutes of that

meeting are primarily devoted to the location for the next dinner meeting, dues and the

appointment of a Nominating Committee. Social work education was left to an unusually brief

single sentence immediately prior to adjournment.

Social work education made its re-appearance at a Southern Alberta Branch Meeting on

October 25, 1954, at the Pig and Whistle Restaurant in response to a letter from the National

Social Work Education Committee with a request to appoint two Branch members to the

National Committee. Following a brief discussion about the small size of the Branch, the

members decide instead to accept Con Ashby’s offer to volunteer as a corresponding member of

the Committee.

Although Ashby was relatively new to the Calgary group, his familiarity with the issues

was likely the result of having moved from Edmonton to Calgary sometime prior to September

29, 1952, the meeting date of the Southern Alberta Branch at which he was introduced and

welcomed as a new member. Ashby had been a Northern Branch member since at least

November 27, 1950 because at that meeting he seconded the motion for that Branch to become

part of CASW. Moreover, the Minutes of the Northern Branch suggest Ashby was an active

participant in the organization and at the March 6, 1951 meeting, accepted appointment to the

CASW National Committee on Social Work Education. His voluntary appointment by the

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Calgary Branch to the same National Committee in 1954 allowed him to continue with the

Committee he had first joined in Edmonton. On January 31, 1954, Ashby presented a report from the Regional Western Workshop on Social Work Education to the Calgary Branch members.

Unknown to the CASW Branches’ members was the eventual outcome of a letter discussed at this same meeting. The letter came from Alberta’s Director of Personnel informing the members that DPW was prospecting for applications for the Superintendent of Child Welfare

position. Charlie Hill, the nemesis of Charlotte Whitton, Alberta social workers and the Calgary

Herald journalists, was about to retire even though his anti-professional views would continue to

exist in the Department for many decades.

It was likely a welcome development for credentialed social workers. Isabel Munroe, for

instance told Karen Hill on May 1, 1985, that Charlie Hill had informed his Branch did not need

any social workers. Instead, he had suggested she should apply to both the City of Calgary and

the City of Edmonton Children’s Aid Departments for part-time positions since they needed

social workers. To defray the obvious expense, Hill offered to pay her transportation costs to

travel between the two cities (Karen Hill, 1985, p. 8, Munroe-Smith interview).

With that as background, the following position description the Branch received was

clear in its meaning, “a grade 12 education and a thorough knowledge of Child Welfare work

acquired through practical experience, good judgment, and executive ability are necessary.”

Although the CASW, Southern Branch Executive and the Northern Branch both wrote Minister

Jorgenson following receipt of Hill’s retirement, rather than continue direct engagement with the

Department, both Branches decided to leave action on the issue of professional qualifications to individuals and lay groups (CASW Northern Branch Minutes, December 17, 1954; CASW,

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Southern Branch Minutes, January 31, 1955). The Calgary group offered the rationale for the decision with the Edmonton group’s concurrence: “any organized effort might rebound so as to be detrimental to both the Council and CASW” (CASW, Southern Branch Minutes, February 28,

1955, CASW Northern Branch Minutes, March 14, 1955).

On reports of the appointment of a “lay preacher” reported in the May 9, 1955 Minutes, the CASW Northern Branch restricted its actions to asking an “informant” for more information.

Although subsequent Minutes of the Northern and Southern Branches fail to record it, DPW’s

Annual Report for 1956 – 1957 records for the first time J. E. Ward, as the Superintendent of

Child Welfare and the Chairman of the Child Welfare Commission, the oversight entity for all child welfare services in Alberta. Ward began the process of reversing Hill’s practice, and began to hire social workers (Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report 1956-1957, p 25).

A year later, at the urging of Stuart Bishop, the Northern Branch held a discussion about the requests it had received from several opposition politicians during a recent election about issues in the administration of the DPW. Although the members did not arrive at a recorded decision, several issues were recorded: promoting good social work practice, tactfulness and honesty, a single position for the Branch while agencies might wish their own position and a request to the CASW office for information how other Branches were dealing with such requests

(CASW, Northern CASW Branch Minutes, September 26, 1956).

The prospect of retiring DPW Deputy Minister A.H. Miller, confronted the December 2,

1956, Joint Executive meeting of the two Alberta CASW Branches with a new challenge. The meeting received reports of opposition to the person who was the object of speculation by DPW staff, inquiries from Opposition MLAs and social workers. “The man, who it thought, might be appointed to this position, was not considered by social workers to be personally or

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professionally suited for it” (ACSW, Southern CASW Branch Minutes, December 2, 1956). The person in question was ‘rumoured’ to be in the Department of Health (CASW Northern Branch,

Minutes November 19, 1956).

While the identity of the person remains unknown, after several meetings and much discussion, no Branch action was recorded. In any case, the DPW leadership transfer to Deputy

Minister Ray Hagen took place sometime in late 1956 or early 1957 and the Department’s choice brought what turned out to be an ally to a course of action in which the two CASW

Branches were soon to be fully engaged. Moreover, if Charlie Hill had any hand in preparing

the text of the Personnel Memorandum, he too was surely surprised with the eventual outcome

of the Government’s decisions.

Between these early meetings and 1959, both Branches engage in what Jaffary aptly

described as taking up the “family business” typically involved in building organizations. In this

case, doing the family business meant: responding to and engaging CASW in Ottawa,

coordinating meetings between the Branches, responding to professional and community issues,

determining the profession’s entry standards – post-BA BSW or the MSW, professional

licensing, membership fees, international social work, and planning for a provincial association.

During these early years of formal organization, both Branches expressed a reluctance to

engage directly with the DPW on the two retirements and replacements for Charlie Hill and N.B

Miller. Instead, the two Branches decided to engage surrogates to comment. Similarly, rather

than engaging with the government directly to obtain information, credentialed social workers

relied on ‘informants’ for it. Even as the members were considering the formation of the two

CASW Branches, genuine concern about a negative reaction from DPW, weighed heavily in the

minds of many. A similar pattern of silence and withdrawal from engagement took place when

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social worker Charlotte Whitton was the subject of public ridicule, vilification, derision and legal action by the Alberta government. The fear of being seen or heard to support Whitton is visible in the letters exchanged with CASW’s Executive Secretary.

In response to a suggestion by Joy Maines to offer support to Whitton, Margaret Dick, the Executive Director of the Edmonton Family Welfare Bureau responded. “I do feel quite strongly . . . that the rest of the CASW people who do not know of your inquiry, but with whom

I have discussed the matter from time to time before, feel quite strongly that a resolution would be worse than useless” (MG 28, I 441, Cont. 5, File 3).

This kind of reluctance did not go unnoticed or unchallenged by at least one social

worker who participated in the CASW Southern Branch meetings during this period. After

having served in the Navy for two years and with the support of federal post-war education

grants for aspiring social workers (Irving, 1965, p. 243), Lois Alger graduated from the

University of Toronto, School of Social Work in 1947. She recalled both Harry Cassidy as Dean

and especially Malcolm Taylor as an instructor and a decade and half later as the Principal of the

University of Alberta, Calgary. Alger initially went to work for the City of Calgary Children’s

Aid Department, followed by nearly a year at the Calgary Child Guidance Clinic preparing

social histories. Because of her military experience and social work degree, she was

subsequently hired as the medical social worker at the Colonel Belcher Hospital for war

veterans.

Growing up in northern Saskatchewan as the daughter of a medical doctor, had both kept

Alger from the worst of the direct experiences of abject poverty and at the same time

familiarized her with its impact through those in her community. Its effects re-emerged in the

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experiences of a post-WW II social worker in Calgary in the early 1950s that eventually led her to the same question Alice Salomon in Germany faced and asked herself in the late 19th century.

Actually, I have to tell you, that I was not as happy about social work. I felt . . . well of course I saw, . . . What it did, it sort of radicalized me, . . . I thought, no, I could see why people are poor and we’re not doing anything much about the causes . . . social work, we’re mending some of the things that happen, but I think, I think, like I used to love to shock my friends back those in the 50’s, what I think what I need, what I’m going to be, is a communist.

And, of course that shivered and shook everybody because you know, maybe you remember, maybe you don’t remember that, well I mean that word was just consigning me to eternal hell. And of course, I think the idea of communism was excellent, I think how the dictators manipulated people and all that you know, but I said I think I am a socialist. I realized why so many people were poor and then there’s the rich.

And so, I wasn’t that happy in social work and then of course because we were older. Ross and I, we decided to have a family and I was to forget about social work, because I think so much more was needed than social work; a fundamental kind of revolution, and I used to say I was a communist and people were shocked, and of course I wasn’t. Stalin wasn’t a communist he was a fascist dictator. (Lois Alger, Personal Communication: July 03, 2013).

As Alger went on to explain, the RCMP heard about her efforts to ‘shiver and shock’ her

friends and colleagues; it did both to them. As a result, her father received a visit from the

RCMP in an effort to determine whether his daughter was a communist and especially the

potential security risks a short-term resident guest with suspected communist leanings in the

Alger home might present to the nation.

In spite of what appears to have been a mostly unspoken antagonism between social

workers and the DPW, the late 1950s in particular also represented at least a temporary thawing.

A new Deputy Minister, the hiring of the first credentialed social worker – Bill McFarland – to

lead the Child Welfare Branch and the development of an education, training program for staff

was welcomed and signalled a significant change of direction for DPW. Marsha Mildon (1990)

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captured the change in an interview with Bill Nicholls, then the Executive Director of the

Edmonton Social Planning Council.

There was a gradual change in relationships [with the provincial Welfare Department] which was most noticeable in 1959, when the DM Miller and Superintendent of Child Welfare, Charlie Hill retired. Right after that, Duncan Rogers and Ray Hagen came to see me, which considering the history of relationships between the Council and the Welfare Department was quite an act for them.

Their purpose was to ask if there was any way we could help to develop training for their staff since before that time, by definition, a person could not be hired if they were a social worker. They felt that having a good heart and loving kids had fulfilled its day. Ray, who had only two years left in terms of inheriting the Deputy Minister-ship, was very, very intent on getting something changed in terms of education for staff (p. 97).

Nicholls connects this discussion and the subsequent development of the U of A, Faculty of Extension program for DPW and municipal staff as well as the two-year social services technology course at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology in 1967 led by Mike

McIntyre. Although the Northern Branch Executive expressed support for the principle, initially its members had sufficient reservations, including one that Branch members’ recommendations had not received the warranted support. As a result, letters were sent to the U of A itemizing their concerns about the certificate course (CASW Northern Branch, Minutes, January 7, 1958).

The General Meeting on January 20, 1958 attended by 17 members, including Bill Nicholls of the Edmonton Social Planning Council, supported both the Executive’s concerns and the letters sent to the U of A.

In the final analysis, both CASW Branches and the National CASW supported the

development of a two to three year certificate program in Social Welfare offered by the

Department of Extension, University of Alberta, beginning in February 1958. The Southern

Branch Minutes of March 24, 1958 record that a week before the local start of the course there

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were “45 authentic applications from people working in Social Work.” Herb Allard recalled the program as an instructor travelling from Calgary to Edmonton on a regular basis to deliver the program.

As Allard commented, his students included the Departmental Supervisor, Duncan

Rogers who already played an important role in DPW as the sole report to Deputy Minister, Ray

Hagen (Herb Allard, Personal Communication: August 4, 2010). Gerald Way, who was to become President of the Alberta Association of Social Workers, was another of the students in the three-year program. Like many others Way showed promise and became one of an increasing number of senior DPW staff, who in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s received sufficient Department funding to attend the School of Social Work at UBC and a few years later, at the School of Social Work at the U of T.

Gordon Stangier was hired during the final years of the C.B. Hill era as a rehabilitation officer, later appointed the first person in a staff development position and subsequently spent much of his several careers in DPW’s staff development program. He was also one of a significant number of DPW staff funded to attend Schools of Social Work across the country, initially for a BSW and later for an MSW. Stangier, referring to the changes that took place in the DPW attributes the attitude change to social work and social programs to Deputy Minister

Duncan Rogers and John Ward, both of whom were highly regarded in the Department.

In retrospect, it appears that in the post-Charlotte Whitton era, the Manning government recognized the changing social, cultural and political values of Albertans, especially in the two large urban areas. In so far as it applied to the social welfare of Albertans, the retirement of the

Deputy Minister and C.B. Hill, along with the external pressures from voluntary agencies and the municipal governments in Calgary and Edmonton, created a new landscape made it possible

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during the last decade of Social Credit dominance to introduce changes. Those changes did not come without conflict, cf. A.J. Hooke, (1971,) 30 + 5, I know, I was there.

One of the programs that created conflict was the Preventive Social Services (PSS) program Leslie Bella reviewed a decade later and acknowledges as controversial but points out it was rationalized by Premier Manning for those whose beliefs and minds were influenced by the

Christian Social Gospel. John Lackey, a graduate of McGill who worked in the Public Welfare

Department and the Preventive Social Services program in its formative year agreed and recalled

Duncan Rogers and other Deputy Ministers leaving administrative meetings, to attend scheduled

Prayer Meetings with Premier Manning (John Lackey, Personal Communication: April 27,

2011).

In her examination of The Origins of Alberta’s Preventive Social Service Program, Bella

(1978) also placed the changing views of Manning in the context of the development of the welfare state in Canada and the Social Credit Party’s stance and deep commitment to the Social

Gospel acquired through the experiences of the Depression. Ostensibly, it was committed to the values of democracy, freedom, individualism, free enterprise and personal responsibility. At the same time, those values were outweighed by their commitment to the humanitarian expectations of the Gospel. Erick Schmidt, who served as a Special Consultant to Premier E.C. Manning and

H. Strom during the last 6 years of the Social Credit government, similarly recognized the influence of Manning’s Conservative Old Testament Christianity; however, he also noted that

Manning was well aware of the influence of international developments. (Erick Schmidt,

Personal Communication: December 30, 2010).

While many of the changes in Alberta’s social programs appear to have had their conceptual beginning in the last years of the 1950s, (Mildon, 1990, Chapter 10), most came into

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fruition with the leadership of Duncan Rogers during the 1960s particularly as the federal

Canada Assistance Plan (CAP) funding took effect in 1966. Not only did the CAP program enable the provincial and municipal department to increase their hiring and funding of graduate level social work education for existing staff. Much to the chagrin of Duncan Rogers (Sam

Blakely, Personal Communication: February 24, 2011), instead of creating new ‘preventive’ social programs, PSS funded many established agencies engaged in counselling and casework and related agencies.

Social Work Education: CASW Northern Branch: April 2nd 1959

The development of the social work profession and education developed separately, but

predominantly in tandem with provincial social policy and programs. Consequently, the changes

that began in DPW in the late 1950s (Mildon, 1990; Splane, 1985; Bella 1978) with the hiring

and training decisions as the scope of the Department’s activities began to increase. The Annual

Reports of the Department from the late 1950s into the 1960s reflect that change, notably leading

up to the transition from Deputy Minister Ray Hagen to Duncan Rogers. While Hagen’s

comments in the Annual Reports reflect a technical review of growth and development, his

understudy, the former DPW accountant and personnel director Duncan Rogers made the

following statement in his first Annual Report (1960-1961) distinguishing himself from the past..

The Social Allowance and Social Assistance programs in Alberta are founded on a belief in the worth and dignity of the individual and on the recognition that members of society are dependent on one another and the welfare of the individual is essential to the total welfare of the community” (p. 8).

In this changing political milieu, an April 2, 1959 meeting brought together

representatives of CASW, the provincial government, the local municipal government, post-

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secondary institutions and private social agencies. The meeting took place under the umbrella of the CASW and represented a major step towards the development of social work education in

Alberta. Al Westcott, the President of the Northern Branch introduced the purpose of the meeting by distinguishing between the professional standards and welfare services, outlining that the Branch was interest in pursuing the former, namely, professional standards (Minutes in possession of the author),.

Isabel Munroe, the Chair of the Northern Alberta Branch Committee on Education outlined the Committee’s Report, suggesting the profession of social work had unique concerns including insufficient opportunities for professional education, the rapid expansion of the Public

Welfare field and inadequacy of what she named as job classifications. Her analysis led to a distinction between a full professional level, a technical level and those without any formal university level training. The professional level required a post-graduate degree, the technical level an undergraduate degree with some social work course work and the untrained classification for those with either training through a university extension program or by means of in-service training. In the context of explaining her concerns about the lack of a job classification system was a reference to the CSWE study led by Werner W. Boehm and its anticipated publication later the same year.

While it would take another decade, the Munroe classification would come to haunt the

AASW and the School of Social Welfare in the early 1970s, with the effort by Isabel Munroe and Jackson Willis who was also present at this meeting, to establish the College of Clinical

Social Work of Alberta. Likewise, the structure of job classifications that Munroe presented at this meeting in an effort to address the need for social work education in Alberta, would contribute to the development of a new class of human services employees with the designation

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of ‘social welfare technician’ a discussion that Ray Thomlison followed with concern. “I was very concerned about community colleges educating for you see, social work education is predicted on you getting a liberal arts education before you go into the professional courses.

Well that forced us to reverse it” (Ray Thomlison, Personal Communication: December 13,

2013).

The Edmonton Social Planning Council

The history of the Edmonton Social Planning Council, illustrates an organizational

transition from Cassidy’s ‘’narrow’ view to his ‘broad’ view over a period of approximately 30

years in its effort to address the social issues of the day. Through a combination of oral and

documentary history Marsha Mildon (1990), a former Council employee recorded and reviewed

the first 50 years of the Council’s engagement with issues of service and prevention. Among the

research staff at the Council who would join the School of Social Welfare in the 1960s were two

members of CASW, Gus De Cocq, who would become a faculty member in 1967 and Barbara

Scott who joined as an early sessional instructor. The struggles, conflict and change recorded by

Mildon parallels much of the development of social work education as Tyler and School of

Social Welfare engaged with social work students, practitioners, AASW, social agencies and the

provincial government.

The Council’s efforts began when a group of 50 social agencies established the

Edmonton Council of Social Agencies at an inaugural meeting on June 27, 1939 with the intent

of coordinating local social service work. Attending the meeting of what is now the Edmonton

Social Planning Council was Isabel Munroe, a graduate of the Montreal School of Social Work

where she had been a student of Dorothy King, the former official of the Edmonton Board of

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Public Welfare. Even though Munroe was on the Guest List for Dinner and Informal

Discussions on a ‘by invitation only’ two months earlier, her attendance appears to have been inauspicious at the time. However, after traveling and working nationally and internationally for several decades including service during WW II, she returned to Edmonton to leave her mark on social work in Alberta.

Lillian Thomson was hired by the Council as its Executive Director a year later and found the Board had hired her friend Laura Holland from Vancouver to advise them on the issues the Council should address. Holland recognized that the traditional methods of responding to community needs by private charities were inadequate in complex urban settings.

As Holland illustrated in her Report, private charities failed to provide the necessary relief to those who suffered during the Depression by reporting that private charities had provided a meagre $160,000 in relief compared to the $1,000,000.00 provided by the three orders of government. As a result, she suggested private agencies and governments should introduce modern casework services. For the private agencies the Report suggested

there are many maladjusted individuals and families who are emotionally unstable who are not eligible for public assistance nor perhaps in need of it but who may later become permanent public charges unless helped to overcome their attitude of defeatism, inferiority or disillusionment (Mildon, 1990, p. 11).

Holland’s recommendation that private agencies should refocus reflected her concerns about “the lack of any ‘modern’ casework being done with families and the lack of good child welfare services” (Mildon, 1990, p. 13). Holland communicated her concerns to the Board and

Lillian Thomson whose subsequent efforts focused on the development of social casework and remained so for her entire time with the Council.

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In 1943, the Council renewed its early interest in child welfare that led to a Report to the newly established Department of Public Welfare. The Council’s observations about the state of child welfare in Alberta included support for a commitment to social casework and the

importance of education, especially in the area of psychology and the professional skills for

consultation with related professions. The Council also pointed out that it did not know of a

single individual in child welfare or juvenile probation in Alberta, “who is a graduate of a

School of Social Work or has had comparable preliminary training in the social sciences” (p.

33). However, when Hazeldine Bishop became the Executive Director in 1944, the focus of the

Council began to include research and planning (Mildon, 1990) and as a result, changes began to

take place.

Gradually, the emphasis of the Council shifted and expanded after Bishop arrived, taking

on the development of new services, filling gaps in existing services, especially in child welfare.

Among Bishop’s recommendations to the Council in October 1944 was one to change the

organization’s name. Bishop’s rationale was that the name should be “more descriptive of its

objectives, and which would avoid the implication of exclusive preoccupation with the affairs of

‘social agencies’ as they were popularly understood – i.e., as having a ‘relief’ or

‘underprivileged’ connotation” (Mildon, 1990, p. 28). Although the name change was tabled

and not acted on until 1951, the Council’s focus continued to shift towards the whole community

and an “informed public opinion on social problems (p. 28).

The gradual shift from the ‘modern casework’ focus of Laura Holland and Lillian

Thomson to the ‘community development’ initiated by Bishop and later articulated by Bettie

Hewes during her term as the Chair of the Board reflected the broader interests of the Council

and paralleled the developments in social work in the 1960’s. During Hewes’ term as President

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(1963 – 1964), the Board changed the name of the organization to the Edmonton Welfare

Council. The difference, as she explained it represented more than a mere change in name, reflecting a broader vision of the Council’s role.

A small mechanical detail perhaps – but symptomatic of a much deeper change which has taken place gradually. Becoming the Edmonton Welfare Council gave us a new outlook, a new shape; it put an end firmly to an old era and gave our changed philosophy legal status. We are no longer a Council of services, but a Council for welfare and changing our name stated once and for all that we are prepared to act like one (Edmonton Social Planning Council, 1963, Bettie Hewes, President’s Report).

As Hewes suggested, the change of name had consequences for the Council’s emphasis, its techniques and methods, moving from short to long-term planning, from a piecemeal planning and a finger-in-the-dike operation to what she described as community development and community organization. The focus was no longer on services, but rather “on improving conditions and simultaneously strengthening the individual in his environment.” Elaborating on community development, Hewes suggests, “Social work in general and community organization in particular have concentrated on improving conditions attempts to reshape and reconstruct the environment so that fewer people will be broken in the future” (Edmonton Social Planning

Council, 1963, B. Hewes, President’s Report, p. 3).

Social Welfare Technicians

The shortage of qualified personnel reached such a level of concern in Northern Alberta in the early 1960s that the Edmonton Social Planning Council looked for solutions and brought together representatives from the Department of Public Welfare, the City of Edmonton, the

Royal Alexandra Hospital and several other Edmonton agencies. The Youth Services Division of the Council identified the urgent need for qualified staff throughout its community network

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and as a result, in late 1965 the Council established the Welfare Services Course Planning

Committee as its organizational vehicle to study the issue.

The CASW Southern Branch, as noted in a letter by its President, Gerald G. Meyers, dated November 1, 1960, was well aware of the issue and feared that Mount Royal College’s D.

Halstead’s initiative to establish a Social Aides program could undermine the effort to establish a graduate social work program (MG 28 I 44, Container 39 File 9). Frank Anderson, Frank Bach and Dr. F.H. (Tim) Tyler, along with non-social workers, were members of its Advisory

Committee and the Minutes of the Branch of February 26, 1962 reveal the contentious nature of the issue as several motions to address the issue were introduced but failed to pass. Meanwhile, the members were advised by the College that the DPW supported the program, however, it offered no assurance its graduates would be hired even though they were to receive a Diploma with the designation, “Associate in Arts – Social Welfare Major.” The same minutes indicate

Isabel Munroe, AASW President, discussed the issue and concerns with both DPW officials and the College (NAC, MG 28. I 441, Container 25, File 6, Southern Alberta Branch 1958-1962).

However serious the Council regarded the issue in Northern Alberta, it was not unique.

For instance, in the US the problem the labour shortage was significantly higher and at a different scale. The November 1965 Council Annual Report included references to the Report of the Departmental Task Force on Social Work Education and Manpower, Closing the Gap . . . in

Social Work Manpower, outlining the problem as reflected in a covering letter. The letter introduced the problem outlined in the Annual Report with the following comment, “the number of qualified social work personnel in the US is so low in comparison to the demand as to impair the continuation of vital services” (United States, 1965, Introductory Letter to the Under

Secretary of Health Education and Welfare, p. viii).

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Among the features of the US Report is a definition of ‘social welfare’ that captured the breadth of the scope and at the same time took a very different approach in defining the intent of those vital services. In contrast to Hewes’ suggestion of ‘acting’ to achieve welfare and the historic use of the term as a goal most often associated with the role of government, the US

Report’s definition aligned itself with Wilensky & Lebeaux as a description of an existing array of institutionalized services, i.e., “the actual system, services and institutions included in the term” (HEW 1965, p. 6). In pointing out that, the widening gap between the need and the availability of labour had created such a dangerous condition as to warrant federal intervention, the Report noted the following.

The paradox in this problem is that it is a result of social progress. It is a part of the price society pays for advancement. In historical perspective, the current manpower problem in social welfare services is a measure of our national progress and our democratic aspirations (HEW, 1965, p. 3).

In Canada, the labour shortage in social work and allied fields was equally well recognized. Writing for the Canadian Welfare Council, J. M. Gripton (1963) discussed the same labour shortage issue facing social programs nationally. His paper, entitled Staffing and Staff

Utilization in Public Welfare, examined several existing studies on the differential use of staff in public welfare settings. Those studies used a task analysis as the basis for suggesting differential levels of education and training as a way of addressing the critical shortage of suitably educated and trained staff.

Beyond even its relevance to a review of a Canadian national issue, J. Gripton’s report sponsored by the Canadian Welfare Council preferred to use national American data to make its case for social welfare education to augment the dearth of social work graduates. Gordon

Stangier, a member of the Edmonton Social Planning Council’s Planning Committee

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representing the DPW reported that the Alberta government faced a similar problem in a

presentation to the American Public Welfare Association (Edmonton Social Planning Council,

1966).

The AASW Council Minutes of April 17, 1970 indicate that the members were also

familiar with the three levels – technical, undergraduate and graduate – of social work education

but required the Association to establish goals and objectives for the classification prior to taking

a positon. Bert Marcuse agreed to undertake the task. Whether or not that occurred is unclear as

follow up record were not located.

In 1972, Albert Comanor, made a proposal to consider establishing a distinct category of

‘social work technician’ in the broader context of recognizing the variability in education

standard “in the continuum of service in the social welfare field. Comanor recognized including

the two-year post high school training program had consequences. While it would increase the

numerical base, it risked losing members with more extensive social work education, and it

would result in a “slip in its position on the professional hierarchy” (UARC, Accession 96.010

File # 8.06 – A Consideration of Issues and Conditions Pertinent to the Formulation of

Membership Policy of AASW, 1972). Comanor’s proposal was at least somewhat familiar to

AASW as Bert Marcuse of Calgary Family Services and an AASW Council Member introduced

the three –tiered membership model at least as far back as April 1970, although as noted,

whether there was any follow-up to the 1970 discussion is unclear.

The Youth Services Division of the Edmonton Social Planning Council in its 1965

Annual Report noted that its answer to the local labour shortage involved adopting the American

response by the establishment of a Committee and furthermore, that consultations were already

underway to assess the need “with particular emphasis on sub-professional training” (Edmonton

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Social Planning Council, Annual Report, 1965). The ‘sub-professional workers’ theme was

carried forward into the Introduction of the Committee’s 1966 Report with the proposal that this

class of workers would acquire the technical skills necessary to work “under the supervision of

professionals” (p. 1).

The Committee’s recommendations were clear - a two-year diploma training opportunity

for “technicians” in the social welfare field. Preference would be given to those currently

employed in the field and had already taken some in-service training courses. The admission

standard for the program was intended for those who had obtained a high school diploma with

the prospects of employment in institutional settings for children and adults, welfare

departments, hospitals, group homes community development, geriatrics, etc. (Edmonton Social

Planning Council, 1966).

In developing its position, the Council cited W.F. Bowker’s chapter on Staff

Qualifications and Training in her 1965 Report on Alberta’s adoption practices. Bowker

attended a Child Welfare League of America Conference and attended a presentation by Dr.

Charles B. Brink, the Dean of the University of Washington, School of Social Work, discussing

the labour force issues in social work. Consequently, Bowker, relying on an analysis of the

American context comments,

better differentiation between professional duties and tasks that can be performed by persons of lesser academic training, reserving for professional social workers matters of judgment and decision-makers (similar to medical, engineering and nursing professions which use technicians and auxiliary services, leaving matters of analysis and diagnosis to the professionally-trained ( Edmonton Social Planning Council, 1966, p.6).

Consequently, the Council’s recommendation to the Provincial Department of Education to

establish a two-year diploma in ‘Welfare Services’ at the Northern Alberta Institute of

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Technology (NAIT) beginning in 1967, effectively adopted a solution prescribed by an analysis

of the public policy and political context of the US.

As Mike McIntyre recalled it, NAIT, hired him in 1967 to establish what was intended to

be a social work case-aid program for which he thought he would be an instructor. However, the

well-experienced roofer turned social worker soon discovered that NAIT had the position of

Director in mind. As it turned out, neither McIntyre nor the social work case-aid program fit

well within the technology-oriented institution. As he explained, “Surrounded by all this

technological stuff and for example, at budget time they’d go, “What kind of machinery do you

want? Well, can’t you use some video stuff and so on? I guess we could use some video stuff

okay. I was just out of sync with the whole thing!” (Mike McIntyre, Personal Communication:

January 01, 2012).

McIntyre suggested that at the end of two years, the potential for the social work

technician, case-aid program was unrealized. The program’s graduates, if they found work at

all, were likely placed in social work positions with close supervision and without much

autonomy. Soon after the end of his two years, McIntyre left NAIT and soon thereafter joined

the School of Social Welfare. Meanwhile, the NAIT program transferred to Grant MacEwan

Community College and became a social services program. Kay Feehan, the long-term Director

of the Grant MacEwan social services program, had much the same view as McIntyre about the

NAIT program, “it was the first program to be transferred from NAIT to the College because it

was more appropriate in a college rather than a technical school. And so, I was from the

beginning, interested in getting transferability,” referring to the University of Calgary, School of

Social Welfare (Kay Feehan, Personal Communication: November 21, 2010).

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Whether the decision to establish the 2 year, post-high school diploma program had a significant impact on hiring practices, is ambiguous. Reichwein, (1978) examined the record of hiring practices by Alberta Social Services & Community Health and developed a profile of community college trained staffs, however, its significance is unclear. While the number of

community college graduates increased in number, it is unclear whether the change was due to a

growth in the number of positions, the result of retirements or general turnover of staff.

Likewise, it is similarly unclear what motivated hiring decisions, e.g., cost, qualifications or

other extraneous factors.

Nevertheless, in the early 1990s, the Klein government imposed a two-year diploma on

Alberta’s social work profession to solve its reluctance or inability to attract university graduates

in social work, especially in northern and Aboriginal communities (Alberta Legislative

Assembly, Hansard, June 4, 1991, p. 1487-1491). Stan Remple, the Deputy Minister in the lead

up to the decision, suggested that

. . . there was simultaneously a political awareness that the department had a lot of people, especially in the north, who were not necessarily that educated and that also happens to be for those reasons or other reasons or a combination of both, why many things went wrong. And it got picked up and somewhat politicized and from that point of view I think there was a rationalization that we need to be able to get those people into the graduate level program as well and come back to provide services and in a way provide …should I say legitimacy….to what was going on in light of anticipated continued criticism (Stan Remple, Personal Communication: August 8, 2011).

At the same time, knowing the concern of the AASW, Remple acknowledged that the decision had been largely a political, one of which he was certainly aware and to which the

Department had some input.

I do know that the AASW was concerned about not being involved in the discussions around the change. That I do remember. I was much less involved in the discussions leading up to the decision because ultimately it was a decision

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much more made at the political level. Not without having our bureaucrat’s input (Stan Remple, Personal Communication: August 8, 2011).

Although Remple did not suggest a direct connection, the difficulties in providing a professional level of service in rural and northern Alberta weighed significantly on the

Department and resulted in considerable criticism directed at the Department. Even with the two-year, post-high school college diploma in social work, criticism of the Department’s inability to locate social workers in those areas of the province remained. It seems the political calculation to solve the problem by lowering the entry standard for the profession did not achieve its intended political purpose.

Clearly, Remple was aware that the change occurred without the profession being part of the discussions. As he pointed out, social work did not have a high standing in the eyes of many of the government members. Referring specifically to Connie Osterman, he suggested that sometimes that even included the Minister.

She came with early traditional values, values that I suppose many Albertans were perceived to hold. And, she saw a loosening of that kind of thinking by social workers and advocating…..and where she got upset would be where young social workers would be making judgment calls about what happened in families and not having their own kids she would say. And, so they don’t understand what is really going on and yet they pretend to be people in positions of professional authority. And she did not like that (Stan Remple, Personal Communication: August 8, 2011).

Nevertheless, as Kay Feehan, pointed out, the issue of transferability for social service courses and diploma graduates to the BSW program represented a major barrier for college diploma programs. Resisted by the Faculty, it became a timeless issue in the relationship between the Community Colleges and the University; at least until it became evident a substantial number of the diploma program graduates were applying, accepted, entered and

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graduated from the FSW, BSW program. For Feehan, the process was frustrating, slow and without end or action on the part of the U of C, or the government.

You were all taught by professional social workers. You know a curriculum was being developed. We felt it was adequate at least to get some recognition. But it was, well it went on and on and on for most of the twenty years I was there. Transferability was a focus of our energies because an awful lot of our students went on to the university and then for them to have to start from the beginning, was difficult. Now on the whole, we got support from the government….I don’t know….at the beginning it wasn’t separate, but anyway we did get cooperation. They were always anxious to see some kind of seamless transfer happen. At least that is what they told us.

Things didn’t ever seem to move very, very quickly, and the university was very reluctant to accept things. For a while they accepted our psychology, the college’s psychology, and then moved into accepting a few others like sociology and eventually English. Now I can’t tell you how many meetings that went on in all those years in which everybody was congenial but no action was ever taken. My experience and I just have to say this is in retrospect and I may be wrong, but the University of Calgary was quite difficult. Now the Edmonton Division was much more cooperative, but of course, they could not do much without Calgary (Kay Feehan, (Personal Communication: November 21, 2010).

The Junior League of Calgary

The discovery of vast quantities of oil and gas in the late 1940s initiated a lasting influence in all dimensions of Alberta life. Its reach continues to extend well beyond the plentiful supply of an energy resource and into the fabric of the province’s culture. Not long after the initial discoveries, the major American and global energy companies interested in exploiting natural resources began to locate offices in Alberta, especially in Calgary, bringing senior corporate officials to oversee the exploration, refining and development of the discoveries.

Along with the transfers came families. As Tim Tyler observed it, the women who came to Calgary were generally well educated and likely to be much more liberal and progressive in their outlook then the men who came with them. Their interest in the life of their new

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community went well beyond the corporate interests of their husbands and brought them together in an organization with which they were familiar, the Junior League movement from the US with a history of philanthropy and charity (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 6, 2010).

Initially established in the US in the early 20th century, Junior Leagues were generally

associated with young women of influence, initially at least primarily achieved through the

positions and associations of their husbands. By the early1950s, the number of young American women in Calgary was sufficient to establish a Junior League of Calgary. For the first several decades, their organization grew and gained local recognition and prominence. However, as women increasingly entered the labour force in the late 1960s and beyond, even with changes in the eligibility criteria, membership numbers gradually eroded even as other Calgary women joined. While the change did not realize the dramatic growth of the 1950s, it stabilized and the

League remains an effective force for volunteerism, philanthropy, training and program development offered by women in Calgary.

Along with the broad scope of their local interests were the connections to the international League whose activities were reported in The Lasso, the local monthly newsletter.

In that context, an early reference to ‘social work’ occurred in the February 1960, involving the

Toronto Junior League sponsorship of a Special Lectureship on Corrections at the University of

Toronto, School of Social Work. The next occurrence was found in the Board’s Minutes of

November 23, 1961, noting receipt of “a letter from the Southern Alberta Division of the

Canadian Association of Social Workers regarding establishment of a School of Social Work at

the University of Calgary, will be studied by the Community Research Committee.”

Whether it was a coincidence or open to speculation that it was planned but that same

year, Dr. Malcolm Taylor, Principal, University of Alberta, Calgary (UAC), informally sought

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out some of the League’s members to enlist their support in studying the need for a graduate studies program, that led to the League’s decision to establish its Community Research

Committee. Taylor’s interest in working with League was motivated to no small degree by developing the UAC’s pathway to autonomy. His Inaugural Address of October 29, 1960, represented a diplomatic call for institutional autonomy cast in the language of freedom and

increased choice for students (UAC, Taylor, Malcolm Gordon, 1120.2). Likewise, it’s no surprise that Frank Bach, Assistant Director of Calgary Catholic Family Services at the time and one of the first faculty members at the School of Social Welfare, called Malcolm Taylor “the kingpin” in the development of a graduate social work education program in Alberta (Frank

Bach, Personal Communication: August 3, 2010).

On May 02, 1961, Taylor spoke on the topic, “Education of Our Community,” to 103 of the Calgary Junior League’s members at what would be the first of several formal presentations.

A copy of that speech did not make its way into the U of C or the U of A, Archives; however, the topic was sufficiently broad in scope and likely appealed to the well-educated and well- connected group of young women intent on encouraging and influencing the development of their new community.

Their potential for influence was something that would not have escaped a ‘kingpin.’

Evidence of that is apparent when Taylor appeared at the League’s annual meeting a year later, on May 1, 1962. This time he spoke to the League, apparently with much the same purpose in mind, namely, to further the cause of autonomy, Advantages of a First Class University in

Calgary. However, joining Taylor at this meeting was Isabel Munroe, the President of AASW, speaking on the Need for a School of Social Work, in Alberta. The connection between a first class university and a graduate program would appeal to a group of well-connected and

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politically astute women who understood their new community’s long held aspirations for an autonomous university and the importance of graduate programs in a first class university.

However, as the custom of the day, requests for financial support were referred to a committee for review. As Helen Hammond explained, the League had earlier established a

Committee to gather information about possible graduate programs for an autonomous

University in Calgary (Helen Hammond, Personal Communication: August 31, 2011). In the course of the Committee’s work, Hammond explained that the decision for the League came to a choice between a veterinary program and a school of social work. It was not a difficult choice;

Hammond explained.

And so what would be the most likely to be acceptable, “A” the age of the government where we needed funding and “B” to the community, the vocational community which needed to give accreditation and stature to this school….and after rejecting several because for instance there was a veterinary college at Saskatoon and so forth, there was obviously a need for a school for social work in the Prairies. And so, this is where we zeroed in. Then a committee was appointed – I was on it. I was the lead representative on it. Pat O’Byrne was the Catholic Bishop; he was on it, Gertrude Lang who had headed the B and B Commission for the Federal Government, French speaking and was a Calgarian and became a recipient of the Order of Canada as a result of her work, was on it, and there were several others (Helen Hammond, Personal Communication: August 31, 2011).

At the same time, they knew about the importance of a graduate professional school,

especially since the League’s leaders had prepared them to make a decision on June 5, 1962 to

authorize a $10,000.00 Social Work Education Study in which they would play a major role.

The Social Work Education Research Committee:

Isabel Munroe apparently authored a letter of unknown date to the CSWE sometime in

early 1961, asking about the requirements for a feasibility study to establish a school of social

work. The response to her inquiry, dated June 27, 1961, came from Mildred Sikkema, the

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Consultant on Educational Standards who provided Munroe with a copy of its, Guide for the Use in Assessing the Need for a New School of Social Work. Sikkema also elaborated on the role the

CSWE could play in assisting with developing and implementing such a study including suggestions for consultants.

Although it appears as if Munroe acted alone, she had support from others and acted in conjunction with a larger plan. The Southern Alberta Branch Executive requested and received assurances that the Northern Branch agreed with the decision that the Southern Branch would lead the Alberta effort to establish a school of social work. The minutes of November 20, 1961 indicate a substantial review of related activities took place among the 12 members. The

Progress Report of the Committee on Social Work Education was attached to the minutes for the benefit of members informing them of the Committee’s detailed plan of action.

Apparently, U of A, Calgary President Malcolm Taylor participated in the preparation of the plan, including the suggestion that would also further his efforts to develop an autonomous

University of Calgary, namely, the importance of a graduate level professional program as part of a university. In his analysis of the local scene, Taylor suggested a weakness of a Calgary location for a school of social work was an inadequate number of suitable field placements; however, he endorsed response and the proposal for block placements as a solution. Taylor also suggested that he and Fred Colborne, then a Minister in the Social Credit government, would present that as a solution to the government’s Committee on Higher Education of which they were both members.

Taylor obviously saw the opportunity and apparently made numerous other suggestions the Committee incorporated into its planning. It included forwarding copies of Isabel Munroe’s brief on social work education in Alberta to the Chair of the Committee on Higher Education,

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since it would be meeting soon. Exploring funding for a comprehensive study of staffing needs in provincial social agencies, developing a social work library, encouraging an application for funding from the Calgary Junior League and maintaining contact with the Northern Branch were on his list of suggestions. Effectively, it was a campaign in which Taylor introduced the

Southern Branch members to lobbying and influencing government. Simply put, Taylor demonstrated what Frank Bach had in mind, “the Kingpin.” A final note in the Committee’s report is a suggestion that a complete set of the 13-volume study on a social work curriculum be made available to the U of C, Calgary. That copy of the 1959 Boehm Report now resides in the

Library.

The Progress Report presented to the General Meeting of the Southern Branch on

November 20, 1961, omitted a direct reference to Imelda Chenard’s contribution. However, as the Northern CASW Branch Minutes of December 12, 1961 suggest, Imelda Chenard, an

Edmonton psychiatric social worker, and Director of Social Services at the University Hospital, also played a very significant role in preparing the groundwork for professional social work education in Alberta. Technically, Chenard’s position was with the U of A, and as a result was well aware of developments taking place. In her interview with Karen Hill, in 1985 Isobel

Munroe-Smith suggested Chenard wrote U of A President, Walter Johns, in response to a circular to faculty members asking for suggestions for its five-year long-range planning.

Chenard proposed the development of a school of social work. Although the suggestion was late, a response, a mere two days later suggested that her “cogent arguments” resulted in a promise to consider her suggestion (Hill, 1985, Isabel Munroe-Smith Oral History Interview;

NAC, MG I 441 Container 25, File 6, Southern Alberta Branch 1958-1962).

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The same Minutes of December 12, 1961 also indicate the University confirmed its

“agree[ment] to rebase Imelda Chenard’s brief and that Isabel Munroe [would] have 100 duplicated and mailed to all members.” However, to what extent the two documents were blended is unclear (UAA, Accession No. 69-123, Item 225, Box 14, File: Social Work).

Regardless, the brief that made its way to AASW members, the U of A, and the Government, had remarkable impact, establishing an agenda of several years duration.

Simultaneously, the two CASW Alberta Branches decided it was time to incorporate the

Alberta Association of Social Workers, and after a few false starts, the request for incorporation received official approval on December 16, 1961. Although undated, what appears from the context as the first, i.e., 1962, Annual Report, prepared by AASW’s first President, Isabel

Munroe, the Executive Committee reports to the members that, “as you probably know, [the

Executive] is still devoted pretty entirely to activity connected with the need for a School of

Social Work.” The same Report informed the membership that the Calgary Junior League authorized a grant of $10,000 to cover the cost of a study as recommended by the CSWE to determine the need for a school of social work in Alberta (AASW Presidents Annual Reports,

1961 & 1962).

Not long after the Junior League’s approval to fund the research, decisions were made about the Committee’s membership. Who and how it was done, is unclear but the result was

several long list of representatives from every sector of interest. How and who selected the

Chair is similarly unclear. Pat O’Byrne suggested in his interview with Karen Hill that Irial

Gogan, the Medical Director at the Holy Cross Hospital, was the Chair, however, the

Committee’s records shows he was the Vice-Chair. The Committee’s Constitution, guiding the

decisions and business of the Committee was prepared as a legal document that established the

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framework of an Agreement between organizations and the four individuals on the Executive.

In contemporary terms, they signed off on a project charter focused on a single task, namely a

research project. Membership on the Committee reached 26, as replacements became necessary.

However, throughout its existence, the Junior League, the AASW and U of A held nine of the 16

positions. The formal record of the Committee’s meetings suggests attendance was sparse and

spotty.

The selection of James Caven Mahaffy Q.C. was especially politically astute and the

decision may well have benefitted from Malcolm Taylor or even Walter Johns’ advice. As

pointed out earlier, James Mahaffy Q.C. was well known to the Premier and a telephone call to

Premier Manning would be readily accepted. Junior League member, Helen Hammond

remembered Mahaffy as the Chair of the Committee and said he was a “fine man.”

I only knew him as the chairman of these meetings and I had forgotten who it was, but you certainly have prompted my memory. And he was a fine man. And later because I have a business school background, I was able to find a job as an economist and became a little bit more familiar with pipeline applications and so forth, and so I had some at arm’s length dealings with him and was always very impressed (Helen Hammond, Personal Communication: August 31, 2011).

Volunteers from the Committee working through a subcommittee on research, chaired by

John Farry of Catholic Family Services, Public Relations Committee chaired by Irial Gogan and the Finance Committee, chaired by Helen Hammond, carried out the ongoing work. Two consultants from CSWE were invited to come to Alberta with a view to assisting the Committee with its work. Dorothy Aiken’s report evaluated the availability and potential resources for the proposed graduate school of social work. The focus of her work was the assessment of potential field placements. Aiken was a faculty member at the Chicago School of Social Service

Administration and a member of the group at Chicago who led the change from specialized

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casework to direct social work practice. Mildred Sikkema, the CSWE consultant was also retained by the Committee, primarily as an advisor to the Committee during the development of

its Study.

The Committee apparently began its work soon after the Junior League’s June meeting.

It appears that by September 23, 1962, the date of its first meeting, considerable preliminary work had already taken place and decisions were made to contract a research firm to assist with

developing a profile of potential student enrollments. Likewise, Sikkema had already agreed to

come to Alberta to meet with U of A faculty, AASW members and the Committee.

Meanwhile, in a confidential brief dated, November 12, 1962, The Establishment of the

Calgary Campus: An Ideal in the Making, from Malcolm Taylor to E.W. Hinman, the Provincial

Treasurer and Chairman of the Government Survey Committee on Higher Education, Taylor

demonstrated the connection between advocacy for a graduate school of social work and an

autonomous university in Calgary. The Taylor brief illustrates the disparity between the

Edmonton and Calgary campus with respect to programs, faculty and consequences for students

in terms in rank, offerings and the preponderance of freshman students and the continuation of

‘high school habits.’ While Taylor evaluated the role of graduate studies offered by a veterinary

and social work, he concludes the preferred option is to transfer existing programs from

Edmonton to the Calgary campus. Whether the Taylor’s ‘Ideal’ was seriously intended may be

pointless, it precipitated a serious opening for the discussion he believed necessary to achieve

the autonomy he sought.

The Survey Committee, of which Walter Johns was a member, discussed the confidential

brief on November 16, 1962 and Johns’ response to Taylor a few days later is polite in denying

and dismissing the merits of all Taylor’s arguments and views. Instead, John’s conclusion calls

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for “A steady and strong organic growth . . . is in the best interests of students and of the citizens of the Province as a whole. To attempt to hasten this by artificial stimulation would, I feel, be a grave mistake” (PAA Accession 79.106/Box 9 U of A, Survey Committee). Perhaps somewhat mischievously, a November 22, 1962, Editorial in the Edmonton Journal, with the provocative title, “No ‘Amputations’ at the University,” quoted Johns, making Taylor’s suggestion of transferring Law and Commerce to Calgary (UAA Accession 72-132-226, Ref. No. 44/1/8/2-

288).

Taylor did not surrender, reverse or revise the cause. Although a letter of January 28,

1963, was not located, Taylor appears to have proposed a “survey of the administrative structure of the University of Alberta,” presumably including the U of A, Edmonton relationship with its

U of A, Calgary location. Johns’ response acknowledges the merit of Taylor’s suggestion.

I have come reluctantly to the conclusion in recent months that we must have a careful examination of the administrative structures of the University of Alberta and the method of carrying out such procedures as the preparation of annual budgets, the planning of new buildings, and the entire business operation of the University of Alberta” (PAA Accession 79.106/Box 9 U of A Survey Committee).

It seems the Johns’ concerns about ‘artificial stimulation’ withered away and Taylor’s persistence had its desired effect after all and assisted with the creation of a reluctant conclusion

(UAA Accession 72-132-226, Ref. No. 44/1/8/2-288).

As for the Social Work Research Committee, the events in the background do not appear in its records even though it nuanced the dynamics for its Report. From its initial meeting to its concluding meeting on May 14, 1965, the Committee met 8 times with a small core of regulars, e.g., the Junior League representatives, some AASW and U of A representatives. It appears that some may actually have failed to attend any meetings. A noteworthy development at the

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September 9, 1963 meeting is the introduction of Dr. F.H. (Tim) Tyler replacing Mrs. Lang who had represented the Calgary Council of Community Services.

Perhaps the single most important Committee meeting occurred on March 13, 1964.

After the Committee conducted its main business, Bert Marcuse of Calgary Family Services moved, with Mrs. Cairns from the Department of Public Welfare, seconding the motion, “That it

is now time for an informal dialog between the Chairman of the Committee and the Premier of

the Province.” The motion carried, and the meeting adjourned. The support of Cairns, a

relatively senior government employee by seconding Marcuse’s motion not only reinforces the

DPW’s support, but quite likely political support as well.

In all likelihood, the timing was also affected by Malcolm Taylor’s December 1963

decision to leave Calgary for Victoria where he was appointed as President of a new University

of Victoria. Local newspapers correctly interpreted the departure as a sign of Taylor’s

opposition to the Walter Johns vision of the University of Alberta with an annex or branch plant

in Calgary (UAA, Accession 69-123, Item No. 991, Box 56, President Calgary, General

Correspondence, Calgary Herald, November 20, 1964; UAA, Accession 69/123, Ref. No. 994.2

Box 56, Newspaper Clippings, December 19, 1964).

Although Dean Smith wasn’t at the meeting, he was soon informed by M.H. Scargill,

Dean of Graduate Studies, that “Our Chairman [Mahaffy] will speak to the Premier informally, advising him that strong recommendations are to be made for a School of Social Work in

Alberta” (UAA, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education, Alberta

Social Work Education Research).

Although there is no record that the telephone conversation took place, or if it did, what the two men said. However, it involved two former opponents in the Legislative Assembly who

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highly respected each other, the legal counsel to the 1947 Royal Commission on Child Welfare, and the senior executive of Alberta’s first Crown Corporation, the Alberta Gas Trunk Line – all appointments by Premier E.C. Manning. As Preston Manning suggested Mahaffy would have had the ear of the Premier on any matter Mahaffy thought important enough to warrant a call to the Premier’s Office.

Apparently, this was not unusual for Premier Manning and reflects the degree to which he was involved in a wide range of issues. As a contemporary of Tyler, the first Dean of

Medicine and later a U of C President, Wm. Cochrane described his frustrations dealing with provincial government and the Edmonton medical fraternity in the late 1960s. It resulted in another Manning intervention as the result of a phone call. Cochrane, confronted with passive opposition to the development of a medical education program based on system’s theory rather than a subject matter approach, i.e., pharmacology etc. taught independently of systems such as endocrinology, was disappointed and frustrated with the opposition and as a result called the

Premier’s Office.

I was a little disappointed, I phoned up the Premier’s office, and I said I want to come and see the Premier. He phoned me a week later and said Mr. Manning will see you so and so and I went up to see Mr. Manning and here it was the first time I met him. So here is what I said, if your intention is to build a medical school, I said you have a Jubilee Auditorium like the Jubilee Auditorium in Edmonton. It’s copied in Calgary. You have the Glenrose Hospital, a copy of that was in the architects plan for the Rockyview, and if that is your intent for Alberta. He said no, no. Well if that’s your intent, then I’m not going to stick around. I told him what I had in mind and we had a great discussion. So he said, no, no, we want something different and we’ll take the best of whatever we find you know. So that was the background to that. So my comfort was the knowledge that this man was a visionary, he was supportive, and so we pushed ahead. But, the visions were there but after a while, you overcame those (Wm. Cochrane, Personal Communication: January 18, 2011).

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In a comparable position later on, Cochrane encountered opposition, or what he called

‘tardiness’ in response to requests for capital funds to build the medical school. In response to

the persistent questions by Calgary Herald publisher Swanson concerning a new building for the

Faculty, he urged Cochrane to write an article in the Herald. As a result, Cochrane received a

phone call from a newly appointed Minister of Health, Jim Henderson.

He called me about two or three Saturdays after and said ‘I’m coming down there to get this straightened out.’ And, so fine, ‘Where will I meet you, at the Bowlen Building?’ And he said, ‘No, you can pick me up at the airport.’ I said fine and where do you want to go? And, he goes, ‘I’ll leave that to you – anywhere you want to go. I want to get this straightened out.’ So I picked him up, took him, and drove him out to Bowness Park and we walked through the bush and sat with a case of beer at the edge of the river. We had a great discussion for two or three hours and he went back. In about three weeks or so, we had twenty-five million bucks for the medical school (Wm. Cochrane: Personal Communication: January 18, 2011).

Although, as previously suggested, there is no record of a direct intervention by Manning

as result of the Mahaffy phone call. However, by this time not only was the Junior League

funded study well underway if not nearly complete; the members of the League were committed to the goal itself, an Alberta school of social work. Moreover, it was widely supported throughout the province, and at least in Calgary, it was directly associated with the aspirations of

60 years for an autonomous University of Calgary.

On July 28, 1964, the Committee held another of its meetings, and other than the regular business of finalizing the details for the Report, the members decided to limit its distribution to the U of A Presidents in Calgary and Edmonton, the Chair of the Board of Governors, the

Premier and the Minister of Education. The Committee also decided against publicity for the

Report or speaking engagements by Committee members, unless the Executive decided it to be appropriate. Whether this was the advice of Mahaffy after his conversation with the Premier is

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unknown, but the government and certainly the Premier understood a public release of the report would immediately raise expectations, add to the difficulties and without defining a location, stir up and politicize it even further.

Consequently, the Report published in August 1964, recommended the establishment of a school of social work in Alberta. However, it did so without a hint as to a preferred location for the school. The Report’s most significant recommendation with respect to course content confirmed that the primary focus would be on the individual, with casework and group work as the primary methodological focus for practice and established agencies as the vehicles for delivering the service. Likewise, although discussions about ‘prevention’ were already beginning within DPW and in the broader provincial, national and international context, the

Committee’s recommendations maintained the expectations that this would be a classic casework social work education program.

The required professional education is based on courses, combining both theory

and practice, divided into three major areas:

(a) The social services. This includes the historical background to contemporary social services and social legislation and their inter-relationships; the various fields in which social work is practiced such as psychiatric, medical, corrections, community organizations, public welfare and family services, etc.

(b) Human growth and behaviour. This includes the study of both normal and deviant behaviour in order to better understand the phenomena of individual function as well as social factors influencing individual and group behaviour. Such studies while under the direction of the social work faculty utilize specialists in other fields such as psychiatry, other medical specialties, sociology, psychology, etc.

(c) Social work practice. This includes social work techniques and methods of working with people as individuals (social casework) and with groups (social group work). It also includes the administration of social welfare services, community organization and social research. Professional social workers maintain standards of practice and professional ethics through their national organization the Canadian

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Association of Social Workers. As of January 1, 1964, membership in this body, which now numbers 3200 is limited to persons with a minimum professional qualification of a Master of Social Work Degree (Alberta Social Work Education Research Committee, 1964, p. 6).

With the completion of the Committee’s Report in August 1964, the U of A, assumed responsibility for implementing the recommendations in anticipation of a provincial response.

The final meeting of the Committee took place on May14, 1965 to wind-down the Committee, following the U of A Board of Governors decision on April 2, 1965 to proceed with a school of social work; however, once more without a hint as to the location for the school. Somewhat as an afterthought, the Committee formally acknowledged the contribution of Malcom Taylor who had resigned the Calgary position in December 1963, as a form of protest to the U of A’s unwillingness to support autonomy for Calgary. The recognition took the form of a copy of the

Committee’s Report and a copy of President Walter Johns’ letter to the Committee with the announcement of the Board’s decision to establish a school of social work in Alberta.

A Decision – the Halfway Point

At an institutional level, there is no doubt that the U of A played the major role in developing graduate level social work education in Alberta even though it required U of A

President, Walter Johns to move from a position of reluctance and possibly opposition to accepting the prospect Alberta would have a graduate level social work education program.

While AASW, as the institutional initiator, its individual members played a key role throughout the process of the Study and beyond, the most consistent advocate throughout was the Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Douglas E. Smith.

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The precipitating moment for Smith’s effort was Isabel Munroe’s brief. Even as the

Research Committee’s work was incomplete, it led him to write the Dean of Graduate Studies,

A.G. McCalla on October 13, 1963, optimistically declaring that establishing both a MSW and

BSW program should encounter no “insurmountable difficulties in arranging a Master’s degree in Social Work which would satisfy CSWE and Graduate Studies” (UAA, 0867, Accession

72132-245, Ref No. 41/1/7/6/628).

Perhaps Smith’s ready interest and support were the result of his presence on the Board of the Edmonton Social Planning Council and the issues it confronted in the late 1950s and

1960s. Likewise, and not to be discarded is that a well-established institution such as a university, had its own well-defined expectations, roles, customs, controls, recognition and rewards. Successfully establishing a new professional graduate level program represented by a provincial school of social work, would be an important contribution to the status of the

University of Alberta.

The turning point for Johns came because of a circular he distributed to faculty and staff of the U of A with a request for proposals to the U of A’s long-range planning. As noted earlier,

Imelda Chenard’s intervention with a proposal for Johns to consider the development of a school of social work appears as his defining the moment. Johns changed his mind apparently, because

Chenard offered some ‘cogent arguments’ and despite having done so after the deadline. What constituted those ‘cogent arguments’ remains unknown, but it is hard to imagine that they were very different from the well-known reality of a serious labour shortage in the development and staffing of social welfare programs. That shortage was felt regardless of whether organizations were sponsored nationally, provincially, municipally or by small local social agencies, after all, the institution for collective action, i.e., government, decided ‘faring-well’ was within reach.

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After considerable discussion, the decision-making became more urgent and earnest.

The Board of Governors decided and announced its decision to establish a school of social work in Alberta. That decision immediately focused attention on an ironic choice between the

University of Alberta in Edmonton or the University of Alberta in Calgary – making the decision

that more difficult. In an effort to provide the sheen of objectivity, various individuals and

organizations were considered as potential advisors, even though the Aiken Report clearly

favoured Edmonton because of an established university and greater resources for field

placements. However, when the question was put to Tim Tyler, Executive Director of the

Calgary Social Planning Council, the declaration that Calgary agencies would do no less than

Edmonton apparently nullified Aiken’s views.

A similar request to the CASW Executive Director, Florence Philpott failed in the end to

find a solution, quite possibly because CASW was certainly aware of the issues and understood

the professional politics at play between the two cities and its universities (NAC, MG 28, I 441

CASW Container 41, File 29, Education: Universities, Calgary and British Columbia). For

CASW to enter that debate would be tantamount to seeking self-flagellation.

In a letter dated February 15, 1965, the Minister of Public Welfare, Leonard Halmrast

acknowledged a recent telephone call from Johns and reported on the Department’s thinking

concerning a school of social work in Alberta. The letter follows the Mahaffy telephone call to

the Premier and the limited circulation of Social Work Education Research Committee Report to

the Premier, the Minister of Education and the Chair of the U of A Board of Governors. The

letter recognized the value of the work by the Social Work Education Research Committee

followed by a substantial description of the changing characteristics of the province, the

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challenges faced by his Department and steps it had already taken to address the need for trained staff, i.e., in-service training and educational leave.

As if he borrowed from Harry Cassidy, the Minister commented that “we are going to have to do more than simply continue to treat casualties” followed by a broad discussion about the changing role of his Department, municipal governments and the development of preventive social services in the context of the child welfare and social assistance. However, rather than announcing that the Department intended to ‘fight the crime of poverty,’ Halmrast placed the need for “train[ing] more workers capable of giving social services at a higher level than we have required in the past.” However, the ‘higher level’ was within the established context of the

Department’s existing legal framework, its policies and programs. Having made his point about the Department’s expectations, Halmrast sought to tie support for the school to meeting the

Department’s expectations. “I hope a School of Social Work would produce such workers and I am therefore very much in agreement with the suggestion that one be included in the University of Alberta” (UAA, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education).

In addition to outlining his expectations about the relationship of the School to the

Department’s needs, the letter was also the first official and clear indication of the Government’s support. Whether by design or not, it also established the principle that DPW and its successors would attempt to play a significant, if not major role in the development and funding of social work education.

In a somewhat terse memo to Johns dated February 22, 1965 Dean Smith acknowledged the decision by the Government to support graduate level social work education in Alberta.

However, he takes issue with the Minister’s suggestions that the past efforts of DPW should be taken as having met its responsibilities and at the same time hoping that no one on the boards of

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private social agencies or staff will read the final paragraph on the first page of the Minister’s letter. Having recorded his views about the Minister, Smith next re-iterates his objection to delaying a decision by the Board of Governors until April 2, 1965, because it will make it extremely difficult to recruit a director in time for a September appointment and a one-year period to hire staff, develop the curriculum and establish field placements. Presumably, Smith well understood, as did Johns, that the delay would leave Smith’s preference for a U of A location open to Calgary as a viable alternative, if for no other reason that in 1966, Calgary would have its own university, and as Malcolm Taylor had noted, a graduate program was an essential part of a genuinely independent university. Nevertheless, to expedite the anticipated approval from the Board of Governors, Smith offered to begin working informally for possible candidates. In fact he went further, and offered, “As you know, I can already provide a short list of possibilities” (UAA, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education).

Apparently, at least for a time, the offer apparently went unheeded.

It is also evident that speculation external to the University sought to influence the decisions that needed to be made. On March 26, 1965, the Minister of Public Welfare, L.E.

Halmrast, wrote Johns that he’d been asked questions in the Legislature about a school of social work, and particularly whether the University could proceed without government support.

Halmrast denied some of the remarks attributed to him by the Edmonton press, nevertheless, he apparently “presumed that if they [the Board of Governors] were convinced a School for Social

Work had general support in the Province, that they could proceed to set up this School of Social

Work” (UAA, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education,).

Johns, response, dated March 29, 1965, acknowledged in a somewhat servile manner that knowing the Minister, Halmrast’s remarks, must have been misrepresented by the journalist, and

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indicated the University was under no obligations to consult with the Department of Education, at least not officially. Moreover, he wrote that in any case, the Department is well represented on the U of A Board of Governors, and finally, Johns noted that the Board, subject to available funds, planned to make its decision on April 2, 1965.

Accordingly, Johns prepared what appears to be the decision memo for the Board of

Governors and one can imagine, Malcolm Taylor looking over his shoulder from his vantage point at the University of Victoria, to ensure he recommended approval for the establishment of a School of Social Work in Alberta as well as authority to hire a Director for the School. The

Board decided as recommended and on April 7, 1965, its decision was made public by a Press

Release including an announcement that the location issue was to be decided at a later date.

Within a matter of several days after the Board of Governors gave its approval to hire a

Director, Halmrast again wrote Johns. In a letter dated April 27, 1965, the Minister offers his congratulations for the Board of Governors decision to approve the establishment of the School.

Without a hint of subtly, the Minister once again outlined the interests of his Department. In this instance, the interests were to ensure special consideration for DPW’s “naturals,” i.e., employees who demonstrated “qualities of maturity, warmth and feeling in personal relationships, common sense and sensitivity to others needs, are prerequisites for individuals for individuals considering a career in social work.”

Halmrast continued, “Social Work is not yet in a position to be excessively demanding of the educational qualifications of its recruits.” Finally, he suggested that Schools of Social Work have a record of preparing students to work primarily in “private agencies and clinical settings.

The courses offered, and the philosophy that is transmitted to students, do not appear to be

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effective in encouraging graduates to seek employment in public agencies” (UAA, Accession

72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education).

The Location

The decision about the location was as contentious in the mind of some AASW members as the contemporary annual summer-ending Battle of Alberta. That is precisely how Fr. Pat

O’Byrne characterized it in 1986, in response to a question from Karen Hill. After telling her

that the Southern CASW Branch decided, they wanted the school of social work in Calgary, he

placed the inevitable decision about the location of the school of social work in the historic

Alberta rivalry.

We knew that if it ever got to Edmonton, Edmonton would want it and we’d never hear about it anymore, because they’d be bigger than us. And they’re better than us in hockey and everything else you see. So we decided to keep it for own, and so we did, Calgary type thing. We went to the Junior League we got them to back a study and they put up $10,000 and they put good gals on it, and then we went around town and got good chairmen. I remember we got Dr. Gogan of the Holy Cross Hospital as the Chairman of the Board and we got quite a powerful committee and we eventually decided we wanted a School of Social Work in Calgary, and we got it (Karen Hill, 1985).

While O’Byrne may have encased some hyperbole in his comments, it seems the Calgary

Branch did take the initiative to obtain the funding to conduct the CSWE recommended study.

However, it came with considerable assistance and numerous suggestions from the U of A,

Calgary Principal Malcolm Taylor. As noted earlier, he also suggested much of the strategy for

the Southern Branch, and played an active role in implementing it through his work with the

Junior League. For Taylor with a background at the University of Toronto and an indication he

may have taught some courses in the School of Social Work (AASW, Minutes of the September

30, 1961 Joint Meeting of Northern and Southern Branches), the prospect of a graduate program

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in social work education, fit well with his primary interest, an autonomous University for

Calgary. With the broad support of the Calgary community Taylor’s efforts were an attempt to right a historical situation in which Calgary felt they were unfairly denied the provincial university by the Alberta government (NAC, MG 28 I 441 CASW, Container 26, File 6,

Southern Alberta Branch).

Tim Tyler placed that issue in its historical context, suggesting that it had been customary to select one city as provincial capital and another for the provincial university, as had been done in British Columbia and Saskatchewan. With the 1905 Proclamation of the Alberta

Act and Edmonton as the capital city, the provincial university was founded in 1908, in the municipality of Strathcona, Premier Rutherford’s riding and directly across the Saskatchewan

River from Edmonton. Even though a Normal School was established in Calgary, Calgarians understood what had happened and a rivalry driven by resentment was on, even to the extent of a

brief effort by some Calgarians to establish a private university (Tim Tyler, Personal

Communication: August 6, 2010). As a result, much of the early formal development leading to establishment of graduate social work education took place under the aegis of the Faculty of Arts at the U of A and the leadership of Dean Douglas Smith, the Alberta membership of the CASW and the AASW.

Among the first and necessary changes recognized by the social workers in Calgary and

Edmonton was that after much of a decade of discussion, it was time to form a provincial professional association for social workers, namely, the Alberta Association of Social Workers

(AASW). The decision was finalized by the registration as a society and its publication in the

December 18, 1961, Alberta Gazette. To take the social work education issue seriously, the

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profession had to speak with one voice, develop the necessary continuity and capability to follow through on a deliberate strategy.

The timing was similarly good for the University of Alberta, Calgary and its last

Principal, Dr. Malcom Taylor, who arrived in Calgary, with a mandate to develop an autonomous and independent, University of Calgary. Likewise, nearly half a decade ago the

Department of Public Welfare had apparently divested itself of intractable opposition to social work and hiring professional social workers. Moreover, in Calgary, a group of competent, well- educated, ambitious and mostly young American women were intent on influencing their new community by developing new programs and services. Finally, the increasing shortage and growing for professionally educated social workers in private agencies, the federal, provincial and municipal governments was apparent even as high-level discussions about the realignment of social welfare programs and new funding arrangement were well underway.

U of A President Walter Johns was well aware of these developments and the impact they would have on university level education. His contacts and correspondence provincially, nationally and internationally reveals a constant flow of information from his counterparts elsewhere and from senior officials in the Federal and Provincial government and from politicians. He was also well aware for instance, that Duncan Rogers supported the development of a school of social work. In what appears to be his personal ‘working file’ about social work education are copies of correspondence, reports, memos, hand written notes and even a copy of the DPW’s Preventive Social Services Program Manual. The file also contains a copy of an

Editorial from the Albertan of September 8, 1960, describing Malcolm Taylor’s authorized version of a vision for an autonomous University of Calgary, one not prepared to be a mere annex to the U of A. In addition, this informal file contains lists of names of persons Smith and

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Johns consulted for potential directors of the proposed school of social work along with solicited and unsolicited names of applicants for the Director’s position.

Undoubtedly, Johns was also aware, read and understood the implications of the

Resolutions passed at the Banff Conference organized by Taylor and the faculty members in

Calgary, on January 13-15, 1961 – a manifesto and a subtle declaration for independence.

Finally, he understood the significance of the August 30, 1962, memo he received from Dean M.

H. Scargill.

Mr. Rogers, Deputy Minister of Public Welfare, talked with me yesterday, in your absence, and assured me that he was fully behind the Social Work Project. He suggested that Mr. John Ward be added to our Committee. Ward is Director of Welfare, and he can easily be brought in. Mr. Rogers felt that any publicity release from the Committee should have the approval of Mr. Jorgensen and Mr. Hyndman as well as the University. I advised Mr. Rogers that he might find it easy to consult with Dean Smith on the progress of the Committee; and he said that he would call Dean Smith when he needed information quickly. (UAA, Accession 72-132-425; Ref. 41/1/15/2-602, Social Work Education, Alberta Social Work Education Research - this appears to be Johns’ personal ‘working file’ as it contains a random group of documents often in no particular order).

Even with this background the Johns’ letter to Mrs. Sparling of March 21, 1963 referenced earlier, appears as an incomprehensible statement except as an effort to dampen the rising public expectations with respect to the outcome of the Junior League funded Study and the absence of a political commitment by the Government of Alberta. Meanwhile, Dean Smith was actively engaged in promoting the proposal for an Alberta school of social work through the various levels internal to the U of A, as well as developing his own broader contacts. Once the

Report of the Social Work Education Committee was made available in August 1964, the serious work of obtaining the required approvals from within the University began to take shape.

As previously noted, in the course of several letters from Halmrast over several months in early 1965, the DPW sought to institutionalize its expectations for social work education and the

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practice of social work as well as the profession by influencing quality of education, defining the scope of practice, identification of the required training, narrowing the prospect of graduates’ employment and implicitly disavowing the relevance of other social welfare programs.

Likewise, the question asked by a curious Member of the Legislative Assembly and reported by a journalist about the role of the Department of Education, received a definitive answer through the direct interventions by Halmrast and Johns’ obsequious response. The delay

of the decision about the location was hardly the ‘Battle of Alberta’ Pat O’Byrne anticipate. It

was strategic and tactically successful but barely visible. Frank Bach single word assessment is

probably correct; it was the work of a Kingpin!

Even though the University Coordinating Council was mandated to coordinate a wide

range of issues between the Universities in the two cities, the reasoning for placing both the

hiring of a Director and the location for an Alberta school of social work on its January 14, 1966,

agenda are unclear. While Johns was the Chair of the Council, Armstrong was there to represent

Calgary along with 10 of the Deans representing the broader interests of the two Universities.

The Report on hiring confirmed that progress was exceptionally slow. The Selection Committee

had seen and reviewed the applications of some ten or twelve candidates, but no interviews had

been conducted or even scheduled.

On the question of location, this meeting appears as a final event. Apparently, Dean

Smith had found a possible consultant in the person of Ernest Witte, Dean of the School of

Social Work at San Diego State College. Witte’s credentials were considered impeccable having

served as the Executive Secretary of CSWE for a decade. In anticipation of inviting him to

Alberta, he had already been provided with the various reports and correspondence. Writing

back, most likely to Dean Smith, he had reported that Edmonton was most likely the preferred

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location because of the presence of other educational facilities, the ease of communicating with government and governmental social services. Moreover, he apparently suggested, “such a location would also make it possible to achieve national status earlier. At Calgary, a higher status might be achieved on campus, but the effect would be temporary” (UAA, UCC Minutes,

January 14, 1966. Copy provided by the UAA staff without further reference).

Although Armstrong supported bringing Witte to Alberta, the majority apparently agreed that it would be pointless and simply an opportunity to repeat well-known arguments.

Moreover, it became apparent that the UCC Members had made up their mind, particularly as an entirely new issue was apparently injected into the discussion by the Chair, namely, the space requirements for an anticipated Library School. As a result, “on a motion by Dr. Wyman and

Dean McCalla, it was carried that, it be recommended to the Board of Governors that the School of Social Work be located at Calgary” (UAA, No. 78-58-1 (UCC, Eleventh Meeting Minutes

January 14, 1966).

Not to be outdone Dean Smith apparently made a final appeal for an Edmonton and a U of A location prior to the vote, offering,

That Dr.Witte’s letter suggested such schools did not in fact much use the facilities which were said to be necessary, that a Garneau house could be provided at Edmonton as a temporary measure, and that for the master's programme research facilities at Edmonton would have to be used. Dean Bowker said that the Department of Public Welfare could give great help, but that it was developing a large office at Calgary: he added that the B.C. school was not in the capital (UAA, Accession No. 78-58-1, UCC Eleventh Meeting Minutes January 14, 1966).

On February 11, 1966 without a Director or any staff in place, the U of A, Board of

Governors on a motion by Dr. Walter H. Johns, seconded by the U of C’s first President Dr.

Herbert Armstrong, the Board of Governors decided that the school of social work would be in

Calgary. Little did its supporters know that not long after its establishment, the person yet to be

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selected as Director would attempt to bring a very different vision to social work education than expected. That vision aspired to focus on the development of human social welfare by means of social reform and social action and ultimately more in line with what Harry Cassidy named the

‘broad view’ rather than the ‘narrow view,’ – the view almost exclusively associated with what those who worked diligently to establish the School expected.

Selecting the Director

Selecting a Director of any school of social work anywhere was complicated enough in the 1960s, let alone in Alberta. Finding a willing social work academic with the necessary credentials, a record of scholarship and administrative experience to lead a new program in

Alberta proved exceptionally difficult. The timing of the U of A, Board of Governors’ decision to approve the school, the pending decision that led to Calgary as the location for the school as well as the Social Credit government’s decision to grant the University of Calgary autonomy effective April 1, 1966, unduly complicated the difficulty.

At the same time, the least controversial and uncontested issue was the expectation that this would be a casework focused school in the manner described in the Aiken Report presented to the Alberta Social Work Education Research Committee. That Report of September 1963 represented an exhaustive study of Alberta agencies able to provide field placement experience for students. Its 30 pages devoted nearly 29 of them to a detailed review of potential fieldwork placements in Calgary and Edmonton for individual casework oriented experience. Potential group work placements were limited to a single paragraph with the remainder of the single page assigned to community organization and administration.

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The University of Alberta

Notwithstanding the avoidance of making a decision about the location, the selection process for a Director began almost immediately after the Board of Governors made its decision to proceed with the school and authorize the necessary hiring. Johns assigned the task of convening and chairing the Selection Committee to Dean Smith while reserving to himself the right to review the candidates and select the person. The Selection Committee, which included

D.E. Smith, H.S. Armstrong, W.E. Johns, F.H. Tyler and S. Bishop held their first meeting June

10, 1965 to consider a preliminary list of applications. The handwritten notes of that meeting

include the names of John Farina, David Levine, Gary Caster, Jackson Willis, Maxwell Cook,

Ralph Garber, L.T. Hancock and R.B. Splane. Other names added to the list apparently during

the meeting included Rueben Baetz, Don Milne and Walter Rudnicki while John Farina, Meyer

Katz and Alan Klein were identified for possible teaching responsibilities.

However, as the Committee was to discover, the task of finding a willing, qualified and willing group of candidates proved to be difficult. Notably absent, although promised by Johns, and not among this or any list I reviewed, was the name of Bill McFarland as Johns had promised to Minister Halmrast in a February 16, 1965 letter. However, as the Minister acknowledged, McFarland did not have a doctoral degree and would not be qualified; not to be discouraged Halmrast suggested perhaps McFarland would qualify as a professor as long as it meant no reduction in his salary.

There is no direct evidence beyond the customary letters acknowledging the Minister’s contribution, that any of Halmrast’s interventions weighed on President Johns, Dean Smith or even on the Selection Committee as they sought candidates for the Director of Alberta’s school of social work. The search included a broad spectrum of consultations with other schools of

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social work, prominent academics, senior practitioners, senior federal officials, the consultants for the Social Work Education Research Committee and the CASW.

A review of the several lists of applicants suggests that notwithstanding the difficult circumstances, both Smith and Johns made a serious effort to find qualified, potential and

willing candidates. Between the two of them, they consulted at least 41 prominent social

workers from professional organizations, universities and professional bodies. In what appears

to have been the final or near final list prepared by Dean Smith, 13 persons were given serious

consideration, four of whom are listed as ‘Available Now’ including Albert Comanor, Professor

of Social Work at Rutgers. Two others were listed as, “Available by January 1966,” and it

included Frances J. Turner then at St. Patrick’s College. In the final analysis, none of the

potentially ‘willing’ were interviewed while the decision remained within the U of A purview as

the U of A process ended with the decision to locate the graduate social work program at what

was to become the University of Calgary eight weeks later.

The University of Calgary

Although the responsibility for selecting a Director transferred to the University of

Calgary on April 1, 1966, as it gained the long-sought autonomous status, U of C President

Armstrong invited a group of social workers to act as advisors as early as March 1966, shortly

after the decision to locate the School in Calgary. In an undated document authored by Craig

Reid, prepared as a Report by the Chair of the AASW Social Welfare Liaison Committee, he

sketched a timeline that covered a period prior to the September 1967 arrival of students.

Along with Reid, the Committee included Frank Bach, Bert Marcuse and Keith Wass

from the City of Edmonton. Armstrong sought its advice on several issues, including the

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appointment of a Director. As the need arose, Reid reports, members were added, including

Mary Davis, Walter Coombs, Gordon Stangier and two ex-officio members, the AASW

President, Gerald Way and Dr. Tim Tyler. The position that warranted Tyler’s ex officio status is unknown, perhaps it’s a question about timing, but he was the only Calgary member of the U of A, Selection Committee, the Executive Director of the Calgary Social Planning Council and the only PhD level, social worker in Calgary at the time and perhaps even in Alberta.

Reid also noted that Tyler was a member of this Committee before and after his appointment, which likely caused the scepticism about the selection process following his appointment. Summarizing some of the major activities of the Committee, Reid notes, “a dean of a school in California was retained by the university in an advisory capacity” (In possession of the author). In his comments Tyler referred to the Committee’s recommendation to seek the advice of “a couple of American deans on facilitating the process” as the U of C moved towards starting the process of hiring the Director.

The Dean was Milton Chernin, the 30 year Dean of the School of Social Welfare at the

Johns in Toronto at the annual CSWE meeting combined with the 50th anniversary celebration of

University of California, Berkeley, who two years earlier had met with U of A President Walter

the Toronto School. Johns, who thought enough Chernin after a lunch hour meeting in Toronto,

literally offered him the position of Director soon after the Board of Governors approved a

school of social work for the U of A.

Tyler spoke about his May 1966 meeting with Chernin. As one of Armstrong’s

advisors, Tyler arranged to meet Chernin at the Calgary airport and chauffeur him to the

meetings. Aside from the formalities of the visit, it gave the two of them time for considerable

informal conversation. Tyler explained the context and content of the conversation.

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Calgary was still what was known as a cow town and he was interested in getting a handle on where the students might get some sort of placement opportunities and I was the head of the Social Planning Counsel so I arranged the showing around town and getting some idea of what would happen. During that four-hour period, we had extensive discussions about the way social work education should be going. And he was aware from my conversation that I had done my doctoral thesis on a settlement house in Greenwich Village in New York and we talked about the bottom up approach to social work and community practice within settings where you would help people develop the class and need to organize….all that kind of stuff. I can’t remember one single conversation about casework, I must admit. And he didn’t ask but I thought we had a good discussion in a progressive way about what you might do in this wilderness area called Alberta and particularly in the city of Calgary which had no reputation at all (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010)

Tyler’s experience at Toronto apparently interested Chernin. Although not a social worker according to James Leiby, Chernin’s background in corrections at the state level left him with a much broader perspective of social issues than the traditional practice of social casework.

Leiby comments reflect the broader view.

I don’t know the story of how he got the job here in Berkeley but he was very strong. He kept on the notion of that this was a School of Social Welfare and not a School of Social Work and he was referring at that time to a distinction between the schools. The earliest schools of social work in Boston and New York which sort of were primarily the big private casework agencies and the School of Social Service Administration as it is called, at the University of Chicago (James Leiby, Personal Communication: April 28, 2011).

Unknown to Tyler at the time, Chernin’s interest in his views would lead to a change in the trajectory of his career from the Executive Director of the Calgary Social Planning Council to the Director of a new program at the fledgling University of Calgary.

It’s interesting because when we had this four-hour talk of course, he was interested in my Master’s Degree in social work from the University of Toronto. He never mentioned UBC. But we talked for perhaps half an hour about the social work program in Toronto. In particular, John Morgan’s course in Social Policy which very much influenced me. John Morgan of course was a Brit. We talked about you know about the equivalent in Canada. Just as an aside, I’m still offended that when I got to UBC, and only for one course, the guy [Leonard Marsh] who taught statistics, I am so angry at them still for not having an

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opportunity for him to talk about his Canadian report (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010).

As Tyler explained, sometime after Chernin’s visit to Calgary, he received a phone call from Armstrong who apparently wanted to meet and interview him. When they met, Tyler

explained the interview lasted for about 15 minutes before he was asked about his interest in the

position of Director. Up to that point, Tyler had apparently shown no interest in the position.

The confirmation of Tyler’s appointment to the position of Director took place on August 16,

1966 and became public on August 19, 1966, with a Calgary Herald announcement.

A week after the Tyler appointment, Armstrong penned a letter to Dean D.E. Smith, dated August 23, 1966, providing him with a summary of the events and developments in

Calgary regarding Tyler’s appointment. Apparently, Tyler was the second person considered for

the position. The other candidate referenced by Armstrong was, a referral from someone in

Ottawa, who had recently returned from Japan; however, the Committee rejected his candidacy.

With a mounting sense of urgency that experience had apparently precipitated the invitation to

Dean M. Chernin “to come up and talk with our Committee with a view of giving authorization

and appraisal of the Canadian trends in Social Work education” (UAA, Accession No. 72-132-

226, Ref No. 44/1/8/25-288).

Tyler recalled Chernin asking the following questions during their conversations as they

drove from one meeting to the next.

Why Canadians and social workers in particular, were so colonial. Why were we so beholding to Americans or British. Why didn’t we just say, we have the confidence in doing it our way. They were quite appalled at the idea that they would be brought up here by the Association and the government somehow to impose a model that was called American (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010).

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Ironically, the Chernin questions might also have been asked in reverse. The Canadian, Harry

Cassidy, the person who gave the Berkeley School its name – the School of Social Welfare – in

1944, (Irving, 1982, p. 360), may also have hired Milton Chernin.

The conversations between Chernin and Tyler apparently had an impact on both of them.

On his return to Berkeley, Chernin wrote a Report about his visit to Calgary. Chernin had not met with Armstrong who was suffering from a case of laryngitis. The Report to Armstrong was the only communication between them. In a letter of August 23, 1966, to Dean Smith at the U of

A, Armstrong commented about the Chernin visit and in addition to meeting with the

Committee, he had also spoken with several social workers in the city. The Report of those meetings prompted Armstrong to write Smith.

Upon returning to Berkeley, he sent me a Report which included a strong recommendation that we appoint Tim Tyler. Upon discussing this with other members of our Committee, I found them similarly minded. I talked with Tyler, found him interested and received a formal application. His references were enthusiastic about offering him the appointment and action has taken place by which the Board of Governors at its meeting a week ago today confirmed the appointment (UAA, Accession No. 72-132-226, Ref No. 44/1/8/25-288)

Armstrong also confided that he did not expect Tyler to stay long, and perhaps out of frustration with the timing and the entire process, he added the following.

It seemed to us wise, however, to get the blessed school started in the expectation that a going concern with lines of contact established at Edmonton and Ottawa, might be more interesting to a very good senior man than something which needs to get off the ground. I am conscious of the fact that there appears to be a good deal of politics involved in this particular area (UAA, Accession No. 72-132-226, Ref No. 44/1/8/25-288).

In due course, Armstrong was to find out just how much ‘politics,’ was part of his position as President as he personally came under increasing pressure from the Chair and the

Board of Governors ‘encouraging’ him to leave the University. In 1982, Armstrong submitted a

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fascinating ‘Personal Statement’ to the University describing in considerable detail what took place that led to his sudden departure (UARC, 82.01/2.12, Series 4 – Issues of the Presidency,

Personal Statement H.S.A. 1982).

As for Tyler, the ‘good deal of politics’ was underway almost immediately, even before he had an office at the University. It should not have surprised Armstrong. In a letter, dated

December 17, 1965, to Armstrong Tyler had expressed his views about social work succinctly.

The revelation came with the documents for the U of A Selection Committee of which Tyler was a member and sent to him by none other than Armstrong himself. Tyler used the opportunity to make his point about social work more than a year before his own appointment.

In my opinion, the letter dated September 30, 1965 from Professor Albert Comanor is particularly relevant. I think he clearly describes some of the pressures presently bearing on Schools of Social Work, which will surely have a fundamental impact on their role in society in training practitioners. I am personally convinced that the old tradition of training specialists in one particular method, i.e., casework, group work, community organization, is quite inappropriate for the future (UAA, Accession 72-132-226, Reference No. 41/1/8/25-288, School of Social Work).

As a result, the first person Tyler sought out after his appointment was Professor Albert

Comanor. Tyler interviewed him for several hours and after their conversation, offered him a position. Although Comanor first appeared in 1968 as a consultant and sessional instructor, his appointment as full professor waited until 1969 as a full professor with the primary responsibility for authoring the first Accreditation Report.

Comanor’s own vision of social work was expansive no doubt in part because of his range of experience in practice and teaching, but also in the indomitable spirit and sense of justice, he displayed in person and through his writings. The documents, letters, papers, speeches, curriculum guides, course outlines and correspondence about practice, curriculum

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development, social action, community development, research and teaching incorporated all the specialties Tyler referenced in his comments to Armstrong. Moreover, it made him a highly credible professional asset for a new school seeking accreditation and an ally to a new Director, new to the role, and a new School at a fledgling University.

THE TYLER VISION

Capturing the development of Tyler’s vision proved to be a significant challenge. Other than the preparation of the first Accreditation Report for which Tyler set the direction, the writing was left to Comanor with an amalgam of contributors. Tyler’s own academic work consists of a B. Comm., a BSW, a thesis-based MSW, a PhD thesis and a single paper presented at an Alberta Symposium in 1969. Tyler also spent two years at University of California, Los

Angeles, as a graduate student pursuing industrial relations and adult education however; there is no record of a published work during that period.

The destruction of many of the Faculty’s documents covering an extended period of time, apparently well beyond the 1980’s, severely constrained access to historically valuable documents that one could reasonably expect to find as a new School developed its philosophy, vision, the ensuing discussion about its curriculum development and the challenged faced by the

School and its leadership. As Ralph Tyler suggested during the preparation of the Boehm

Report, the early task of developing a curriculum requires answers of lasting importance to foundational questions. Unfortunately, in case of the School of Social Welfare, very little of this remains in the available record.

On the other hand, many of the interviewees reflected on the years Tyler was Dean and later as a faculty member. Whether ‘friend or foe,’ no one I interviewed expressed doubt that

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Tyler had a vision for social work significantly different from the expectations of those who had worked for more than a decade to see an Alberta graduate school of social work become a reality.

The foundation of Tyler’s vision is examined and gleaned from both the written and the oral history as he spoke about what he sought to accomplish. Tyler’s MSW, PhD theses and the single paper he wrote in 1969 provide insight into the development of his views and in spite of the fact that they span nearly 20 years, they reflect some common themes. Likewise, the oral history of faculty members provides a measure of Tyler’s influence and impact.

While not examined in any detail in this context, his work as a community leader in

Hillhurst-Sunnyside during his retirement, similarly reflects much of what he wrote about on community development and organization in the 1950s and again in 1969 (W.A. Thompson,

Calgary Herald, March 7, 2001: B1/Front ). Even in his 1979 comments to the AASW membership, Tyler reiterated the importance of a Deweyian vision of ‘lived experience’ as foundational for social work education and practice.

Application of group education characteristics in a Farm Forum group

Completed at the University of Toronto, School of Social Work in 1952, Tyler’s MSW thesis is a study of the CBC’s Farm Radio Forum, a program initiated on January 21, 1941 by bringing together small groups of Canadian farmers in their own homes for discussions on farming and community issues. At its peak, nearly 1,300 registered groups engaged 30,000 members in a weekly broadcast, initially for twelve weeks and later expanded to 20 weeks. The program was so successful it led to a study by the United Nations intent on determining its applicability elsewhere. Alongside similar CBC initiatives such as the Citizens Forums, the

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Women’s Institute and the Farm Forum remains a high point in Canadian adult education

(Welton, 2013).

The core of the program was a group discussion that took place as part of the Forum’s program structure. Based on friendship and common interests, group meetings had three distinct components – listening to the broadcast, group discussions on issues prepared by Forum staff, and a period for socializing. The groups focused their discussions on education through democratic participation; issues were primarily those they faced in farming and in their community with an implicit expectation that the discussions would lead to action and broader participation in the life of the community.

The general benefit of the Forum Groups included an increased understanding of issues, increased sense of responsibility to the larger community and as the most important benefit an increased sense of self-confidence. Tyler recorded the process as follows,

First, there is the person-to-person leader-centered program where individualized learning is experienced. Secondly, there is the small face-to-face group-centered situation where learning and communication is accomplished by the direct participation of group members. The third situation is the large group experience where individual participation on the part of all members is impossible (Tyler, 1952, p.15).

Although Tyler’s thesis necessarily limited its analysis to a particular Radio Forum Group, he was critical of several operational features and offered several recommendations designed to

reinforce and strengthen the adult education component.

To add perspective to the significance of Tyler’s interest in adult education, Michael

Welton (2013), in, Unearthing Canada’s Hidden Past, A short history of Adult Education, points

to the influence of women in 19th and early 20th century Canada as a high point in adult

education with the ‘person case’ as an example adult education’s influence social reform

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movements. Similarly, Welton could have included the 1935 On to Ottawa Trek as an example of the ‘nurturing effect’ of the Depression on the development of adult education strategies in the opposition to government work camps in Western Canada to confine and control the unemployed. However, it wasn’t until the post WW II era, especially the mid-1950s during which adult education formally obtained sufficient status to enter into the universities as a distinct field of study, albeit with the name, andragogy to distinguish itself from pedagogy (p. 6).

As a graduate student and social worker, first at the University of Toronto, School of

Social Work, followed by graduate studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, in

Industrial Relations and Adult Education, and finally for his PhD at Columbia University’s

Teachers’ College, Tyler spent nearly the decade of the 1950s at the academic centres of these developments.

Greenwich House for Community Organization and Development

Completed at Columbia University in 1958, Tyler’s PhD dissertation developed his interest in urban issues, community organization, neighbourhood identity and the importance of the adult education principles of democratic participation and decision-making. According to

Merriam & Brockett (2007), in 1922, Columbia University’s Teachers College where Tyler studied was the first university to offer a course with ‘adult education’ as part of its title.

A leading adult educator at Columbia, Paul L. Essert, is listed as Tyler’s Major Advisor.

In 1952, Essert & R.W. Howard published, Educational Planning by Neighbourhood, with a global aspirational objective of “finding unity in diversity.” In Adult Education: an Overview,

Essert offered the following comment. “In general, it can be said that observers see adult

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education moving in the direction of becoming a more dynamic force in modifying cultural change, rather than simply responding to it after the fact” (Essert, 1953, p.196).

John Dewey, a well-known supporter of Jane Addams and a regular visitor at Hull

House, also taught at Columbia University’s Teachers College and became a force of local and international influence in the theory and philosophy of education. Although he was initially influenced by the idealism of Hegel and T.H. Greene, according to his daughter her father adopted the William James’s pragmatism whose book, Principles of Psychology, she suggests,

“was much the greatest single influence in changing the direction of Dewey’s philosophical thinking” (Dewey, Jane, 1939, p. 24).

More recently, Dewey’s affinity to Hegel’s style of idealism has been re-established,

even the extent of finding his own admission of it (Garrison, 2006). Torus Midtgarden (2011)

likewise suggests Dewey’s reliance on Hegel’s social philosophy, especially its allegiance to

social reform was more profound than was previously acknowledged. Citing Dewey’s (1973)

Lectures in China, Midtgarden points out what amounts to a scathing critique of the classical

liberalism distinction between public versus private as the social source of conflict. Midtgarden

suggests social conflict “may be latent and embedded in institutional structures” and reflected in

a “pattern of suppression and legitimization of group interest” (p. 370). Moreover, he adds,

“When one group achieves a position of recognized privilege and power, when it becomes the

dominant group in a society, its members tends to define all those interests that do not pertain to

their group as the interest of individuals, and their own as the interest of society” (p. 371).

Although Dewey’s philosophy and work as a theorist and philosopher, is best known for

its influence on pedagogy, his emphasis on the wholeness of experience and human relationships

has been accepted more broadly including by adult educators as well as environmental activists

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(Miller , 1997). Similarly, Dewey’s adoption of experience found its way into action research in the 1950s and later in the same decade, the development participatory action research (PAR)

(Glassman, Erdem & Bartholomew, 2013).

Tyler understandably referenced the influence of John Dewey in both theses, reflecting the status and influence of Dewey’s philosophy on his own. Even much later, at the 1997

AASW Conference, Tyler succinctly summarized the extent of Dewey’s influence with the comment that ‘lived experience’ formed the foundation for knowledge and required students to ground their views in, the wholeness of, “I think, I feel and I believe” (In possession of the author).

Tyler’s comment on the importance of ‘lived experience’ re-states Deweyian educational philosophy articulated in Experience and Education. “I assume that amid all uncertainties there is one permanent frame of reference: namely, the organic connection between education and personal experience; or, that the new philosophy of education is committed to some kind of empirical and experimental philosophy.” Not to be misunderstood, Dewey quickly dispelled the idea that “all experiences are genuinely educative.” Instead he suggested that the transition to

“mis-education [occurs when it] has the effect of arresting or distorting the growth of further experience” (Dewey, 1938/1987, p. 25).

Priority Urban Problems: A Social Work Perspective

In his presentation to the 1969 Symposium on, Urbanization and Urban Life in Alberta, sponsored by Alberta Human Resources Research Council, Tyler expanded his interest in adult education to the growth and development to urban development. The Alberta Human Resources

Research Council had only recently been established by the Social Credit government as a

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research and policy arm for government. On Manning’s part, it represented new thinking and an analysis of what was needed in the changing character of Alberta, in much the same way as his

White Paper, published in 1967. Largely authored by Preston Manning and Erick Schmidt as system theorists, the White Paper was an attempt to provide the Social Credit government with a moderately progressive and conservative framework for public policy development. For this

Symposium, participants were drawn from the three Universities in Alberta, the Research

Council and the City of Calgary. Tyler’s presentation dealt with the consequences of urbanization for social life and the effects of cybernation, the separation of work from leisure and the necessity to create new opportunities for interpersonal and social experiences in an urban context.

In the face of the 1960s urban renewal thrust involving the destruction of older communities surrounding the central core, Tyler proposed an analysis of the urban environment as a whole rather than the segmented approach based on examining single geographic communities especially without reference to those nearby or their function in the large urban landscape. In a political context favouring urban renewal over an emerging ‘new urbanism’ advocated by Jane Jacobs, Tyler developed a rationale based on an unequal distribution of income and wealth for the creation of new institutional and organizational arrangements for public infrastructure and services. His observations dealt with such issues as who does and who does not benefit from the distribution of the public good.

The implications for social work, as Tyler saw them, led to an analysis that included recognition of the consequences of fragmented legislative mandates, the power of bureaucratic administrative structures and a need to revise or replace the institutional structures created by earlier generations. While Tyler’s questions and suggestions reflected his context, he asked and

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responded to the questions in a remarkably similar fashion to questions asked at a staff level during the futuristic exercise known as ‘Imagine Calgary’ in which I participated for much of its duration for several years prior to retirement.

Tyler’s proposals called for establishing indices of social need, social accounting and a comprehensive data bank. At a service delivery level, he proposed an experimental multi- service centre, the development and testing of the Heimler Scale of Social Functioning and neighbourhood councils to influence municipal level public policy. In many of these examples citizen participation was deemed essential and social workers were the new breed of practitioners engaged in community development and community planning.

It is worth noting that Tyler’s choice as a presenter at this Symposium may not have been entirely a result of the academic position he held in 1969. Alf Hook (1971), an ultra- conservative Minister in the E.C. Manning government wrote and self-published his memoirs under the title, 30 + 5; I Know, I was there including his account of the reasons he was in and out of favour with Premier Manning and entirely discarded by Premier Harry Strom. Among

Hook’s revelations about ‘insiders,’ is a brief reference to Dr. Tim Tyler as one of three minority shareholders in a company called Systems Research Ltd., of which Dr. Erick Schmidt, Special

Consultant to Executive Council, was the major shareholder.

Together, Schmidt and Tyler were beneficiaries of contracts with the government’s policy think-tank, the Human Resources Research Council. The connection directly to Schmidt and indirectly Preston Manning, apparently reinforced and enabled Tyler’s access to the progressive side of the Social Credit Party. Albeit based on the retrieval of a limited number of documents bearing Tyler’s name as author or recipient, some were directly from Social Credit

MLAs and Cabinet Members. The content of the correspondence ranged from discussions about

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his plans for the School, confirmations of meetings, request for comments on professional legislation for social workers, funding and proposals for new programs (PAA Accession 79.106,

Box 1, U of Calgary, No. 123 General).

Erick Schmidt confirmed that Tyler was able to fit in well with the views of several progressive, new generation Social Credit MLAs (Erick Schmidt, Personal Communication:

November 20, 2010). However, apart from the Private Papers of Boggle, Minister of Social

Services and Community Health, in the early 1980s, many records from the Lougheed era and beyond, remain subject to onerous or potentially expensive FOIP legislation, e.g., possible restrictions on interviewing persons named in documents. Consequently, it’s difficult to ascertain Tyler’s relationship with the Lougheed government.

From a WW II, RCAF career in training fighter pilots, to the University of Alberta for a commerce degree, the transformative experience of listening to Charlotte Whitton’s lecture on child and family welfare, to social work, first at UBC, followed by the U of T, two years at

UCLA and finally at Columbia University. Tyler explained that his education as a social worker began at the U of T.

Well in terms of my own values, my one year at the University of Toronto was very influential. Unlike UBC where I got a bit of training, at Toronto I got an education and at Toronto I got a good introduction to the welfare state, it’s history, to the movement that influenced this development and the emergence of a training program for those who would work at it, sometimes called social work, sometimes called social welfare. That’s when I learned about the history of the welfare state in England and Europe. How it got transferred to North America, the influence of ground up development by neighborhood work, that led to the influence in Washington and Ottawa, of significant developers like Charlotte Whitton and when I took the position at Calgary, that training influenced me (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010).

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The U of T experience was important to Tyler because it offered more than the ‘bit of training’ he received at UBC. In fact, as he explained, it significantly influenced his vision for the U of C School of Social Welfare.

I didn’t want the program to be just a narrow methodology program. I wanted the graduates to understand their history and to recognize they had a role in ground up social change. They weren’t just working with clients; they were working with people, with their homes, with their communities and at a national level. So, I wanted a curriculum that prepared students to be active in social reform. I think I supported the idea they would have some confidence and some methodology

But I wanted them to understand the social history they were representing and therefore the curriculum would have to have a good grounding in the history of social reform. The emergence of professional training for those who facilitated social reform, rather than just “working face to face with an individual” which was by then the American word for it was caseworker. And we adopted it.

So sure, I tried to develop a curriculum that would at least straddle the European and American backgrounds and you know Cassidy at Toronto helped establish that. And my background, my year at Toronto, had a strong influence on me (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010).

Faculty Members and Students

Several former faculty members from the early years of the School recognized Tyler as both charismatic and visionary. On the other hand, while critics sometimes doubted his background in social work, they acknowledged his intellectual ability and willingness to engage them with difficult issues and questions was never in doubt. Derek Baker, who was among the first group of faculty members Tyler hired, recalled the vision with community and people as the centre of what he hoped the School would represent.

I think Tim wanted to shake up the establishment. I think he had a strong feeling about that things were getting in the way of meeting the needs of people. You know he had a strong community background and I had a sense that he was very much an advocacy type guy – a perception, that sort of – the classic perception – that people were getting screwed by the system as much as by

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anything else. I think you know, that – it’s a long time ago, and a number of things came together but one got an overwhelming feeling that Tim was really committed to community and to people. And, rightly or wrongly, he saw, if you like, the service organizations kind of getting in the way of that (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2010).

The view that social service agencies might stand in the way of people benefitting from

the services they needed as Baker was to discover, was also a primary source of dissatisfaction

with the School.

Ben Carniol also recalled Tyler’s influence, somewhat differently and perhaps

more appreciatively after his own decision to accept a position at Ryerson when he

learned that Ray Thomlison was selected as the Dean in the early 1980s.

The quality of intellectual conversation was in my opinion very high and encouraged by him. He would sometimes pop into my office or other people’s office and say well what about this and what about that? And it wasn’t so much, in terms of my recall, a staff meeting debate, but it would be an ongoing conversation about the role of social work, the role of politics, the role of structure, it was part of the ongoing clarification, disagreement, but they were all friendly discussions. People did not divide into camps as opposed to you know, this ideological camp; the conversations transcended that. I think Tim gave leadership to that in his own way, through the tone of acceptance of different ideas. He established that and I didn’t really appreciate it at the time. I only appreciated that when I see other institutions. He encouraged those kinds of questions and many, many other questions to be continuously examined (Ben Carniol, Personal Communication: April 20, 2011).

David Baxter, who joined the faculty soon after his graduation from the School and primarily, if not exclusively interested in community development and organization, had been impressed with Tyler both as a student and later as a colleague.

Tim always tried to encourage me to do what I was there to do, which was basically be a community activist, to be a community animator, to encourage my students to participate fully in the communities, in their classrooms. We had a faculty counsel that had an enormous number of student delegates and participants, and he encouraged that right from the word go. I felt very at home in that kind of atmosphere (David Baxter, Personal Communication: September 29, 2010).

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Uniquely, Dick Ramsay recalled the student discussions at McGill and the persistent

questioning about developments in social work by a fellow student and Albertan, Bill Purves-

Smith. In Ramsay’s view, ‘systems thinking’ began to influence the development of social work in the US well before it appeared in Alberta. The School’s adoption of it occurred in the context of the American War on Poverty and Canada’s ‘Just Society,’

But I contend now in looking back into the history of it, that the Tim Tyler’s or even the young Turks from the Alberta Government side did not understand what was happening in social work in the fifties and the sixties in the United States. In particular where they were trying to broaden from the narrow to the broad and social work by definition, meant broad as opposed to social casework if you want.

So in the sixties when we did develop the School of Social Welfare in Alberta, had people understood that – and I certainly admit that I had in my studies at McGill and other….well in McGill in particular – I never even heard of Bartlett. I don’t even recall being introduced to the concept of person and environment in a way that I would sort of remember that (Dick Ramsay, Personal Communication: August 16, 2010).

Jacqueline Ismael, initially hired as sessional instructor by Tyler, recognized that as a

charismatic figure, Tyler was controversial and “like all charismatic figures, he tended to centralize power and control around himself, he is very charismatic and very dynamic. So you either loved him or you hated him or had confrontations with him” (Jacqueline Ismael, Personal

Conversation: November 5, 2010).

Reflecting on his own values and how they shaped his vision, Tyler placed himself in the historical context of his education while making an important distinction between ‘training’ and

‘education.’ In the context of the late 1950’s and the 1960s as the demand for professional social workers increased, it was an important distinction, moreover, it constituted an important point of contention in his relationship with social agencies, especially, as will become evident, in his dealings with ASS&CH.

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Malcolm Taylor, the Principal of the U of A, Calgary, and well known to Tyler, had also

highlighted the same issue in his Inaugural Address in 1960 in the context of a university versus

a technical education, i.e., learning based on ‘technique’ or ‘techne,’ stressing the value of both,

but without confusing or ignoring the difference. U of C, Vice President (Academic), Peter

Krueger, a chemist by profession, made the distinction by comparing a technician, competent to

operate and monitor a water treatment plant, while suggesting that designing a water treatment plant required an engineer (Peter Krueger, Personal Communication: February 22, 2011).

Karen Remple, a professional educator before becoming one of 16 students in the fall of

1967 to enter the first year of the School of Social Welfare, commented about her experience as a student and the School’s influence. As a clinical social worker with many years of practice, she pointed out the richness of the School’s program during its early years in bringing such notables as Virgina Satir to the classroom.

It was a long time ago. . . I felt that our program looking back sort of had a useful balance between more of the clinically oriented practice; we had faculty who certainly had that as their specialty . . . but we also had faculty who were more in the larger environment, organizational, the welfare field in terms of you know, supporting families who needed welfare either financially or just through support. You know we had…..I was grateful that we had both kind of perspectives offered and that we could have some experience in our practicums and so on with each. Like I remember one of my field placements was in child welfare. I interviewed foster parents and things like that. But I later got a sense that it was….it was just a sense because I was a practicum supervisor for many years for MSW students that as the years rolled on I was getting a sense of the curriculum from various students. I felt that the program over all was becoming somewhat diluted from that level of teaching and information and so on. It concerned me that actually it was becoming a little less clinical if you like. I thought that the richness that I think was part of our program seemed to be weakening and that students that I was you know, supervising etc., didn’t seem to have the richness of background that I think we were given by some of our professors. So that concerned me because I think there needs to be both. There needs to be some integration.in the teaching and in the, in the development of our profession (Karen Remple, Personal communication: August 12, 2013.

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Bob Holmes, also a student in the first class who several years in social work, changed first to the field of organizational development and there to become an urban planner, characterized Tyler’s vision of social work in the context of its two major streams.

I didn’t really have a benchmark at that point, of what the so-called typical social worker was. I knew there was an element of social change involved in the profession both at the policy level and at the individual practice of social work. I remember thinking that probably on a continuum of conventional to the unconventional, Tim was perhaps more on the unconventional side in terms of new thinking, challenging society’s values and things like that. But no, I remember his influence quite well. I thought it was in many ways partly destabilizing and he was partly invigorating because it did cause you to think (Bob Holmes, Personal Communication: January 17, 2013).

The Influence of Albert Comanor

Apparently, even before the Board of Governors finalized the appointment, U of C

President Armstrong gave Tyler a file of five applicants for the Director’s position. In all likelihood, it was the winnowed list of applicants who responded to Dean Smith’s queries in

1965 and subsequently screened by the selection committee. Among the applications was Albert

Comanor’s September 30, 1965 letter that led Tyler to write Armstrong on December 17, 1965 registering his agreement with Comanor about the ‘old tradition of training specialists,’ i.e., group work, community work and casework.

On this occasion however, reading the letter prompted Tyler to travel to Rutgers where he interviewed Comanor. Impressed with Comanor in person, he offered him a position based on his views on the state of American social work. According to Tyler, Comanor wrote and told him.

I am so fed up with American social work. It’s in a big rut. I’d like one more kick at the can. And he used this language and he talked about his background and the curriculum he thought would be modern. Well I read it and I re-read it and I said this is very interesting. I phoned him up and he said yes,

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I’d be delighted to meet with you. Off I went to Rutgers and I guess we spent three or four hours in a motel. You know Albert had quite a vocabulary. Well, I knew right away, he could help us develop a curriculum. We needed a father figure; we needed somebody with this kind of experience. And I didn’t have any interest in being perceived in that role. So I offered him a position as a full professorship. He said I’m really interested. So, I came back and wrote him a letter – the rest is history (Tim Tyler, Personal Communication: August 26, 2010).

Comanor formulated his own vision of social work beginning with an undergraduate degree in economics, a graduate degree in Economics, Political Science and Sociology all from the University of Pennsylvania. In 1933, Comanor began his social work education, receiving a

Certificate in social work in 1935 from the School of Social Work and Public Health where Karl

De Schweinitz was then the Director. Later in the decade, the School joined the University of

Pennsylvania and became the School of Social Work. In 2004, the name would change again,

this time to the School of Social Policy and Practice.

Comanor’s range of experiences in social work after graduation included the Jewish

Family and Children’s Service in Pittsburgh, military service as a psychiatric social worker, UN

work in China, followed by several years with a US government settlement agency and a return

to the Jewish Family and Children’s Services in Miami, Florida. In 1960, he moved to Rutgers

where Werner Boehm of the 1959, CSWE Curriculum Study was the Dean, followed by a brief

period at San Francisco State College, before arriving in Calgary in 1968, first as a sessional and

as a full professor in 1969.

Commenting on Comanor’s role, Derek Baker suggested Comanor was “a maverick too in some ways” but recognized his importance and the influence he brought by the stamp of approval through the accreditation process thus advancing the School’s credibility.

Tim I think brought Al in, the first sign as far as I could see that Tim had either recognized or been pressured or whatever it was, but in order to move the

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accreditation process forward to success, he needed somebody to quarterback it (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2010).

What Comanor brought was much more than just a familiarity with accreditation. When he first indicated an interest in coming to Alberta to Dean Smith at the U of A, Comanor was at

Rutgers. Later, he moved to San Francisco State College, a centre of massive student protests and strikes against the US involvement in Vietnam. Whether he sought it or not, Calgary must have seemed rather staid by comparison to the wealth and diversity of experience he brought.

The Comanor Collection at the U of C Archives (UARC, 96.010) includes a wide range of documents spanning from his early career as a social worker, administrator and educator to his experience at the University of Calgary. The documents reveal an increasingly astute and remarkably insightful person. His course outlines, curriculum notes, memos, correspondence and papers as well as comments on the work of others, demonstrates a capacity to integrate a wide range of knowledge, the depth of his experience and ideas that remain as instructive about the breadth and depth of social work as any of his contemporaries. His course outlines cover social administration, casework, community development, social policy, group work, social action and integrative seminars with various areas of practice and all similarly broad in scope.

Comanor’s Collection similarly reveals that academics, practitioners, organizations and other social work educators frequently sought his views on a wide range of professional issues.

Derek Baker commented about what Comanor brought to Calgary just a few years before he was forcibly retired at the age of 65 by the University of Calgary.

What Comanor brought, was a kind of some sense of what accreditation is all about, because nobody in the faculty at that time as far as I’m aware, had ever been through the process. So he was brought in for his expertise but I think also what I certainly picked up, and Al certainly had that okay from Tim to pursue that role, was a kind of little bit more stiffness in our spine in terms of intellectual rigor (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2010).

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Even in response to his forced retirement, Comanor demonstrated his tenacity at making a necessary point. Writing to President W. A. Cochrane on April 4, 1975, following receipt of the notice for his expected departure, Comanor wrote.

I do want to make a comment about the policy, which terminated my tenure. I am, you may know, a Fellow of the Gerontological Society and a founding member of the Canadian Gerontological Association, in brief, a gerontologist is an advocate for the aged. To be mild about it, the Provincial policy within which the University acts is common and is defective. I hardly need to go into the historical arbitrariness, the inequity, the wastefulness and the destructive personal consequences of that ritualistic 65. A better policy would permit voluntary retirement, with a system of functional assessment to protect the University from loss of a faculty member's personal judgment and effectiveness. I hope that the opportunity may arise when you might influence a change of policy (UARC Comanor Collection, 96.010.209).

Reading Comanor’s letter reminded me of a class discussion he led about advocacy

during which he suggested, ‘Always asks for the policy; in the absence of a policy, suggest one

should be created, and if one exists ask for it to be reviewed, and participate.’ Implicitly

Comanor’s comment in class and the letter to the U of C President implicitly incorporated

Tyler’s belief and emphasis on citizen participation in local neighbourhoods, communities,

institutional arrangements and government as part of a democratic society, social reform and public policy development.

At the 1997 AASW Conference, Tyler reflected briefly and fondly on the contributions and person of Albert Comanor with a slightly rephrased Dylan Thomas quote, “Rage, rage, rage, do not go gently into that dark night!”

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THE CONTROVERSIES

Prior to Tyler’s appointment as the Director, there was no doubt that the name of the new

School would reflect anything other than the name of the profession. Moreover, there was no

doubt that the School of Social Work would focus on anything but individually focused practice,

i.e., social casework; the other modes of practice would be assigned their necessary but residual

role. Likewise, it was an unstated assumption that the profession would also continue aligning

itself with the dominant focus on individual casework, apparently unaware of the broader

national and international debate about the purpose and focus of social workers.

Those expectations were part of the initial proposal developed by Isabel Munroe and

Imelda Chénard. Likewise, the letters from Minister Leonard Halmrast supporting development of an Alberta graduate school of social work left little room for doubt. In fact, Halmrast even appeared to have doubts about a school that went beyond the bounds of education for public a service. The consultants who advised the Alberta Social Work Education Research Committee and especially the discussion about suitable fieldwork placements all assumed, without a hint of controversy, that the School would be a casework school, designed to meet the needs as articulated by agencies and governments. However, the choice of Dr. F.H. (Tim) Tyler, as

Director, signaled an unexpected surprise with consequences. Some of the ‘consequences’ lasted for a decade or more. Tyler spoke about that experience briefly during his presentation at the AASW Conference in 1997. He explained that on his arrival at the University, President

Armstrong handed him the file that contained the recommendations from one of the Consultants to the Alberta Social Work Education Research Committee that recommended a social casework program. Tyler told the audience with no hint of uncertainty, “. . . that study went in the files.”

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Likewise, soon after he arrived at the University, Tyler was again asked to come to the

President’s office, was handed him a file and asked, “What am I going to do with this?” The file contained a petition signed by the members of the AASW asking the President to get rid of

Tyler. As he pointed out, it was so soon after his appointment that he didn’t even have an office.

And in his 1997 comments to AASW members, with a smile, he suggested that some in the audience were among those who had signed the petition and in due course, joined the School.

The Choice of Names

The earliest formal reference to a name for the new social work education program at the

University of Calgary appears in the Minutes of the Tenth Meeting of the Council of the Faculty

of Graduate Studies, dated September 21, 1966. Dr. F.H. (Tim) Tyler, only very recently

appointed to lead the School, was not present at the meeting. Nevertheless, the Graduate Studies

Council undeterred by the recent appointment, asked the new “School of Social Work” to submit its graduate program for the Council’s approval.

Tyler’s introduction to his colleagues on the Graduate Studies Council took place inauspiciously at the October 5, 1966 meeting with only a brief announcement that the MSW program would be the subject of a special meeting November 16, 1966. However, with only half the members of the Council present, that meeting revised itself to a ‘Working Group of the

Whole’ at the suggestion of Dean J.B. Hyne who followed a rule approved at the Council’s

September meeting. Ratification of the decisions by the Working Group of the Whole, took place at the next regular meeting (UCA, Accession 94. 016, File 01.52).

Of more interest than the gymnastics of Robert’s Rules of Order, was a discussion about the name of the degree the School sought to issue. The Faculty Council members received three

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supporting documents for their discussion. The first was a one-page series of recommendations from Dean Hyne including one that named the program, ‘The School of Applied Social Science’

with the MSW as the first-degree program offered by the School. The Hyne document offered

no rationale for the proposal. The second document, apparently also prepared by Hyne,

presented an outline of the Four Phases for the development of the proposed ‘Applied Social

Science Program.’ Phase I announced students would be accepted for a September 1967

opening of the new School. Phase II proposed the establishment of an ‘experimental training

programs’ for students and for those in leadership positions with the title, ‘Applied Behavioural

Science Laboratory.’ Phase III, proposed development of an interdisciplinary group of research

staff through the establishment of an ‘Applied Social Science Research Institute.’ Phase IV,

considered the establishment of a 4-year BA program with a major in Social Welfare sometime

within the next 5 years (UCA Accession 94.016, File 01.56).

Derek Baker, one of the original faculty members recalled some of the discussions that

took place over several years between Dean Hyne and Director Tyler. He suggested Hyne’s

interests were motivated by concerns about meeting the academic standards of the University’s

Graduate Studies program, legitimizing and broadening the scope of the School. He

commented, “I’m very sure, in fact I know Tim spoke to me directly about it at one point that,

you know, it was Hyne’s idea to sort of make this thing a little more Kosher in front of the

Faculty Council” (Personal Communication: Derek Baker, October 26, 2010).

The third document an, “Outline of Proposed Graduate Studies in Social Welfare,”

offered considerably more substance than the two previous documents especially recognizing

Tyler’s appointment occurred barely a few months earlier. This document appears to represent

Tyler’s project charter for the future of the School. Its analysis of the concept of social welfare

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begins with individual choice and its role in guiding social, political and economic institutions.

Moreover, it suggests, social work in Canada and the US have focused on a similar philosophy that, he argues, has led to “social work education consist[ing] of diluted medical psychology

(psychiatry)” (UCA Accession 94.016, File 01.56).

In contrast, Tyler effectively aligned himself almost entirely with the critique of social

work articulated at the 1964 CSWE Annual Conference and the Toronto School’s 50th

Anniversary celebration and which U of A President Johns witnessed. However, the proposed

name, School of Applied Social Science, was not acceptable and instead, as a compromise, the

School of Social Welfare emerged.

The record on how that took place is unclear. Certainly, Tyler would have been aware of

the name of the School Dean Milton Chernin led. Moreover, names other than ‘school of social

work’ were not uncommon. Nevertheless, the Chernin – Tyler conversations would surely have

included reference to the name, School of Social Welfare. Moreover, having spent a year at the

Toronto School following Cassidy’s death and the influence of John Morgan followed by

graduate work in adult education in California and Columbia, led him to develop a much broader

vision for social change and social work and in a very different context than that of either

Minister Halmrast or the members of AASW.

The focus on the School’s name took place intermittently over a five years period. Apart

from the initial attempt to name it the School of Applied Social Science, soon after Tyler’s

appointment, the dispute took place primarily between Tyler and the AASW Council, many of

whom held senior positions in Alberta’s social service agencies. On the acceptance and

approval of the name, School of Social Welfare, Tyler was invited to come back with a proposal

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for a different name. However, apparently for much of the next three years, the name change discussion was silent.

On January 15, 1970, the Academic Policy Committee, returned to the issue, with Tyler’s proposal for renaming the School of Social Welfare, to the School of Social Planning and

Community Development. However, along with issues of academic property inherent in the use of the word ‘planning,’ the discussion focused primarily on a secondary question, namely, the merits of arguments for and opposed to the distinguishing features of a ‘school’ from a ‘faculty’

(UARC Accession No. 66.002, File 1505). The only agreement at the end of the meeting was to return the item to the agenda.

Meanwhile, Bert Marcuse apparently brought the name issue to the attention of AASW

Council. Judging from the formal record of Council, the debate occupied a rather modest amount of time. The objections focused primarily on the failure of the name to identify with the profession and the AASW’s ongoing efforts to amend the legislation regulating its members.

Finally, the AASW Council Minutes suggest Bert Marcuse led the opposition to the name change. However, it’s rather ironic that Marcuse, the Chair of the AASW Education Committee charged with reviewing the School’s first Accreditation Report prior to submission to the

CSWE, failed to make even a single observation in its October 1970 AASW Commentary on the

Accreditation Report. .

Bert Marcuse was the Executive Director of Calgary Family Service Bureau and had

made it clear from the outset that anything short of the name School of Social Work would fail

to satisfy its proponents. Hilde Houlding, one of Bert’s colleagues and a long-term staff member

at Calgary Family Services, described him as: outrageous, an advocate, always ready to speak

out or write a brief, he was both compassionate and adversarial, “but not as adversarial as Tim

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Tyler.” Herb Allard would likely agree with Houlding’s assessment of both, adding that

Marcuse was ‘left-wing’ and contributed massively to the development of social work in

Calgary.(Hilde Houlding, Personal Communication December 2, 2010; Herb Allard, Personal

Communication: August 4, 2010).

Apparently, Marcuse, like others, realized Tyler had the necessary credentials to be the

Director, however, “none of those guys wanted him to be the Dean, so there was a general, fairly

strong feeling among people and of course, this came out in conversations that he [Tyler] was

not a person to make the success they wanted it to be.” Houlding added, “Now of course, my

private reading was of course that they wanted to be the Dean themselves” (Hilde Houlding,

Personal Communication: December 2, 2010).

Houlding also acknowledged, “ . . . there were a couple of people and I include Bert in

this, that were very strong for making a school of social work that had a fairly strong clinical

bias and they wanted the school to be that and of course Tim challenged just about everything

that anybody else thought was of value.” In spite of his strong views about the name, Marcuse

went on to teach at the School. The change, Houlding suggested, came because of a dispute with

the City’s decision to use Preventive Social Services funds for developing its own counselling

services. Apparently, before the dispute was fully settled, Marcuse left the agency, became

involved in a hospital-based program, joined the School of Social Welfare as a sessional

instructor and for a time continued the battle there via AASW.

Marcuse led the opposition to Tyler’s attempts to change the name of the School even as

AASW was engaged with the Alberta government in an effort to amend the 1969 Social

Workers Act to protect the title,’ social worker’ and obtain control of practice. The first

announcement of Tyler’s intent to change the name from the School of Social Welfare to the

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School of Social Planning and Community Development, was apparently approved by the

General Faculties Council in late 1969, and reached the University’s Academic Policy

Committee on January 15, 1970. On April 21, 1970, the Academic Policy Committee Chair,

T.M. Penelhum received a Report from Tyler which argued that different names and name changes were not uncommon for social work programs in Canada, the US and Great Britain.

The Report goes on to note the Department of Public Welfare has become the Department of

Social Development. Moreover, relying on his adult education work Tyler sought to offer a substantial argument for his position.

The United Nations defines “community development” as “approaches and techniques which rely upon local communities as units of action. The concept is clearly one of social interaction with emphasis on social processes whereby citizens participate in planning and follow-up action. The professional role in community development involves the application of techniques and methods based on social science knowledge to maximize achievement of such interaction of social processes. Community development is, in addition to the above kind of action process, a method of action, a form of programme and a social movement (UARC Accession 66.002 File 15.05).

Tyler’s position on community development as outlined here conveyed his background and vision for social work in the context of the social reform movement in adult education combined with his experience and interests in the settlement movement. As a result, he concludes with the request to rename the School of Social Welfare to the School of Social and

Community Development.

At the June 29, 1970 meeting of AASW Council, Albert Comanor reported that Tyler apparently dropped the name change, apparently referring to the name, School of Social

Planning and Community Development. At the May 19, 1971 Meeting of the School Council,

Tyler reported that some University Faculty members had opposed the word ‘planning’ in the name of the school, however, it was apparently agreed that the School would be allowed to make

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its case. AASW’s reaction to Tyler’s proposal in the Report to Penelhum was a response to another Marcuse’s letters. Marcuse reported having strenuously objected to the change at the

May 19, 1971 School Council, but with minimal support. The Council agreed to write Tyler once more, objecting to the change and recommending the School be renamed to the School of

Social Work.

In a memorandum dated, June 24, 1971, to Dr. W.F.M. Stewart, Academic Secretary for the University while making a final request for a name change, Tyler writes, “It is so clear that the word ‘welfare’ has a negative connotation within the citizenry and has lost its historical meaning, i.e., to help citizens fare well” (UARC 87.9/14.10 Social Welfare). With only two months before the last Alberta provincial election in which there was a change in political leadership, Tyler recommended that effective September 1, 1971, that the phrase ‘social development,” replace ‘social welfare.” Tyler added that the phrase, ‘social development’ had come into prominence with the Canadian Welfare Council’s recent change to the Canadian

Council on Social Development. Likewise, the Social Credit government had renamed the

Department of Public Welfare, to the Department of Social Development in 1969.

The name issue appeared on the AASW Agenda again for the September 22, 1971,

Council Meeting. On this occasion, Council invited Tyler and three other faculty members to attend, including Bert Marcuse. The discussion was “free and frank.” With the election of the

Lougheed government a month earlier, AASW again contextualized the name issue into the uncertainty about the status of AASW’s efforts to obtain professional legislation. Apparently, with some uncertainty about the new government’s position on professional legislation,

Council’s concern with the proposed name change heightened, even though the support of the officials in the Department of Social Development had not changed their view.

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Following the departure of the Tyler and the others, AASW Council continued its deliberation and on a motion by Baldwin Reichwein, decided AASW would continue to press the Faculty and the University, to change the name to the School of Social Work. However, by

October 19, 1971, on the recommendation by Mavis Marteinson, who had discussed the matter with Bert Marcuse, reported that AASW’s decision at the September meeting would not be well received, apparently faculty members supported Tyler’s efforts to change the name. On a motion by Walter Coombs, the Council rescinded its September decision, and followed it up with a motion, again by Coombs, that on the instructions of Council, the AASW representative on the School’s Council, should reopen the debate and argue the case for a name change. There are several other ‘sparing-like’ references to a name change in subsequent meetings, but it appears the issue had effectively gone away. I was unable to locate a record that AASW

instructed its member to reengage on the issue. Furthermore, not until 1989, after the arrival of a

new Dean was there an effort to change the name. Meanwhile, AASW failed to convince the

new Conservative government for amendments to its legislation protecting the title ‘social

worker’ and establish the control of practice it had sought.

As a fledgling professional organization and institution, AASW failed in its efforts to

change the name of the social work program at the U of C. At the same time, Tyler was not

successful in changing the name of the School of Social Welfare; the standoff was to last until

1989. The new Dean, somewhat like Tyler would also suggest, “welfare had such a bad taint to

it that it was not good for the public relations of the teaching program and welfare clients who by

then were beginning to be viewed as less than full and productive citizens” (Ray Thomlison,

Personal Communication: December 13, 2010).

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In contrast, John Mould, a long-term provincial government employee and Children’s

Advocate, whose involvement with the profession included several terms on its governing

bodies at the provincial, national and international organizational levels, reflected on his own

development. He began by tracing it back to a time when he was first asked about joining

AASW when he saw it as “a bunch of self-interested academics that have no connection to

practice.”

Over the years, as I became more acquainted I think with what is properly called a schism for the profession of medical practice, community practice, or broader social welfare issues. And one of the things that I believe among a variety of things was that keeping the title social welfare, at this stage in my life as a social worker, is a much better descriptor of what the profession should be about. I worry about the title social work as being too involved with the individual problems of individual people, where social welfare is much more curious about the way in which we address issues of social justice, of equity of power and control. So that’s really kind of what I, if I were to turn the clock back now, I would have, that would have been the platform from which I would have worked. My degree, my MSW is in clinical practice I swear I would love to go back and change that. I loved it at the time; I don’t love it now (John Mould, Personal Communication: September 7, 2010).

In a noteworthy comment, reflecting further about the influence of his experiences, especially at the national and international level, Mould briefly also offered a reminder about the indivisibility of social justice and peace making.

There’s no record in the AASW files suggesting that its Council considered a similar, and broader understanding of Tyler’s various efforts to change the name, its implications for the profession’s scope of practice or recognized the possibility that human ‘social welfare,’ or

‘humans faring well,’ as a purpose-filled statement for the profession or even the goal of all professional advocacy.

Similarly, although the Alberta government and the municipalities had adopted unique legislation in the Preventive Social Services Act and its uncharted scope. Unlike Tyler’s efforts

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to focus on the idea of social welfare as social well-being and social reform, community development, social planning and social action as the means, there is no record that its potential implications beyond a funding mechanism for established services were part of AASW’s deliberations during this period of the School’s development.

Shannon Marchand, an Assistant Deputy Minister in Human Services commented

shortly after the 2012 amalgamation of several provincial departments employing large numbers

of social workers. Without commenting specifically about the ‘Human Services” name, he

offered the following: “From my own experience I think the name can have a very important

impact on helping people think about the work they’re doing and how they think about the

work” (Shannon Marchand, Personal Communication: March 17, 2012). Instead of aligning

itself with centuries of emancipatory efforts and conflicts in the Western struggles for human

progress, AASW’s leadership aligned itself with the ideology of a phrase steeped in the history

of charity and an identity associated with a gendered elitism of the late 19th century.

THE ISSUES

As Tyler told the members of AASW in 1997, it didn’t take very long at all for questions

to emerge once it became clear that he had been appointed as the Director, in fact, even before

he had an office at the University there were questions about his qualifications. Some even

doubted he had a degree in social work; a question that also surfaced during some of the

interviews. However, the more serious questions were about his inexperience in social work

education, administration and the absence of publications, all of which were correct.

Nevertheless, as Armstrong candidly observed in his letter to Dean Smith at the U of A, “there

appear[ed] to be a good deal of politics involved in this area” but it was necessary “to get the

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blessed school started.” The positive recommendation from an experienced and well recognized

American Dean had satisfied Armstrong that Tyler was the person to lead the development of graduate level social work education in Alberta.

The Profession:

Tyler’s comments about the AASW as one of the major obstacles to his appointment was

not limited to the appointment itself or the even the name of the School; the name was merely a

focus for what it represented, or rather, in the eyes of those who opposed it, what it failed to

represent. The underlying issue throughout were his non-traditional views about social work

itself and especially his opposition to the focus on the individualistic social casework. When the

AASW became embroiled in its own internal dispute with the members of the College of

Clinical Social Work of Alberta, Tyler was actually on the sidelines and direct references to the

School are scant although notably critical because of a lack of focus on clinical social work.

However, throughout the dispute, the School was present by virtue of those in the

Clinical College who were instrumental in establishing it as well as the professional association

and by virtue of the members of AASW Council who were also faculty members. The blurring

of boundaries served neither the School nor the profession and succeeded in further alienating

and deepening the division between AASW and the Clinical College. Furthermore, it was

aggravated by the consistent narrative that implicitly expressed the School’s failure to provide an

education, preparing students for clinical social work practice, allegedly preferring the panaceas

of social planning and community development (College of Clinical Social Work of Alberta,

1975, 4.2).

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The professional in fighting that took place during much of the 1970s about the identity of social work and the role of its professional organization took place in the context of the process of professionalization and the institutionalization of social work in Alberta. Likewise, in spite of several efforts, the struggles with the Alberta government, especially the position of its child welfare program over delegating professional self-regulation to AASW, including protection of title and mandatory membership from 1969 to the late 1990s, resulted in legislation that was voluntary, imprecise and generally benign in its effect. Ironically, during much of this period, the government regularly referred to its child welfare staff as social workers, e.g., job classifications regardless of credential. Since the title social worker was restricted under the

HPA, the same government avoids use of the title even for those entitled to use it.

Professionalization of Social Work

Jennissen and Lundy (2011) point out that the development of a capitalist economy created the conditions for the emergence and need for the social work social work profession (p.

21). Like several other professions, notably recreation (McFarland, 1970) and urban planning

(Van Nus, 1976) among them, social work’s rise began in the European tradition during the late

19th century because of the effects of capitalism exemplified by the industrial revolution.

Beatrice Webb captured the issue in the 1880s with her cryptic comment about the charitable

movement that developed in England, just as Alice Salomon captured it sometime during the late

19th century as she reflected on her conversation with Lily Braun – charity versus social reform.

While the charity movement reflected acts of individuals both in giving and receiving, the social reform movement was primarily associated with the emergence of democratic forms of political

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governance and the obligations and duties associated with the state in reference to the welfare or well-being of the public at large.

As H. Siegrist (2001) points out, the early history of the high-standing professions, e.g., lawyers, physicians and university professors, began in Europe during the Middle Ages. While the professions of lower standing, notably surgeons and notaries, developed during the same period, they were distinguished from the higher professions primarily by the means of gaining their income. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century the cultures of these traditional professions, dissolved with the high-standing professions falling under the control of the state (p. 12155), the consequence of which was that their education and training transferred

to the institutions of higher learning, i.e., the universities. However, during this same period the

lower standing European professions, continued to rely on a complementary style of training

based on what Siegrist phrased as “training through practice” (p. 12156).

Siegrist goes on to suggest that the development of professions in the more radical and

liberal states such as France, Switzerland and the US, moved increasingly towards greater

deregulation and separation from the control of the state and some even became what he termed

were ‘free trades.’ At the same time, under the influence of more authoritarian and bureaucratic

governments, the professions moved towards greater government control and influence. As a

generalization, he suggests the professions varied on three basic themes “(a) loyalty to and

dependence on the state, (b), a progressive-liberal worldview, and (c) the desire to defend or

revitalize traditional professional cultures and corporate mentalities” (p. 12155).

In much the same vein, Siegrist suggests the method of professional education played a

central role in the professionalization process. On the one hand, education in continental Europe

led with theoretical scientific education while the “training through practice” or what he calls the

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“complementary training” model remained and was used by state agencies through such means as a mandatory internship with experienced practitioners or through several years of apprenticeships like work experience (p. 12156).

The concluding stage in institutionalization, according to Siegrist, involved the formal act of recognition by the state and through the legislation that the professions themselves were expected to implement. Once again, he points to a distinction between the authoritarian state and the more liberal state in the formation and institutionalization of professions. In the former, the professionals are more likely to be civil servants with a direct obligation and duty to the state, while in the more liberal states, such as the US, a process of de-institutionalizing the professions actually took place. The formation of new professions in the 19th century established long processes leading to eventual formal state recognition.

State recognition of professions, according to Siegrist was premised on the role of the state “as the guarantor of the legal order, the promoter of culture and as an intervening force in society” (p. 12156) and thus separating them business, agriculture and commerce. As a result, the professions represented occupations that “were occupied with central goods and values, or with securing property, honor, health, public order, morality, and science. In this new

configuration, the old European conceptions of profession, guild and vocation were combined

with the ideas of progress, order and freedom” (p. 12156). Siegrist follows the historical

analysis of professionalization with four distinct broad categories: (a) professional civil servants,

(b), the state appointed professions, (c), the free professions, and (d), the professions exercised

as a free trade and subject to market forces.

While these categories were initially developed in the political and economic context of

the 19th century, their expansion took place in the 20th century with the rise in need and demand

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for increased services in a number of areas, including medical, social and cultural services especially in the lower strata of society effectively creating a new market for professional services. Moreover, as Siegrist points out, women had generally gained access to university level education by the beginning of the 20th century however, in some parts of Europe women

remained largely excluded from traditional professions.

Historians have viewed the modern history of professions within a framework of

particularism versus universalism based on national cultures versus the universalization of

knowledge. Siegrist suggests that the professionals themselves have typically viewed the

developments within a national framework even when, apart from relatively small differences,

even when in objective terms international patterns dominate. Although Siegrist employs the

term ‘imitate’ to describe the tendency of national [provincial] professions to borrow from other

jurisdictions if they believe it will enhance their own standing, convergence or an isomorphic

tendency appear equally applicable (p. 12158-12159).

Professionalization of Social Work in Alberta

Although social workers established themselves in the Department of Public Health in

the late 1920s and in private agencies well before the Charlotte Whitton affair in the late 1940s,

however, that event focused public attention on social work and drew unprecedented

government scrutiny. Nevertheless, Amy Samson (2014), examining the gendered professions,

suggests social workers and public health nurses in the Alberta Department of Public Health, and

visiting teachers in local school boards established their respective professions with their role

and acceptance in the implementation of Alberta’s eugenics program. As a result, she suggests,

they presented their respective professions with

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. . . an opportunity to maintain and extend their professional authority. The access that these professions had to individuals, particularly infants and children, families, homes, and schools allowed them to establish themselves as critical players within the eugenics and mental hygiene movements and the professional landscape. Their niche within these movements was created on the backs of individuals determined to be “mentally defective,” a term which a number of scholars have argued often had more to do with class, gender, and ethnic stereotypes than genetic diagnosis (Samson, 2014, p. 144).

Although there were others in both the Mental Hygiene and the Eugenics Division,

Samson specifically named three social workers who each served in both the Public Health

Department’s Mental Hygiene Division as its Chief Psychiatric Social Worker and as the

Secretary of the Eugenics Board: E.J. Kibblewhite, Mary Frost and Isabel Munroe. Munroe’s

efforts and influence in the professionalization of social work in Alberta have been noted with respect to the establishment of AASW, the development of graduate level social work education and the College of Clinical Social Work of Alberta – all of which occurred after she left the

Alberta Department of Public Health.

While Samson names three social workers, the reference to Isabel Munroe who was hired

in 1939 as a staff member in the Mental Hygiene Division in Calgary, highlights a seemingly

oddity in the position of the Alberta government on hiring and professionalizing social work.

Until 1943 the provincial child welfare service was part of the Department of Public Health

where C. B. Hill apparently became the Deputy Superintendent in 1942 when he is identified as

such in its Annual Report for the first time. Presumably, Hill acquired some awareness of the

fact that his colleagues in the Department supported hiring social workers in the Guidance

Clinics in both Calgary and Edmonton. Nevertheless, when the transfer of the child welfare

program to the newly created DPW took effect in 1944, C.B. Hill continued his position of

opposing the hiring of social workers.

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A possible rationale for the bifurcated position, first within the Department of Public

Health and later between the two Departments, lies in the position taken by the 1943 Report of the Child Welfare Committee. The Committee was established by the Social Credit government through an Order in Council, to examine the best ways to deal with neglected/delinquent children, the administration of the Child Welfare Act, and to recommend changes as deemed necessary. A.H. Miller, who was to become the Deputy Minister of DPW in 1948, was the

Secretary to the Committee and likely had a hand in drafting the Report.

Chapter 21, Academic Training for Child Welfare Officials, notes that representations to the Committee included suggestions staff in child welfare and youth probation should be, “either

graduates of a school of social work or who possess qualifications equivalent to such training

through academic education together with experience in child welfare agency using standard

methods” (Alberta Legislative Assembly, 1943, p. 45). However, because of a shortage of social

workers, the Committee settled on the following. “The minimum qualifications of child welfare

workers and probation officers should be education, experience, but perhaps more important

skill [will be] the possession of a good personality and character, tact, resourcefulness,

sympathy, and understanding of children and their problems” (p. 45). Summed as “heart and

mind” qualifications (p. 46), the Report effectively undermines the Chapter’s opening comments

and offers a rationale for the position he advocated and supported by A.H. Miller during the

Charlotte Whitton study and the 1947 I.O.D.E. Report controversy. Although the Miller and

Hill legacy has been eroded, in 2014 Alberta Human Services continued with the ambivalent position in accepting applicants with “equivalencies.”

As Samson also notes, Alberta social workers were outside the larger professionalization process in Canada until the formation of the two Alberta CASW Branches in 1950.

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Consequently, the beginning of professionalizing social work is more appropriately considered to have begun in the 1950s – the post-Whitton era. Even though some Alberta social workers were involved in CASW well before this time, it appears primarily based on established relationships rather than as the representative of an organization of Alberta social workers.

The provincial government’s response to the Charlotte Whitton affair of 1947, left social work portrayed in the public mind in a distinctly negative fashion, however, it also fostered significant discussions among Alberta social workers. Likewise, the retirement of Charlie Hill and Deputy Minister A.H. Miller and the subsequent appointment of Ray Hagan as a new

Deputy Minister signaled an initial and tentative change in the attitude of the DPW towards the social work profession. Albeit that the education program initiated during the Hagen period, was designed primarily with municipal and provincial government employees in mind, the change in personnel in DPW resulted in both the beginning of informal social work training and the employment of social workers.

As noted earlier, the development of the social work profession in Alberta followed the pattern of institutionalization from informal connections among individuals to the formation of local organizations. Eventual provincial consolidation led to the formation of a single organization, initially operated by volunteers. Growth in numbers led to recognition first through voluntary legislation followed by hiring staff and eventually to legislated mandatory membership and professional accountability through the HPA.

As an observer and participant for much of the last five decades, the government’s stance towards social work has been mixed, unsettled and at times simply capricious and self-serving.

Similarly, the profession’s relationship with the Alberta government varied substantially sometimes depending on personal relationships, employment, political connections with

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Ministers, or public policy issues. Throughout much of this time, advancing the cause of professional legislation, employment of social workers in traditional social work programs such as child welfare and improving a wide range of provincial legislation and social programs were consistent themes in the relationship between AASW and government.

The College of Clinical Social Work of Alberta

Sometime in the early 1970’s a small group of Edmonton social workers employed in private social agencies and in private practice began meeting periodically in the boardrooms of a

local family service agency to discuss their growing concerns about the lack of professional

education and qualifications for ‘clinical counselling,” i.e., clinical social work (Don Storch,

Personal Communication: April 26, 2011). As a group, they were well positioned to engage in

that kind of reflection. All of them held credentials at the MSW level, well experienced in some

cases in a range of social services. Several and particularly Isabel Munroe, were part of the

effort to establish AASW in 1961. Munroe, the first President of AASW was also a key initiator

and strategist during the early 1960s to develop social work education in Alberta.

Don Karst, a former Executive Director of Calgary Family Services Bureau, described

the generally recognized leader Jackson N. Willis as “charismatic” (Personal Communication:

February 8, 2014). At the time, Willis was likely already in private practice as a family

counsellor in Edmonton after a long affiliation with the Edmonton Family Services Bureau

including several years as its Executive Director. Willis’ own involvement with the

development of Alberta social work education reached back at least as far as May 28, 1962,

when he delivered a speech to an unidentified audience in Calgary. As part of her strategy to

establish social work education in Alberta, Isabel Munroe sent a copy to U of A President Walter

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Johns and members of the University’s Academic Planning Committee urging them to establish a School of Social Work (UAA, Accession No. 69-123, Item 225, Box 14, File: Social Work).

Willis intended his speech to persuade the audience to support the need for an Alberta school of social work as proposed by AASW. The speech used a critique of Canadian culture in the 1960s to appeal and draw his audience into the popular concerns about changing impact of social values on family life, society, business and industry as evidenced by “mounting social problems and social disease” (p. 2). The structure of the argument was designed as the rationale for a new kind of professional person to address these complex issues. Citing US corporate executives, the speech sought to connect the family issues to a loss of productivity and preventable business costs. Reporting on several US studies on the rising cost of welfare programs, he presented family counselling, i.e., social workers, as an effective intervention to reduce private and public expenditures, reinforce human dignity and re-established personal responsibility. To provide the necessary education, Alberta needed its own school of social work at the University of Alberta.

By September 1972, ten years after his speech in Calgary, the informal discussions in which Willis played a major role, reached a level of concern and seriousness that led to a request for statutory sanction to establish the College of Clinical Social Work in Alberta (CCSWA). It was a goal Willis and his colleagues eventually achieved in 1974, but by registration under the

Societies Act and not the standalone Act of the Legislature, they had sought. However registering as a society was a well-known approach as Munroe played a role in a similar effort by AASW in 1961 as part of its longer-term strategy to gain legislative standing for delegated authorization as a self-regulated profession.

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Meanwhile, sometime in the early 1970s, the clinical social work group found itself at odds with the AASW over comments about ‘elitism’ and ‘extravagant fees’ attributed to the

AASW President, Percy Royal at the Select Committee on Professions and Occupations hearings on professional regulation. Royal’s comments were directed at ‘some social workers,’ i.e., clinical social workers, who ostensibly wanted support for distinct professional legislation that was separate from the AASW.

Royal, a social worker hired in the UK and brought to Edmonton by the Family Services

Agency as a clinical social worker and fired soon thereafter over a dispute about the authenticity of his credentials effectively, poured salt in the open wound of a broken relationship. He won the dispute in early 1975, when Judge C.H. Rolf ruled in his favour and declared that the whole matter “. . . smacks, quite frankly, out of persecution and not a prosecution” (Provincial Judges’

Court, Municipal Court Bldg., Edmonton, March 17, 1975 – in possession of the author). It further spiked an already damaged relationship between the Edmonton clinical social work group and AASW.

Aside from the legal issues surrounding his dismissal, Royal’s comments at the public meeting were inflammatory to the members of the CCSWA; Don Storch characterized the appointment and commented it was “like a match on oil” (Don Storch, Personal Communication:

April 26, 2012). Similarly, the AASW considered itself in the dark about the concerns of the

CCSWA particularly with rumours that the group envisioned itself as an independent entity.

Consequently, AASW invited the CCSWA members to a meeting on September 24, 1973.

The Chair for the meeting was AASW President, Percy Royal accompanied by several

Council Members. The shared level of mutual suspicions of the other was such that it required an agreement to record and transcribed the meeting of September 24, 1973. Moreover, to

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complicate the mistrust, unbeknownst to the clinical social work group, AASW brought its lawyer who stayed only briefly, but long enough to deepen and solidify the mistrust.

John Farry, Acting Chair for the CSSWA and a prominent member of the leadership of the effort to establish a school of social work in Alberta, formally introduced the concerns as he spoke at length about the personal and professional issues that had pre-occupied the group for

over a year.

Let me begin by way of introduction to, I think, what we see as a somewhat critical problem within the province. We feel that the development of the College of Clinical Social Work has gone back about 3 years now. I think when it was abundantly clear to those of us in clinical practice that the AASW were not interested in moving towards the development of standards for practice.

Now, if I recall my history within the Association over the past ten years or so, and in my sixteen years in the province, I think we have been watering down professional membership standards and more particularly over the past six to eight years. I think we have changed the ground rules as far as membership is concerned. The Association seems to have been in the position of creating new ground rules for blanketing people in.

This is of some concern to us because it seems to be that the Association is gearing its drive for standards to the lowest common denominator. Increasingly, as I pointed out, over the past five or six years, I think the Association has not addressed itself in any measure to the needs of those in the membership who have made the greatest personal sacrifices to achieve the highest goals and proficiency in practice. Now I believe I became increasingly aware of the direction AASW was going following the opening of the School of Social Welfare in Calgary. A school which was directly the result of some five years efforts on my part and a number of others such as Isabel Munroe [Munroe is noted as attending the meeting] and Bert Marcuse and those, interestingly enough who primarily distinguish themselves in clinical practice.

The School to my understanding from the correspondence I have received is now in a position of foundering on the basis of its inability to find a suitable clinical practice program. Now I feel that the AASW has been of little help here. It didn’t represent the interest of the clinical practitioner in any way, shape or form. Now I let my membership and support for your organization falter because it had become very clear to me that you have become what I consider an occupational grouping, not a professional association.

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Secondly, you have not addressed yourselves with what I consider a minimum amount of effort to obtaining licensing and our interests are chiefly at this point. I should say our interests are chiefly at this point in the enhancement of skills and protection of the public. This is what the College is all about. These are the two things that I believe the AASW is not doing.

Now, we are here to tell you something about the differences between the College and what I referred to as an occupational grouping. I would like to circulate some material which I think is relevant to the matters we are discussing and will undoubtedly discuss at some length before the evening is out. I don’t believe for my part that this is an issue of anything to do with, I am right and you are wrong. It is simply a matter of clarifying the issues as you say. I don’t believe we have made any depositions behind closed doors. We have simply gone ahead as I promised you three years ago when I met with the Association regarding these same matters.

There are a good number of professional people I believe within the province that have human interests, people on my staff and your staff and I think we are interested in serving the needs of those people and serving them directly and professionally. I think that the people here that are involved with the College have a great deal to say both from their background within the province and services which they have provided for the province, for the people in this province. I feel that probably more than any people in this room as a matter of fact they contributed largely to the success of whatever welfare schemes have evolved over the years and I feel that you should listen to them. I think they have something very important to say to you. I don’t like the idea personally of being detached from a professional association. I have some strong feelings about that and I don’t make those decisions off the top of my head.

It is with careful decision was a number of years ago simply because of the issues we are now about to discuss. I think everyone here representing the College – and the College represents some 25 – 30 people at this point in time – is interested in doing something in getting the AASW, our Association back into the development and enhancement of skills and would like to circulate to you a couple of documents that have been prepared that hopefully can depict for you some illustrations of the difference between the kind of things you say you offer under RSW membership under AASW and what the College purports to impart. There are some things I think some statements within that, that hopefully will clarify some of the things that seem at variance with you at this time and I will try to answer or see that the questions you may have about these things are answered before the evening is out. So let me leave these with you if I may take the liberty, Mr. Chairman, of passing these out (John Farry, September 24, 1973 – In possession of the author; also available from ACSW’s Archived Records – College of Clinical Social Work Practice).

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The AASW President Percy Royal and the comments he made at Select Committee represented the subtext to the meeting and was central to the broken relationship between the two organizations. Moreover, although the conflict was between the CCSW and the AASW, identifying the representatives of AASW with their employers complicated the disagreement. In this instance, it included the Edmonton School Board, a Counsellor for the Association of the

Retarded, the University of Calgary, School of Social Welfare, Maple Ridge, Edmonton Family

Services Association, the University of Alberta. As Storch pointed out, much more was stake because, by implication the listed agencies were also being judged (Don Storch, Personal

Communication: April 26, 2011).

Although, as Farry noted, the problem that led them to this point was the ‘foundering’ of the School of Social Welfare, whose existence came about because of their efforts.

Nevertheless, the CCSWA directed its criticism primarily at AASW and its leadership for an unwillingness to consider a special and independent status for clinical social workers. While appropriate standards for social work education and preparation for practice were the cause of the dispute, the specialist professional designation of clinical social worker, sought by the

CCSWA, was under the control of the AASW.

Both sides to dispute appear to have realized what was at stake. Although not directly involved, on May 1, 1974, Dick Ramsay then AASW President, wrote Albert Comanor to thank him for a proposal to establish a ‘Fellowship Program.’ In his July 19, 1964, response Comanor elaborated on his proposal by referring to the designation, ACSW, conferred on him by the

Academy of Certified Social Workers. As Comanor suggested, the designation conferred on him the qualifications and competence as therapist because of post-graduate education, recognized experience, supervision as well as successfully completing an exam. Similarly,

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Comanor pointed out that as a “fellow” of the Gerontological Society, he was officially recognized for long-term service, leadership and contributions to the field. His fellowship proposal in the midst of the debate was intended to provide the CCSWA with a similar form or recognition. As part of his response to Ramsay, on July 9, 1974, Comanor wrote to Chauncey A.

Alexander, the Executive Director of the US, National Association of Social Workers, explaining the risk of the local professional body splitting in two, asking for the advice on what he phrased as an “elite” status for clinical social workers.

My Canadian association is confronted by a divisive effort by “clinical social workers” to get government legitimation of a separate association. I have made some suggestions which might dry up that attempt. One is the creation of an “elite” status within the Association so that the claim that the AASW gives no recognition to qualitative achievement would lose substance. What is proposed is a very hard to get into “fellow” or “diplomat” status (UARC, 96.010, 2.10).

Whether Chauncey Alexander responded, is unclear and moot as it likely became irrelevant to any proposal for an elite status soon thereafter. The ironic nature of Comanor’s proposal missed the point that the opening salvo fired by an AASW President who accused the

CCSWA, as an ‘elitist group’ seeking legitimacy inside of AASW or through its own legislation.

Touch Therapy

The issue that conclusively defined the boundaries between Clinical College and AASW,

the provincial government and social agencies, resulted from the controversy about ‘touch

therapy.’ Apparently, a complaint from a client about ‘sexual touching’ by a member of both

AASW and the Clinical College prompted an AASW investigation. While the details of the

issue are outside the scope of this study, it resulted in AASW issuing a guideline for its members

in December 1974.

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The AASW statement recognized the importance of physical touch as, “part of a process when employed by a competently trained therapist, and is skillfully administered with a high degree of professionalism and standards of ethical conduct” (AASW, December 1974). The guidelines for marital therapy where sexual dysfunction was medically established, limited the social worker engaged in counselling to ‘talk therapy,’ without any examination, demonstration, touching or any kind of sexual surrogacy.

Walter Coombs expressed the concern of AASW Council, “. . .when it got to the political level it was the politicians realizing that this was a pretty touchy item, and so we’re going to be extremely careful about this in whichever way it goes. And we’re just going to be very, very careful” (Walter Coombs, Personal Communication: August 17, 2010). Likewise, Don Karst

explained, the 1960’s and 70’s were the age of sexual liberation and echoing Coombs’ comment

said that Council feared the consequences of any kind of physical touch of erogenous zones and

especially surrogacy that had been part of the debate (Don Karst, Personal Communication:

February 3, 2014).

It’s not surprising that the issue also resulted in a direct intervention by Bruce Rawson,

Chief Deputy Minister of Alberta Health and Social Development. On January 15, 1975

Rawson issued a Statement of Department Policy on Touch Therapy to all Department staff, prohibiting any kind of physical touching by staff involving the genitals or erogenous zones

(Rawson Letter, ACSW Archived Files). The Directive was a restatement of the position taken

by AASW Council and effectively ended the CCSWA’s efforts to gain legitimacy.

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A Final Attempt at Recognition and Cooperation

Even though ‘touch therapy’ issue signaled the beginning the end for the Clinical

College, its leaders were committed to one more effort to gain recognition for clinical social work. With the public debate barely over the Clinical College made its last known effort to gain the recognition. In March 1975, the Clinical College published with a rather lengthy and peculiar title, “A Summary Of The Development Of Social Work In Alberta And Canada

Comparative With The United States And United Kingdom In Respect To Legislation Related To

The Function, Qualifications And Licensing Of Social Workers. A Report of more than 200 pages presented to the Minister of Health and Social Development, MLAs and government officials, summarized the development of social work, and outlined some of the issues it encountered with AASW, commented on social work education in North America and proposed new legislation for the profession.

The revised Social Work Profession Act proposed by the Clinical College established three distinct Colleges for the AASW: the College of Welfare Workers, General Social Work

Practitioners and Clinical Social Workers with each acting almost entirely independently of the others including the Council of AASW which was limited to perfunctory organizational maintenance responsibilities. Whether by silence or other means, a written response by the

Minister was not located.

As an attempt to persuade a government to act by legislating in the manner it proposed, the Clinical College violated accepted protocols for influencing government officials. By taking an exclusive position for itself, the CCSWA damaged the merits of its cause. Responsible for staff development in the Department employing increasing numbers of social workers, Gordon

Stangier explained his encounter with the CCSWA members at Edmonton Family Services.

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I can remember when I was appointed Director of Staff Development in the mid-seventies I was invited by Jackson Willis to come and meet with him and his staff. It was the most uncomfortable hour or two I think that I’ve ever spent. We went into a very dimly lit boardroom and a half a dozen of them were sitting around a table; it looked like they were grilling me as to whether or not I had the qualifications and orientation to be a Director of Staff Development. I said what the hell are you guys doing. It’s none of your damn business, you’re not my employer.

I think the other thing that might have been proof . . . some private agencies that were totally focused on professional social work and advocacy and counseling and that sort of thing . . . who didn’t have a particularly good view of what the department was doing and so on. They felt that they weren’t professional enough – that sort of thing. And I think . . . I can remember sitting with the Family Service Association or Bureau in Edmonton and Jackson Willis, and we were obviously not regarded very highly. In return I didn’t regard them very highly either (Gordon Stangier, Personal Communication: August 14, 20120).

Ironically, the experience of the meeting with Edmonton Family Services and the clinical social workers represented by Jackson Willis, carried over and generalized into the broader relationship of the issues between the Department and the profession as well as the Faculty of

Social Welfare.

So that kind of argument or feelings carried over to University and Department relationships. You know there was maybe some skepticism of it if you trained social workers to be clinicians, there aren’t going to be too many jobs in our department (Gordon Stangier, Personal Communication: August 14, 2012).

The end of the Clinical College and its disappearance followed its inability to influence either the AASW or the Alberta government into recognizing its aspirations as a distinct profession. Even though at the heart of its dispute was social work education and preparation for practice, it was compelled by law to engage with the AASW. Aside from a general awareness of the issues, no one other than former members of AASW Council had more than a general awareness of the events that took place almost exclusively in Edmonton. Although the clinical

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specialization issues were dormant during the 1980s and into the 1990s, the issue in the 1970s was part of the professionalization and institutionalization of social work in Alberta. As Siegrist pointed out, once legislative approval is obtained, it falls to the profession to determine how it will govern itself. Consequently, the prospect of establishing a clinical social work specialty

re-emerged following the 1995, decision by AASW Council to lobby the Alberta government for including social work in the Health Professions Act.

The University

Inside the U of C the University, opposition to Tyler’s vision and leadership peaked in

1976/77 with two Reports, the first initiated by the Students Union while President Bill

Cochrane initiated the second Report. Cochrane was the former Dean of the Faculty of

Medicine and served as the Deputy Minister of Health in 1973 and 1974.

Ostensibly, the Students Union chose the Faculty of Social Welfare for its first review,

because the Faculty represented a small teaching unit and could serve as a realistic place for the

Students Union to begin its planned review of a number of programs offered at the ten-year old

U of C. The Faculty of Social Welfare experience was designed to refine the methods in

conjunction with a similar survey in the Faculty of Education. The Faculty of Social Welfare

survey was limited to BSW graduates from 1974 – 1976, current students and faculty members

as well as some administrative personnel from the community.

A lengthy questionnaire with 60 questions probed for reactions to the BSW program on a

series of issues ranging from availability of courses, faculty member preparation, practicum,

student advising, preparation for practice, availability of faculty, etc. Overall, the response of

students deemed the program to be satisfactory. In summary, students acknowledged that much 295

had improved since 1971 when the BSW program began and recommended that the Faculty should continue on its path of improvements by addressing the areas of concern, rather than ossify at its current state. Finally, the Report noted that President Wm. Cochrane had informed the Student’s Union of his plan to evaluate the Faculty as well by appointing a special committee.

Release of the Student Unions’ Report to the media, likely caused greater consternation at the University than the Report itself. On February 3, 1977, Calgary Herald staff writer,

Vickie Barnett’s analysis of the Student Union’s Report appeared under the headline, “U of C social welfare students feel ‘inept,’ says report.” Barnett’s use of ‘inept’ referred to students’ performance in ‘practical situations,’ as in the context of employment. However, the Study places the phrase in the context of the student’s treatment skills, before exposure to the practicum experience. Regardless of the context, the public message, likely reinforced a view that Derek Baker encountered during his visits to social agencies (Derek Baker, Personal

Communication: October 26, 2010).

Meanwhile, U of C President Cochrane had already established a Task Group to Evaluate the Faculty of Social Welfare. The public image of the Faculty presented by the Herald story was anything but a deterrent to proceed. Cochrane had been at the U of C as the Dean of

Medicine for much of the first decade of the U of C’s history, he knew Tim Tyler as a colleague and the two of them had several discussions

I met Tim and his ideas were different from the usual and mine were, and we hit it off reasonably well. We did occasionally debate and argue but that was secondary to the focus that we had. And his ideas were somewhat similar to my own but in a different discipline (Wm. Cochrane, Personal Communication: January 18, 2011).

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Apparently, at the invitation of Premier Peter Lougheed, Cochrane spent approximately a year as the Deputy Minister of Health Services and at least for part of the time when social worker Dave Stolee served as his counterpart as the Deputy Minister of Social Services. Both

Cochrane and Stolee reported directly to the Chief Deputy of Social Services and Health, Bruce

Rawson. As Cochrane explained, soon after his return to the U of C, he decided to begin a process of evaluating the University’s Faculties because of student complaints beginning with the Faculty of Education followed with by the Faculty of Social Welfare.

Although Cochrane suggested, his short stay as Deputy Minister of Health left him unfamiliar with the complaints of Alberta Social Services and those of his former colleague

Dave Stolee, he was certainly familiar with the professional issues. After little more than a year, his appointment as Deputy Minister of the Health Services side of the Department ended when in 1974 the U of C Board of Governors asked him to become its President.

In response to the common complaint by Social Services about the School of Social

Work that graduates were not prepared and ready to work in the specialized area of child welfare, Cochrane pointedly compared it to training a pediatrician before educating and training them as general practitioners (Bill Cochrane, Personal Communication: January 18, 2011). On his behalf and as Cochrane’s choice for the Chair of the Study Group, Peter Craigie wrote Dave

Stolee a letter on February 22, 1977, asking for a meeting to obtain his views on matters related to the School of Social Welfare (PAA, Accession No. 83.401, pgs., 252, Box 7).

Cochrane had initiated the Report in late 1976 with a request to Peter Craigie from the

Department of Religious Studies, to Chair the Task Group and report by May 1977. Apparently,

at an earlier point, Tyler and Cochrane had a conversation about a review, because on October 8,

1976, Tyler had written to Cochrane with recommendations for members on a Review

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Committee. The two recommendations for the U of C academic representatives were the Chair,

Peter Craigie and A.H. Finley, a member in the Faculty of Medicine. Of the three academics external to the U of C, two were recommended by the Tyler’s Administrative Committee

(UARC 85.45/17.5, - Welfare (Faculty) President’s Task Force to Evaluate Faculty of Social

Welfare, 1976-77).

Both Cochrane and Craige were careful not to call it a study, distinguishing between the two by use of “data” to inform a study and “information” to conduct an “evaluation” (UARC,

85.45. In this instance, ‘evaluation’ meant to assess or to engage in making a judgment of the value of that which is the subject of the evaluation - President’s Task Group, 1977). Whether in this instance A = B, may have been a reasonable question, however, it is moot only because, in

time, the Cochrane Report achieved the sought after outcome.

Paraphrasing the details of Task Group Evaluation is challenging, however, it reports on

a new University, a new School with a relatively young faculty with its growth paralleling the

strengths and weaknesses of the university as a whole. The Report recognizes that the School has

benefitted from vigorous leadership, dedicated faculty members, excellent support staff and

overall its innovative programs deserves praise for its performance and achievements.

Following these preliminary laudatory comments, the Report developed a framework that

initially placed the School in the context of issues confronting social work education generally.

However, by broadening the scope to include outside organizations, it was possible to legitimize

and normalize the critique.

But the Faculty of Social Welfare is not entirely free from problems. The inevitable growth of student numbers and the expansion of programmes have stretched the Faculty to its capacity. New programmes, such as the BSW, have brought into the Faculty problems which characterize Social Work education as a whole, and which are in no sense peculiar to this Faculty. And certain tensions

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between general educational aims and the meeting of professional goals and needs continue to characterize the life of the Faculty (p.2).

Although the problems are somewhat obscured and contextualized as belonging to all social work education program, the critical observation in the preceding quote is the juxtaposition of ‘general educational aims’ and the ‘meeting of professional goals and needs.’

However, some clarity in its reach for greater specificity was forthcoming, first by acknowledging that the negative views have been heard, given serious consideration, but less frequently the source of the Task Group’s recommendations.

In this evaluation, as in any, both positive and negative statements have been heard and received. The positive views about the Faculty, which came both from within the University and from persons and agencies beyond the University, are a source of encouragement. The negative views have been given serious consideration, and in several cases this Report identifies problem areas which arise from that consideration; less frequently, the Task Group has made recommendation which arise from that consideration (p. 3).

Continuing, with the critique the Task Group heard, the Report moved from the general toward a more specific identification of the issues. In doing so, the criticism became concern and appreciation for strengths and desire for improvement.

Criticism from within the University, from students and others, and criticism from persons and social work agencies outside the University reflected a genuine concern for the Faculty - appreciation of its current strengths and a real desire for its overall improvement. It may be a statement of the obvious, but the Faculty of Social Welfare is of great importance to the University of Calgary and the Province of Alberta (p. 3).

The Report offered only four explicit recommendations, consolidation over growth, solving existing problems over initiating a PhD program, strengthening the Edmonton program and establishing an advisory committee for hiring new faculty members. However, scattered throughout the Report is a potpourri of comments about such matters as grading, the excessive use of sessional instructors, the imbalance of academic qualifications of faculty members, the

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large number of student representatives on Faculty Council, increasing the emphasis on scholarly and research skills over clinical and practical matters are just a few. The most important recommendation, buried near the end of the Report, dealt with the matter of leadership and style.

The governance system is strongly imprinted with the personal leadership style of the Dean, but this was not apparently regarded as being in any way problematic. Having said this, it does appear that there is a pressing need for the re-orientation of leadership style at this point in the Faculty’s history. The problems faced by the Faculty now tend to lie less in the direction of seeking substantially new initiatives or in promoting new ventures; rather there is a need to consolidate, to refine, to upgrade, to address more mundane issues of solving persistent problems in the present operation of the programme. There is, then, less need for leadership of a promotional and visionary character and more need of assistance in correcting present weaknesses through systematic and thorough attention to detail (p. 28).

The Community Colleges

The post WW II era development and growth of social welfare programs contributed to a

dramatic increase in the demand for social work services and professional education in North

America. In both the US and Canada, that led to the development of programs variously geared

to the training of “social work technicians,” “sub-professionals” or “case aids.” Alberta was no

exception to the issue or proposals for solving the problem. As noted earlier, Alberta social

workers were engaged in the broader discussion as early as the late 1950’s in the context of

developing graduate level social work education in Alberta.

Even before the School of Social Welfare opened its doors to students in September

1967, ‘rumours’ from Edmonton about the U of A establishing a ‘social work-like” with the

name, ‘human resources development’ program reached Calgary and Tyler in particular. As a

result, U of C President Armstrong sought clarification from W. H. Swift, Chair of the

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Universities Commission, established by the Social Credit government to coordinate university level education in Alberta. In a letter dated June 2, 1967, Swift explained the U of A

The proposal appears to be another in the currently fashionable ‘interdisciplinary approach. By taking a group of courses in sociology, psychology and other fields the student obtains a background of general education in the social sciences so that he may interest himself in social problems and developments in their broad aspects (UARC 85.45/17.1 School of Social Welfare 1964; 1967-1970).

In explaining, what has since become ‘the provincial mandate’ Swift added the following comment to clarify the larger question about the provincial role of the U of C, School of Social

Welfare.

For the time being all I can say is that it is my opinion that a School of Social Welfare having been established at Calgary that university has a prior entitlement to develop a program in this field, and to expand it, as conditions warrant or necessitate, into its various specializations (UARC 85.45/17.1 School of Social Welfare 1964; 1967-1970).

In a letter dated July 12, 1988, more than two decades later, the Deputy Minister of

Advanced Education, G. Lynne Duncan commented on the ‘provincial mandate’ once more.

. . . from the perspective of the Department of Advanced Education the University of Calgary has sole responsibility to offer the baccalaureate and graduate social work education provincially. This mandate includes the ongoing delivery of the social work program in Calgary, Lethbridge and Edmonton centres; and distance delivery to other locations as determined by the University, based on regional demand and available funding. This mandate may change from time to time, of course, as agreed upon by the University and the Department (Faculty of Social Work, The University of Calgary, October 30, 1997).

Although the two versions of the mandate are worded somewhat differently, the effect on professional social work education in Alberta remained the same. Both placed the responsibility for province-wide delivery of the BSW and MSW program on the U of C. Both raised public expectations for access to professional university level social work education

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regardless of location. At the same time, it simultaneously created an air of uncertainty rather than stability for ongoing support and funding at the level of the province-wide mandate. The establishment of the community college programs designed as training programs to supplement and assist professional social workers added to the problem by creating a demand for transferability of college social service courses to the School of Social Welfare for professional social work education.

Tyler recognized the issues created by the decision to establish the community college based programs early in his tenure. In response to an invitation from the Minister of Health, Jim

Henderson, to meet with him and two other Cabinet Minister, Tyler responded with a letter of his

own on July 8, 1969, listing among others, “a sequential and coordinated approach between

colleges and the School of Social Welfare.” On August 18, 1969, Tyler wrote to the Minister of

Education, R.C. Clark as a follow-up to the July 16, 1969 meeting with J. Henderson and R.A.

Speaker, Minister, Department of Social Development [formerly the DPW]. Although that

meeting was largely purposed to discuss practicum opportunities in the Departments of Health

and Social Development, the two-year post-high school social service diploma course was discussed as well. With the August 18, 1969 letter to R.C. Clark, Tyler sought the opportunity to obtain political support “to bring together representatives of these teaching units [the colleges] for the purpose of developing complementary post-high school programs” (PAA Accession No.

79.106, File/Item Box 12, U of Calgary, No. 123, General). Although the response by the

Department of Education appears as supportive to Tyler’s request, the process became far more complex than simply “developing complementary post-high school programs.”

The Chair of the Government’s Program Development Committee, N.G. Fast generally agreed with Tyler’s request for a coordinated approach to college programs. In the context of an

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MSW program, Fast suggested that the two different levels of training did not create any problems, but with the discussions underway about the BSW as the new entry credential to social work, the landscape changed. MSW graduates were generally assigned to area administrator positions and college graduates to positions as Social Worker Aides. At least with respect to

MSW graduates, Fast reinforced the message delivered to Walter Johns by DPW Minister,

Leonard Halmrast about the level of education for government social work positions half a decade earlier. As a result, Tyler’s request became an issue for the three Universities and the

Colleges’ Commission responsible for overseeing all college level programs.

On June 18, 1970, a Special Meeting of a Senate of an unnamed University was called to discuss the relationship of the three Universities and the Colleges. With Ross Alger in the

Chair, it’s likely that the meeting was held under the auspices of the U of C. Minister R.A Clark, on behalf of the Government made its position known on several issues, and with immodest clarity, he announced, two-year post high school program diplomas are ‘primarily terminal,’ i.e., transferability is not possible but not necessarily impossible.

On August 31, 1970, Premier Harry Strom addressed a meeting with Colleges, explaining the government’s official position on the role of a relatively new institution, developed largely in response to post-WW II population growth and public expectations for access to post-secondary education. As the Premier indicated, universities were seen to meet that need for a limited number of students, with colleges and technical programs intended to serve a much larger population. Although the Premier did not address the ‘not possible but not impossible’ conundrum, his intentions were clear. Universities were to be teaching and research focused while colleges were intended as teaching vocationally oriented institutions with research discouraged, “because of the very nature of the clientele served and the function of the

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institution.” He went on to elaborate, “I do not think there is room on a college faculty for a staff member who is more interested in research than he is in teaching” (PAA, Accession 79.106,

File/Box No 107, and pgs. 18, Box 12).

On January 21, 1971, 8 months before another conservative party replaced the Social

Credit government, President, Don Milne of the 235 member AASW, wrote to express AASW’s interest and concerns about the to the College Commission decision to commission a study of post-secondary social work programs and social services in Alberta. The AASW request for information and consultation was terse and asked for answers to a series of questions.

Apparently, without much explanation, the AASW had been asked to supply a list of its members to a research team employed by the Commission to undertake some unspecified research. Milne, in turn, not unwilling to co-operate, nevertheless informed the Commission that the requested action had been deferred until an explanation was offered.

The decision by Tyler and the School of Social Welfare at the U of C appears as the precipitating event for the Study proposed by the Commission. The Minutes of the December

10, 1970 meeting of the Commission recorded the decision to approve a $7,280.00 study for research describing and evaluating the social work programs in the Province of Alberta and determining the future needs for social workers at all levels” (PAA, Accession 74.411, pgs. 87,

Box 2). A copy of a research proposal by faculty members in the Department of Educational

Psychology at the U of A was included in the sequence of files. However, I was unable to locate any record of the actual Study or whether it was even undertaken. Nevertheless, it is clear that at least some of the Colleges saw this as an opportunity for expansion without treading, into the morass of the difference between ‘the not possible and the not impossible.’

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The President of Lethbridge Community College, for instance proposed but found the creation of a program leading to “social counselling,” rejected by the College Commission. For

Tyler and those that followed, the message from successive Alberta governments remained the same; ‘not possible but not necessarily impossible.’ With the U of C School of Social Welfare and its provincial mandate and provincial funding, and similarly with the Colleges’ request for transferability grounded in government policy and funding, the institutional differences and incoherence of a conservative government on policy issues invariably spilled over into personal relationships as a substitute for resolution of the issues.

Provincial Departments: - Public Welfare and Advanced Education:

The interplay between two major Alberta government departments may as well have been included in Tyler’s 1997 comments to AASW members as a third obstacle to raise its objections, not to the name per se, but rather to the vision and the program that followed from it.

Although the concerns were identified in the series of letters from Halmrast to Walter Johns referenced earlier, there’s no record that any of those letters, their content or the issues were shared with the University of Calgary or with Tyler. Moreover, his access to the political level of government during the final years of the Social Credit government may well have dampened any enthusiasm for raising them during the School’s early development.

Nevertheless, Derek Baker generalized similar issues raised by ‘the agencies’ as he visited them in the course of supervising student placements. He spoke at length about his role in settling the anxiety, fear confusion and anger about the direction of the School of Social

Welfare.

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The sharp edge came as we started to move out into field placements. That’s where the edges started to get rough as you fanned out. You know I found probably two or three, four years along in the program, found some pretty angry people out there, angry at Tim and angry at the School (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2012).

Baker went on to explain that the agencies, i.e., the Department, complaints were

directed at the perception that graduates were not ready for what were mostly front-line

positions. “People were coming out and they were spending more time criticizing the

Department rather than learning. I think it was a perception, the same perception as that you’re

not sending people to us who are what we want.” Baker continued, that agencies were “looking

for people who administer [deliver] social services and you’re sending us policy wonks or you

know, social advocates, a social advocacy program” (Derek Baker, Personal Communication:

October 26, 2010).

Baker’s comments point to two common and early complaints about the School of Social

Welfare, namely, its emphasis on advocacy and its position on education versus training. Dave

Stolee, a Deputy Minister during the late 1970s commented on these issues that on hearing the

word advocacy “I start conjuring up visions of Tim Tyler again . . . but the interest of the

department was just . . . you know we have neglected children, we have troubled families and we need caseworkers out there (Dave Stolee, Personal communication: December 17, 2010).

Readiness for practice and Stolee’s reference to advocacy and caseworkers became a contentious issue for the School and its relationship with social agencies, especially when the two major government departments regarded the graduates as inadequately prepared or simply not ready for practice. The difference was frequently expressed as one of ‘practice as it is versus practice as it ought to be.’ While a complete examination of that issue is beyond the scope of

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this Study, the following example illustrates the context in which this issue was defined in the early 1970s.

It begins with an acknowledgement that the Lougheed government apparently refused

AASW’s request to amend the 1969 Social Work Profession Act to protect the title social worker. As a result, anyone could use the title, ‘social worker’ regardless of any education or experience. ASS&CH and its successors consistently used the title and irrespective of

qualifications, staff were considered to be social workers, devaluing professional education and

establishing its own ‘practice as it was’ – a phrase coined to counter the ideal and reminiscent of

Halmrast’s concerns.

Ironically, now that the title ‘social worker’ is protected by the Health Professions Act, the practice of the Human Services Ministry, especially in the child welfare program has

reversed but with the same effect. Alberta Human Services apparently now avoids using the

title, even for those of its employees entitled to use it. Along with devaluating the profession, it

may well reflect a conclusion that much of its staff is still without professional social work

qualifications.

On May 3, 1978, Bill Supynuk, the Staff Development Officer for ASS&CH wrote to

D.E. Berghoffer, Assistant Deputy Minister, AE&M, on the Subject, Relevance of Graduates,

Calgary Faculty of Social Welfare. The purpose of the note was to inform Berghoffer of a

temporary hold on a distance education proposal by the School and a review of the competency

based modules developed by the Faculty. Berghoffer was also asked to inform the Faculty of

Social Welfare “that government departments have not been hiring the graduates in any

significant numbers because it has been their experience the Calgary Faculty of Social Welfare

program has not been relevant enough to the needs of the field.” In addition, Supynuk

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announced he had arranged for a ‘quick survey’ of recruitment and selection files over the previous two years to quantify what he believed would demonstrate the lack of relevance of the

Faculty of Social Welfare. Ostensibly, the survey would show that ASS&CH did not hire the graduates of the Tyler-led program.

Attached to Supynuk’s May 3, 1978 note to Berghoffer was a copy of an ‘Abstract of

Submission A, prepared by Ian D. Lazarowich, under the date of January 3, 1977. Also attached

to the same Supynuk note was a copy of an undated, AAS&CH report regarding its relationship

with the School of Social Welfare. The Report, cautiously headed with the legal qualifier,

“Confidential and Without Prejudice,” is fascinating for its candour and mythology. Supynuk

qualified the status of the Report by asking for its confidential nature to be respected and

suggested that the Department didn’t necessarily endorse all of its recommendations without

revealing which of the Report’s recommendations he or the Department had in mind.

The Report alludes to and repeats the historic resentment of unnamed persons deemed to

be ‘prominent social workers’ about the decision to locate the School of Social Welfare in

Calgary. Similarly, with unspecified innuendos he notes, Tyler was hired for the Director’s

position while he was a member of the Selection Committee, the School’s stance on skill

development was akin to those employed by the American Civil Rights Movement, the anti-

bureaucratic views of its early graduates and finally, the unjust criticism of the Department staff

without social work education. In response, Supynuk’s proposed strategies include “utilizing

AASW representatives” to present the Department’s position on the curriculum committee and departmental needs (PAA, Accession No. 1984.189 Box 3).

On June 26, 1978, Supynuk advised Berghoffer of the results of the ‘quick survey’ he had arranged a month earlier. To Supynuk’s surprise, “the results were surprising to many

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persons in the Department since the conclusions did not support the rather pessimistic rumours that have persisted for years.” Even though the data he sought admittedly did not support the

‘not ready to practice’ position of the ASS&CH, Supynuk proposed the following remedy to address what were now the unwarranted pessimistic rumours.

I recommend that the University of Calgary not be approached at this time re the relevancy of the Faculty of Social Welfare graduates. The appointment of their new Dean will be announced shortly, I understand. The issue can be raised again, if necessary, after he takes office (Accession No. GR1984.0189, Box 3 5/55.2).

John Mould, who knew Supynuk well and worked in Staff Development during at least some of this time, commented on Supynuk’s remarks. “It would have been a reflection of a ministry stance rather than an original thought on the part of Mr. Supynuk who I say, would be an individual, bright man, but that’s a reflection of his environment” (John Mould, Personal

Communication: September 7, 2010).

In the face of contrary evidence, the thought of an apology apparently did not occur to the officials in either ASS&CH or AE&M for what they surely realized involved several years of maligning the U of C, the Faculty of Social Welfare and particularly its Dean. Instead, the design of the recommendation they adopted left intact the unwarranted impression they created, unless deemed otherwise desirable and necessary. A March 1980, Status Report on Social

Workers for the Alberta Health and Social Services Disciplines Committee, prepared by the

Research and Planning Division, ASS&CH, introduced a somewhat modified observation but nevertheless, with the same effect.

Some provincial employers of social workers have complained that the graduates of the BSW and MSW Programs at the U of C are inappropriately trained for the employer’s service needs. For example, 12 employing agencies, which responded to the Discipline Committee’s September 30, 1979 Survey of Employers, voiced this complaint (PAA, Accession No. 86.235, Box 5).

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The results of the ‘quick survey’ Supynuk did not want to share show that, ASS&CH hired 58 U of C, Faculty of Social Welfare graduates and on October 20, 1977, 118 of School’s undergraduate and graduate social workers were employees of the Department. The repeated allegations about the Faculty and its graduates, by senior officials were simply divisive rumours.

Nevertheless, the narrative characterized and unduly complicated the efforts of Faculty members and the Dean as well as ASS&CH, for much of the School’s history.

Moreover, because of the relationship between AE&M and ASS&CH, efforts by the

Faculty to expand, innovate and develop its program were evaluated on the basis of a standard that Supynuk and others eventually acknowledged was unfounded in the reality of the ASS&CH hiring practices. Albeit in different language, the perpetuation of the myth created by senior officials in ASS&CH, apparently unaware of the hiring practices in their own Department, is found in the Report of the President’s Task Group Evaluation (p. 4 – 5).

THE TRANSITION

The transition from Tyler to the next Dean chosen by the University is shrouded in an official mystery. At the completion of Tyler’s tenure, the University apparently selected Frank

Turner to be the Dean, presumably to implement the Task Group Evaluation Report’s recommendations. Accordingly, the necessary arrangements were ready for him to take on the duties of the Dean on the day his expected arrival. However, to everyone’s surprise, Turner simply failed to show-up. According to both Derek Baker and Dick Ramsay, Turner apparently decided at the last minute, for unrecorded reasons against coming to Calgary. Instead, Len

Richards, who had been on Faculty since the late 1960s, took on the position and task of implementing the Task Group’s recommendations.

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Appointed in 1978, Len Richards was very much a transitional figure. Nevertheless as

the 1977 President’s Task Group Report suggested, he was responsible for addressing the “need

to consolidate, to refine, to upgrade, to address more mundane issues solving persistent problems

in the present operation of the program . . . more in need of assistance in correcting weaknesses

through systematic and thorough attention to detail” (p. 28). Richards was not expected to be the

visionary innovator, or even engaged in promoting new programs; it was a time for focusing

internally rather than externally oriented to create and innovate.

With a dearth of documentation, the selected excerpts in the 1997 document prepared by the Faculty of Social Work, nevertheless illustrate significant events and issues challenged and even taxed the Dean and his Assistants. Unfortunately, it also included significant periods of

illness for Richards with the result that during some events Derek Baker acted as Dean. On

reviewing some of the issues during the five years of Dean Richards’ tenure, it is clear they were

anything but mundane. Some of the issues that occupied the Dean and his Assistants were new,

generated externally and beyond the Dean’s control or even influence. In every instance, they

were far more significant than the routine administrative issues the Task Group envisaged.

Included in the issues Richards and his Assistants faced were the rising and politicized

expectations created by the provincial mandate and apparently because he was the new Dean.

Among the issues he faced were the demand for increased scholarly work, a hapless and mostly

surreptitious effort by several Edmonton faculty members and a U of A Dean to transfer the

BSW program to the Faculty of Arts at the U of A. Likewise, the critique by AFSS - a scaled-

down ASS&CH – continued. Likewise, he was compelled to deal with the efforts by the U of A

Department of Educational Psychology to establish an MSW program as well as the aspirations

of the University of Lethbridge for the independence of its BSW program. Internally, the

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development of a proposal for a BSW degree in Child Care, the perennial funding issues driven

by Advanced Education often with AFSS running interference, occupied the Dean and his

associates. Perhaps because of these issues, the U of C developed a proposal to transfer the

Edmonton and Lethbridge programs to those Universities. Peter Krueger, Vice President

(Academic), who signed-off on those proposals, surely knew that without the transfer of funds

his offer was taken seriously about as long as it took to read the letter. However, perhaps it

succeeded in its real purpose, namely, to bring an end to these institutions circling the wagon,

looking for an opening to exploit and develop their own social work program.

The result of their collective efforts, Richards and his Assistants brought some perceived

improvements, but as Derek Baker experienced it those changes were likely not enough. By the

time Len Richards’ term as Dean drew to a close, Baker suggested, “Len had read the tea leaves

and so, given his style of slow moderation – probably wasn’t fast enough for the university.”

Combined with failing health Richards announced he would not seek a second term and

resigned. Baker summarized it with the following comments.

The noose was tightening from the University. If we were going to become more than we were, we had to have a strong academic reputation and we had to have a strong academic leadership and move in the direction which I gather the school has subsequently moved, which is [to say] into a much stronger research and writing profile PhD level (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2010).

Although the President offered Baker the Dean’s position, he resigned as well; fully realizing it

was time for someone new, someone with the required academic credentials and with a bent and

record of scholarly work.

I wasn’t disillusioned because I’d worked so hard personally and with Len – I mean full marks to Len, not to me. Full marks to Len, I sort of hang-glided with him; we had a vision of, okay, the writing’s on the wall. How can we retain what’s important but move at the same time and so, recruitment was always in

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terms of bringing somebody with a good academic record and nobody was going to come in without a PhD (Derek Baker, Personal Communication: October 26, 2010).

A NEW DEAN AND A NEW VISION

If there was ever any doubt in his mind, it became clear very soon after Ray Thomlison

arrived in Calgary that his recruitment was a serious effort as U of C President Norm Wagner

became actively engaged in persuading him to leave Toronto. By the end of the walk across the

campus, Tomlinson knew his mandate and the challenge that awaited him.

I remember we were walking across the campus and he said, ‘Look! I’m going to tell you right now that if you don’t take this position I’m going to close the god damn thing.’ And that’s how angry he was. I doubt he would have ever done that but that is something that reverberated in my head at the time (Ray Thomlison, Personal Communication: December 13, 2010).

There is little room for doubt that the Faculty also understood Ray Thomlison’s mandate;

they knew what it was and some were moved to leave the U of C.

When Ray came, there was no question about the mandate then. It was really was to move the scholarship side of the Faculty and to move it not just in terms of research and publication, but also in terms of the graduate program and the movement toward a PhD. Ray was working hard to get a PhD program almost from the beginning in my memory (Jack MacDonald, Personal Communication: August 31, 2010).

Clearly, not everyone was enthusiastic about Ray Thomlison as the choice for Dean. Ben

Carniol, who knew him from Toronto, realized the vision and direction of the Faculty was about to change and it wasn’t compatible with his own. In the early 1980s, Carniol was already formulating his own vision for social work and social work education based on dominance and oppression, inequality, privilege, ideology to name but a few of the themes he subsequently

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developed through six editions of Case Critical, Social Services and Social Justice. As a result, he left as soon as he could after he learned of Thomlison’s appointment.

I’d read some of his material, I was familiar with his focus on child welfare and his approach to social work and that he was a bright guy with lots of energy and I realized he was going to take the school in a very different direction. So, I mean, I was happy to leave for that reason. There was a big grin on my face when actually Ryerson, at the time it was not a University but it had a School of Social Work, came through with an offer and I was very quick to accept it and I was relieved to be out of there (Ben Carniol, Personal Communication: April 20, 2011)

For David Baxter the change he expected and briefly witnessed was more about the change in orientation from a preference for practice to that of a preference for the academic.

Ironically, the division he saw divided along the same fault line as Leonard Halmrast and the

ASS&CH officials in their critique of the Faculty. It was nearly two years before he walked into

Thomlison’s office and came out with terminal sabbatical.

It didn’t matter what you called it. You could have called it bologna because it was going in that direction and I don’t think anybody was going to stop it. You know it was ‘publish or perish’ time, basically that was it. I didn’t see any future for myself there at all and I wanted to get back out and do something in the field, do something I was trained to do (David Baxter, Personal Communication: September 28, 2010).

Butch Nutter, a registered psychologist and registered social worker in the Edmonton

Division, on looking back recalled the 1989 decision to change the name to become the Faculty of Social Work.

It was Ray who really wanted that because he considered himself to be a really expert social worker and by that he meant one to one social work kind of stuff. I mean he considered himself to be an expert clinician and a lot of us didn’t think he was very good at that either. After the first year or two, Ray and I did not have a very smooth relationship (Butch Nutter, Personal Communication: February 17, 2011).

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Others recognized that Thomlison brought a new sense and a much greater emphasis on scholarship and publication to the Faculty that had been there only intermittently. In commenting about the change from an Edmonton perspective, Ron Levin suggested,

. . . they [Calgary] kind of saw it as an outpost with an emphasis on trying to train and prepare social workers for practice. I think probably – not exclusively certainly – and certainly people were involved in scholarship, but the emphasis was not on practice. And I think when Ray came on, certainly his focus was on growing the scholarship publication component and it was balancing maybe he was tilting more towards that area and reemphasizing the academic reality of what we were (Ron Levin, Personal Communication: September 5, 2010).

Levin had much the same perspective about Thomlison’s vision for social work practice

and education. In spite of the interest and support for a structural focus on social work education

and with the proximity and influence of colleagues in the government, the reality of practice in

Alberta as the Edmonton Division understood it was very different and grounded in the needs of

the community.

. . . the program was geared to practice and I think in Edmonton that was probably the emphasis although I think that community development ...... emphasis and structural change, that was included but I think the focus was more on the practice as we saw it. And of course Ray came and Ray – I mean his background, his writing, his practice background was all in family counseling at the time. So you know that’s what he had written about I think he brought that kind of focus coming from U of T and before that his teaching was in the area of social practice and in the behavioral modification approach to social work and family practice. The change in the name, certainly in Edmonton, I think was probably a pretty accurate reflection of the kind of emphasis that was going on in the program at the time. But, I think there was discussion as I recall, that there was – that that change of name also promoted a change of focus from the time that Tim and Len were directing the program (Ron Levin, Personal Communication: September 5, 2010).

The Edmonton Division’s focus on practice that apparently distinguished it from Calgary was echoed by Margot Herbert. Ironically, it had meant that the difficulties faced in Calgary, during Tyler’s era, the Edmonton Division was largely exempt from the criticism of ASS&CH

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because of its focus on practice as it existed in Edmonton. However, with Thomlison’s arrival its viability and existence would face its own challenges.

I really think that was a very profound difference and I think that’s what gave us a lot of credibility in Edmonton was that connection with the practice community and the fact that because we had all those practice connections, we brought the community into the classroom. And, you know [we] connected student experience with hands on practice in the community in so many ways (Margot Herbert, Personal Communication: December 14, 2010).

The perspective and style Thomlison brought to his relationship with senior officials in

AFSS had consequences. It may well have fit in a similar framework as Tyler with the focus

more on ‘practice as it should’ rather than ‘practice as it is.’ The difference between Tyler and

Thomlison, however, was more about what is deemed here to be the broad versus the narrow

view of social work as Harry Cassidy defined the phrase in the 1930’s. Stan Remple, one of a

very few social workers to occupy the position of Deputy Minister in AFSS, described his

frustrations as missed opportunities.

I’m going to be very transparent with you. I had a great deal of respect for what the Faculty of Social Welfare was doing and what its mandate was. The difficulty I had were two. One was that the party in power had its own biases relating to the social work profession which made it somewhat more difficult for anyone responsible for administering, like Family and Social Services. The other one was also creating some difficulty. I think sometimes it was difficult to get into dialogue with people in the Faculty of Social Welfare because Ray was sometimes viewed as, I guess there’s no harm in saying what I think a number of people were feeling a certain amount of arrogance and that blocked dialogue that I think could otherwise have happened. So when you’re talking about recognizing the mandate, I recognized that. It was difficult for me sometimes to have the kind of dialogue I was looking for. The dialogue I would be looking for related to the need for more social workers and qualified social workers because we had I think a significant number of staff who’s level of expertise was quite limited – even in child welfare (Stan Remple, Personal Conversation: August 8, 2011).

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Whether Remple had access to Supynuk’s ‘quick survey’ data is unknown, and his concern was more about expanding the number of social workers employed by the AFSS rather than in taking issue specifically with the quality and readiness for practice of its graduates.

Similarly, whether the missed opportunity for the dialogue he sought contributed to the decision by the AFSS to include community college graduates in social service program in the 1991 legislation and designate the two-year graduates as ‘social workers’ is primarily conjecture.

Nevertheless, as he pointed out, the Department had to do something to acquire staff with some

form of recognition

A New Vision

Ray Thomlison’s maternal grandfather, Ray Hagen, the Deputy Minister of the

Department of Public Welfare introduced him to social work early in life. Thomlison recalled

visiting Charlie Hill’s office with his grandfather and seeing the pictures of adopted children that

covered Hill’s office walls. While his grandfather’s urgings apparently influenced his eventual

career decision, his father initially succeeded in encouraging him to take law. But it only lasted

a matter of a few weeks when law lost whatever appeal it had held. Instead, Thomlison moved

to UBC and social work followed by several years in mental health programs and employment

by Alberta’s DPW, that in turn eventually led to the U of T, PhD program at an age that caused

concern because it implied a ‘lack of experience.’ In spite of it, the time at Toronto led to a

dissertation that offers some insight into his view of social work, the importance of research and

scholarly work as an academic. The dissertation took on the philosophy and form of a classical

behaviourism in its analysis and treatment of the ‘marital dyad.’

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A Behavioural Model for Social Work Intervention with the Marital Dyad

Thomlison outlined his vision for social work education in the opening chapters of his

doctoral dissertation of 1972 in which he suggests his interest is in the conditioning theories of

learning and their relevance to social work for the development of a stronger empirical base of

professional knowledge and professional practice. It was particularly the latter – practice based

on knowledge – that held Thomlison’s interest and formed the basis for his vision of the social

work practitioner. The intent was to increase the predictability of the consequences of professional practice, which he deemed to be the moral responsibility of its practitioners whose

existence society sanctioned. The knowing process was cast and ordered in the six traditional

categories developed by Hearn: experiencing, empirical inquiry, conceptualizing, testing,

concretizing and communicating. In a pragmatic bent, Thomlison suggested the goal of

profession should be to move from what it ‘should do’ to what it ‘can do.’

Although the phrase, evidenced-based practice, (Flanagan, 2013; Claridge & Fabian,

2005), had not yet entered the social work lexicon in the 1970s, the nascent concept, was already

present in Thomlison’s ‘pragmatic bent’ and would find further development in an article he

authored prior to coming to Calgary. Examining the critical commentary by a variety of authors

on social casework, led Thomlison to point out that much of it is geared to some form of

therapeutic intervention, rather than social casework interventions. As a consequence his

proposal was to examine conditioning theories in the context of social work knowledge and

practice.

On its most basic level, it led Thomlison to examine the behavioural approach to social

work. The view of social work, he proposed included recognition of the social environment,

which he apparently defined operationally, as ‘parents, children, teachers, husbands or wives’

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suggesting that the combination of them constituted the ‘client system.’ Similarly, Thomlison acknowledged that the behavioural approach relied less on the causes of psychic conflict than on modifying the environmental conditions that supported the problematic behaviour of the individual. Although the phrase ‘clinical casework’ was introduced early (p. 7), Thomlison avoided using the phrase ‘clinical social work.’ Instead, he employed the ‘clinical’ designation to the place or context, a method of intervention and as an application of behaviour modification.

Thomlison realized that the introduction of the behavioural approach would invariably lead to criticism as mechanistic in character because it ignored “feelings, thoughts, attitudes and purposes” (p. 11). While the reality and complexity of human experiences were not denied, the reports of them were deemed irrelevant to the work of the behaviourally inclined clinical casework practitioner who favoured the overt behaviour over reports of the intra-psychic experiences. Among the advantages for social workers, Thomlison suggested was that of greater consistency and agreement among social workers in assessments for instance. Presumably, the focus on overt or observable behaviour, change was deemed more readily measurable and over time, even more predictable. Even the stock and trade of human empathy as a desirable basis for human relationships and interaction, was regarded of value only so long as it acted to reinforce the sought after change.

Obviously, there is much more to Thomlison’s dissertation, which overall represents a remarkably consistent, precise and detailed exploration of the applicability of the theory of behaviourism to social work practice. It is necessary though, to draw a distinction between behaviour and behaviourism. I suspect that social workers, regardless of where or how they work, all engage in observing behaviour. However, as Thomlison points out in this context, overt behaviour is all there is and it is the reduction of the relevance and complexity in the total

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human context as well as the interaction between a social worker and a client, to overt behaviour that defines it as the theory of behaviourism. In that sense, behaviourism is a Comtean like theory as the explanation for everything.

Even the environment that had been part of social work, before it had a name, is only important to the extent it is or has observable effect. Only the overt human behaviour is the object of study and the basis for measuring change. The proverbial ‘black box’ and Margaret

Archer’s internal conversations are unimportant to behavioural science oriented social workers unless there is a measurable base for determining evidence of behavioural change. While behaviour, what humans are observed to do or not, is important, however, as Thomlison suggests for behaviourism, it is the only thing of any importance.

Something Works: Evidence from Practice Effectiveness Studies

Well before Thomlison came to Calgary, he was engaged in a serious study of the effectiveness of what he called, ‘direct social work practice’ in its multiple forms of psychotherapy, marital therapy, family therapy, and behavioural therapy. Responding to ten questions of importance, he concluded that, “Yes, some things do work! Although the phrase evidence-based practice was being used in other disciplines and professions, most notably in medicine, Thomlison’s article is likely among the first, if not the first to employ the concept without fully using the name that now dominates research across many disciplines and professions.

The article, published in Social Work, in 1984, no doubt represented where Thomlison thought the profession and the Faculty of Social Welfare he had inherited, should direct its research. “If the objective of social work intervention is to produce the greatest change for the

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client, then it appears that workers who develop time limited approaches that are planned and systematically applied to specific problems have an advantage” (p. 55).

I carried [it] forward into the School of Social Work, the belief that we had to educate our students on a model that you needed to go to the research literature to be guided in the selection of your intervention, your assessment data collection and your intervention methods. And so that’s the direction we went with the curriculum. And much of that – I haven’t looked at their curriculum for you know ten or more years – but I would expect it’s still focused in that area. But it was a significant change and I made it very clear that I’m a clinician, a social work clinician and we will be doing work in the area of education in the area of direct practice (Ray Thomlison, Personal Communication: December 13, 2010) .

When asked about the broad view, proposed by Harry Cassidy, a former Dean at the

Toronto School, Thomlison offered the following observation, coloured no doubt by his most recent experience in the US, but applicable as he suspected, to Canada a well.

We are known and often perhaps take the lead in certain areas of practice in social work that others have not abandoned, but not been as competitive. And what do I mean by that? Well I would say that one of the best indicators of our relevance and success in the United States I suspect also in Canada, but I don’t have the same data, is produced year after year by the NIH survey on who is delivering the most psychotherapy in the U.S. And every year that comes forward that – those data come forward every year and it indicates that social work does in excess of seventy percent of the therapy done in the United States. Now I don’t, as I say, I don’t know that we’ve reached the same evidence in Canada, but I’d be surprised if we asked a question and it didn’t come up the same way. Now that to me is extremely significant in terms of our relevance now. Do we get the credit for that? No, we don’t. And do we get the credit for the amount of activity that we break forward in and I think I just want to ……

. . . . this is an interesting process that’s happening in my head as I say this to you Jake….I almost have to say I’m more now an American social worker than I am a Canadian, which is not something that I’m proud of but it is something that has the requirement of my position. Now what do I mean by that? I mean that I have come to realize that American social work is heavily political and less institutional and certainly less intended to issues of poverty and a quality and working with the disadvantaged. Now I will say there is still that core group of dyed in the wool and to be respected and to be encouraged and to be supported, social workers that practice in the area of social justice and they are dedicated souls. But I, you know I guess the pendulum has not to be swung back to a sixties

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era where you know there was a lot of commitment to issues of social welfare, the welfare society, the need for social workers to be advocating on behalf of the disadvantaged. That’s still there, we still educate for it, but the bulk of the students still want clinical practice (Ray Thomlison, Personal Communication: December 13, 2010).

Thomlison’s self-reflection on the personal and professional impact of moving from

Canada to the US dawned on him abruptly, in the middle of the conversation. Articulating the

differences he went on to contextualized them on the basis of political and institutional

differences between the two countries. Perhaps, indirectly and inadvertently, he also raised the

prospect and question of American influences on Canadian social work with the implicit

suggestion that most students want to engage in clinical social work practice, speculating that the

same was likely the case in Canada.

Changing the Name

Soon after he arrived in Calgary Thomlison asked Dick Ramsay to do the background

research for a name change in 1983. However, changing the name waited until 1989, as there

were other and more pressing priorities. Thomlison was well aware of the challenges he faced

internally, organizationally and externally. His first priority was in re-directing the Faculty to

comply with the University’s priorities, the expectations for academic scholarship in the form of

research and publications. Even though he learned soon enough about Tyler’s several efforts to

change the name, and understood its symbolic value, he waited to act.

In my mind, that would be just you known, maybe almost as, as soon as Ray came, he might have said to the administration you known, one of the things that I’m really concerned about is that I want this to be a faculty of social work, not a social welfare (Jack MacDonald, Personal Communication: August 31, 2010).

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Rather ironically, even though the personal relationships of the two Deans deteriorated rapidly after Thomlison’s arrival, each cast their desire to change of name in the same rationale.

Tyler acknowledged, as noted his rationale in a June 24, 1971, letter to Dr. W.F.M. Stewart,

Academic Secretary for the University, “it is so clear that the word ‘welfare’ has a negative connotation within the citizenry and has lost its historical meaning, i.e., to help citizens fare well” (UARC 87.9/14.10 Social Welfare). Thomlison offered much the same comment,

recalling the issue as it was presented at the General Faculty Council in 1989.

It went through General Faculties Council as I recall, I presented it there anticipating a lot of questions. I recall people would just ask the question, why do you want to do this? My answer was a stock answer and I’ve already given it to you, that it reflects a commitment to the profession of social work versus the institution of social welfare. My main motive in it from my recollection is that welfare had such a bad taint to it that it was not good for the public relations of the teaching program (Ray Thomlison, Personal Communication: December 13, 2010).

When the name change came, it was entirely a symbolic act; a final and perhaps a

concluding act in the search for a new identity for the Faculty. An association with the methods

of the profession rather than the well-being of the people served. Nevertheless, the near

unanimous decision of the Faculty Council to change the name signaled that real change had

taken hold as the President’s Task Group to Evaluate the Faculty of Social Welfare had sought in

1977.

Like Dean Smith at the U of A in the early 1960’s, Thomlison understood his personal

success as achieving the goals laid out in the mandate set out for him by President Wagner in

their walk around the campus. Simply restated, he and the Faculty would be judged on

demonstrating leadership in scholarship, recognized not only within the University itself, but

also by the community at large, the provincial government, and with their colleagues and

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counterparts outside of Calgary. Confirmation of their success came from Peter Krueger, who

Thomlison admired and respected both as the Vice-President (Academic) and as his mentor.

Krueger’s measure of success meant,

Getting it to a point where it could lift its head with the other faculties. Let’s say we’ve got a research program within the faculty, we’re progressively moving into post graduate work, we’re like every other faculty. We’re publishing, and in reviewed journals. Some of that was always taking place but to jack it up to a higher level so that there was a no way to downgrade the practical aspects (Peter Krueger, Personal Communication: February 25, 2011).

The year 1989, also represented a significant high point in the history of the Faculty of

Social Work. Not only had Thomlison achieved the success as Cochrane Task Group Evaluation

Report had defined it in 1977, but it also came from the Vice President (Academic), Peter

Krueger who judged Thomlison’s personal efforts similarly.

When the opportunity came, Krueger answered a question, not clearly asked. Towards

the end of the interview, the discussion moved briefly to the Faculty’s increasing focus on

addressing personal social issues contrasted with the intent with the 1966 Preventive Social

Services Act, i.e., to prevent their occurrence.

Well I think a successful, or what I would call a GOOD Faculty of Social Work would have the balance. I mean there’s no other group in the province that’s going to be forward looking and thinking about how we could do this better. What’s the theory behind this? Why is this failing? Why has this failed for years? How could we change this? (Peter Krueger, Personal Communication: February 25, 2011).

Krueger’s questions can be good questions, however, the answer, in my judgment ought

to be cast in in the language of enabling social welfare, faring well, flourishing, or living life to

its fullest.

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CHAPTER 5: ANALYSIS AND CONCLUSION

In the opening Chapter, I suggested this dissertation would look back through the lens of a conflict that emerged during the development of social work education in Alberta, and captured by a dispute about the name of the School. The difference of a single phrase – ‘social welfare’ versus ‘social work’ – led through selected events in the history of social work where similar differences existed and disputes took place about important and, in my judgment, largely unresolved matters. The themes of the issue are deeply embedded in the philosophical history of

Western Tradition in which the development of social work education and social work practice

represents a focal point for addressing the consequences of what Peter Jonker insightfully

described as ‘the painful disorientation generated at the intersections where cultural values

clash.’ In this instance, the clash is manifest in multiple ways – here in the vision of the

profession as Tyler attempted to establish it and subsequently, as Thomlison sought to

implement it nearly two decades later.

Overview

I suspect former Vice President, (Academic), Peter Krueger enjoyed the double-entendre

by turning my question about the name change into a rhetorical response, “You mean welfare as

opposed to work?” (Peter Krueger, Personal Communication: February 25, 2011). Our

discussion about the change of name from School of Social Welfare to the Faculty of Social

Work in the late 1980s occurred during his tenure as Vice President (Academic). While both

Tyler and Thomlison favored a different name, their respective preference for the name

symbolized a representation of the identity and vision for social work education. Krueger’s

clever play on words reflected the change of a single word in the name of a Faculty and

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simultaneously pointed to the change that had taking place in the direction of Alberta’s public policy.

For Tyler ‘social welfare’ meant faring well, or in terms of more current usage, it referred to the ideas of flourishing, well-being, or a life lived well. Although it remained the

Faculty of Social Welfare throughout his term and beyond, the several failed attempts to change it deliberately avoided the phrase ‘social work’ or any phrase suggesting a focus on casework or an identification with the name of the profession. Instead, his several attempts sought an

association with the role of government even to the extent that his final attempt proposed the

same name as a government department – the School of Social Development and the Department

of Social Development.

As reported earlier, historically the phrase ‘social welfare’ was associated with the role of

government, particularly with respect to its duty to its citizens. However, in the context of the

post-WW II welfare state, the phrase assumed an association with programs developed by

governments to address the social issues of the day. As a result, Tyler and Thomlison both

realized that over time in the public mind the name ‘social welfare’ developed a pejorative

association referring to a view that public policy and programs resulted in an undeserved

reliance on government for an income, programs and services.

On the other hand, Thomlison’s preference for the name, ‘Faculty of Social Work’

reflected the desire to associate the Faculty directly with social work and its professionalization

dominated by a highly individualistic social casework method, or in more contemporary terms,

clinical social work. Historically, ‘social work’ was used to designate women of wealth and

leisure, a ‘noblesse oblige,’ engaged in work described as helping those of a lower social

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ranking, often as an expression of the Christian idea of charity and ostensibly with salvific benefits.

I began by asking why the name issue was so important to Tyler, and even though the name, School of Social Welfare was not the first choice, why did Tyler reject the name School of Social Work. Was his vision for the School so significant that it required the School to be disassociated from the profession? At the same time, as the organization representing the profession how could the AASW and the social agencies that employed its members keep Tyler from changing the name? As the institution that held the School, what role did the University play? What was it about Tyler’s vision and his view of social work that he consistently refused to adopt the name expected by those who were instrumental in establishing Alberta’s graduate level social work education program?

The School clearly outlined its vision for social work education in its 1970 Report to the

CSWE as it sought accreditation for the MSW program. At the same time, even though AASW had an opportunity to raise its objections to the name, I found no evidence that it did so in that context. As a result, the CSWE gave the School its stamp of approval and commended it for the innovative program with the development of micro and macro practice. At the same time, the

School was clearly intent on focusing its vision and agenda on social reform, social action and advocacy. Even as it acknowledged the necessity of working with individuals, it proposed to do so in the context of public policy issues as they were indivisible.

Tyler’s vision and agenda reflected similar views to those expressed at recent national and several major international conferences. However, even while the CSWE believed the

School had contributions to make to the progress of social work practice, AASW was already opposed to the name and the several changes Tyler proposed. Don Milne, the AASW President,

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made it clear in a letter to Tyler, dated April 13, 1971, that if there was to be a name change, the change should reflect the name of the profession – the School of Social Work (UARC

87.9/14.10 – Social Welfare).

At the same time, critical voices were being heard; graduates weren’t ready to practice.

As the criticism grew and became more forceful, the U of C, ASS&CH, AR&M, the Student

Union, AASW and the CCSWA each engaged in protracted direct and indirect critique of the

School’s program and its graduates. In due course, it led the President of the U of C to conduct an evaluation that over time led to a new Dean and direction, with the emphasis on scholarly work, research, publications and a name change.

Looking back further through the immediate conflict, it is apparent that this fissure

already existed in social work in the late 19th century from where it was an inheritance of the

Enlightenment. A similar fissure also existed in the policy framework Alberta inherited directly

from the Poor Laws. The conflict of ideology and its ramifications were also clearly stated and

captured in the Beatrice Webb aphorism, referring to the efforts of Octavia Hill and her

supporters as ‘my friends the enemy.’

In a similar vein, the Amsterdam School changed its name because mothers feared their

daughters were being sent into the arms of the socialists. The women from around the world

who travelled across the prairies by train politely observed Canadian churches were doing what

local governments in Europe did. In Toronto, the idealist Urwick objected strenuously to the

behaviourism of American social sciences. In Germany, Alice Salomon, confronted by the

feminist and socialist Lily Braun, realized she faced a decision that Harry Cassidy would

summarize for the members of CASW years later in the midst of the Depression as the broad

view versus the narrow view. In Alberta, Lois Alger, a student during the Cassidy years in

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Toronto believed in the common good and was dissatisfied with her CASW Southern Branch colleagues who demonstrated little or no interest in addressing the Cassidy’s crime of poverty

Ideology

Sheri Berman (2011) suggests that after a long period of neglect, the prominence of ideas

has once again begun to occupy the work of social scientists. Without naming him, she suggests

that the end of the Cold War and the end of history, i.e., Fukuyama’s, End of History and the

Last Man, was a cause of the neglect. Its central premise claimed a near universal consensus and

legitimacy that the Western, liberal democracies represented the end of ideological

developments. In contrast, Berman proposes that a renewed interest in the role of ideas and

ideology has begun in political science because they’re viewed as the cause of recent major

political upheavals that continue to take place around the globe.

Berman suggests ideologies, as a subset of ‘worldviews’ are the “coherent interpretation

of the world and guidelines for dealing with it. Ideologies link people who would otherwise not

be linked and creates political communities that simply would not have existed” (Berman 2010,

p.106). Using ideology, as a subset of ‘worldview’ is particularly important because the first use

of the term ‘weltanschauung’ as its German origin, is by the philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte

during the interregnum between Kant and Hegel (Henrich, 2003). It brings with it the much

deeper meaning than its outwardly positivistic English translation – world view. In Hegel, for

instance, it takes on a correlation between mind and world image and is used by Marx to point

out that the correlation limits ideologies from seeing beyond themselves, i.e., the mental image

imposes its limits (p. 20 - 21). Its influence and even its relevance have been debated (Nielsen,

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1993), nevertheless as Berman suggests, its survival offers understanding especially in times of fundamental differences and upheaval.

That kind of difference, particularly during periods of profound upheaval such as that of the 19th and early 20th century, is also the point at which social work emerged. Describing the

differences in motivation that emerge from different worldviews for engaging in social work, the

Dutch social work historian Maarten van der Linde (2011) suggests these differences, motifs, energize social work to confront the points of disorientation and upheaval.

Helping is as old as the world and wherever people live, they create the means for mutual aid, especially within the circle of their own family and neighbors. In the nineteen eighties the concept of 'caring society' was introduced by Elco Brinkman, then Minister of Welfare, Health and Culture, and these types of help are again gaining increasing attention. It is not government that cares for people, but people must provide for each other. The Social Support Act introduced January 1, 2007 has this thought in mind. Citizens must care for herself and provide for his family; governments step-in only when needed. This is the Social Support Act, the youngest participant in a century-long parade of social professions and social practices (Van der Linde, 2011, p. 11, my translation).

Van der Linde’s comment recognizes both the current form of structural pluralism in the

Netherlands and the unifying, perhaps implicitly the disruptive influence of neoliberalism in the

legislation of 2007. However, his larger purpose is a desire to broaden the reader’s awareness of

a fuller scope of social work’s historical, cultural, religious and ideological origins. By focusing

on a more systematic understanding of social work’s diverse history, he demonstrates that the

multiple origins of social work are primarily located in various worldviews and ideological

frameworks. While van der Linde’s reference to the 2007 Social Support Act is of recent origin,

it apparently signaled a finality of the welfare state in a country with a history of it. Although

notably not in a legislated form, the Alberta government’s 2013 Social Policy Framework

reflects a similar and singular ideological framework, however, in this instance not substantially

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different from the ideological inheritance of more than a century earlier.

Following a review of the development of social democracy from the 19th century on,

Berman suggests “the need to analyze carefully the role played by both structure and agency,

and the need for different types of historical analysis and process tracing in order to

understand the two stage process by which ideologies rise and fall” (Berman, 2010, p. 105).

As a subset of worldviews or Weltanschauungs, ideologies rise and fall based first on what

Berman characterizes as periods of questioning and the opening of political space that the

ideas of competitors and new ideologies then begin to occupy. The second stage, she

suggests begins with the development of political actors creating new ideas and approaches,

competing for what she calls “mind-share and political power” (p. 108).

Although the name promulgated by the Dean Hyne of Graduate Studies, was rejected out

of hand, Tyler recognized the compromise, School of Social Welfare, was understood to

represent a focus on prevention with the aim of furthering the human social welfare. The focus

on prevention was not unique to the School of Social Welfare. At the same as Tyler and Hyne were struggling with the name, the Alberta Social Credit had barely introduced the Preventive

Social Services Act in an effort to redirect provincial and municipal social programs based on local community citizen participation, social planning, community development and local decision-making. As such, Tyler’s vision was compatible with and grounded in the current lived experience of local Alberta communities. In so far as it applied to social work education it was

to be achieved through the strategies of social reform, social action, community development

and political action associated with the reform tradition of both social work and adult education.

Moreover, his views reflected the idealism inherent in the Post WW II development of

the welfare state. Tyler’s choice of name and the subsequent efforts at changing it occurred in a

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context derived from the efforts of social work to change itself under the influence of the welfare state and through the course of several conferences in the mid-1960s. In that respect, Tyler’s efforts to change the identity and vision of social work were in-line and reflected the optimism and tenets of the welfare state ideology as it developed in Canada and particularly in Alberta during the 1960s.

As a result, I suggest that the issue and conflict with the name for Alberta’s graduate social work was caught in the turbulence of the ideologies of the welfare state and a conservative liberalism that still dominated Alberta. Tyler’s comment that ‘welfare’ had lost its historic meaning of faring well was significant in that he recognized an end to the broad view of social work as Cassidy outlined it in 1943. Similarly, Thomlinson assessment of the name’s significance was much the same, and for similar reasons. It’s not surprising then that the influence of the English Poor Laws in Alberta’s public policy history and its classification of

‘undeserving’ were readily incorporated in the public discourse during the transition. However, it’s noteworthy that by the early 1980’s neoliberalism had begun to transform the public policy landscape in Alberta. Popularly associated with the ascendency of Thatcher in the UK and

Reaganism in the US, it was Friedrich von Hayek (The Road to Serfdom, 1944), and Milton

Friedman (Capitalism and Freedom, 1962), who developed and published their ideas much earlier (Bockman, J., 2011, p. 2), lending a time frame for its ascendency to Berman’s discussion of the two-stage process.

As a Weberian ideal type, Tyler may be regarded as a transitional figure near the end of the ideology of the welfare state as it was constructed in Alberta during the final years of the

Manning era. Thomlison on the other hand, may be regarded as an ideal type representing the emerging neoliberal state that reached its pinnacle in Alberta some years later during the Klein

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era. Moreover, drawn to the University of Calgary to direct and integrate the Faculty of Social

Welfare into the University through a record of academic credibility, research and publications,

Thomlison recognized the name issue early, but waited to act until 1989, when the change was adopted with near unanimous support including that of AASW.

Both Tyler and Thomlison’s ideological views reflected the influences of their respective

MSW and PhD programs. Their views of social work’s vision, identity and purpose reflected a perspective of the profession they brought to social work education at the University of Calgary.

Tyler’s views were shaped by the post-WWII ideological views of the state and the importance of lived experience as the basis for social reform through such means as community development, social planning, social and political action. On the other hand, Thomlison scholarly work represented the early emergence of a brand of behaviourism and positivism that led with his contribution to the development of evidence-based practice in the early 1980s and is now regarded as part of the foundation for social casework in its contemporary expression as clinical social work. As such, it was incompatible with Tyler’s aversion to individual casework and the focus on community development, social planning and social and political action that stemmed from the Deweyian inspired lived-experience

Isomorphism

Paul J. DiMaggio and Walter W. Powell begin their highly regarded discussion of institutional isomorphism by quoting Max Weber’s, Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of

Capitalism. In doing so, they extended Weber’s warning to their readers that “the rational spirit ushered in by asceticism had achieved a momentum of its own and that, under the spirit of capitalism, the rationalist order had become an iron cage” (1997, p. 63). Humanity’s only

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escape, Weber suggested is a “prophetic revival” but only after “the last ton of fossilized fuel is burnt.” Weber was convinced that the power of a bureaucracy and the spirit of rationalism within it was an “efficient and powerful means of controlling men and women that, once established, the momentum of bureaucracy was irreversible” (p.63).

Although DiMaggio & Powell disagree with Weber, they merely have a different explanation for the rise and powers bureaucracies exercise in the interest of domination.

Concerning institutional isomorphism, they suggest the origin of bureaucratization lies in the structuration of organizational fields, a process primarily affected and directed by the state and professions that, they argue, have become the rationalizers of human affairs in the later part of the 20th century. By organizational field, they intend to refer to the aggregate of “a recognized

area of institutional life: key suppliers, resource consumers, regulatory agencies, and other

organizations that produce similar services or products” (p. 64-65); the intent is to include all

relevant actors in the same general area producing or providing similar services.

By any measure, universities, government departments, professions and the social

agencies, are considered to be institutions, with a specific university, government department,

profession or social agency an organizational instantiation of that institution; acting together in a

particular area, they constitute an organizational field, the unit of analysis employed by

DiMaggio & Powell.

Using the organizational field as a predictor of change has led to the development of two

types of predictors of isomorphic change: organizational-level and field-level predictors of

change. The distinction lies in (a) looking more like others in the same field and (b) a decrease

in the differences in variation and diversity of organizational forms. Discussed in Chapter 2, the

organizational-level predictors include six hypotheses while the field-level predictors list seven

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hypothesis of isomorphic change. In spite of CSWE’s suggestion, that Tyler’s vision of social work was capable of contributing to the development of social work, the vision of social work education he promoted ran counter to the field in the effort to distance the new program from the established method of social casework. Tyler’s efforts to develop his vision rather than conform, while not necessarily doomed from the start, created a remarkably difficult challenge for a new

Director, a new faculty, a new program in a new University. Externally his efforts were faced with the decline of dominant ideology that led to the social welfare state and instead was faced with the challenges of a largely conservative province, a profession in the early stages of its own development and soon from the earliest developments in neoliberalism. In the face of such resistance, institutional success was unlikely.

As Cameron Flincher suggested, the development of institutions, takes place over time, through several phases and generally in response to particular issues. It begins through informal interactions involving some shared issue or interest and in time a more formal process begins to direct the activities of its participants, leading in due course to further formalization including processes for leadership, development, selection, role differentiation and clarification, staffing, organizational maintenance and continuity, etc., eventually lead to the establishment of the institution. As earlier outlined, in its most basic form, professionalization following a legislature’s decision follows much the same process from relative informality to gradually increasing its hold on professional practice.

I’ve attempted to demonstrate through the series of historical events in Chapter 4, social work and social work education as it developed primarily in Europe, followed the pattern described by Flincher. Even in Alberta, the development of social work and social work education followed a broadly similar pattern of moving from casual interaction with colleagues

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to a full instantiation of the institution. It began with the actions of groups and individuals who organized themselves around a particular interest, need or purpose, largely as an act of personal charity and acts of obligations frequently derived from the beliefs held by faith communities and expected by the established rules for public order.

The first persons recognized as social workers and in some cases specifically educated as such, were primarily employed in legislated positions responsible for the implementation of public policy. Even Dorothy King, employed as the Director of Edmonton’s Board of Public

Welfare, functioned in the context of provincial policy as imposed through the Alberta Act.

Likewise, Alberta’s sterilization legislation constituted the basis for hiring social workers to implement government policy. Even the C.B. Hill’s resistance to hiring social workers for child welfare, can be understood in part as the product of Alberta’s inheritance of the Poor Law structure given the initial responsibility of local authorities for delivery of child welfare services.

Only the failure or inability to do so did the province step-in by means of the RCMP. As in case

of Calgary, the delivery of the child welfare program was regarded as the local community’s

obligation as an act of charity, something it did until 1920.

The development of the social work profession and social work education in Alberta

followed a similar path in that the initial gatherings and meetings, to the extent there are records

and memories, were informal and loosely organized and scheduled with information sharing,

discussions of current issues and socializing as the rationale. Relationships formed through

employment, periodic conferences, journals and the continuation of relationships established in

schools of social work. Establishment of the two CASW Branches represented a significant step

in formalizing the profession in Alberta. Incorporation as a registered society in 1961 was

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followed by an Act of the Legislative Assembly in 1971 in which membership in AASW remained voluntary until the late 1990s.

Likewise, the early development of social work education began largely informally primarily related to the performance of tasks specifically associated with the Department of

Public Health and sterilization. In spite of recommendations to establish formal programs of education for child welfare employees, official government policy for DPW resisted adopting the recommendations, favouring the personal characteristics and commitment by prospective employees. The dual policy can be explained by the relatively high standards and preferential status for the medical and health professions versus the relatively lower status and a preference for personal characteristics associated with charity.

Although beyond the intended scope of this Study, the development of several private, charitable social agencies in Alberta followed a similar pattern. Beginning as an initiative of individuals often motivated by the charity of their faith, Calgary Family Services and Edmonton

Catholic Social Services developed in due course into substantial organizations employing social workers and advocating for social work education. As such, they and others like them represent a distinct sector, Wilensky and Lebeaux identified as part of the institutional model of social welfare programs, and included in the DiMaggio & Powell definition of the organizational field for social work education.

In order to complete the field, DiMaggio & Powell suggest four conditions must be met, namely, increased interaction among the organizations, the presence of interorganizational structures of domination and coalition, an increase in the information load, and a mutual awareness of the organizations among the participants. They suggest that meeting these conditions leads to a structuration process based on either competition, the state or by the

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professions. In this particular instance, it was an emerging Alberta profession of social work that bound a university, several government departments, a professional association with a quasi-

regulatory function and variety of charitable voluntary organizations. More by virtue of funding,

employment and profession rather than an explicit pattern of dominance, these organizations are

tied together primarily by a shared interest in the education of social workers, which in this

instance became the issue creating a divide between the Faculty of Social Welfare and the

others in the organizational field. Of the three DiMaggio & Powell mechanism for institutional

isomorphic change: coercive, mimetic and normative, the efforts of ASS&CH, AE&M and the

University were largely coercive while the opposition of the profession was normative.

Although I concluded that the ideological differences between Tyler and Thomlison

were, in effect, the causal mechanisms precipitating the 1989 change in name, the process for the

change lies in what has been described in Chapter 2, as isomorphism – a tendency towards

homogenization of organization in the same field. In that regard, the change of name from the

Faculty of Social Welfare to Faculty of Social Work with both normative, i.e., in its adoption of

the and symbolic components, as it increasingly resembled other social work education

programs in its institutional field

The coercive mechanism is most readily apparent in the Faculty’s relationship with the

interplay between the two government departments and the discounted belief that its graduates

were not prepared for practice. Likewise, AASW’s consistent opposition to any name change

other than Social Work and the implicit support for the profession’s position by the University

reflects a consistent use of normative pressure to oppose Tyler’s proposals. Although Thomlison

waited to 1989, to change the name, the other changes he introduced began soon after he arrived

set the stage. Having fully grasped the comment by the President of the University in their walk

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around the campus, Thomlison knew the legitimacy the Faculty sought, required a significant increase in its scholarly production in the form of research and publication. In due course, in the view of the university constituency, the change was viewed as real; substantive changes took place. As an organization dependent on public funds, the change created by the Faculty was a keystone to its survival and viability. Although initially under a threat of closure, by the time

Thomlison sought to change the name, the DiMaggio & Powell isomorphism process was complete. On becoming the Faculty of Social Work, Thomlison selected the same name as the majority of programs in North America as part of the professionalization process

In spite of the change, several of the issues that plagued the Faculty almost from its beginning remained unresolved: the relationship with the Alberta College programs, the issues identified by a former Deputy Minister and the struggles with respect to the provincial mandate.

Moreover, except for some individuals, Thomlison had no particular relationship with the professional association aside from what was minimally required by the Universities Act and periodic meetings of Universities Coordinating Council, Professional Examinations Board in

Social Work. The relationship with AFSS, the successor Department to ASS&CH was mixed.

As Thomlison spoke about his relationship with government, he suggested a preference for

‘working from the inside’ but at the same time, Thomlison’s relationship with a Deputy Minister apparently precluded a meaningful discussion about the needs of the Department.

In summary, the name changes sought by Tyler and Thomlison followed the patterns expected by the theoretical work of DiMaggio & Powell. In addition to the institutional forms and structures in the field of social work education, the homogenization of the field prevailed through a variety of pressures, coercive acts and defined normative expectations. Even the encouragement of the accreditation body for the program Tyler and his colleagues designed, was

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of no particular effect. As new institutionalists have noted, the interplay between structure and agency was at the foundation of the challenge Tyler acknowledged in his comments to AASW members in 1997.

Philosophical anthropology and agency

As noted earlier, DiMaggio & Powell make the point at the beginning of their paper with a quote from Max Weber, suggesting that in a capitalist society the iron cage is so encompassing, dominant and powerful that only a ‘prophetic revival’ has the ability to loosen the bonds of its prison. The point, Weber makes with his rhetorical flourish is that of human agency. However, the concept and discussion are missed except in so far as it apparently applies to the elite of capitalism and their enterprises. As such, Weber appears to reinforce and accept

the dominance of the elites, as if it is inevitable in a capitalist system. Moreover, implicitly in this view is that agency is at least as much a function of position, role and class as the capacity of the human person.

In contrast, although critical realist C. Smith substantially agrees with DiMaggio &

Powell about the power and influence of social structures in the life of humans, his view of the human person and agency is not limited to the actions of the elite. It begins with the reminder of his view of a human person.

A person is a conscious, reflexive, embodied self-transcending centre of subjective experience, durable identity, moral commitment, and social communication who – as the efficient cause of his or her own responsible actions and interactions – exercises complex capacities for agency and intersubjectivity in order to sustain his or her own incommunicable self in loving relationships with other personal selves and with the non-personal world (Smith 2010, p. 340).

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At the same time, he suggests that persons in the course of their daily lives create social structures, institutions among them. At the same time, Smith offers that “the nature of human personhood naturally generates people’s resistance to the constraints of social structure” (p.

342). Thus, the same human efforts that create social structures to “define, pattern, organize,

regulate, motivate, express and control human life” (p. 343), also result in resistance to those

activities. While the name Tyler choose was symbolic of a very different vision for social work,

the interplay between the School, the University, the several government departments , the

profession and social agencies demonstrated Tyler’s efforts to influence change as well as the

resistance to both the name and the vision.

In his speech to AASW in 1997, Tyler spoke and reaffirmed his belief about the importance of agency based on the Deweyian importance of experience and formulated as, ‘I think, I feel and I believe’ as a critical factor in the recruitment and education of social workers.

Tyler’s several efforts to change the name early in the School’s history failed in part because of opposition by the profession as represented by AASW. Although relatively new and early in its efforts to professionalize, AASW was part of the CASW as the national institution for social work and its opposition brought the legitimacy of the national institution to its representations at the U of C.

Likewise, the persistent narrative ‘not ready for practice’ advanced by social agencies and in particular ASS&CH combined with the funding role of AE&M, consistently challenged

Tyler’s vision, even to the point of doubting him personally. Moreover, even when those

Departments discovered through their own research that the allegations of their narrative, that the School’s graduates were not being hired were unfounded, the information was withheld and the narrative was allowed to continue. As Smith points out in his discussion of the power and

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influence of social structures, the exercise of the causal powers of capacities are not directly observable themselves, however, the actions that result are and they reflect the formation of intent and thought based on a belief and the expectations. In this instance, an institution of government through its actors exercised its power to compel and coerce.

In much the same way, Thomlison understood the importance of the mandate he received in his walk across the Campus with the President. Consequently, he recognized what was necessary to achieve the objectives set out for him. His vision for social work education was clearly oriented to that of a professional faculty in a university environment, with scholarship, research and publications as the primary objective to raise the Faculty’s standing in the

University of Calgary as well as among his peers in social work education. While Thomlison was able to achieve the approval for his effort and work within the University, most notably from Vice President (Academic) Peter Krueger, like Tyler issues related to provincial funding and external relationships continued to challenge the Faculty.

The decision to change the name in 1989 was largely symbolic of the change he had already brought and implemented. By this time, not only the faculty members but also the social work and social services community new that Thomlison had brought a new vision, and in some ways, the old vision of social work as casework to the Faculty of Social Welfare. Thomlison made it clear both in his scholarly work and in the direction he established, that clinical social work held the future to the social work profession. Albeit after more than a decade in the US,

Thomlison caught himself, realizing that he had become more of an American social worker and less of a Canadian. By pointing out that the change was a necessity of the job, he acknowledged social work education and practice in its individualistic clinical form in the US, has become the institutionalized response to human issues. In the face of appearing as an exercise of agency,

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one might still wonder whether the influence of the professionalization process of social work in the US and Canada has provided Weber’s iron cage with a new occupant.

Conclusions

I drew an end to Chapter 1, at a point where it had already become clear that the development of social work practice changed significantly over the history of it since the early

1960s when a small group of social workers in Alberta decided to pursue an Alberta graduate social work program. Although, the welfare state had begun to unfold in eastern Canada, this was Social Credit Alberta and only a few signs gave reason to hope that change would come.

The School of Social Welfare with broad community support was one of the signs of hope.

‘School of Social Welfare’ was not the first choice, nevertheless, with his broad view

Tyler was able to defend it against the wishes of AASW. In a similar vein, I believe, he would have preferred to use the phrase ‘social practitioners’ to describe the expected graduates and occasionally did to differentiate them and himself and his views from the dominant and individualistic American style social casework tradition. At the same time, Thomlison preferred identifying with the profession, Thomlison preferring ‘Social Work’ to distinguish the

Faculty from other professional programs. The difference represented an ideological choice with consequences for the vision, identity and focus of social work education.

Implications for Social Work Education

In this final section, I offer some thoughts about the implications of this study for social work education. The remarks follow from comments in Chapter 1, particularly those under the heading of ‘Personal Declaration.’ Like those comments, these follow as a reflection on this

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project and begin with a strong belief in the value of a liberal arts education and a much longer

experience that began on June 20, 1966. As such, what follows is in the form of the lived

experience of a social practitioner fortunate enough to have had multiple and unique

opportunities to explore beyond the traditional boundaries of social work practice and believing

that its scope can and should be much broader.

I take the purpose of the social work profession to be that of enabling human life, i.e.,

people(s) life, to flourish, individually and collectively as communities in the broadest sense. In

that respect, it is not unlike the early intent of the phrase ‘social welfare’ in that the scope of

social work’s contribution to flourishing is limited only by the ‘social’ or, stated differently,

‘social relationships.’ In the past governments sought to create the conditions for the social

welfare of its citizenry, but with the growing influence of neoliberalism, governments

increasingly focus their attention on economic development with the expectation that life will get better for everyone. However, as Thomas Piketty (2014) inadvertently points out, the welfare state is alive and well; it’s the distribution that’s the problem.

In my view then, the absence or loss of the phrase ‘social welfare’ is a loss for the profession. Its absence has created an undesirable distance between governing and citizens.

However, the meaning of words change and in its Latin version ‘flourishing’ is an old word in the Western Tradition, and while it fortunately comes without the burden of isolating those who live at the junction of competing worldviews, visions and values, it comes without an acknowledgement of the importance of ‘relationship.’

In a similar vein, I attempt to discard the phrase ‘social policy’ even though it has an honourable history, but with the dominance of neoliberalism and a very narrowly constructed view of economic theory, I prefer the phrase ‘public policy,’ as governments increasingly use

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‘social policy’ to identify those who its policies and practices exclude. In this context, the 2013,

Alberta Social Policy Framework employs the term ‘vulnerable’ or ‘most vulnerable’ as a personal and individual condition that separates and distinguishes those persons from mainstream Albertans and Canadians for whom ‘social policy’ is an answer. Moreover, it is all too frequent that traditional public policy limits, restrains or withholds flourishing from some.

For instance, minimum wage levels are determined by their impact on business and, unlike

Adam Smith not on the rules of decency as a measure to prevent shame, disgust and isolation.

Several touch points were generated by this project for social work education. However

I restrict my comments to five: (1) the implication of the Health Professions Act, (2) Alberta’s sterilization legislation of the late 1920s, (3) the limits of social policy, (4) the renaming of

Pennsylvania’s School of Social Work, and (5) the focus on the individual as the location of the problem best exemplified, but certainly not limited to the specialist designation clinical social worker.

First, since 2003, the Alberta’s Health Professions Act effectively established a legislated mandate for social work education by its adoption of a scope of practice for the profession

(Schedule 27, Section 3) and in its definition of a health service (Section 1, p). The HPA defines what social workers do as regulated members of the ACSW through the scope of practice.

While the language of the Act’s definition is somewhat archaic by current standards, it nevertheless legitimized social work education in a number of areas where course work, research and publications could be expanded, especially by taking into account the context of the HPA’s inclusion of social work in its definition as a ‘health service.’

In a letter dated September 23, 1996, to AFSS Minister Stockwell Day about including social work in the Health Professions Act, I proffered the Calgary Regional Health Authority’s

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1996 definition of health from its Primary Health Care Report: A Work in Progress as the rationale for including social work in the Health Professions Act (In author’s possession). The

letter formed the basis for the Minister’s support for AASW’s request. By contextualizing what

social workers do as a health service (Section 1. 1. p), the HPA establishes a broad view of

social work practice in so far as it relies on and is grounded in the determinants of health.

Second, reading files in the Provincial Archives of Alberta in the course of the research

for this project, I encountered a significant number of documents from the Manning era that

reported on the number of sterilizations conducted over an extended period of years. Likewise,

as referenced earlier, the Annual Reports of the Department of Public Health offer an even

broader overview of the provincial sterilization program including, as I’ve noted, the discovery

that the first social workers employed by the Alberta Government, were employees of the

bureaucratic structure designed to implement the purpose of the legislation.

Similarly, recalling the Klein government’s efforts to use the ‘notwithstanding’ provision

of the Charter, to prevent legal redress for the victims of the legislation, begged a response from

social work. Likewise, I am struck too by the silence of social work in the face of the numbers of

children who died anonymously while in care of the Minister of Human Services. The question

these and similar issues raise, is what can, and what does social work education do to prepare

social workers to resist doing such things. It is essentially a moral question. Does social work

have a moral foundation? Are there things a social worker ought not to do? How and by who are

they determined? How does one resist? Moreover, it clearly established that social workers

were to be employed as agents of an ideology sanctioned by government.

Third, although I was directly involved in policy development at the municipal

government level for many years, in the course of this project the realization of the effect of the

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phrase ‘social policy’ as distinct from the effect of other kinds of policy became problematic.

As a profession, social work can legitimately take pride influencing and promoting a variety of

social policy initiatives. However, I’m increasingly inclined to believe that just as the phrase

‘social welfare’ changed and adopted a different meaning, so the meaning of ‘social policy’ has

changed in that it now divides citizens.

In contrast, somewhat like the phrase ‘the personal is political,’ all policy is public

policy. Especially, in the context a political and economic ideology that supports the broadening

of a private market-based consumerism through public policy including agencies and

organizations funded directly or indirectly by governments to act on its behalf. While

governments not infrequently use such agencies and organizations to avoid direct involvement

and accountability, they serve a public function but frequently, apart from the necessary

budgetary authorization, they function without a specific legislated mandate and can thus be

easily controlled through annual budgetary measures.

The point is that social work education should be concerned with the full range of public

policy by all levels of government as it affects the public and the common good. To illustrate

the point, with an example of its misuse is the designation of citizens without a home as

‘homeless,’ and identifying it as ‘the problem of homelessness’ rather than an example of

classical capitalist market failure, a theory with its roots in Adam Smith’s, The Wealth of

Nations. Identifying homelessness as a problem of the individual rather than one of market

failure has the effect of excluding them from the public sphere often with the assistance of

publicly funded charities who typically adopt a focus on service rather than prevention. Even

the vaunted ‘housing first’ principle is a recycled solution to poverty and homelessness first

adopted by Octavia Hill in 19th century London.

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Fourth, the decision by the University of Pennsylvania, School of Social Work, to rename itself as the School of Social Policy and Practice, is apparently intended to establish a link between social policy and the practice of social work. Whether this name best establishes the link is likely a subject for a different occasion. However, in making the change the School recognizes that a name change can have a positive benefit, just as a range of business organizations, professions and university faculties have also recognized. For example, former

Faculties of Physical Education in Canada recognized the problems they faced with the declining demand for physical education teachers several decades ago. As a result, many of these former schools, including the U of C program, examined and reformulated their interests and concluded that their prime focus was on ‘kinetics,’ i.e., ‘motion’ or ‘movement.’ As a result, the name change to Kinesiology took place followed by growth in enrollment, the creation of new professions and an expanded scope of practice, teaching, scholarly research and publications.

Social work education and practice would do well to examine its own future.

Fifth, the focus on the individual, combined with development of evidenced-based practice is reminder of Cassidy’s warning that already in the 1930s social workers were becoming society’s stretcher-bearers. Now particularly with the continuing influence of positivism and behaviourism as manifest in the development of evidence-based practice, the extension of this focus seems likely to lead inevitably to the manualization of practice. In the case of public service and especially statutory based programs such as child welfare or probation, the added feature is a greater focus on compliance with standardized procedures primarily designed to ensure certainty and accountability.

Bruce Thyer, in an observation about the European Bologna Declaration suggests the competencies outlined in the European Diploma in psychology “are extremely congruent with

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the practice skills of professional social workers, illustrating the overlap between these two disciplines” (Thyer, 2008, p.345). In an effort to contextualize both its philosophical perspective and its world view, Thyer relies on a vision of human progress as articulated by Auguste Comte, and an essential, but inadequate ‘caring and liberal view, itself an ideology now the subject of serious critique in light of its contributions to current global upheavals.

In conclusion, names do matter; changing them can reflect a shift or new way of thinking about identity and vision. In the late 19th century, Alice Salomon posed the question

that continues to sound its refrain and begs for an answer.

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Zwaigenbaum, L., (2012). What’s in a name: changing he terminology of autism diagnosis – Editorial, Developmental Medicine & child neurology, 54 (10), p. 871, doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8749.2012.04424.x.

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APPENDIX A: ARCHIVES

Alberta College of Social Workers The ACSW made both its Minutes and related documents available as well as those of the Southern and Northern Branches of the Canadian Association of Social Workers. Likewise, the ACSW’s records also contributed documents about the CCSWA.

Alberta Provincial Archives - Edmonton, AB The search of accessible records was limited to the DPW, Education and their respective successors. While a card index system is available to assist in locating records, a majority of records are unprocessed and with the absence of standard finding aids, access is constrained. Records deposited in the Archives prior to 1995 were generally accessible. However, regardless of the date the records were created, those deposited after Proclamation of the FOIP legislation in 1995 are largely subject to its provisions.

The publication, An Administrative History of the Government of Alberta 1905 – 2005, was helpful in tracking departmental name changes, organizational changes, legislative mandates and structural changes. The names and terms of the Ministers and Deputy Ministers are also included. http://culture.alberta.ca/paa/archives/research/adminhistory.aspx

The Bert Sheppard Stockmen's Foundation Library and Archives - Cochrane, AB

The handwritten research notes by the authors of Kay Sanderson & Elda Hauschildt’s, (1999), 200 Remarkable Alberta Women, elaborate on the publication and in some instances indicate the source of the information.

Catholic Family Services of Calgary

Catholic Family Services invited me to photograph the relevant historic operational documents of the agency prior to arranging for their destruction. The documents include newspaper clippings, letters and speeches by some of its supporters and a variety of documents related to the social history of Calgary and surroundings.

Edmonton Social Planning Council

The Edmonton Social Planning Council made its Annual Reports and a number of related documents for the late 1950s and the early 1960s available that outlined its contributions to the development of a graduate school of social work as well as the two-year post high school certificate in social work.

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The Glenbow Foundation Archives – Collections & Research

http://www.glenbow.org/collections/

The Glenbow Collections includes a wide range of art, artifact, published works and archival material related to Western Canada. With detailed Finding Aids available on-line as well as number of scanned documents, my focus was on the following collections.

Family Life Education Council of Calgary Fonds

http://ww2.glenbow.org/search/archivesMainResults.aspx?XC=/search/archivesMainResults.asp x&TN=MAINCAT&AC=QBE_QUERY&RF=WebResults&DL=0&RL=0&NP=255&%0AMF =WPEngMsg.ini&MR=5&QB0=AND&QF0=Main%20entry+|+Title&QI0=Family+Life+Educ ation+Council+of+Calgary+fonds

The Fonds includes records of the Calgary Social Planning Council, the agency that employed Dr. F.H. (Tim) Tyler prior to his appointment as Director of the School of Social Welfare. The fond also includes records related to the AASW, the City of Calgary Preventive Social Services Program, several social workers and correspondence with related Alberta Government Departments.

The Maude and Harold Riley Fonds http://www.glenbow.org/collections/search/findingAids/archhtm/riley.cfm

Maude Riley was a significant figure in the social reform history of Calgary and Alberta generally. The focus of her influence was in the broad area of family and child welfare. The collection offers a rich background to the development of social programs in Alberta both charitable and statutory services offered by municipal and provincial governments.

Library and Archives Canada - Ottawa, ON

The Canadian Association of Social Workers Collection is remarkably well organized; the on-line Finding Aid (MG 28, I 441, No. 1713) is similarly well organized and thorough. The search was limited to files directly related to the development of social work and social work education in Alberta. http://data2.archives.ca/pdf/pdf001/p000000322.pdf

Social Welfare History Archives - Minneapolis, MN The Social Welfare History Archives provided duplicate copies from its files of the 1971 CSWE’s accreditation of the School of Social Welfare

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University of Alberta Archives - Edmonton, AB

The U of A Archives hold the primary source documents related to the development of graduate level social work education in Alberta. My search was limited to the records created by President Walter Johns http://www.ualberta.ca/ARCHIVES/guide/8INDIVID/johns.htm, Douglas E. Smith, Dean of Arts http://www.ualberta.ca/ARCHIVES/guide/8INDIVID/smithd.htm and the Universities Coordinating Council, http://www.ualberta.ca/ARCHIVES/guide/6COLLEGE/151.htm

University of Calgary Archives - Calgary, AB

The U of C Archives has received a limited number of primary source records from the School of Social Welfare/Social Work. Selected records of Principal Malcolm Taylor, Presidents H.S. Armstrong, A.W.R. Carrothers, W.A. Cochrane, and N. Wagner as well as Dean of Graduate Studies, J.B. Hyne were made available.

The Albert Comanor Fonds 1937 – 1984

The Fonds contain the records of Albert Comanor during his diverse career as a social work administrator, academic and as a consultant. A detailed Finding Aid is available on line http://archives.ucalgary.ca/files/lcr_archives/comanor-96.010.pdf

The University Publications - Institutional Reports

The several reports by University of Calgary Reports and the School of Social Welfare referenced in this Study are available as part of the U of C Archives, University Publications at the following website. http://contentdm.ucalgary.ca/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/ucpub

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APPENDIX B: WEBSITES

The Alberta Heritage Digitization Project; Our Future Our Past

The Alberta Newspaper Collection

http://www.ourfutureourpast.ca/

The Collection of early Alberta Newspapers is a resource for access to numerous historical Alberta newspapers however; the selections from any one of the many newspapers are severely limited.

The Alberta Law Collection

http://www.ourfutureourpast.ca/law/search.aspx

The Collection includes all Alberta Statutes for the period 1905 - 2000, as well as the Ordinances of the Northwest Territories from 1877 - 1905

The Journals of the Alberta Legislature cover the period 1906 - 1989, and provide a limited summary of the Annual Sessions of the Alberta Legislative Assembly.

Hansard is available for the period 1972 – 1993, and provides a verbatim transcript of what was said during the Annual Sessions of the Alberta Legislative Assembly.

The Alberta Medical History Collection http://www.ourfutureourpast.ca/medhist/browse.aspx?g=medhistperiodicals

The Annual Reports of the Department of Public Health of Alberta from 1921 – 1966 includes information about social workers in its Eugenics Division, the Social Services Department and Guidance Clinic as well as the various programs which were to become the Department of Public Welfare in the early 1940s.

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APPENDIX C: INTERVIEWS AND ETHICS

Interview Questions

As noted, 64 persons were interviewed each of whom had a relationship with the School of Social Welfare or were familiar with some aspects of the background, development and history of graduate social work education in Alberta. In broad terms, the interviewees fell in three categories, (a) the pre-1960 development of social work in Alberta, (b) the development of social work education in Alberta to the establishment of the School of Social Welfare, and (c), the School of Social Welfare 1967 – 1989. Some of those interviewed spanned more than one category.

Questions were prepared in advance of all interview based on my knowledge of the person’s background and particular involvement with the School of Social Welfare. The following series of question were prepared for a specific interview and illustrate the range of questions related to this study. As happened in many of the interviews, if a response to a question early interview also included comments about subsequent questions, the sequence of questions varied accordingly. As noted in the text, the format of the interview was modified in some instances by introducing a particular area of interest, followed by related questions. In retrospect, this was particularly the case where I knew the interviewee’s background and familiarity with the subject matter. Similarly, questions were not necessarily asked as written especially as the interview progressed.

1. How did you first get into social work? Who or what influenced you to become a social worker?

2. You were recruited as a faculty member, can you elaborate on what lead to your interest and appointment?

3. What did you know or subsequently learn about the establishment of the School of Social Welfare at the University of Calgary?

4. What was your understanding of the vision of the School of Social Welfare?

5. Do you recall how ‘social welfare’ was distinguished from ‘social work’?

6. The CSWE published the Boehm Report in 1959 by copes of which were purchased by the Junior League (13 volumes for $36.00) early 1960’s as part of its contribution to the development of social work education in Alberta. Was that Study part of the faculty’s discussion about the curriculum?

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7. Were you aware at this point what the Government of Alberta expected from the School’s graduates? By way of background, a 1965 letter from Minister Halmrast discussed the changes in the nature of the Alberta social services system to becoming more preventive in focus but goes on to suggest that the program should produce “caseworkers.”

8. The Director of the School appears to have had a generally good relationship with the Social Credit government. Comments?

9. Were you aware at the time that . . . . was a minority shareholder in a company (Systems Research Ltd), the primary shareholder of which was Dr. Erick Schmidt, who Preston Manning and Alf Hooke note as the Executive Assistant to Premier Manning?

10. Schmidt and Manning had a contract with the Premier in the mid-1960’s to write a White Paper. Did that White Paper influence the thinking of the faculty members in the 1966 – 1971 period?

11. Do you have a sense of how the University/School established a relationship with the Lougheed government?

12. There were several attempts to change the name of the School, among them the “School of Social Development” to reflect a name change for the former provincial Department of Public Welfare. How did that come about?

13. The most vocal opposition came from the Alberta Association of Social Workers and ...... in particular. Did that reflect an opposing vision of what social work education should focus on in the future?

14. It has struck me that at least in the written material I’ve found that there doesn’t appear to have been a strong defense of the name “School of Social Welfare.” Only one document points out that it was about ‘people/citizens faring-well.’ In contemporary terms that suggests ‘well-being,’ ‘flourishing,’ ‘living life well.’ Did the School have a clearly defined purpose that distinguished it from other social work education programs?

15. What did the faculty think its graduates would be expected to do/achieve?

16. The 1971 MSW accreditation by CSWE in the US, seems to have been very positive about the leadership, innovation and relationship of faculty and students. Its standards for accreditation appear to have been influenced by the Boehm Report of 1959. Who was the primary author of the Accreditation Report and how was the faculty involved?

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17. The issue of changing the name of the School/Faculty seems to have come to a halt in 1971, after the fourth attempt to establish something as a permanent name for the program. Was that a deliberate decision by the Director, the faculty or by the University?

18. On the other hand, early on already there appears to have been criticism directed at the School because its graduates were seen as being unprepared for the kind of jobs that agencies were defining as important and necessary. Alberta Family and Social Services seems to have been a leader in that criticism? How was that critique considered by the School? What was the response to that?

19. 1977 seems to have been a rather significant year. There were two Reports, one by the Student Union and one by a Committee established by the President of the University. What do you recall as the background to those reports?

20. The Report by the President’s Task Group was not very subtle and hinted that the leadership of the Faculty was not consistent with the expectations of the University and the social services community. More attention needed to be given to the details than to the vision and expansionary record of the Faculty and its leadership. What was your reaction to the Report?

21. The critique also dealt with the issue of scholarship (meaning research and publishing) versus practice (meaning teaching and community engagement).

22. There were internal reports in Alberta Family and Social Services that were very critical of U of C social work graduates and it seems held the view that the Faculty had adopted a generalist model and graduates were deemed to be most interested in systemic issues and advocacy and less able to do the casework.

23. In some instances, the internal critique gets quite personal, and refers to “Tyler” style advocacy at the expense of doing client work. From your perspective, did this become a personal issue, or was it still about something else?

24. There are also comments by ASS&CH staff about discussions with the Faculty regarding “training” social workers versus “educating” social workers. Can you elaborate?

25. What can you say about the relationship with the junior/community college programs during your tenure at the U of C?

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26. Al Comanor was the Acting Dean briefly at one point. What happened to end his term? Was he considered for the Dean’s position?

27. Do you know why Tyler hired Comanor, an established American academic social worker?

28. Did Comanor influence the direction of the School? In what way? Was the name of the School an issue for him?

29. Whatever happened with Frank Turner as Dean?

30. Len Richards became the next Dean. In terms of the issues at that point, it seems that there was a serious attempt to transfer the Edmonton and Lethbridge programs to the Universities in those cities. What was the rationale and why did it fail completely?

31. Was there any discussion during this period about changing the name?

32. What did you understand was the reason for the U of C appointing Ray Thomlison as the Dean?

33. What did you understand as Thomlison’s “mandate” from the University?

34. How did Thomlison go about implementing his mandate?

35. In 1984, Dick Ramsay was asked to write a Report for the new Dean about the history of the name and the name of other social work programs? What was the reaction of the faculty to that Report?

36. Did the name issue ever come up during your tenure?

37. Do you know Tyler’s reason for wanting to change the name?

38. Of all the things that happened during your time at the School of Social Welfare, what stood out as its most important achievement during your tenure?

39. Is there anything else I should’ve asked you?

Thank you very much!

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Ethics Approval

Because the Study involved interviews with human subjects, approval to conduct the interviews was requested and received from the Conjoint Faculties Research Ethics Board (CFREB), dated July 12, 2010. Annual progress reports were required and submitted in each of the subsequent years with the final report due and submitted by August 31, 2014.

In advance of the interview, each of the 64 interviewees were provided with a copy of the release form which included a brief summary of the purpose, and scope of the research with a request to sign the release, authorizing their interview to be recorded and quoted. All 64 interviewees signed the release. The participants were also provided with an opportunity for one week during which they could review the recording of the interview if so desired. However, no one asked to do so. The interviews were subsequently professionally transcribed under the terms of a confidentiality agreement.

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APPENDIX D: LIST OF INTERVIEWEES

Arie Klapwijk Saskatoon, SK Audrey Ferber Calgary, AB Baldwin Reichwein Edmonton Betty Farrell Edmonton Ben Carniol Toronto, ON Bill Cochrane Calgary Bill Novasky Edmonton Bob Holmes Calgary Bob Rechner Edmonton Bruce Rawson Ottawa Butch Nutter Edmonton David Baxter Shuswap, BC David Stolee Camrose Derek Baker Vancouver Island, BC Desmond Berghofer Vancouver BC Dick Ramsay Calgary Don Karst Calgary Don Milne Edmonton Don Storch Victoria, BC Erick Schmidt Lacombe Gerald J. Way Edmonton Gordon Stangier Red Deer Helen Hammond Calgary Herb Allard Calgary Hilde Houlding Calgary Jack MacDonald Calgary Jacqueline B. Hill Chicago, IL Jacqueline Ismael Calgary James Leiby Berkeley, CA Jean La France Edmonton Jeanette McEachern Calgary Jim Midgley Berkeley, CA Joachim Wieler Weimar, Germany John Lackey Edmonton John Mould Edmonton Karen Remple Calgary Kay Feehan Edmonton 387

Ken Watson Calgary Kim Zapf Edmonton/Calgary Lois Alger Calgary Lynne Duncan Edmonton Margot Herbert Edmonton Mari MacDonald Edmonton Martha Cohen Calgary Mary Valentich Calgary Mic Farrell Edmonton Mike McIntyre Rosalind, AB Morris Baskett Calgary Peter Gabor Lethbridge Peter Krueger Calgary Preston Manning Calgary Ralph Westwood Edmonton Ray Thomlison Miami, FL Richard Shelson Lethbridge Ron Levin Edmonton Sam Blakely Calgary Shannon Marchand Edmonton Sharon Herron Edmonton Stan Remple Langley BC Terry White Canmore Tim Tyler Calgary Tina Gabriele Calgary Walter Coombs Onaway Walter Hossli Calgary

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