As wisely pointed out by Trattner (2007), every nation’s social welfare system reflects its social values, culture, moral norms, and progress towards addressing issues faced by the needy better. However, to understand the present-day social welfare system well, and to comprehend the true meaning of each of the statues and regulations in accordance with which it functions, it is vital to take a look at the history of those practices’ formation. Obviously, the history of social welfare system lies within the legal domain – once people found strength in themselves to challenge existing practices and to claim their rights, they gave rise to precedents that further resulted in development of laws and statutes. The present paper is thus dedicated to legal issues related to a field of social welfare, with a specific focus on the legal issues related to institutionalization and treatment.
Chapter 14 of Mandell and Schram’s (2011) book Introduction to Human Services: Policy and Practice is dedicated to overview of legal issues related to human services work. The authors pointed out that to be successful and professional in their work, human service workers have to possess a strong knowledge of legal issues connected to their field, especially taking into account that their task is to cater for the needs of disadvantaged and underprivileged categories of population. Such people are commonly very vulnerable to welfare agencies’ abuse or neglect, and they find it hard to protect their interests and have their needs met. Human services workers cannot keep track of each individual case and make sure that every client gets his or her needs addressed. However, equipping their clients with basic legal knowledge may make a transformative change, empowering human services users to get what they are legally entitled to, thus improving the overall scope of practices in the field and contributing to improvement of needy persons’ status and treatment.
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Laws serve as a framework within which every human services worker operates every day, and they may be both helpful and restrictive in certain issues. Thus, as Mandell and Schram (2011) pointed out, every human services worker should know laws related to his or her professional practice, should motivate his/her clients to get familiarized with laws pertaining specifically to their category of population, and should at the same time be ready to challenge existing laws in case they openly violate human freedoms or impede on the human dignity. This field of work is indispensably connected with immigrants, needy families, etc., which means that the rights of these populations to certain services may be seriously limited by law. In such situations, it is the task of utmost importance to educate clients and provide booklets and informational materials for them to understand those laws and adjust their claims to the US legal framework.
Laws serve as resources for claiming one’s right to treatment, to social welfare, and other state assistance, but they may at the same time restrict people in their rights and actions, so it is vital to differentiate between laws before an appeal is made. For instance, the Social Security Act has imposed limitation on the class-action suits, thus weakening the consumer participation opportunities and making the social security lawsuit a matter of only one individual. In addition, the Immigration Act and the Personal; Responsibility Act both introduced severe restrictions on appeals for deported and imprisoned immigrants, while the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) recipients also have limited rights to appeal against unfavourable decisions of the federal court (Mandell & Schram, 2011). All these laws have to be known by representatives of the named population categories so that they do not waste their scarce funds for initially failing lawsuits.
However, together with the limiting legislation, there are some signs of progressive and liberal improvements in the social welfare and human services legislation in the USA. A separate point of discussion in this chapter is that of the right to adequate treatment and to refuse treatment, which are also highly relevant for human services. In this field, a gradual improvement in inclusion of adults and children with disabilities, as well as recognition of the right to decent treatment and inclusion into the treatment planning process for institutionalized patients has been observed. Such laws as All Handicapped Children Act and the Wyatt v. Stickney (1971) case show how the right of mental health services users are increasingly respected in the field (Mandell & Schram, 2011). Therefore, restrictions required for proper treatment and ensuring security of other institutionalized patients are now much more considerate, softened, and reasonably planned with due regard to dignity of the patient, interests and concerns of his/her family, and goals of treatment. Other legal improvements include greater attention to design of treatment in a least restrictive setting, receiving an informed consent from the patient, and refraining from mandatory institutionalization in cases when patients do not represent a social hazard.
The presented information reveals a very vivid image of the contemporary American social welfare and human services system. Alongside with recognizing the need to assist the most vulnerable and needy categories of population, US authorities have posed many restrictions in terms of immigrants and individuals with disabilities. In addition, poor people in the USA have a very restricted access to basic social services including education and healthcare, which shows that the USA is far from a welfare state in its classical understanding. A case of Medical-Legal Partnership for Children, explored by Mandell and Schram (2011) is highly illustrative of the fact that poor children are at a manifold higher risk of acquiring a number of diseases, and have a much lower chance to get adequate treatment.
Hence, many vital spheres of social welfare and human services seem dramatically overlooked in the USA, which creates additional threats for public well-being. In the USA, unemployed, poor, and disabled individuals unfortunately remain a severely underserved group, and even in the context of the recent legal improvements, there is still a vital need to make the social welfare system in the USA more inclusive and sympathetic for the needs of under-protected Americans.
- Mandell, B. R., & Schram, B. (2011). Introduction to human services: Policy and practice. New York, NY: Pearson.
- Trattner, W. I. (2007). From poor law to welfare state. (6th ed.). New York, NY: Free Press.
