Is Social Work a Profession Abraham Flexner

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The original of tliis book is intine Cornell University Library.

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http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014006617


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Cornell University Library

HV 37.F6Is social work a profession?

3 1924 014 006 617


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?*BY ABRAHAM FLEXNERBefore beginning to consider whether social work is

or is not a profession, I must confess a very genuinedoubt as to my competency to undertake the discus-sion. My acquaintance with social work, with theliterature of social work, and with social workers isdistinctly limited,^far too much so. Hence if theconclusions that I have reached seem to you unsoundor academic, I beg you to understand that I should notbe disposed to press them.The word "profession" or "professional" may be

loosely or strictly used. In its, broadest significanceit ia^simply the opposite ^f the word "amateur." Aperson is in this sense a "professional" if. his entiretime is devoted to an activity, as against one who isonly transiently or provisionally so engaged. The pro-fessional nurse, baseball player, dancer, and cook thusearn a livelihood by concentrating their entire atten-tion on their respective vocations and expect to go ondoing so; whereas the amateur nurse enlists only forthe duration of the war, or the amateur baseball player,during earlyyouth or college life. Social work isfrom thispoint of view a profession for those who make a full-timejob of it; it is not a profession for those who incidentallycontribute part of themselves to active philanthropy.However, I have not been asked to decide whether

social work is a full-time or a part-time occupation,An address before the National Conference of Charities and CorrectionBaltimore, May 17, 1915. '


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 3whether, in a word, it is a professional or an amateuroccupation. I assume that every difficult occupationrequires the entire time of those who take it seriously,though of course work can also be found for volunteerswith something less. than all their time or strength tooffer. The question put to me is a more technical one.The term profession, strictly used, as opposed to busi-ness or handicraft, is a title of peculiar distinction,coveted by many activities. Thus far it has beenpretty indiscriminately used. Almost any occupationnot obviously a business is apt to classify itself asa profession. Doctors, lawyers, preachers, musicians,engineers, journalists, trained nurses, trapeze and danc-ing masters, equestrians, and chiropodistsall speak oftheir "profession". Their claims are supposed to beestablished beyond question if they are able to affix totheir names one of those magical combinations of lettersthat either are or look like an academic degree. Onthis basis chiropody would be a profession because theNew York School of Chiropody confers the degree ofM. Cp., and social work might qualify at once with thedegree S. W. Some years ago the president of a wes-tern university told me that he had compiled a list ofall the degrees ever conferred by his institution. Inthe list appeared a very ominous combination of let-ters,^nothing less, in a word, than N. G. I was relievedto be informed that this was not an effort to characterizethe entire academic output, but signified only "grad-uate nurse". If the academic degree decides, nursingis a profession for that reason, even were there no other.We need waste no time in endeavoring to formulatethe concept of "professional", if the concept is to in-clude the indiscriminate activities. touched on above.


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4 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?If there is a dancing profession, a baseball profession, anacting profession, a nursing profession, an artistic profes-sion, a musical profession, a literary profession, a medicalprofession, and a legal professionto mention no othersthe term profession is too vague to be fought for. Wemay as well let down the bars and permit people to callthemselves professional, for no better reason than thatthey choose in this way to appropriate whatever of socialdistinction may still cling to a term obviously abused.But to make a profession in the genuine sense, some-thing more than a mere claim or an academic degree isneeded. There are certain objective standards thatcan be formulated. Social work is interested in beingrecognized as a profession only if the term is limitedto activities possessing these criteria. The socialworker wants, I assume, to be a professional, if at all,only in the sense in which the physician and the en-gineer are professional, and he wants to make commoncause with them in defending the term against dete-rioration. In this narrower and eulogistic sense, whatare the earmarks of a profession?One has, of course, no right to be arbitrary, notional,

or unhistorical. The nature of a profession has under-gone a readily traceable development, and the numberof professions has not remained stationary. Occupa-tions that were once non-professional have evolved intofull professional status. These changes will continueto go on. The definition that we may formulate to-daywill therefore need recasting from time to time, andinternal modifications will occur in many of the activi-ties that we shall mention. My present concern, how-ever, is not to consider the evolutionary aspects of theproblem, but rather to ask what are at this moment the


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? Bcriteria of a profession and to consider whether socialwork conforms to them. There are a few professionsuniversally admitted to be such,law, medicine, andpreaching. From these one must by analysis extract thecriteria with which, at least, one must begin the charac-terization of professions. As we proceed, we shall con-sider how far the conception hasbeen widened ormodifiedby the addition ofnew professions ; and finally, to what ex-tent socialworkmeasuresup to thestandardthus reached

.

Would it not be fair to mention as the first mark of aprofession that the activities involved are essentiallyintellectual in character? Manual work is not neces-sarily excluded; the use of tools is not necessarily ex-cluded. The physician is not the less a member of theprofession because his fingers feel a pulse and his handssound a patient's chest; the engineer is not the less amember of a profession because he employs instrumentsand tools. But in neither of these instances does theactivity derive its essential character from its instru-ments. The instrument is an incident or an accident;the real character of the activity is the thinking process.

A free, resourceful, and unhampered intelligence appliedto problems and seeking to understand and master them,^that is in the first instance characteristic of a profession.Wherever intelligence plays thus freely, the responsi-

bility of the practitioner is at once large and personal.The problems to be dealt with are complicated; thefacilities at hand, more or less abundant and various;the agentphysician, engineer, or preacherexercisesa very large discretion as to what he shall do. Heis not under orders; though he be cooperating withothers, the work is team work, rather than individualwork, his responsibility is not less complete and not


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6 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?less personal. This quality of responsibility followsfrom the fact that professions are intellectual in char-acter; for in all intellectual operations, the thinkertakes upon himself a risk. If then intellectuality withconsequent personal responsibility be regarded as onecriterion of a profession, no merely instrumental ormechanical activity can fairly lay claim to professionalrank; for the human mind does not, in instrumentalor mechanical activities, enjoy the requisite freedomof scope or carry the requisite burden of personalresponsibility. The execution or application of athought-out technique,be it crude or exquisite, physi-cal or mental,^is after all routine. Some one back ofthe routineer has done the thinking and therefore bearsthe responsibility, and he alone deserves to be con-sidered professional.We are accustomed to speak of the learned profes-sions. What is the significance of the word learned inthis connection? Does it imply that there are un-learned as well as learned professions? I suspect not,for the intellectual character of professional activityinvolves the working up of ideas into practice, involvesthe derivation of raw material from one realm or an-other of the learned world. Professions would fallshort of attaining intellectuality if they employedmainly or even largely knowledge and experience thatis generally accessible,if they drew, that is, only onthe usually available sources of information. Theyneed to resort to the laboratory and the seminar for.constantly fresh supply of facts; and it is the steady-stream of ideas, emanating from these sources, whichkeeps professions from degenerating into mere routinefrom losing their intellectual and responsible character!


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 7The second criterion of the profession is therefore itslearned character, and this characteristic is so essentialthat the adjective learned really adds nothing to thenoun profession.

Professions are therefore intellectual and learned;they are in the next place definitely practical. Noprofession can be merely academic and theoretic; theprofessional man must have an absolutely definite andpractical object. His processes are essentially in-tellectual; his raw material is derived from the worldof learning; thereupon he must do with it a clean-cut,concrete task. All the activities about the professionalquality of which we should at once agree are not onlyintellectual and learned, but definite in purpose. Theprofessions of law, medicine, architecture, and engi-neering, for example, operate within definite fields andstrive towards objects capable of clear, unambiguous,and concrete formulation. Physicians rely mainlyon certain definite sciences,anatomy, physiology,pharmacology, etc.,and apply these to the preserva-tion and restoration of health. Architecture relies onmathematics, physics, etc., and applies these to thedesigning and construction of buildings. Ends may ofcourse be concrete and practical without being physicalor tangible. University professors, engaged in teaching,in the training of teachers, in the increase of knowledgeor the development of thought, stand the tests thatwe have thus far enumerated :their work is intellectual,learned in quality, and definitely practical in object.Each of the unmistakable professions already men-

tioned for the purpose of illustration possesses a tech-nique capable of communication through an orderlyand highly specialized educational discipline. Despite


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8 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?differences of opinion about details, the members of agiven profession are pretty well agreed as to the specificobjects that the profession seeks to fulfill, and thespecific kinds of skill that the practitioner of the pro-fession must master in order to attain the object inquestion. On this basis, men arrive at an understand-ing as to the amount and quality of training, generaland special, which should precede admission into theprofessional school; as to the content and length of theprofessional course. These formulations are meant toexclude from professions those incapable of pursuingthem in a large, free, and responsible way; and to makesure that those potentially capable are so instructed as toget the fullest possible benefit from the training provided.A profession is a brotherhood,almost, if the wordcould be purified of its invidious implications, a caste.Professional activities are so definite, so absorbing ininterest, so rich in duties and responsibilities, that theycompletely engage their votaries. The social and per-sonal lives of professional men and of their familiesthus tend to organize around a professional nucleus.A strong class consciousness soon develops. Butthough externally somewhat aristocratic in form, pro-fessions are, properly taken, highly democratic institu-tions. They do indeed tend to set up certain require-ments for matriculation, so to speak; but democracy,I take it, means not the annihilation of distinctions, butrather the abrogation of gratuitous and arbitrary dis-tinctions. If membership in a profession were condi-tioned on some qualification not essentially related tothe activities involvedon birth or wealth or some otheraccidentprofessions could be fairly charged withbeing snobbish or aristocratic; but if qualifications are


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 9determined by the nature of the responsibility alone,and if membership depends solely on satisfying termsthus arrived at, then professions must be adjudgedthoroughly democratic in essence.

There is, of course, always danger that the interestsof an organization may conflict with those of the bodypolitic. Organizations of physicians, lawyers, andteachers may find the personal interests of the individ-uals of whom they are composed arrayed against thoseof society at large. On the whole, however, organizedgroups of this kind are, under democratic conditions,apt to be more responsive to public interest than areunorganized and isolated individuals. In any event,under the pressure of public opinion, professionalgroups have more and more tended to view themselvesas organs contrived for the achievement of social endsrather than as bodies formed to stand together for theassertion of rights or the protection of interests andprinciples. I do not wish to be understood as sayingthat this development is as yet by any means complete.Such is far from being the case. Organizations ofteachers, doctors, and lawyers are still apt to look out,first of all, for "number one". But as time goes on itmay very well come to be a mark of professional char-acter that the professional organization is explicitlyand admittedly meant for the advancement of thecommon social interest through the professional or-ganization. Devotion to well-doing is thus more andmore likely to become an accepted mark of professionalactivity; and as this development proceeds, the pe-cuniary interest of the individual practitioner of agiven profession is apt to yield gradually before an in-creasing realization of responsibility to a larger end.


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10 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?Let me now review briefly the six criteria which we

have mentioned: professions involve essentially in-tellectual operations with large individual responsibil-ity; they derive their raw material from science andlearning; this material they work up to a practicaland definite end; they possess an educationally com-municable technique; they tend to self-organization;they are becoming increasingly altruistic in motivation.Itwill be interesting to submitvariousforms of activity tothe test in order to determinewhether these criteria work.We begin with a crude and obvious example,^plumb-ing. Plumbing possesses certain professional charac-teristics: it is definite in purpose, possesses a techniquecommunicable through education, and has developeda very definite organization. Nevertheless plumbingis not a profession. The plumber is a mechanicalperformer, acting on the instrumental rather than theintellectual level; the data which he uses are the prop-erty of common experience, not immediately or re-cently derived from the realms of science and learning;finally, there is as yet no convincing evidence that thespirit of plumbing is becoming socialized. Plumbing isstill prosecuted too largely for the plumber's profit.It is therefore a handicraft, not a profession.Bdnking is an activity with certain professional

characteristics. Its purpose is definite; it gives a gooddeal of scope to intelligence; it develops a distinct classconsciousness. But the disqualifications are plain:banking is as yet far from being to a sufficient extentthe application of economic science; it is largely amatter of what is vaguely called "business sense" or"business experience", "common sense" or "rule ofthumb". The scientific possibilities unquestionably


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 11exist, and recent legislation marks a distinct advancein the direction of scientific or professional banking inthe stricter use of those terms. For the present, how-ever, banking practices are still too largely empirical tosquare with the modern conception of professionalism.There are, of course, other defects. A prominentbanker recently described himself as "a dealer incredits". The motive of financial profit is thus toostrongly stressed. It is true that in times of crisis thebanking interests of the country have mobilized for theprotection of the general public. But in these instances,trade interest and general interest so largely coincidethat it is a question whether the motive can be regardedas an example of professional altruism; in any case, itis exceptional, due to common danger from the outsiderather than to spiritual striving from within. For thepresent, therefore, banking is to be regarded as a tradewith certain professional leanings.

Is pharmacy a profession? Is trained nursing a pro-fession? The pharmacist compounds the physician'sprescriptions, for which task he requires a considerabledegree of expertness, a knowledge of certain sciencesespecially chemistryand a high degree of caution,since either the slightest error on his part, or inability todetect an error on the part of the physician, whetherdue to ignorance or to carelessness, may have veryserious consequences. Recurring to our criteria, Ishould say that pharmacy has definiteness of purpose,possesses a communicable technique, and derives atleast part of its essential material from science. On theother hand, the activity is not predominantly intellec-tual in character and the responsibility is not originalor primary. The physician thinks, decides, and orders;


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12 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?the pharmacist obeysobeys, of course, with discre-tion, intelligence, and skill^yet in the end obeys anddoes not originate. Pharmacy therefore is an armadded to the medical profession, a special and dis-tinctly higher form of handicraft, not a profession.Nor is this distinction merely a verbal quibble, for ithas an important bearing on the solution of all educa-tional questions pertaining to pharmacy.

I am conscious of endeavoring to pick up a live wirewhen I undertake to determine the status of thetrained nurse. But if consideration of various activi-ties serially arranged will throw any light upon theproblem as related to the social worker, there are ob-vious advantages in discussing the twilight cases. Thetrained nurse is making a praiseworthy and importanteffort to improve the status of her vocation. Sheurges, and with justice, that her position is one of greatresponsibility; that she must possess knowledge, skill,and power of judgment; that the chances of securingthese qualifications, all of them essentially intellectual,improve, as the occupation increases in dignity. It isto be observed, however, that the responsibility of thetrained nurse is neither original nor final. She, too,may be described as another arm to the physician orsurgeon. Her function is instrumental, though not,indeed, just mechanically instrumental. In certainrelations she is perhaps almost a collaborator. Yet,when all is said, it is the physician who observes, re-flects, and decides. The trained nurse plays into hishands; carries out his orders; summons him like asentinel in fresh emergencies; subordinates loyally herintelligence to his theory, to his poUcy, and is effectivein precise proportion to her ability thus to second his


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 13efforts. Can an activity of this secondary nature bedeemed a profession? On the answer, an entire educa-tional policy depends.

I have spoken of the trained nurse, the sick-roomattendant, and I have raised, without endeavoringfinally to dispose of, certain questions suggested by herrelationship to the physician. Meanwhile, it is onlyfair to add, we are developing nursing along otherlines. The public health nurse is a sanitary official,busy in the field largely on her own responsibility ratherthan in the sick room under orders. Whether the termnurse is properly appUcable to her, whether a differen-tiation in training and terminology is not likely to occuras pubUc health work comes into its own, I need notundertake to decide.With medicine, law, engineering, literature, painting,

music, we emerge from all clouds of doubt into the un-mistakable professions. Without exception, these call-ings involve personally responsible intellectual activity;they derive their material immediately from learningand science; they possess an organized and education-ally communicable technique; they have evolved intodefinite status, social and professional, and they tendto become, more and more clearly, organs for theachievement of large social ends. I need not estabhshthis position separately in reference to each of them.Let the case of medicine sufiice. The physician'sfunction is overwhelmingly intellectual in quaUty andhis responsibility absolutely personal. He utihzes vari-ous instruments, physical and human: microscope,stethoscope, sphygmograph, orderly, pharmacist, diet-ician, nurse. But his is the commanding intelligencethat brings these resources to bear; his the responsi-


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14 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?bility of decision as to the problem and how it is to besolved. There are of course, physicians in abundanceto whose processes the word "intellectual" cannot beproperly appliedroutineers, to whom a few obvioussigns indicate this or that procedure, by a law of me-chanical association; but these poorly trained and ill-equipped medical men have no place in modern medi-cine. They are already obsolete, mere survivals des-tined soon to pass away.

In the next place, medicine derives its materialimmediately from science. Indeed, an imposing arrayof sciences has been developed, very largely out ofproblems encountered and needs felt in medical prac-tice: anatomy, physiology, pathology, bacteriology andpharmacology. These sciences have now achievedindependence in the sense that, hke chemistry andphysics, they possess inherent interest and are capableof development without immediate reference to disease.They nevertheless furnish the data with which thephysician very largely operates, and his professionaldevelopment may be determined by the degree towhich he substitutes in his observation and thinkingdata thus derived for data empirical in character.Medicine quahfies on other points equally well: ithas the definite, practical end already noted, viz. thepreservation and restoration of health; it lends itselfadmirably to an effective and orderly educational dis-ciphne, calculated to attain the definite object juststated; it has achieved a very definite status; finally,though neither the organization as a whole nor themembers as individuals can claim to be exempt fromselfish and mercenary motives, it must in fairness be saidthat the medical profession has shown a genuine regard


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 15for the public interest as against its own, that it is increas-ingly responsive to large social needs, and that there arenot wanting signs of a development that will minimizepersonal profit somewhat as it is minimized in teaching.

I hope that these examples have made our criteria soclear that they can now be applied to social work. Issocial work a profession in the technical and strict senseof the term? The Bulletin of the New York School ofPhilanthropy under the title "The Profession of SocialWork" makes the following explanation:

The School of Philanthropy is primarily a professional train-ing school, of graduate ranlc, for civic and social work. Theword philanthropy is to be understood in the broadest and deep-est sense as including every kind of social work, whether underpublic or private auspices. By social work is meant any formof persistent and deliberate effort to improve Uving or workingconditions in the community, or to relieve, diminish, or preventdistress, whether due to weakness of character or to pressure ofexternal circumstances. All such efforts may be conceived asfalling under the heads of charity, education, or justice, and thesame action may sometimes appear as one or another accordingto the point of view.The activities described in these words are obviously

intellectual, not mechanical, not routine in character.The worker must possess fine powers of analysis anddiscrimination, breadth and flexibifity of S3Tnpathy,sound judgment, skill in utilizing whatever resources areavailable, faciUty in devising new combinations. Theseoperations are assuredly of intellectual quafity.

I confess I am not clear, however, as to whether thisresponsibility is not rather that of a mediating than anoriginal agency. Let me explain as concretely as I can.The engineer works out his problem and puts throughits solution; so does the physician, the preacher, theteacher. The social worker takes hold of a case, thatof a disintegrating family, a wrecked individual, or an


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16 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?unsocialized industry. Having localized his problem,having decided on its particular nature, is he not usuallydriven to invoke the specialized agency, professionalor other, best equipped to handle it? There is illnessto be dealt with,the doctor is needed; ignorance re-quires the school; poverty calls for the legislator, or-ganized charity, and so on. To the extent that thesocial worker mediates the intervention of the particu-lar agent or agency best fitted to deal with the specificemergency which he has encountered, is the socialworker himself a professional or is he the intelUgencethat brings this or that profession or other activity intoaction? The responsibility for specific action thusrests upon the power he has invoked. The very varietyof the situations he encounters compels him to be not aprofessional agent so much as the mediator invokingthis or that professional agency.

In speaking of social work as mediating, I do notintend to say that other professions are mutually inde-pendent and act independently. Indeed, the collabora-tion of different professions in the doing of specifictasks is a characteristic feature of latter-day organiza-tion. Architects, engineers, sanitarians, lawyers, andeducators cooperate in the building of a school or atenement. But it is to be noted that this is a divisionof labor among equals, each party bearing, subject togeneral consent, primary responsibility for his particu-lar function, the definiteness of that function and thecompleteness of the responsibility differing, I take it,from the function and responsibility of the social workerunder similar conditions.

Consideration of the objects of social work leads tothe same conclusion. I have made the point that all


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 17the established and recognized professions have definiteand specific ends : medicine, law, architecture, engineer-ing,one can draw a clear line of demarcation abouttheir respective fields. This is not true of social work.It appears not so much a definite field as an aspect ofwork in many fields. An aspect of medicine belongsto social work, as do certain aspects of law, education,architecture, etc. Recur for a moment to the scope ofinterest indicated in the extract above quoted from theprospectus of the New York School: the improvementof living and working conditions in the community, therelief or prevention of distress whether individual orsocial in origin. The prospectus of the Boston Schoolfor Social Workers enumerates the various kinds ofpositions occupied by its graduates as follows: care ofchildren, church and religious work, civic agencies,industrial betterment, institutional and medical socialservice, neighborhood work and recreation, organizingcharity, probation and parole. The field of employ-ment is indeed so vast that delimitation is impossible.We observed that professions need to be hmited anddefinite in scope, in order that practitioners may them-selves act; but the high degree of specialized com-petency required for action and conditioned on limita-tion of area cannot possibly go with the width of scopecharacteristic of social work. A certain superficialityof attainment, a certain lack of practical ability, neces-sarily characterize such breadth of endeavor. If,however, we conceive the social worker, not so much asthe agent grappUng with this or that situation, butrather as controlling the key board that summons,cooperates with and coordinates various professionalspecialists, this breadth of attainment is very far from


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18 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?being a matter for reproach. It imposes upon thesocial worker the necessity of extreme caution, of con-siderable modesty, because in these days a considerablemeasure of certainty is possible to any one person onlywithin a restricted field. Would it not be at least sug-gestive therefore to view social work as in touch withmany professions rather than as a profession in and byitself?

Perhaps the same idea can be brought out inother ways. A good deal of what is called social workmight perhaps be accounted for on the ground that therecognized professions have developed too slowly onthe social side. Suppose medicine were fully socialized;would not medical men, medical institutions, and medi-cal organizations look after certain interests that thesocial worker must care for just because medical prac-tice now falls short? The shortcomings of law create asimilar need in another direction. Thus viewed, socialwork is, in part at least, not so much a separate pro-fession, as an endeavor to supplement certain existingprofessions pending their completed development. Itpieces out existing professions; breathes a new spiritinto them; and binds them together in the endeavor todeal with a given situation from a new point of view.Lack of specificity in aim affects seriously the prob-

lem of training social workers. Professions that areable to define their objects precisely can work out educa-tional procedures capable of accomplishing a desiredresult. But the occupations of social workers are sonumerous and diverse that no compact, purposefullyorganized educational discipline is feasible. Well-informed, well-balanced, tactful, judicious, sympathetic,resourceful people are needed, rather than any definite


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 19kind or kinds of technical skill. In so far as educationcan produce this type, the education is not technicallyprofessional so much as broadly cultural in a varietyof realms of civic and social interest. The vaguenessof the enterprise in which they are engaged must havetroubled the instructors themselves, if I may judge froma remark once made to me by one of them: "Wedon't know just what to teach them". In this con-nection it is worth noting that the heads of schools forsocial workers are trained men with subsequent ex-perience, but not trained social workers. Dr. GrahamTaylor is a theologian by training, Dr. Brackett andDr. Devine are economists. In addition to knowing aspecialty well, they are all well-informed in many otherdirections. This breadth of interest and attainmentreinforced by practical experience makes them compe-tent heads of schools for social workers,^this, ratherthan any particular training aimed at the particular job.

Let me add, however, that what I have just saiddoes not imply that schools of philanthropy are super-fluous. Looking at them as educational ventures, Isuspect that they are as yet feeUng about for theirproper place and function. There is an obvious con-venience, however, in having an institution whichfocuses as far as possible the main lines of social activ-ity; an obvious advantage in having an institutionthat emphasizes the practical side of what might other-wise be more or less academic instruction in manybranches. But instruction of this kind is not exactlyprofessional in character; it supplements and bringsto bear what good students might well acquire in thecourse of their previous higher education.

If social work fails to conform to some professional


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20 IS SOCIAL W6k A PROFESSION?criteria, it very readily satisfies others. No questioncan be raised as to the source from which the socialworker derives his material^it comes obviously fromscience and learning, from economics, ethics, religionand medicine; nor is there any doubt on the score ofthe rapid evolution of a professional self-consciousness,as these annual conferences abundantly testify. Fi-nally, in the one respect in which most professions stillfall short, social work is fairly on the siame level aseducation, for the rewards of the social worker are inhis own conscience and in heaven. His life is markedby devotion to impersonal ends and his own satis-faction is largely through the satisfactions procured byhis efforts for others.There is, however, another side even to this aspect

of professional activity. Professions may not be culti-vated for mere profit. Neither, let me add, can theydevelop on the basis of volunteer or underpaid service.Most men and women are fortunately so placed thatthe career they adopt must afford them the incomenecessary to their existence and development. Well-trained men and women cannot, as a rule, be attractedto a vocation that does not promise a living wage inreturn for competent service. Am I mistaken in think-ing that not infrequently the inner joy attached tophilanthropic endeavor has seemed to those in controla more complete satisfaction of the worker's legitimatedesires than it has seemed, for example, to the workerherself? Here again I am raising a question, notmaking a criticism.Now that we have run through the marks of the pro-fessions and have found that on the whole at this stagesocial work is hardly eligible, it is fair to ask whether


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 21we have not been simply engaged in verbal quibbling.Has an analysis of this kind any practical significance?

It seems to me that it has. For example: the socialworker is at times perhaps somewhat too self-confident;social work has suffered to some extent from one of thevices associated with journalism, excessive facility inspeech and in action. Let us suppose for a momentthat our reflection on the differences between the ac-cepted professions and social work reminds the socialworker at crucial moments that he is, as social worker,not so much an expert himself as the mediator whoseconcern it is to summon the expert: will not his ob-servation be calmer, his utterance more restrained, bethe difficulty he encounters economic, educational, orsanitary? He will, I mean, be conscious of his depend-ence, and this consciousness will tend to induce caution,thoroughness, and moderation. For if social work isnot definite enough to be called a profession, the socialworker will at least be less cock-sure than the profes-sional man whom he calls in. Is it not possible thatpart of the vast army of reaction is made up of thoseneedlessly terrified by the occasionally reckless^andperhaps somewhat baselessconfidence of the reformer?If so, failure to realize the limitations of social workfrom the professional point of view is not without prac-tical consequences.Matthew Arnold somewhere quotes Goethe as say-

ing: "To do is easy; to think is hard". There is asense in which the remark is true. If we mean routinedoing and fundamental thinking, then truly to do iseasy, to think is hard. But there is a sense in whichthe remark is false. For if we mean by doing, effectivedoing, and by thinking the facile movement of sugges-


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22 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?tion, then to think is easy, to do is hard. The easyimpatient sweep of progressive recommendation, char-acteristic of even the best progressive journalism, isone thing; the working out of a practical problem isquite another. I know of nothing more difficult thanto take hold of a definite situation in sanitation oreducation and to make it better. Nor is it only or insome cases mainly the iniquity and perversity of menthat are at fault; our impatience may occasionally beunjust, if it is due to any such view. The problems arein themselves intricate; our resources are inadequate;our powers, especially in dealing with others, are rela-tively slight and work slowly. In the sense in whichwe are now speaking, Goethe's saying may be reversed:to think is easy, to do is hard.

I have no desire to discourage social workers; stillless do I want to bring aid or comfort to the enemy.I do not want to diminish the vigor of any attack thatcan be made upon poverty, ignorance, disease, selfish-ness; but for the moment I am, ignoring all else, lookingat the method of the social worker from the merelyprofessional standpoint. Now when social work be-comes thoroughly professional in character and scien-tific in method, it will be perceived that vigor is notsynonymous with intelligence. Moreover, vigor cannotsucceed without intelligence. The battles that socialwork wages will not be won by phrases which too oftenserve as a substitute for experience and knowledge,but by trench,warfare carried on by men and womenwho have learned every inch of the ground over whichthey must fight.

I spoke a moment ago of journalism. I would notbe understood as discrediting effective and able journal-


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IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION? 23istic work. Its limitations however are obvious, andby none are they more acutely felt than by some ofthose who are compelled by the necessities of the caseto labor within them. What I mean to point out hereis this: that a profession needs in these days a formof expression and record that is scientific rather thanjournalistic in character. The newspapers, the weeklyand monthly periodicals, more or less serve social workas far as journalistic publicity is concerned. Nowwhile it is doubtless still advisable to concentrate thismaterial in journals expressly devoted to social workfor news-propaganda and agitation, it is important toremember that we do not thus rise above the journalisticto the scientific or professional level. A professionmust find a dignified and critical means of expressingitself in the form of a periodical which shall describein careful terms whatever work is in progress; and itmust from time to time register its more impressiveperformances in a literature of growing solidity andvariety. To some extent the evolution of social worktowards the professional status can be measured by thequality of publication put forth in its name. I cannotpretend to such familiarity with the Hterature of socialwork as to warrant me in passing an opinion as to howfar its periodical or its book literature is impressive,scientific, or professional in quality; but I believe thepoint is one which might be profitably considered bythose who wish social work to be taken as seriously asmedicine or engineering.At the moment, therefore, it may beobserve that

I am not endeavoring to be very positiveit may bethat social work will gain if for the time being it be-comes uncomfortably conscious that it is not a profes-


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24 IS SOCIAL WORK A PROFESSION?sion in the sense in which medicine and en^neeringare professions; that if medicine and engineering havecause to proceed with critical care, social work has evenmore. The father of the late President Oilman wasonce asked whether his son Daniel had "chosen hisprofession". "I don't know," he replied, "Daniel isalways working rather than professing."But after all, what matters most is professional

spirit. All activities may be prosecuted in the genuineprofessional spirit. In so far as accepted professionsare prosecuted at a mercenary or selfish level, law andmedicine are ethically no better than trades. In so faras trades are honestly carried on, they tend to risetowards the professional level. Social work appealsstrongly to the humanitarian and spiritual element.It holds out no inducement to the worldly,^neithercomfort, glory, nor money. The unselfish devotion ofthose who have chosen to give themselves to makingthe world a fitter place to live in can fill social workwith the professional spirit and thus to some extentlift it above all the distinctions which I have been atsuch pains to make. In the long run, the first, mainand indispensable criterion of a profession will be thepossession of professional spirit, and that test socialwork may, if it will, fully satisfy.


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Is Social Work a Profession Abraham Flexner

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