Conceptual muddle, practical dilemma - Human rights, social development and social work education

A clear understanding of the concept of human rights is fundamental to social work that places a priority on social development as a strategy for social justice; this paper illustrates the difficulty in applying the concept by reference to the Asia-Pacific area. Social workers should take a position on human rights and social justice, weighing conceptual, cultural and political aspects. This is a prerequisite to defining feasible strategies, based on a view of the relationships between idealism and pragmatism and between universalism and relativism. For social work educators, it is a prerequisite to curriculum design for social development.