Strategies for a sustainable and competitive international research environment
In July 2001, ‘The International Association of School of Social Work’ (IASSW) and the ‘International Federation of Social Workers’ (IFSW), passed a mutual definition of social work and declared that ‘Principals of human rights and social justice is fundamental for all social work’.
Based on this definition, research within social work considers its main task to be research for promoting social justice and promote knowledge about socioeconomic injustices in society as well as improving the possibilities for integration of marginalised groups. This includes questions of the structural and institutional relations that cause injustice and social problems, both on a national and a global level. This is why social work is a socio-political field where research and education cannot be separated from its political consequences.
The Department of Social Work at Mid Sweden University (SOA) sees itself as a part of an international research and educational field where knowledge is produced and spread to encourage social justice. An increased international competition and the need for new knowledge within the more and more globalized field of social work lead to a necessity for strategic programmes to face these new challenges.
The research profile at the Department of Social work
The increased national and international research and education within social work demand that we place our resources in the areas where we can keep up with the competition, both nationally and internationally. The research profile of the department, "The Post-modern Challenges of Social Work" has a great capacity to keep up with the competition and also establish itself as a profile that is missing at many other seats of learning, both nationally and internationally.
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