Greening the Social Work Curriculum to Engage in Averting Climate Change Disasters: A Transdisciplinary Approach to Theory and Practice.

This is an online event that will take place on March 24th 2025 from 10:00am to 11:30am. Please register here.

Climate change is one of the greatest social challenges facing contemporary societies. This presentation provides green social work perspectives on what social work academics and practitioners can do to integrate extreme weather events (floods, heat waves, coastal erosions among others) into their daily routines in the academy, in practice and in their lifestyles as citizens living in communities that require nurturing.

Green social work is a holistic, transdisciplinary approach to disasters and social interventions aimed at preventing, and if that fails, responding to them. Green social work integrates insights from the physical scientists such as seismology, vulcanology, civil engineering, physics, chemistry and biology with social sciences theories including anti-oppressive theory and practice and an understanding of people’s interactions with nature and society to care for nature and planet earth by reinforcing the centrality of reciprocity between people, societies, and nature and all it contains. Green social work also encourages the use of artistic forms of communicating the messages from research to diverse audiences. These should follow the principles of equality, acknowledgement of diversity, inclusion, social and environmental justice, and respect and dignity, values essential to anti-oppressive social work theory and practice. This plenary will focus on what people need to learn as well as what to do, regardless of their role or status in society. Green social work argues that every inhabitant on earth has a duty to care for the planet if they expect the planet to provide the resources and ambiance that they need to survive and thrive. Feminist ethics as expressed in the duty to care for others and the expectation to be cared for oneself, are an integral part of green social work in implementing a green approach to taking care of the planet and all it entails.

Dr. Lena Dominelli

Lena Dominelli, PhD, AcSS, holds a Chair in Social Work and is Director of the Programme on Disaster Interventions and Humanitarian Aid at the University of Stirling in Scotland.  She was previously Co-Director at the Institute of Hazards, Risk and Resilience (2010-2016) at Durham University.  She has a specific interest in projects on climate change and extreme weather events including drought, floods, cold snaps and wildfires; earthquakes, volcanic eruptions; disaster interventions; vulnerability and resilience; community engagement; coproduction and participatory action research.  Her research projects include funding from the ESRC, EPSRC, NERC, the Department of International Development, Wellcome Trust and UNICEF. Lena is a prolific writer and has published widely in social work, social policy, and sociology. She currently chairs the IASSW Committee on Disaster Interventions, Climate Change and Sustainability and has represented the social work profession at the United Nations discussions on climate change, since Cancun, Mexico in 2010.  Her latest single authored book is, Social Work During Times of Disasters (2023, Routledge). She has received various honours for her work.