Last Updated on January 27, 2023 by Team TSW

This article aims at helping you understand an important social work method through which the deprived and the oppressed sections of society seek changes to achieve social justice. After reading this piece, you would be able to understand the social action concept, scope and skills required to carry out social action. Social action has grown along with human society. There has hardly been any age in social evolution when people have not grouped themselves and joined hands to protest against social, economic and political injustice. Though struggles did not always achieve their goals, but made authorities aware of the emotions of the deprived, who wanted to secure a more humane society. With the advent of professional social work education, social action received an academic status by recognizing it as one of social work methods.

Social Action Definitions

There is no universally accepted definition of social action. Let’s look at some of the widely used definitions so that we can get an idea of how different scholars look at social action :-

☰     Mary Richmond

“Mass betterment through propaganda and social legislation”

☰     Gabriel Britto

“Social action is a conflictual process of varying intensity initiated and conducted by the masses or by a group of elites, with or without the participation of the masses in the action against the structures or institutions or policies or programmes or procedures of the government and/or relevant agencies and/or power groups to eradicate/control any mass socio-economic-political problem with a view to bringing betterment to any section of the under-privileged at a level larger than that of a sociologically defined community”

☰     Friedlander

“Social action is an individual, group or community effort, within the framework of social work philosophy and practice that aims to achieve social progress, to modify social policies and to improve social legislation and health and welfare services”

☰     Roger Baldwin

“Organized effort to change social and economic institutions as distinguished from social work or social service, the fields which do not characteristically cover essential changes in the established institutions. Social action covers movements of political reform, industrial democracy, social legislation, racial and social justice, religious freedom and civil liberty; its techniques include propaganda, research and lobbying.”

☰     Paull

“Those organized and planned activities that attempt to influence the social distribution of status, power and resources.”

☰     Coyle

“Social action is the attempt to change the social environment in ways, which will make life more satisfactory. It aims to affect not individuals but social institutions, laws, customs, communities.”

Social action is a great instrument to empower the deprived and to attain social, economic and political justice. It tries to bring changes in an unjust social and economic order. Based on aforesaid definition we can conclude that there are two schools. One school is of the opinion that social action should be confined to seeking the goals within the existing social, economic and political framework. Second school is of the view that the methods could be legal, or if the situation so warrants not so legal, specially when legally permissible methods fail.

Concept

There are situations in the social environment such as inequalities, injustice, discrimination, which brings in misery and hardship to certain section of society. When these problems even after much efforts are not resolved amicably, these circumstances then call for social action. Social action is considered as very controversial method of social work practice because of its area of operation and strategies used. It has brought about a lot of debate among the social work practitioners as it addresses and uses the conflict present in the social system to realize the goal of social justice and empowerment.

Objectives

The objective is to create an environment where all the residents of society live a life free from discrimination, inequalities and injustice. Mishra (1992) has identified following goals:-  

1. Prevention of needs.
2. Solution of mass problems.
3. Improvement in mass conditions. 
4. Influencing institutions, policies and practices.
5. Introduction of new mechanisms or programmes.
6. Redistribution of power and resources (human, material and moral).
7. Decision-making. 
8. Effect on thought and action structure.
9. Improvement in health, education and welfare. 

Thus, it is safe to say that social action is a method of professional social work which makes people aware of their social, political, economical and cultural rights. At the same time bring changes in the societies where certain sections are deprived of aforesaid rights. Strategies employed to bring the change at times are radical and that’s what make it controversial.

Tools of Social Action

There are different tools for different circumstances. The issue at hand determines the tools. Whatever the tools are, the important thing is to have a clear understanding of issues in organizing movements. Let us look at these tools:-

Tools	Techniques
Direct Action	1. Picketing 2. Marches 3. Renouncing Honors 4. Haunting 5. Fraternization
Non-Cooperation	1. Strikes 2. Boycott 3. Tax-Refusal
Intervention	1. Sit In 2. Reversal Strikes 3. Obstruction
Gandhian Model	1. Samrachna (Reconstruction) 2. Satyagraha ( Insistence On Truth) 3. Ahimsa ( Non-Violence)

Conclusion

This method of social work is mainly focused to protect the rights and interests of marginalized people. To achieve this ambitious task, the deprived section of society comes into conflict with the system and makes the power and resources available to the masses which were in the hands of the privileged few. Aim of this method is to address social, economic, political, cultural, ecological and ethical issues present in society.