African Region

The Global Agenda for Social Work and Social Development is a joint venture between the International Association for Schools of Social Work (IASSW), the International Council on Social Welfare (ICSW) and the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW). The team that leads the Global Agenda for the African region is Antoinette Lombard (South Africa) and Janestic Twikirize (Uganda) for IASSW; Judith Kaulen (Zimbabwe) for ICSW and Charles Mbugua (Kenya) for IFSW. Abye Tasse (IASSW) and Charles Abbey (ICSW) provide the link between the Africa region and the Global Coordinating Group of the Global Agenda. The Africa region is committed to the institutionalization of the African Observatory for the Global Agenda for Social Work and Social Development. The process towards this end commenced with individual discussions and by preparing the data collection instruments. The Africa region used two international conferences as a platform to launch the Global Agenda Dialogue; to articulate mechanisms to solicit participation for collecting data on the theme, Promoting social and economic equalities; and to start coordinating the work in the region. The first was the International Consortium for Social Development (ICSD) conference in Uganda in July 2013. The IFSW African Regional Conference, hosted by the National Association for Social Work South Africa (NASW:SA) in September 2013, provided a further platform to discuss the Global Agenda, to plan and coordinate activities (in particular, to solicit and mobilize participation in the data gathering actions) and to agree recommendations to the United Nations and others. Data on the first pillar of the Global Agenda, namely Promoting social and economic equalities, were obtained by means of case studies and an online survey. In both instances, a set of questions guided the data gathering processes. Colleagues could choose to respond to the survey or send in a case study or do both. The purpose of the data instruments was to gather data on activities/experiences/examples/case studies on how social work and development educators and practitioners promote social and economic equality. The data gathering instruments clearly stated that participation was voluntary; that all the data would be captured for the envisaged Africa Regional Observatory and would be a source of information for teaching, practice and research purposes, including research reports and professional and scientific publications. The data gathering instruments were directed at social work and social development practitioners, academics and students. The call for participation was circulated amongst various academic and practitioner networks within the Africa region. Seven case studies were received, albeit in different formats; two from South Africa, four from Uganda and one from Kenya. A total of 188 responses were received for the online survey. In view of the limited scope of this observatory report, the discussion will only focus on an analysis of the case studies. The following section will present a preliminary view on how social workers and social development practitioners in the region see their role in promoting social and economic equalities; what activities they engage in and how they succeed in reducing social and economic inequalities. Seven case studies in three countries cannot claim to be the voice of Africa; however they offer, within the qualitative context of case studies and taken with other evidence, significant pointers to the current social and 528848 ISW0010.1177/0020872814528848International Social WorkGlobal Agenda for Social Work and Social Development: African Region research-article2014