The social worker as the Good Samaritan: When my heart did the thinking

Mats Niklasson; Ulrika Hansson Blomkvist

doi:10.1921/swssr.v23i2.2091

Authors

Mats Niklasson Head of Department, Vestibularis Clinic, Center for Sensorimotor Research, Kalmar https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4295-8105
Ulrika Hansson Blomkvist Dedicated Social Worker https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9704-5835

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1921/swssr.v23i2.2091

Keywords:

decision-making, drug addiction, homelessness, the other, the face, social work, collaborative autoethnography

Abstract

Professionally a social worker has to pay attention to both the society’s values and to a client’s personal values. However, a social worker’s personal values are not the least of importance and can’t be ignored. Where could a sharp line be drawn between professional and private values and acting? The problem of decision-making has been pondered over since ancient times when Socrates contended that ‘everyone desires the good.’ Could it then be that for some the profession becomes a calling? This paper uses a collaborative autoethnographic approach with the narrative told by the first author, a female Swedish social worker. The story is about her meeting with a male drug addict living on the streets of London and about the decision she made. As it turned out, her decision would have consequences far beyond her and his imagination. The Introduction was written by the second author in order to provide the scientific framework embedding the first author’s story. Finally, the Discussion was written mutually as an interview

Author Biography

Mats Niklasson, Head of Department, Vestibularis Clinic, Center for Sensorimotor Research, Kalmar

Ulrika Hansson Blomkvist is a dedicated social worker, BA in Social Work.

The last four years she´s spent partly on the streets of London working hard to save a homeless and heavily heroin addicted man´s life. Parallel with this still ongoing support work she´s writing a book about their experiences together.

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