SOCIAL WORK HANDOUTS

HISTORY OF SOCIAL WELFARE

Objectives:

 Understand the history of social welfare both foreign and local settings
 Identify and discover the emergence of various social welfare activities and or
services
 Value the trends and integration of the previous and advanced social welfare
activities
 Compare and explore the social welfare activities both foreign and local settings

A. BEGINNING IN ANCIENT TIMES

 Helping the needy and the distressed is an old civilization itself although not
necessarily on a formal organized basis.
 In ancient china, refuge was provided for the sick and the poor; also, provisions
for distributing clothing and feeding the unfortunate.
 In Greece and Rome there were “Xenodochia” or guest houses for the custody
and care of the various classes for the unfortunate.
 Almsgiving was recognized by the religious as a duty or means of obtaining
grace for the giver.
 It was only slightly more than 100 years ago that the magnitude of social problem
made it necessary to organize under private and public initiatives services for the
needy.
 Problems of destitution, maladjustment, physical and mental illnesses were dealt
with by:
1. The family and the tribe;
2. The church;
3. Private philanthropy;
4. Community; and
5. Government

B. OLD WORLD BACKROUND (European Beginnings)

 Became the most powerful incentive for benevolence and charity, particularly in
Jewish and Christian’s religious teachings.
  Charity was motivated primarily by the desire of merits of good deeds for eternal
life.
 According to Christian teachings, charity gave the recipient of almsgiving
dignity whereas almsgiving ennobled the generous giver.
1. The early Christians helped one another when facing poverty;
2. Medieval church entrusted the administration of charity to the bishop, local
priests and deacons;
3. With the acceptance of Christianity as state religion, institution for the poor were
established in monasteries, serving as orphanages, as homes for the old, sick
and the handicapped as a refuge for the homeless.
 Missionaries devoted their time to missionary searching, collecting alms, and
distributing relief to the destitute. They established charitable institutions.
 Later on, institutions were replaced by “hospitals” for old and sick persons,
orphans, abandoned children and pregnant women.
 Common Chest

◦ The prototype of modern day community chest. Martin Luther conceived

that there should be a “common chest” for the receipt of food, money, and
clothing to assist the needy.
The responsibility for the collection of funds and distribution of relief to the
destitute, the sick and orphans was assumed by the local authorities but the church
wardens played the leading role in relief administration.
 Individualization

◦ During the 16th century the Spanish philosopher Juan Luis de Vives
advanced the idea that the fate of the individual poor deserves attention.
There should be investigation of the social conditions of every pauper
family.

◦ He recommended that aid be provided through vocational training,

employment and rehabilitation instead of the customary distribution of
alms.
 Hamburg Experiment (1788)

◦ Professor Busch, Commissioner for Public Relief introduced a district

system of investigation and distribution of relief to individual paupers
through volunteer committees.

◦ The poor were interviewed and the individual needs of each family were
determined.
 ◦ Children and youth were trained in elementary courses and an industrial
school was attached to the central orphan asylum.
 Military Workhouse (1790)

◦ Was established in Munich by Benjamin Thompson, later Count of

Rumford to prevent begging by able-bodied paupers.

◦ The workhouse manufactured clothing for the army by utilizing the

employable poor.
Hamburg and Munich Relief System were both financed by taxation and by
collections of voluntary gifts
 Elbergfeld System (1853)

◦ The city of Elberfeld introduced the idea of financing relief exclusively by

public taxation
 Daughters of Charity (1633)

◦ The forerunners of social work. The organization was founded by St.

Vincent de Paul, who recruited young women of the peasant class for
charitable work. They were trained in nursing the poor.

◦ Father Vincent de Paul was the most important reformer of the charities
of the Catholic Church during 17th century.

C. ENGLISH SOCIAL WELFARE

 Religious Foundations

◦ In Medieval England, care of the poor was an activity of the church.

◦ The main motive for almsgiving was the salvation of the soul of the
donor.
 Early Charities

◦ Relief to the destitute was first distributed by the priest of the parish with
the help of the church wardens and deacons.

◦ In the 13th and 14th centuries, religious orders and church institution
relieved the parish churches from the most of the duties of caring for the
poor.

◦ From the 12th to the 15th century, the work of the church was
supplemented by the relief activities of the guilds.
 ◦ Craft and merchant guilds, rural fraternities and social or church guilds
were organized primarily for the purpose of mutual self-help,
brotherhood and fellowship.

◦ The English (Elizabethan) Poor Law of 1601

◦ Remained for long time basis of English social welfare. It was a

codification of preceding poor relief legislations starting with the Statute of
Laborers in 1349.
 Its salient points were:

◦ Primary responsibility for the care of the poor belonged to the individual’s
family and relatives;

◦ Those who would not be supported by relatives had to be cared for by the
parish or the local community;

◦ Only the poor who were bona fide residents of the parish were eligible for
assistance;

◦ The parish must maintain the impotent poor from voluntary contributions
of the parishioners through collections; and

◦ A general tax was levied to provide the “poor tax” and was the main
source for the financing of poor relief

◦ In England up to early part of the 20th century, Personal Failure was

considered the main cause of poverty;
 The Poor Law distinguished three (3)classes of poor;
a. The able-bodied poor;
b. The impotent poor; and
c. Dependent children

 Principle of Investigation

◦ Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847), a parish minister in Scotland introduced

the philosophy of personal, parochial relief. He organized a program of
private charity on the principle of investigation of each case of destitution
on an individual basis and of attempting a solution to the cause of distress.
He stressed that a personal interest in the fate of the destitute is essential.
 Individual Approach (prototype of casework)

◦ Fifty years after Chalmer’s pioneer work, the London Charity

Organization Society organized a program of relief based on his idea,
and laid the foundation of the individual approach in social work now
known as “casework.”
 Social Reform

◦ Edwin Chadwick, the first pioneer in public hygiene, supervised

investigation into the causes of poverty and the means of an effective
social reform.

◦ He recommended a system of government providing under central

direction decent aid to the poor, a sound public health protection,
adequate housing, recreation and public schools for the entire population.
It was many decades before his vision became accepted concept of
society.
 Charity Organization Society

◦ The C.O.S encouraged the growth of private charities, the giving of

donations and bequest in their behalf, and the initiatives among the
volunteers for bringing individual aid to families in economic distress.

◦ The C.O.S believed that the individual was responsible for his poverty
and that the acceptance of public relief destroyed self-respect of the
pauper should therefore be asked to exert all his abilities to maintaining
himself.

◦ The C.O.S used well-to-do volunteer to give aid the poor but their main
emphasis was to exert moral influence that would change the way of life of
the poor.

◦ The example of the London C.O.S of 1869 was followed by other cities in
England and the United States. It developed cooperation between poor
relief and private charities, succeeded in eliminating some fraudulent set
ups, prevented duplication of support and strengthened the concept of
rehabilitation of the poor. It formed the group work for casework in
individual aid, and community organization.

 Settlement House ( Modern Community Center)

◦ It was introduced in London during the latter half of the 19 th century and
the first one was called Toyn Bee Hall.

◦ The basic purpose was to established contact between the educated men
and women and the poor for their mutual benefit, so that by common work
and studies they could exercise a cultural influence beyond the teaching of
special subjects. It reached out to children and adults.
 ◦ The attitude of a superior “lady bountiful” ,which still prevailed in charity
societies was replaced by cooperation and learning on the part of both
instructors and workers attending lectures and discussion groups.
 Social Research

◦ The third important factor that influenced the social philosophy and the
practice of poor relief in England.

◦ The most important among the surveys was that made by Charles Booth
started in 1886.

◦ The study showed that one-third of the London population was living on or
below the “poverty line”.

◦ These findings disproved the previous theory that poverty was

always the fault of the individuals.

◦ The studies showed that the deterrent features of the poor laws were no
solution and the human suffering from destitution was often created by:

◦ Insufficient wages;

◦ Environment,;

◦ Inadequate housing ;and

◦ Unhealthy sanitary equipment.

◦ The findings of social research showed the necessity of introducing more

effective measures of social reform.
 Beveridge Report 1941

◦ The Beveridge Report, named after the man who headed the committee
which prepared the report, is the basis of the present social security
program of England.
 Its underlying philosophy is that the British people should be secured against
want and other social evils and that security could be rendered while preserving
the personal freedom, enterprises and responsibility of the individual for his
family.

◦ It declared that the goal of social security was to guarantee a basic level of
income for every citizen with his own efforts, so that his initiatives to
secure for himself and his family more than a mere subsistence minimum
should not be stilled.
 England’s Social Security Program
 ◦ The present structure of the British social security program follows the
recommendation of the Beveridge Report. It consist of:

◦ Social Insurance
◦ Family Allowances
◦ Public Assistance

D. AMERICAN SOCIAL WELFARE

 American social welfare was founded on the concepts of the English Poor Law
which remained the basis for public welfare in U.S up to end of the 19 th century.
 Paupers, beggars and vagrants were regarded as criminals. Whatever the cause
of his distress, the pauper was regarded as a morally deficient person.
 Today the principle continue to be upheld that the individual is primary
responsible for his welfare but that the community should established a basic
measure of security in areas beyond the individual’s control.

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT SOCIAL

WELFARE
 First Phase: Poor Relief- Almshouses

◦ Relief was given to paupers in various ways:

◦ Outdoor relief to paupers in their own home;
◦ Farming out to the lowest bidder who undertook to care for a single
“pauper”;
◦ Contract usually with the lowest bidder for the care of all paupers in a
given locality;
◦ Care in almshouses which was under the direct control of public officials;
and
◦ Indenture or “binding out” a form of apprenticeship.

 Second Phase: State (public) institutional care for special groups

◦ These programs were designed to remove some groups of inmates form

undifferentiated misery of incarceration in the local almshouses and
indicated recognition of a special claim these persons had on the
sympathies of the community.
 Institutions were set up for:

◦ Care of the insane;

◦ Care of the mentally deficient;
 ◦ Care of the blind; and
◦ Care of the deaf and deaf-mute

 Third Phase: State Board of Charities and Corrections

◦ The purpose was state supervision of the administration of institutional

care. The first state board was organized in Massachusetts in 1863. it
emphasizes the family system by placing children and adults in the
community whenever it was not absolutely necessary to keep them in
almshouses, hospitals, or asylums.
 These state agencies had the power:

◦ To recommend institutional changes to legislature.

◦ To compel the institution to carry out the intent of the relevant statutes as
interpreted

 Fourth Phase: Aid to the needy without institutionalization

◦ Special measures were enacted by state legislatures to meet the needs of

special groups without placing them in institution.

◦ Pension for the blind- Illinois, 1903

◦ Mother’s aid- Missouri, 1911

◦ Old age pension- Montana, 1923

 In 1909 President Theodore Roosevelt called the First White House
Conference on Dependent Children.

◦ It inspired the creation of the U.S Children’s Bureau.

◦ This was the first tacit assumption of federal responsibility for social
welfare.
 Fifth Phase: Federal Government entry into Social Welfare

◦ The welfare patterned throughout the nation on the eve of the Great
Depression was a patchwork consisting of local, country, state and
private activities. Three fourth of all the aid to indigents was provided
under public measure. However the services were far from adequate.
They were in a real sense simply a preferential form of poor relief.

◦ The Great Depression of the 1930’s hit the U.S with a jarring impact.
Millions of unemployed had no place to go and there was a mass
destitution. Now the Federal government had to step in with a series of
emergency relief measures.
 ◦ Previous to this, the states were mainly responsible for social welfare.

1. Emergency Relief and Reconstruction Act (1932) - to assist Industry and

agriculture to provide funds to states for relief works.
2. Civilian Conservation Corps (1933) - to provide work opportunity for young
men in the conservation of natural resources.
3. Federal Emergency Relief Act (1933) - provide for grants to states for relief of
unemployment.
4. Work Progress Administration (1935) - a large scale program of relief through
employment in publicly sponsored projects.
 All these measures were considered temporary. It was planned for the federal
government to withdraw for social welfare as soon as the crisis was over. What
happen however was that in the end the federal government assumed the major
responsibility for social welfare, culminating in the passage of the Social Security
Act in 1935.
 Sixth Phase: Social Security

◦ In 1935 the Social Security Act was passed at the instance of President
Franklin Roosevelt. It changed the emphasis from limited aid to a few
needy people to a comprehensive system for the entire population.

◦ It brought much broader resources to bear upon the problems of social

welfare.

◦ It was a new approach to the problem of income maintenance in times of

crisis.
 Seventh Phase: War on Poverty

◦ In 1964 the economic opportunity act was passed and “war on poverty”
became the rallying point. The act was specifically geared to deal with the
problem of poverty, education, manpower training, mental health,
vocational rehabilitation, public health and medical care, housing and
urban development

◦ However, many of the programs started during this period have been
phased out or cut back for lack of federal support.
 MAJOR DEVELOPMENT IN U.S PRIVATE SOCIAL WELFARE

 Charity Organization Societies

◦ A friendly visitors was installed in order to determine the need of every

applicant and necessary measures for each case. (Pioneering in
casework)

◦ Training School for Applied Philanthropy was set up in New York in 1898.
The plan was formulated by Mary Richmond in 1897.(pioneering in social
work education)
 Settlement House

◦ Concept
 It was a place for working people where their high moral and
intellectual capacities were developed to insure full participation in
a democracy as exemplified by the U.S

◦ Hull House (in Chicago)

 Was the settlement house in the U.S. it was founded by Jane
Addams and Ellen Gates Starr in 1889.

◦ Residents of settlement houses became the champion for social reform.

They fought for:
 Equal opportunities for the poor and handicapped; and
 The abolition of prejudice and discrimination against people
because of their skin, religion, race and foreign birth.
 Programs they had
 Boys and girls club
 Kindergarten
 Adult education
 Handicraft
 Art and cultural workshops

BASIC POLICY OF AMERICAN SOCIAL WELFARE

 Basic principle

◦ The individual is primarily responsible for his welfare but the community
should establish a basic measure of security in areas beyond the
individual’s control.
  Basic objective

◦ The development, achievement and happiness of the individual.

 Some basic ideas that influenced social welfare

◦ Protestant Ethic
 One’s life should be a vocation followed with zealous and
disciplined scrupulosity. If a man worked hard and invested his
income, he was likely to prosper.
 Wealth represents meritorious achievement in addition to material
benefits.

◦ Laissez-Faire (free enterprise)

 There should be freedom to invest and trade for men worked
harder when they worked for themselves.

◦ Social Darwinism (survival of the fittest)

 Successful competition in the market place is inevitably
accompanied by hardships and inequalities . Only those fir survive
the competition.

E. PHILIPPINE SOCIAL WELFARE

 Pre-Spanish times

◦ Basic concept : Bayanihan

Damayan

◦ Source of Policies: Maragtas Code

Kalantiao Code
 Spanish Time (1521-1898)

◦ Basic Philosophy
 Religion was the motivation force for charity.

◦ Forms of Charity
 Almsgiving;
 Charitable institutions;
 Hospitals for the poor; and
 ◦ Source of Funding
 Religious order
 Contribution
 Donations of rich individuals; and
 Subsidy from Spanish government (in the Philippines and Spain.
 Significant Developments- Institution established by religious
order

◦ San Lazaro Hospitals, 1578 (took care of indigent beggars and sick
“natives”)

◦ San Juan de Dios Hospital,1596 (took care of indigent and sick

Spaniards)

◦ Hospicio de San Jose,1810 (for the care orphans and the aged)

◦ Asilo de San Vicente de Paul, 1885 (for the care and protection of
indigent and orphaned girls)

◦ Santa Isabel (school for indigent girls)

◦ San Juan de Letran (school for indigent boys)

◦ For the indigent outside of the institution, almsgiving was regularly

practiced by the churches and convents and the affluent individuals and
families.
 First Philippine Republic (1898-1902)

◦ Tandang Sora (Melchora Aquino)

 Took care of the sick and wounded and fed the soldiers

◦ Hilaria Aquinaldo
 Wife of the president of the first republic introduced the concept of
Red Cross.
 American Colonial Period (1899-1946)

◦ Philosophy
 Birth of voluntary organization for social welfare.
 Example : Associated Charities (1917)
 Public Welfare – beginning assumption by the government of its
responsibility for social welfare.
  “Parens Patriae” child welfare concept that it is the duty of the
government to place children in better circumstances, whenever the
parents could not provide adequate care themselves.

◦ Government social welfare

 Pre-war trends, growth and development of child welfare programs
and services
Public Welfare Board (1915)
A government board was set up to coordinate, supervise and regulate the work
of all charitable agencies and organization, individuals and groups, public and private ,
engaged in “social services” work
Child Welfare Laws
Led to the establishment of more child caring institutions:
1. For orphaned, abandoned and neglected children
2. For feeble-minded children
3. For the non-leprous children of leprous parents
4. For the care, training and treatment of juvenile delinquents.
5. Welfareville (1925)- seat of all government child-caring institution located in
Mandaluyong Rizal

During this period Dr. Jose Fabella, Director and later Secretary of Health was
the pioneer in public welfare, later acknowledge as the Father of Philippine Social
Welfare.
Bureau of public Welfare (1941) - under the Dept. of Health & Public Welfare
 Functions:
1. To coordinate, supervise and relate all social services activities.
2. To provide social services to children with special needs
3. To provide public assistance to needy individuals and families.

Public Assistance Service

On May 31, 1941, President Manuel L. Quezon issued an executive order
abolishing the Associated Charities and creating it into a “Public Assistance Service”
under Bureau of Public Welfare.
Private Social Welfare
Associated Charities Inc. of Manila was established by a group of Manila
residents in 1917.
Its objective was to assure community responsibility for social welfare.
 It became the first family welfare agency the first to use “casework” in the
Philippines
 Japanese Occupation

◦ Private individuals, groups and organization undertook relief for pioneers

of war, displaced person
 Post-Liberation Years (Relief and Rehabilitation Period )(1945-1950)

◦ Trends

◦ First assumption by the government of the major responsibility for

social welfare

◦ Establishment and growth of the public assistance program

◦ Emergence of a national social welfare agency

◦ Factor the prompted government social welfare

◦ World War II

◦ Social Unrest (dissident movement

◦ War Relief and Rehabilitation

PCAU (1945)- Philippine Civilian Affairs Unit of the U.S army distributed relief supplies
during the period of liberation.
PRATRA (1945-1950)- Philippine Relief and Trade Rehabilitation Administration, a
trade establishing agency which used its profits for relief.
Rice Wage Formula- it was in connection with PRATRA that Irene Ellis Murphy, UN
consultant on Social Welfare and her group developed the Rice Wage Formula.
RWF consisted of the number 145. According to the Murphy team it took the equivalent
of 154 gantas of rice a month for a family of 5 to be able to meet its basic needs.
Multiply the current price by 145 and the results is the income in pesos needed by the
family to live a month.
WRO (1945-1956) War Relief Office- for the relief and rehabilitation of indigent
victims of war, specially unrecognized guerillas, their widows and orphans. Created by
Congress, the law was the first public assistance program in fact and not only in name.

◦ Social Amelioration
 PACSA (1948-1950), President’s Action Committee on Social
Amelioration was established by President Elpidio Quirino to
counteract social unrest (dissidence). It had a six-point program:
  Health;
 Education;
 Social welfare;
 Agriculture;
 Public works; and
 financing
 It is considered a forerunner of the Philippine Community
Development Program.
 Asuncion A. Perez, was appointed Chairman of PACSA and
became the first woman member of the President’s cabinet.

◦ Public Welfare
 The Bureau of Public Welfare was revived in 1946.
 Social Welfare Commission was created absorbing the Bureau of
Public Welfare. The War Relief Office was placed under the
supervision of the Social Welfare Commission.

◦ Private Social Welfare

 CWAPI (1949)- Council of Welfare Agencies of the Philippines, Inc.
coordinating and planning body for social welfare. Its prime mover
was Minerva Laudico.
 Community Chest (1949)- Community Chest of Greater Manila was
organized for joint fund raising and coordinated financing. Its prime
mover was Irene Ellis Murphy, UN Adviser on Social Welfare
 PASW (1948)- Philippine Association of Social Workers was
organized. Its charter member were:
 Josefa Jara Martinez
 Carmen Montilona Luz
 Agapita Murillo
 Minerva G. Laudico
 Olypia Pia Lozano
 Flora Ruis Palomar
 Felicidad A. Silva

Its main objective was to upgrade and maintain the standards of the social work
profession
 Stabilization of government social welfare (1959’s)

◦ SWA – Social Welfare Administration was created by President Elpidio

Quirino on January 3, 1951 as the Government agency for social welfare.
It absorbed PACSA and SWC.
 ◦ Asuncion A. Perez - was appointed first Social Welfare Administrator.
 its programs consisted of:
 Child Welfare
 Residential Care
 Child aid and placement
 Probation and parole
 Public Assistance
 for indigent war victims
 Victims of dissident operations
 Victims of natural disaster and calamities

OVR (1954) - Office of Vocational Rehabilitation

The office of Vocational Rehabilitation of the Handicapped was set up by law and
placed under the SWA.
• Strengthening Of Government Social Welfare (1960’s)
 UNICEF Assisted Social Services Project- was set up in 1961 to
improve social services to children and families as part of the
country’s total development program. In 1967 it was integrated into
the SWA.
 Significance:
1. Revitalization of child welfare (public and private) from
residential care to the strengthening of the families as part of
the country’s development program. In 1967 it was
integrated into the SWA.
2. Increased professionalization of social work- in service
training and study grants for master’s degree in social
workers in public and private agencies.
• Integrated Social Welfare Program-set up by Mrs. Imelda R. Marcos in
1966 decentralized Welfareville institution and modernized institution care
for children.
• Elsie Gaches Village (1964)- for mental retardates
• Reception and Study Center (1964)
• Nayon ng Kabataan for Orphans
• Marillac- home for girls with special problems.
• Don Vicente Madrigal Home- for deliquents boys.
• Golden Acres- home for the aged and or infirm.
• Creation of the Department of Social Welfare
 On June 15, 1968 President Marcos signed RA 5416 creating the
DSW
 Policy: “it is the responsibility of the government to provide a
comprehensive program of social welfare services designed to
ameliorate the conditions of distressed Filipinos, particularly those
who are handicapped by reason of poverty, youth, physical and
mental disability , illness and old age or who are victims of natural
calamities including assistance to the member of the cultural
minorities to facilitate their integration into the body politics”
 Programs:
 Family and child welfare
 Youth welfare
 Rehabilitation of the handicapped
 General assistance in times of disaster and calamities.

• Other developments during period

 Board Examination for Social Work
1. R.A 4373 signed on June 19, 1965 regulates the practice of
social work agencies.
2. Henceforth every individual practicing social work or
occupying a position calling social work functions must:
3. Possess at least the degree of Bachelor of Science in Social
Work (BSSW).
4. Must be a registered social worker- having successfully
passed the board examination for social work