An investigation of social justice: the values, attitudes, and behaviour of newly qualified South African social workers

ABSTRACT Social work in South Africa is currently engaged in a transformational process to adapt its developmental approach based on the pursuit of social justice. Research has indicated that the values, attitudes, and behaviours of newly qualified social workers is a major determining factor in their pursuit of social justice. Consequently, the study reported here aimed to investigate the above-mentioned as pertaining to the achievement of social justice within client systems. The study, which was of a quantitative, cross-sectional nature, collected responses to a standardised psychometric scale from 108 newly qualified social workers, measuring their values, attitudes, and behaviours regarding social justice. The results reveal that South African-based social workers feel impeded in the work for social justice by inadequate training, skill set, and other obstacles, despite being committed to social justice.