Social work class

Social work class

Contents

TOC o “1-3” h z u Introduction PAGEREF _Toc385415978 h 1Social Darwinism; PAGEREF _Toc385415979 h 1Freedmen’s Bureau; PAGEREF _Toc385415980 h 2The poor laws; PAGEREF _Toc385415981 h 2The settlement house movement; PAGEREF _Toc385415982 h 3Charles Loring Brace; PAGEREF _Toc385415983 h 4Social security; PAGEREF _Toc385415984 h 5

IntroductionSocial work class is a group of individuals who fought for development and advocated for their rights in the better part of slavery error. The following points outline how the citizens came out as victors after periods of grave torture and slavery;

Social Darwinism;In the 19th century, people believed in the natural cause of action, for instance, anything or rather everything happened for a given reason. Social Darwinism is renamed after the great scientist; Charles Darwin. Darwin is associated with the formulation of this trait, having been known for his famous book; natural selection of species, it is believed that, Charles is behind the coming up of this policy.

In a nutshell, social Darwinism is the natural alignment of events, i.e. survival for the fittest; it is believed that, in a man’s life everything happens for a reason. Events such as; poverty, floods, economic crisis among others are believed to be natural cause of action and these events are believed to have a self-balancing effect over a period of time, where it seeks to correct itself back to normalcy. Charles believed that every event in a man’s calendar had its own self-correcting technique where it seeks return everything back to normal.

Social Darwinism was applied to offset the natural imbalances of power among; groups, races, individuals and nations. Due to its mantra; “survival for the fittest”, it is arguably believed that a self-correcting technique would naturally formulate itself and seek to regulate this imbalance.

Freedmen’s Bureau;This is a federal agency that was formed in the United States of America to offer aiding and protection services to the freed blacks in South America immediately after the civil war. This agency was established though an act in the year 1865, and was to perform its functions for one year after the termination of war. Through Veto powers, a bill that sought to extends its useful powers was vetoed in the year 1866 by the then president; Andrew Johnson, who in his view, continuation of war forces in peaceful time were unconstitutional and unwarranted.

The Freedmen’s bureau was formed to perform the following functions; it was the most superior tool of reconstruction, to undergo relief work for the blacks and whites in war stricken areas, served as a regulatory tool for black labor under the dispensation of new rules and conditions, administration of the rule of justice in case concerning the blacks, control and management of confiscated and abandoned property, and promotion and support for education for the blacks.

To a large extent, the bureau operated as a political driving machine, it held most of the voting power of the Americans, it organized and directed all the blacks votes for the republican party, due to this division of votes, the Southerners hated them. With the influence of the congressional plan of reconstruction, a new setting of state governments of blacks was established on the south; hence this led to the termination of the bureau on first July, 1869.

The poor laws;Before the year 1834, the cost and expense associated with looking and catering for the poor was gradually proving to be more expensive as the years went by. These associated and relative costs cost was catered for by the middle and upper classes in each and every town through local taxation system that was managed by the relative regulatory bodies. This led to the questioning by the middle and upper classes of whether they were paying the poor to be lazier and develop a tendency of avoiding work. This reason led to the federal government of the United States of America to introduce a new law known as, ‘poor law’, in the year 1834. This law was meant to cushion the poor against cost of living, abolish beggars and implement a universal system that would cater for the poor across the states. With dispensation of the new law, the relevant parishes were established and grouped into unions; each and every set of union had to construct a workhouse if they did not have one. These workhouses were meant to house the poor in conducting their day to day activities, expect only in given special conditions.

The living conditions inside the workhouses were unfriendly and unfavorable, they were deliberately harsh and it only gave a chance to the individuals who were in need of help and were willing and able to ask for it. The poor families were split up and housed in different sections of the workhouse, they were also made to wear identical uniform and their diet was unfriendly and monotonous. Apart from this, here were also a given set of rules and regulations that were to be followed in the workhouses.

With the introduction of the poor law, several discrepancies made it to the headlines with great concerns of how the poor were being treated. One such workhouse is the ‘Andover workhouse’; reliable reports showed that, starved inmates were on most cases found eating rotting flesh from their bones. The government responded by laying down stringent measures in fighting against the animosity, these included undergoing regular inspections across all the workhouses in the state.

The settlement house movement;This movement began in the year 1886 when Stanton Coit (disciple of Felix Adler), established new neighborhood on the lower side of Manhattan. The residents in the neighborhood guild organized clubs for Italian and Jewish young boys. A constituent organization offered favorable programs for the immigrant girls. Due to the solid support from the Jewish benefactors, the two organizations merged to develop a university settlement. Within a period of twenty eight years of the neighborhood settlement foundations, four hundred settlements houses were developed in the United States of America. The eventualities of World War 2 led to the settlements movement being regarded as non-denominational though a few of them integrated and adapted the Jewish and Christian lifestyles.

The settlement house movement scheme offered the following benefits to the residents; through the settlement movement, the Jewish female immigrants were able to access varied opportunities that they weren’t able to access through the other institutions, friendship between the Jewish residents in Chicago was solidified which led to promotion of social advancement, the Jewish residents especially women were able to find real time romance from the settlements, through the settlements many women lives were transformed by the nature of the meaningful livelihood that they found at the settlements, the settlement movement was the root that sustained social reform through; reforms in public education, housing, recreation, education, employment and recreational services. The board members of the settlement scheme were good for leadership roles and in donations.

Charles Loring Brace;

Charles is an American philanthropist who was in the frontline advocating for social reforms in the year 1855. He is solidly remembered for his contribution to the development of the modern foster care movement and is widely remembered for kicking off the orphan train movement activity in the early 19th century and also his contribution in laying down the foundation of the children’s aid society.

Charles contributed to the social welfare cycle in America through the following; he fostered and offered parenthood roles to the orphans, he contributed strongly towards the emigration plan. Brace assumed the role of placing children into the farm families of the northern side of the New York state immediately after the civil war. He transported the children from orphanages, lodgings, streets, or the private homes and brought them to cities and towns where local co-coordinators had created positive interest in taking over the program.

In the emigration plan strategy; Brace abolished the outdated culture of indenture, in this, he ensured that the children who had been taken to the foster homes were given the amnesty of leaving the premises if they were unsatisfied with the placement process.

Social security;In the year 1935, social security act was passed into law under the stewardship of the then president; Franklin Roosevelt, this process was part of the new deal program for the citizens of the United States of America. This act led to the establishment of two major insurance programs, for instance; the federal state program of unemployment compensation and that of old age retirement insurance policy. This ac further provided for federal grants that were meant to assist the states with programs such as; the aged, the disabled, vocational rehabilitation, public health services and the disabled. In the act, provisions were made in such a manner that the old-age insurance paid benefits were proportionate to actual earnings for citizens aged over 65, and all the reserve funds were accumulated through the payroll tax control system over the employers and employees at the rate of 1%.

Social security funds were hugely invested in federal securities (long-term bonds), this offered a higher return for the investment pooling. The government further made an amendment that the funds should also be invested in stocks and government bonds as these would assure a higher return volume in the investment venture. It was believed that the underlying costa from this program would be less than the revenues being generated and this would boost the income capacity for the federal government. Administration of factors such as; disability insurance, retirement benefits and survivors led to the market imbalance especially with the underlying fact that individual investment accounts were administered.

Conclusion

The citizens proved to be more organized and laid strategic objectives in the struggle from the slavery error, this enabled them to fight against all odds and emerge as victors.

PART TWO:

Question 3;

In the first half of 19th century, the second evangelical liberation traversed through the nation, this led to rise of profound religious activities. During this period of second liberalization, women rights and concerns echoed through the sates and led to their rise to stardom, this fully transformed and changed the lives of women who lived in these states. The chief convert in the women lives was the young group of women who had the chance of having gone to school and were enlightened, through the young women efforts; other women lives were fully transformed.

Firstly, women played a phenomenal role in market revolution; this was affected by the desire to revolutionize on the dynamic gender roles. Market revolution is the commercialization of the static economic life and doing away with the traditional norm of subsistence farming that was a day-to-day ordeal of the American citizens. A define example is the coming up of the textile industry in Lowell, Massachusetts, this was due to the unlimited contribution from women as they played a major role in weaving and spinning clothes in these mills.

Another contribution from women is the call for morally upright standards, men were known to be the most morally upright beings, on the contrary, they used the their moral powers to play major roles in power and political stadia, they also treated their women with the least dignity and usually regarded them as house assistants and believed that women couldn’t make any role to define the future of the nation. With the rising settlement movement scheme that led to the introduction of religious and education liberalization. Many women rose to the stardom and advocated for their rights and the rights of the fellow women. Women like; Jane Adams, Ellen Gates Starr contributed to the foundation of ‘Hull House’ located in the western side of Chicago in the year 1889, this was institution chiefly designated for the women, so that they could educate themselves and takeover the leadership roles. The main role of the women significantly changed over the time and led to more women being educated thus, led to the uprising effect in the fight for morally upright standards and to the women taking their roles as housewives, but people who had the same capacity as men to influence and take up leadership roles.

Creation of political awareness and inculcating political rights to women was another significant phenomenon of social reform that was brought into light by women. In the United States of America, women had no right to exercise their constitutional duty of voting leaders into power; this was due to lack of education and the rude treatment that men accorded to their women. Due to the second liberalization through evangelical activities that led to the uprising call for education for women, they were able to acquire education and skills necessary to take on the leadership roles.

In conclusion, women initiated their path to their liberalization in social reform stadia. This was affected due to the natural rude treatment that men treated and accorded their ladies with. As the saying goes, ‘behind every successful man lies a woman behind him’, this led to more women rising to the epitome of social reforms.

Works cited

Carson Mina. Settlement House Movement: US Women History. New York, Kaplan Publishing, 1985. Print.

Peter Peirce. The Freedmen’s Bureau: Operation of the Freedmen’s Bureau in the South. Michigan. Butterworths. 1916. Print.

Oliver Bohren. Theory Development Processes in the Social Sciences: The Case of Stochastic Choice Theory. Journal of Economic Psychology. 2003. Print.

Robert Bannister. Social Darwinism: Science and Myth on Liberty, Society and Politics. McGraw Hill Professional. 1995. Print.

Johnson Creedy. Social Insurance in Transition. Columbia university press. 1988. Print.