Social Work For Poverty Alleviation 9789819921744

Poverty-Alleviation and Social Work in China
Deping Xiang
Social Work
for Poverty
Alleviation
This series is in line with the major strategies and decisions for China’s poverty
alleviation and the policy that social work expertise should be applied to critical
national strategies. More than 20 experts and scholars from top universities,
including two in the Changjiang Scholars Program and one specializing in poverty
alleviation, carried out a systematic and comprehensive review of poverty alleviation
theories and experience with Chinese characteristics, ranging from anti-poverty
theories (introduction, models, etc.), specific perspectives (community-based, asset-
building, empowerment, etc.), specific targets (children, women, the elderly, etc.),
to specific regions (Chengkou County in Chongqing, the Center for Advancement
of Rural-Urban Sustainability in Guangdong Province, etc.). By focusing on the
three methods of social work, individual work, group work, and community work,
this series showcases how academic research could play a role in national policies
and guidelines. Boasting both academic value and social influence, it serves as a
dedication to China’s completion of a moderately prosperous society in all respects.
Deping Xiang
Social Work for Poverty

Alleviation
Deping Xiang
Wuhan, Hubei, China
Translated by
Haiming Xu Jingjing Guan
Shanghai International Studies University Shanghai Maritime University
Shanghai, China Shanghai, China
ISSN 2731-5924 ISSN 2731-5932 (electronic)

ISBN 978-981-99-2173-7 ISBN 978-981-99-2174-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-2174-4
Jointly published with East China University of Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd.
The print edition is not for sale in China (Mainland). Customers from China (Mainland) please order the
print book from: East China University of Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd.
ISBN of the Co-Publisher’s edition: 978-7-5628-6423-3
Translation from the Chinese language edition: “反贫困社会工作导论” by Deping Xiang, © East China
University of Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd. 2021. Published by East China University of Science
and Technology Press Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
© East China University of Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd. 2023
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Contents
1 An Overview of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

1.1 Relations Between Poverty Relief and Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.1.1 China’s Experience in Tackling Poverty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.1.2 Intrinsic Consistency Between Targeted Poverty
Relief and Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.1.3 New Demands for Targeted Poverty Alleviation
in Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.2 Significance and Role of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work . . . . . . . . 9
1.2.1 The Significance of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work . . . . . . 9
1.2.2 The Role of Social Work in Alleviating Poverty . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.3 Concepts and Methodologies of Poverty-Alleviating Social
Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.3.1 Concepts of Poverty Alleviation Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.3.2 Practical Path of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . 16
1.4 The Space for and the Paths to Social Work’s Involvement
in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.4.1 The Space for Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty
Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.4.2 The Paths to Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty
Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
1.4.3 Challenges Facing Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . 23
1.4.4 Tactics for Developing Poverty Alleviation Social
Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2 Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
2.1 Multi-dimensional Subject Theory of Poverty Alleviation
Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
2.1.1 Multi-dimensional Poverty Requiring Multi-agent
Collaborative Governance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
v
vi Contents
2.1.2 Theoretical Basis for Social Work to Participate

in Poverty Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2.1.3 Theoretical Implication of Social Work’s Participation
in Poverty Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
2.2 Systematic Support Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social
Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
2.2.1 Theoretical Background of Poverty Alleviation
System Support Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
2.2.2 Theoretical Connotation of Poverty Alleviation
System Support Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.2.3 Social Support Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2.2.4 Practical Application of Poverty Alleviation System
Support Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
2.3 Empowerment and Empowerment of Poverty Alleviation
Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
2.3.1 Theoretical Background of Empowerment Theory . . . . . . . . 50
2.3.2 Introduction to the Theory of Weighting
and Energizing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
2.3.3 The Practical Application of Empowerment Theory
in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
2.4 Social Integration Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . 58
2.4.1 The Theoretical Background of Social Integration
Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
2.4.2 The Theoretical Connotation of Social Integration
Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
2.4.3 Practical Application of Social Integration Theory
2.5 Social Capital Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work . . . . . . . . 63
2.5.1 Poverty in the Perspective of Social Capital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
2.5.2 Introduction to the Social Capital Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
2.5.3 Practical Application of Social Capital Theory
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
3.1 Overview of the Social Work Value System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
3.1.1 Values and Value System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
3.1.2 Professional Value System of Social Work and Its
Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
3.2 Development of the Value System of Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.2.1 Basic Values System of Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
3.2.2 Value Ethics of International Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
3.3 China’s Social Work Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
3.3.1 Localization of Social Work Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
3.3.2 The Professional Value of Social Work in China . . . . . . . . . . 82
Contents vii
3.4 Application of Social Work Values in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . 86

3.4.1 People Orientation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
3.4.2 Helping Others to Help Themselves . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
3.4.3 Multi-dimensional Recognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
3.4.4 Targeted Measures for Different Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3.4.5 Increasing Confidence and Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
3.4.6 Protection of Rights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
4 Methods of Social Work in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
4.1 Main Methods of Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
4.1.1 Origin of Social Work Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
4.1.2 Characteristics and Classification of Social Work
Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
4.1.3 Traditional Social Work Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
4.2 Practices of Social Work Methods in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . 98
4.2.1 Practical Background of Social Work Methods
4.2.2 Application of Traditional Social Work Methods
in Poverty Alleviation Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
4.2.3 Developmental Trends of Poverty Alleviation Social
Work Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
4.3 Innovation of Poverty Alleviation Social Work Methods . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.3.1 Characteristics of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.3.2 Innovation of the Methods of Developmental Social
Work in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
4.3.3 Integrated Practices of Poverty Alleviation Social
Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
5 Poverty Alleviation Social Work Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
5.1 Regional Development Assistance Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
5.1.1 Overview of the Regional Development Assistance
Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
5.1.2 Composition of the Regional Development Assistance
Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
5.1.3 Case Study of the Regional Development Assistance
Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
5.2 Community Work Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
5.2.1 Overview of Community Work Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
5.2.2 Composition of Community Work Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
5.2.3 Case Study of the Community Work Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
5.3 Casework Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
5.3.1 Overview of Casework Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
5.3.2 Composition of Casework Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
viii Contents
5.3.3 Case Study of the Casework Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

5.4 Group Work Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
5.4.1 Overview of Group Work Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
5.4.2 Composition of Group Work Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
5.4.3 Case Study of the Group Work Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
6 Factors Involved in Poverty-Curbing Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
6.1 The Clients of Poverty-Curbing Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
6.1.1 Women . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
6.1.2 Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
6.1.3 The Elderly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
6.1.4 The Disabled . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
6.2 Poverty-Curbing Social Workers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
6.2.1 The Roles Played by Poverty-Reducing Social Workers . . . . 157
6.2.2 The Functions of Poverty Alleviation Social Workers . . . . . . 161
6.2.3 The Core Competencies of Poverty-Eliminating
Social Workers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
6.3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
6.3.1 The Core Value—Helping People to Help Themselves . . . . . 166
6.3.2 The Professional Value of Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
6.4 Approaches of Poverty-Reducing Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
6.4.1 Case Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
6.4.2 Group Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
6.4.3 Community Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
6.4.4 Social Work Administration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
7 The Contents of Poverty-Reducing Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
7.1 Participating in Administering Relief and Support to the Poor . . . . . 180
7.1.1 The Professional Advantages of Social Work
Participating in Social Assistance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
7.1.2 The Intervention Methods of Social Work
Participating in Social Assistance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
7.1.3 The Practical Features of Social Work Participating
in Social Assistance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
7.1.4 The Specific Content of Social Work Participating
in Social Assistance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
7.2 Forging Poor People’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
7.2.1 The Manifestations of Capability Poverty Among
the Impoverished . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
7.2.2 The Intervening Paths for Social Work to Improve
the Poor’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
7.2.3 The Specific Content of Social Work Improving
the Poor’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
7.3 Facilitating Relocated Poor People’s Adaptation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Contents ix
7.3.1 The Major Problems Confronting Relocated Poor

People . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
7.3.2 The Specific Content of Social Work Facilitating
Relocated People’s Adaption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
7.4 Protecting the Left-Behind Children in Poverty-Stricken Areas . . . . 196
7.4.1 The Major Problems Concerning the Left-Behind
Children in Poverty-Stricken Areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
7.4.2 The Major Tasks of Social Work Participating
in the Care and Protection of Left-Behind Children . . . . . . . 198
7.4.3 The Specific Contents of Social Work Participating
in the Care and Protection of Left-Behind Children . . . . . . . 199
7.5 Offering Pastoral Care and Love to Other Special Groups
of People in Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
7.5.1 Providing Services for the Elderly with Special
Difficulties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
7.5.2 Providing Services for Other Groups of People
with Special Difficulties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
8 The Process of Poverty-Reducing Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
8.1 Assessing the Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
8.1.1 What Needs Assessment Means . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
8.1.2 How Needs Should Be Assessed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
8.1.3 The Process of Making the Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
8.1.4 The Theoretical Framework and a Case as an Example . . . . 213
8.2 Making Schemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
8.2.1 Setting Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
8.2.2 Integrating and Evaluating the Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
8.2.3 Determining the Best Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
8.2.4 Making a Detailed Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
8.2.5 An Exemplary Service Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
8.3 Implementing the Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
8.3.1 Carrying Out Individually Tailored Case Work . . . . . . . . . . . 224
8.3.2 Networking and Mobilizing External Resources
and Carrying Out Community Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
8.3.3 Engaging in the Design and Implementation
of the Poverty-Curbing Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
9 Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
9.1 The Evolution of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies . . . . . . . 232
9.1.1 China’s Poverty-Alleviating Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
9.1.2 The Evolution of the Policies Concerning Poverty
Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
9.2 Objectives of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies . . . . . . . . . . 240
9.2.1 Attending to the Actual Needs of the Poor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
x Contents
9.2.2 Improving the Intrinsic Motivation of the Poor . . . . . . . . . . . 242

9.2.3 Strengthening the Capacity Building of the Poor . . . . . . . . . . 243
9.3 Main Content of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policy . . . . . . . . . 243
9.3.1 Overall Requirement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
9.3.2 Clarifying the Service Content of Social Work
Professionals Participating in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . 244
9.3.3 Supporting and Strengthening Professional Social
Work Forces in Poverty-Stricken Areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
9.3.4 Supporting the Implementation of Key Projects
by Social Work Professionals Participating in Poverty
Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
9.3.5 Strengthening the Organizational Guarantee
of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
9.4 The Effect of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies . . . . . . . . . . 249
9.4.1 Providing Guidance on Social Work
in Poverty-Alleviating Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
9.4.2 Making Plans for Rural Social Work on Poverty
Alleviating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
9.4.3 Injecting Professional Strength into the Cause
of Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
Chapter 1
An Overview of Poverty Alleviation
Social Work
As underscored in the document entitled “Guideline on Approving Social Work

Professionals’ Participation in Poverty Alleviation” jointly issued by the Ministry of
Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Finance, and the State Council Leading Group Office
of Poverty Alleviation and Development of the CPC (China’s top-ranking poverty
relief office) on July 6, 2017, social work professionals are an emerging force which
can provide the poverty-stricken population with social services, such as psycho-
therapy, mental health care, relationship adjustment, and skills training, and which
plays a potentially positive role by fostering in the local population a self-reliant
attitude, a more resourceful approach toward wealth management, and greater confi-
dence from improved vocational skills. This policy document also defines the ways
and means for social work professionals to contribute to poverty relief, namely,
to help with the rescue and assistance of the poor and the needy, empowering
them with the means to prosper, facilitating their adaption to and integration into the
new community after resettlement or relocation, and offering protective care to stay-
at-home children in poverty-stricken areas. Meanwhile, it also supports social work
professionals’ participation in core poverty curbing campaigns and care services that
specifically target other underprivileged groups.
To take social work as a helping hand in the fight against poverty means to incorpo-
rate its values, expertise, methodology, and specialists all into the fray, drawing on its
unique expertise and talents. A higher professionalism and a nationwide framework
will flourish, provided that a team of professional social workers skilled in helping
underprivileged groups in the combat against poverty would be built to mobilize
intervention strategies. The evolution of social work is deeply embedded in the long
history of fighting against poverty. It was utterly in tackling poverty and related social
issues that social work takes its shape, morphs, and matures into a discipline with its
own theories and practices.
Social workers represent a vital contingent of force in the fight of targeted alle-
viation of poverty caused by social forces. As a relatively professional team, it aims
at the development type of poverty relief rather than the aiding type. Specifically,
this is achieved through the following processes: making needs assessment by firstly
© East China University of Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd. 2023 1
D. Xiang, Social Work for Poverty Alleviation, Poverty-Alleviation and Social Work
in China, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-2174-4_1
2 1 An Overview of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
locating specifically the poor population and identifying the causes of impoverish-
ment; then following this up with different poverty relief organizations and resources
mobilized for coordination, to boost a greater ambition and self-reliance in the
targeted group through capacity building; and ultimately turning “blood transfusion”
into “blood generation” by transforming the initial aiding-type poverty relief into the
development-type poverty elimination.
1.1 Relations Between Poverty Relief and Social Work
1.1.1 China’s Experience in Tackling Poverty
Since the reform and opening up, China has sustained its efforts in large-scale poverty
relief through development which has lifted over 700 million people out of poverty,1
making a vast contribution to the global efforts in poverty eradication. There is still
a long way to go for those in deep poverty, though the complexity and severity of
their impoverishment makes it way harder to reduce poverty in these situations. But
with the goal of achieving a full victory over poverty as the bottom line, building a
moderately prosperous society in all respects allows no region to be left behind. All
this entails central government’s strategic deployment of targeted poverty reduction
and elimination.
As an academic discipline specialized in aiding vulnerable groups and those in
need and resolving social conflicts, social work finds its own niche in developing its
capacity to attend to the impoverished population through active participation and
contribution to China’s poverty elimination campaigns.
China’s triumph over poverty is attributed to a gradually deepening vision toward
it and constantly adjusting policies and practices. At the initial stage of the reform
and opening up, a two-tier management model based on the “household contract
responsibility system” alongside a fiscal and a rural reform constituted an enormous
drive for China’s agricultural productivity and brought about an exponential growth,
effectively mitigating rural poverty.
Back in the mid-1980s, the Chinese government set up specialized agencies to run
a structured, planned, and large-scale development-oriented poverty relief system. A
county-level targeting mechanism was established according to the then demographic
distribution characteristics of the poor population, followed by nationwide targeted
poverty-reduction campaigns.
While implementing the “Seven-Year Priority Poverty Alleviation Program
(1994–2000)” since 1994, China has gradually formulated a framework for poverty
relief featuring special projects, industry-specific projects and social forces, all
combined in mutually complementary and compatible ways. At the beginning of the
1 Chinanews. Report on China’s 40 Years’ Poverty Alleviation: Having Lifted More than 700 Million
People out of Poverty Makes a World Miracle[EB/OL] (2018-11-17) [2018-11-17]. http://finance.
sina.com.cn/roll/2018-11-17/doc-ihnyuqhh5578856.shtml.
1.1 Relations Between Poverty Relief and Social Work 3
twenty-first century, the “National Program for Rural Poverty Alleviation (2001–
2010)” was promulgated in keeping with contextual changes and adjustments and
newly posed tasks of poverty alleviation. Meanwhile, this period saw a gradual
maturity in particular models such as poverty Alleviation by supporting industry,
whole village promotion, and the Yulu Program (a vocational skill training-oriented
program), with heartening results achieved from continuous input, thus accumu-
lating valuable experience for the follow-up poverty relief work. With considerable
investments in assisting the poverty population including manpower, material, and
financial aids, a world-renowned progress was achieved in downsizing the poverty
demographic and in satisfying the basic food and clothing need of rural popula-
tions, gradually turning the “blood transfusion” type of poverty relief into “blood
generation”.2
In January 2014, the document “Decision on Creating New Mechanisms for
Promoting Rural Poverty Alleviation and Development”, jointly issued by the
General Office of the CPC Central Committee and General Office of the State
Council, proposed for the first time multiple specific measures for targeted poverty
relief mechanism, strategically outlining a new round of poverty Alleviation. In
2015, “Decision on Winning the Tough Battle Against Poverty by the CPC Central
Committee and the State Council” further elevated “targeted poverty alleviation” to
an important strategy for poverty elimination.
Targeted poverty alleviation presupposes an accurate identification of a poverty
group through robust appraisal before allocating aid and assistance resources accord-
ingly for eradicating poverty and providing for development. This differs from
previous approaches. Targeted poverty relief calls for an “accurate drip-irrigation”
(precisely targeted) for eradication. It is a governance model of poverty alleviation
that requires collective and concerted efforts by the government, markets, society,
communities, and the poverty population alike to provide for a holistic total-life
distribution of fiscal resources by identifying, assisting, and managing the target
group on an accurate basis. It is also a systematic, comprehensive operational mech-
anism, with accurate identification to account for “whom to be assisted” and with
accurate assistance and management as the answers to “who to take charge” and
“by which means”, respectively, among which accurate management serves as a key
institutional guarantee for the other two steps.
Since China’s reform and opening up was kick-started, it has navigated a path of
poverty relief and development with Chinese characteristics, as was often specifically
termed as “China’s Experience” which is characterized by the following strengths.
Firstly, a visionary strategy. It is by insisting on the prosperity side of the work that
the Chinese model has proven to be the most successful. Shifting from the “aid type”
to the “development type” of poverty reduction, the central government advocated
the sustainable nature of the new approach alongside its poverty-reduction efforts.
2 Xiang and Huang [1].

Secondly, a strong leadership. “Government leadership” is a defining feature of the

Chinese model. It involves a cornucopia of actions, ranging from policies announce-
ment by the central administration in public finance, industries, and social security
to the planning, timing, and deployment of these policies on a regional level.
Thirdly, an extensive social participation. The overall Chinese framework has a
“three-in-one” pattern combining special campaigns, industry, and social participa-
tion with the last one gaining increasing momentum, as social organizations and
individual citizens keep on contributing to eradicating poverty through resources
relocation, experience sharing, and policy advocacy.
And fourthly, a comprehensive poverty management. In the early stage of poverty
alleviation, a conditional social assistance practice was often adopted based on
the poor populations’ livelihood. Given the diverse causes of their impoverish-
ment, though, a more comprehensive approach is in dire need. An overall plan-
ning and design should be put in place to have those causes of poverty classi-
fied in order to provide a way out for each case, and this covers facilities, public
services, village-level administration capacity, community culture, etc. This is done
to achieve a general advance in terms of economy, society, culture, and ecology in
poverty-stricken areas.
1.1.2 Intrinsic Consistency Between Targeted Poverty Relief

and Social Work
Targeted poverty Alleviation work and professional social work practice are intrinsi-
cally consistent with each other in three ways: their common concern for individuals’
sufferings; their shared conscious pursuit of greater social justice; and their similar
reverence for scientific methodology.3
1.1.2.1 Common Concern for Individual Sufferings
It was in charity work that the initial idea of social work began to take shape and later
blossomed into a field of study as relief activity continued to adapt, standardize, and
specialize itself.4 Throughout its history, the practice of social work has shown its
enormous empathy for underprivileged groups and other individuals who are afflicted
by social deprivation and poverty. Social workers deem helping those with difficulties
as their basic professional duty and feel committed to guarding individual dignity
against infringement. If they were part and parcel of the poverty-reduction team, their
professionalism would ensure that the causes of impoverishment should be sorted
out and a practical treatment should be well schemed before assistance was doled
out to guarantee their financial security and ensure their exposure to skill training,
3 Gao and Xiang [2].

4 Liu [3].
the latter being a long-term goal. In other words, social work helps out the under-
privileged by empowering them, relocating social resources, and building up their
personal assets and gradually effects a transition from aid-type poverty governance
(relief) to development-type poverty governance, thus converting outer financial aids
into an inner drive for sustainable development. Likewise, targeted poverty allevi-
ation also adopts a people-centered perspective. To be “people-oriented” instead
of “community-oriented” means to single out individual cases out of the communal
frame and to treat each case with a separate cure regimen, rather than to have individ-
uals submerged by the “flood” of general and undifferentiated treatment. “There are
thousands of impoverished households, but each has a different cause of becoming
poor”. The diversity of poverty causes requires that, in reducing poverty, differential
actions should be taken. Only by making effective diagnosis can one expect to have
the condition properly treated. Social work and targeted poverty relief adopt the same
mode of thinking in this regard: “putting people first” with maximal concern for each
individual’s suffering.
1.1.2.2 Shared Conscious Pursuit of Greater Social Justice
The pursuit and realization of social justice is social workers’ primary concern. It
is their firm belief that regardless of age, gender, occupation, and race, everyone is
entitled to the fruits of social development, progress, and prosperity. It is evident
that social justice runs through the history of social work as a conscious pursuit. The
foundational value of social work is social justice. So social work commits itself to
promoting social justice by helping the vulnerable groups to realize their potential
and to preventing or solving social problems by taking advantage of their received
skills and trained methodology by facilitating interactions.
At the policymaking stage, social work can strive for and safeguard the legit-
imate rights and interests of the underprivileged groups by proposing schemes
and initiatives that are in favor of these groups. Where policy implementation is
concerned, it should regulate the needs structure by properly redistributing social
wealth for the sake of justice. As for the modus operandi, it should focus on
satisfying the basic survival needs of the underprivileged groups by purposefully
redressing social inequality and impoverishment. Achieving common prosperity
by improving people’s livelihood and eliminating poverty is the essential require-
ment of socialism, and targeted poverty alleviation addresses this requirement
directly. With enormous amount of resources invested in this lofty cause, the tradi-
tional poverty curbing pattern carries triumphs as well as defects—poorly targeted
with low efficiency, poor results being not uncommon. Therefore, the thinking of
“improved” governance has to take the lead, in order to channel limited resources
into the genuinely poor groups and into where aid and assistance are most needed.
Through co-construction and the sharing of benefits, the Chinese people in question
would have a higher sense of reward, with income gap narrowed and social justice
maximized, should poverty be eradicated.
1.1.2.3 Reverence for Scientific Methods
Social work is a value-driven profession that expertly delivers services, specialist

skills, and professionalism to underprivileged individuals, groups, communities, and
organizations, helping them to resolve problems, facilitating interactions, restoring
functions, promoting social growth potential, and generating social harmony. The
reason why social work has flourished into a profession is that, besides values, it
operates through scientifically validated methods when assisting people, for example,
group social work (abbreviated as “group work”); case social work (abbreviated
as “casework”); community social work (abbreviated as “community work”), to
name just a few. In addition, its intervention tactics are also multiple, such as indi-
vidual counseling, group skills, resource mobilization, consultation, and training at
a community level. Through systematic and appropriate methods, social workers
have come to know that the exact plight known firsthand before a personalized treat-
ment should be worked out for the recipient. Similarly, targeted poverty alleviation
is also noted for its systematic and scientific approach. Specifically, it consists of
four different measures, that is, categorization, people and revenue clarification,
poverty-cause identification, and poverty-type specification. It requires precision in
six aspects, including recipients, project design, funds allocation, measures suited
to each household, measures matching village staff, and analysis of the results.
It is carried out through five channels, namely, boosting production and employ-
ment; relocation and resettlement; ecological protection; education; and subsistence
allowances, and through ten projects, namely, vocational education and training,
cadre stationed at villages, micro-credit, relocation, e-commerce, tourism, photo-
voltaic project, papyrus planting, and entrepreneurship training by rural vanguards
and by leading enterprises’ guidance. Taken together, these four measures, six precise
aspects, five channels, and ten projects reflect a clearer goal and a more systematic
and scientific approach to alleviating targeted poverty.
1.1.3 New Demands for Targeted Poverty Alleviation

in Social Work
Over four decades of efforts in reducing poverty made China’s absolute poverty popu-
lation shrink substantially. This is attributed to the robust momentum unleashed by
rural reform and an overall growth in economic development, particularly the contin-
uous, promising, and rapid growth within the past 10 years. Entering the economic
stage of “the new normalcy”, China has to modify its poverty management model,
though, as the law of diminishing returns through investment starts to loom large when
mere growth in quantity is hardly able to sustain sufficient support to poverty-related
governance. This requires the renewing of the original model and the perfecting of
the original mechanism that govern poverty management and innovating the system
that deals with poverty in an unprecedented refined way and thus poses new demands
to social work as well.5
1.1.3.1 Returning to Rural Social Work as the Central Task
Social work has its origin in industrialization which presupposes its affinity with
urban life. As the wave of modernization surges in the west, farmers making a living
near the city often suffer from solitary urban problems such as hunger, poverty,
and disease. Deprived of support and shelter from their biological community back
home, they badly need social assistance to lift them out of this predicament. It is in
such demand that social work came into being. Without the spotlight on poor urban
dwellers, rural populations are often ignored in the tradition of western social work,
which has also left its mark on China’s social work tradition—the bulk of Chinese
social work practices takes place in urban areas not least due to various restraints like
outdated service awareness and limited budgets. However, the new stage of economic
development has ushered in a shift of focus toward rural areas, for building a well-off
society in an all-round way that requires adding rural China into the equation, and
this makes it all the more urgent to achieve prosperity for rural populations. Poverty
is now taken as a comprehensive social issue involving more than financial factors;
its governance therefore goes beyond offering resources to the impoverished group
and is more about an overall improvement in their physical fitness, social networking,
and social functions.
This being said, multiple forces need to be summoned for a joint solution. The
above-mentioned disadvantaged and vulnerable groups are in urgent need of inter-
vention by social workers to get them out of plight. International experience has
proved that social work participation in poverty alleviation can bring about remark-
able results.6 Given the current urgency on being targeted, social work can contribute
to poverty alleviation work in three ways: firstly, to provide services, support, and
psychological comfort for the underprivileged groups such as empty nesters (the
elderly alone without having able-bodied dependents at home), stay-at-home chil-
dren and women, and families bereft of their only child; secondly, to help local offi-
cials diagnose the basic needs of poor groups in order to come up with reasonable
assistance scenarios; and thirdly, to offer proper training. Social workers can build
a positive social image of poor rural residents by administering them proper profes-
sional skill trainings that may require mobilizing and directing social resources, thus
rebuilding a close-knit village to improve their life quality.
5 Gao and Xiang [2].

6 Zhang et al. [4].
1.1.3.2 Building Professional Personnel Committed to Rural Social

Work
While putting rural areas first is a precondition for the poverty curbing social work
to make advances, it is by no means less urgent to vigorously build a talent pool
of professionals. Often in extreme isolation with limited transportation, promotion
channels, and harsh living conditions, social work careers in rural areas are a far less
appealing option, even for college graduates with a local background who generally
show little desire to return to their hometown, which creates a constant shortage of
social workers there. This means, simply to recruit graduates specializing in social
work the way cities do may not be enough. Instead, recruiters need to “walk with two
legs”, with one “recruiting” graduates and the other “training” local people, and thus
build a team combining “professional” and “semi-professional” talents to address
the shortage of trained people. Three measures are needed to be put in place. Firstly,
incentive measures have to be taken to attract more college graduates majoring in
social work to join rural teams. Secondly, special workshops are needed to instill
appropriate skills and values as well as technical know-how for college students
from the “One Village, One University” project, so that they can understand the value
concept of social work and have a basic command of the methods of social work.
And thirdly, well-educated locals such as village-based cadres, teachers, college
graduates, and village officials can make a useful addition to the talent pool if with
proper training.7
1.1.3.3 Building Service Outlets for Rural Social Work
The document “Decision on Winning the Tough Battle Against Poverty by the CPC
Central Committee and the State Council” highlights principles of putting poverty
population first, fostering inner drive by improving their self-development ability,
and allocating more social workers there for help.
To improve social work services and to nurture enough social work, professionals
locally calls for more service outlets to be built as platforms and carriers. As for
how to expand the number of service centers, a good first step is to build a “station
center” joint action mechanism combining efforts on the township level and those on
the village level. Specifically, large-scale service centers will be set up for each town,
while each administrative village or traditional village would own smaller centers
called stations. Each center will be responsible for planning and coordinating the
work of its subordinate stations within this town, undertaking no other concrete
duties, with its staff mainly composed of governmental staff and non-social work
majors. It is each station that takes charge of performing specific service duties for
the villagers within its reach.
In short, the people-oriented professional ethics of social work dovetails with the
“targeted” identification demanded by precision poverty relief—they both prioritize
the needs of disadvantaged groups, keeping a close eye on the actual hardships of
7 Wang [5].
1.2 Significance and Role of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work 9
these people so as to address the most relevant and immediate troubles of their highest
concern first.
In terms of actions, social work is more attentive to tapping the potential of
the poverty population via education and capacity building. This creates a better
climate for self-realization on the part of the recipients by improving their tech-
nical know-how in more trades. Likewise, targeted poverty relief also gives impor-
tance to capacity building of the vulnerable groups, cultivating their social capital
through multiple means involving re-education, training, and industry planning. As
for the attitude toward social participation, they both advocate in-depth engagement
by social forces, for poverty control is not so much a mission exclusive to either
the government or to the poor as a goal shared by the whole society. Only when the
government, social workers, and non-government forces alike take jointed actions
shall we be in a position to claim full victory over the battle against poverty.
1.2 Significance and Role of Poverty-Alleviating Social

Work
1.2.1 The Significance of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work
Poverty refers to the condition that, in a specific social context, some members of
society are deprived of their right to participate in economic and social activities
and to obtain means of living, which results in their life quality being consistently
lower than the normal average in society.8 Since 1978, China’s poverty reduction has
undergone three major stages: top-down reforms through institutional changes on a
large scale, development-oriented poverty relief with a regional focus, and poverty
relief while building a well-off society in an all-round way. With a joint effort by the
CPC and the Chinese people, remarkable achievement was made through China’s
poverty alleviation work. Even by an ever-rising poverty line, the statistics are impres-
sive: China’s poverty population decreased from 770 million in 1978 to 16.6 million
in 2018, with poverty incidence lowered to 1.7% from 97.5%.9 As society keeps
advancing, poverty takes on a new look: transitioning from absolute poverty to rela-
tive poverty, from regional poverty to stratum poverty, from social division poverty to
social transformation poverty, and from individually attributable poverty to compre-
hensively attributable poverty.10 Given the multiplicity, complexity, and crossover
of the present-day poverty reducing tasks and goals, it is far from enough to rely
solely on administrative forces. Government-led models albeit assuredly efficient
still possess their own built-in shortcomings.
8 Xiang and Yao [6].

9 Xinhuanet. National Bureau of Statistics: China’s Rural Poor Population Has Decreased by 700
million Since the Reform and Opening-up [EB/OL] (2015-10-16) [2015-10-16]. http://news.xinhua
net.com/politics/2015-10/16/c_1116848645.htm.
10 Yao [7].
First, a single force. In a government-led poverty alleviation model, social partici-

pation is rare. This means that government has to undertake loads of work with limited
resources which often brings about pressure. Second, a single service content. Most
government-led poverty alleviation projects focus on “blood transfusion” with finan-
cial aids and material supply, lacking capacity building and psychological and mental
support to the impoverished groups. Third, instable results. As the “blood transfu-
sion” method helps little with building up poverty group’s capacity for self-reliance,
they are prone to returning to poverty once assistance funding is cut off or financial
turbulence returns, which may even turn into a vicious circle of “out of” and “back
into” poverty for the first time, for the second time, etc.11
Given such circumstances, to modify models of work for higher efficiency is obvi-
ously a must, which has led to a greater realization of how much social work would
mean to a development-oriented poverty reduction drive. Actually, born amid the
Industrial Revolution, social work finds in its founding mission a desire to address
acute and persistent social problems. As a thorny issue prevalent in many countries,
poverty has remained a key concern for social work since its early days. After years
of practice in reducing poverty, social workers have developed a set of efficient and
practical interventions. Poverty alleviation social work is characterized by interac-
tion, sustainability, and serviceability. Against the backdrop of “Big Society, Small
Government”, it is the trend and a matter of course to have social work join the
mission.12
1.2.2 The Role of Social Work in Alleviating Poverty
Social work has its value objective in targeting social needs, achieving social equity,
innovating governance mechanism, tackling social problems, resolving social contra-
dictions, improving social services, and promoting the advancement of people and
society, among which social justice is considered as its core value. It highlights a
rational distribution of social resources and the coordination of social interests and
the realization of social justice through professional services. In terms of policies,
social work helps vulnerable groups, strives to safeguard their legitimate rights by
promoting and intervening in welfare policymaking. Social policies follow certain
procedures to mobilize, deploy, and allocate various social resources, to protect the
basic rights and interests of vulnerable groups, while properly and effectively coordi-
nating various interests across the social strata for the equity and fairness of outcome.
By redistributing social wealth, social work is able to address inequality and poverty
by a well-prepared intervention. It pays special attention to the vulnerable groups
with satisfying their basic needs being the core focus. In terms of practice, social
work has developed a specialized set of techniques and strategies to help people maxi-
mize their potential in the face of difficulties by using external resources, to improve
11 Xiang et al. [8].

1.2 Significance and Role of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work 11
communications and to coordinate social networks, to address social problems, and

to meet people’s material and spiritual needs. Equipped with professional means,
social workers are able to help those in need and provide more social resources to
vulnerable people by building better networks with better connection and support,
thus maximizing their potential and upgrading their capacity package.
Equality, respect, helping people to help themselves, as well as harmonious inter-
action are the guiding principles for social workers—and not least to help people
out of difficulties and to guide them toward a better life are their professional duties.
These merits can make a critical difference to protecting the rights and interests of
people, especially the vulnerable groups, coordinating their interests and relations
and maintaining social justice. Social work can provide for poverty relief in the
following ways.13
1.2.2.1 A Systematic Set of Values
Social work is a highly specialized activity based on systematic technical know-how.

It is there to help achieving this lofty objective by pragmatism, passion, and an innate
sense of altruism. It is a value-dominated profession from start to finish.
“Helping people to help themselves” forms the backbone of its belief system. It
references a model that requires social workers to help their plight by enhancing
their ability for self-support so that when assistance ends, people are able to cope
on their own when similar problems emerge or to take preventive measures to avoid
worst effects. To put it simply, this model is to make people agents stronger in
self-improvement, self-reliance, and adaptation to the environment.
This is most definitely not a one-sided form of delivery of charity, nor is it designed
to play a savior role. The truth lies in a firm belief of social workers in the potential
for people themselves to overcome difficulties and solve problems that is inherent
in every individual, organization, community, and society. And once such potential
is brought into full play, the problems would solve themselves. So in fact the actual
point of social workers is to present a true picture of the reality poverty groups find
themselves in spite of their plight and helplessness and to steer them into viewing the
picture in a saner, healthier, and fairer manner so as to take proactive and desirable
actions addressing the problem. It is termed “helping people to help themselves”
because the whole process begins with helping those in need and terminates with
self-help on the help recipient’s part.
1.2.2.2 “Systematic Vision” and “Strengths Vision”
The causes of poverty are not one-off or isolated, and multiple factors are interacting
at the same time. In response, social work helps the poverty population in varied
methods, regarding them and the environment they are in as an organic whole. With

a “systematic vision” in mind, it works on improvement in individual capacity, social

relations, and macro-environmental factors.
It is generally believed that poverty would not occur without certain societal or
personal triggers. Therefore, it is in addressing these issues that social work helps its
subjects, and that’s the “problem vision”. They also strongly believe in individuals’
potential and attribute impoverishment to a poor realization of their potential and
proficiency. By this theory, the priority of poverty relief is empowerment—potential
tapping, capacity building, and eventually helping people to help themselves, which
makes the “strengths vision”. Social work is not only committed to tackling various
obstacles, but also to a better self-achievement for its recipients.
While offering assistance, social workers fully respect the recipients’ right of
autonomy and self-determination. They are also attentive to mobilizing their initia-
tive, enthusiasm, and creativity. Not only do social workers help the poor out of their
plight, they are also building their capacity for better self-development. By involving
all kinds of social resources, forces, and conditions to help, social work aims for
better prospects for individuals, organizations, and communities by advancing their
career know-how, their resilience in difficulties, and social coordination capacity. It
also highly values education as a priority of the poverty group toward a better-tuned
mentality and behavior patterns to fit in a new social environment. Significance is
also attached to upgrading the internal resources of the poverty group, such as to
improve their intelligence and ability, so as to create conditions for a better personal
development in the recipients.
1.2.2.3 Specialized Approaches and Techniques
Social work has been exploring cures for poverty since its inception. The entire history
of social work is a history about poverty curbing. During its long-term response to
poverty relief, social work has developed an efficient and effective set of methods
and skills. Through professional modes and methods such as case work, group work,
and community work, poverty curbing work is carried out at the micro-, meso-,
and macro-levels to ensure its comprehensiveness and effectiveness; from profes-
sionalism applied to case counseling, group therapy, resource linking, and problem
mining, poverty reduction has become more efficient and effective. In practice, social
workers attach importance not only to the idea of “helping others to help themselves”,
but also to adopting specialized techniques and means. For example, various interven-
tion methods and skills are adopted such as case counseling, group skills, community
resource mobilization, consultation, and training, in order to explore the plight of the
poor, to assess their needs, to cultivate, tap, and enhance their capacity, thereby getting
them out of difficulties while facilitating their integration into society. As an inclu-
sive systematic approach, the core value of social work is to transform the “helping
people to help themselves” attitude into improving their ability.
1.3 Concepts and Methodologies of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work 13
1.2.2.4 Specialized Platforms
Social work is a “third party” which works independently of the government and
of the affected population, while maintaining a cooperative relationship with other
poverty relief bodies. Being a third party, social work serves as a “bridge” and a “lubri-
cant”, capable of communicating and exchanging views with all parties involved.
With a proper understanding of what is needed by other parties in their poverty
relief work, it can pass down experiences and lessons learned from one party to
another. This is not only conducive to matching the government’s poverty Allevia-
tion actions with the needs of the poor population, but is also beneficial to enhancing
understanding and trust. It means a lot to involve the social forces into poverty alle-
viation practice, to get the work more effective, and to build a long-term poverty
reducing mechanism.
1.3 Concepts and Methodologies of Poverty-Alleviating

Social Work
1.3.1 Concepts of Poverty Alleviation Work
Social work offers new principles and visions to poverty reduction. As these prin-
ciples spread, the public has been through phases in understanding the content and
causes of poverty as well as the principles and approaches to reduce poverty. It
evolves from an empirical view to a practical scientific view.14
1.3.1.1 Equal Importance Attached to Absolute Poverty and Relative

Poverty
In the early days, absolute poverty was what poverty Alleviation practitioners under-
stood to be the main issue affecting poorer people. Through such understanding,
poverty is defined as a living condition lacking in the resources or capability to access
goods (currencies) and services essential to the survival and wellbeing of individ-
uals and households.15 Such notions together with the then social climate meant
early poverty-reduction practices that mostly had absolute poverty as its primary
goal, with more interest focused on financial aids and material supplies to the needy
rather than psychological and mental health support. Accordingly, the main recipi-
ents of this help are the extremely impoverished and vulnerable struggling below the
poverty line and less concern shown to other marginalized/peripheral groups around
or slightly above the poverty line. As economy and society advance, relative poverty

15 Wang [9], p 317.
began to take the lead in the way that people perceive poverty, namely poverty is
dynamic and defined as the living condition of an individual or a household whose
income is below the social average as measured by certain criteria. Instead of a fixed
numeric, this definition regards poverty as something dynamic that hinges on the
income gap of the impoverished group in relation to other groups.16
1.3.1.2 Single Attribution to Comprehensive Analysis
Two opposing views persist when it comes to analyzing and explaining the causes
of poverty. One puts the individual in charge, while the other is built upon struc-
turalism.17 The latter claims that one only has himself or herself to blame for living
in poverty since we are all, theoretically, entitled the opportunity for self-achievement
through hard work. Conversely, the latter attributes impoverishment to inappropriate
social structure and uncaring institutional situations because theoretically everyone
is capable of achieving a living standard of average social means. Although divergent,
the two claims interpret the causes in a single dimension with no consideration of
interferences from other factors. Under such guidance, early poverty relief practices
were either focused solely on individuals or on society instead of attending to both
and, moreover, paid little attention to the impact from factors outside of individuals
control or perceived cultural values. Practice has proved that by simply attributing
the cause of poverty to the individual or society, we often fail to detect the real
causes. In fact, multiple factors are intertwined and coexist jointly giving rise to the
occurrence of poverty and they can be individual, social, and cultural values related.
This being said, it is normal for poverty relief work to be far from satisfactory in
effectiveness and efficiency derived from the single-cause attribution logic. Soon
after this epiphany, people started to abandon the old framework with individuals
or society being the exclusive concern from earlier times, which led to a boom of
more inclusive ideas such as culture theory, social mutual construction theory, and
ecosystem theory. In terms of causal attribution, poverty Alleviation theories went
from divergent beliefs with each claiming their own arguments to a more pluralistic
unity.
1.3.1.3 From Problem Perspective to Advantage Perspective
Be it the individualistic, the structuralist, or the cultural explanation of poverty, they

only recognize certain personal, social, or cultural inadequacies as the root cause of
poverty. Consequently, the job of reducing poverty is to address these inadequacies
that lead to the “problem perspective”. Within this perspective, poverty alleviation
work focuses on mining the personal, social, and cultural deficiency that may result
in poverty and its solution in this process. However, the “problem perspective” may
16 Wang[9], p 317.
17 Zheng [10].
not be paying enough attention to the strengths of the land and people in poverty,
and thus fail to fully mobilize and give play to the positive role of the poor and the
environment they are in. It’s fair to say that poverty relief not only aims not only at
solving problems, but also at cultivating skills. Only by recognizing the capabilities
and strengths of the recipients and cultivating these strengths can social work truly
“help people to help themselves”. As such, the perspective of poverty relief work
has turned from “problem perspective” into “strengths perspective”. It means to take
into consideration the strengths of the aid recipients while assessing their problems
and demands and to solve their problems by applying their strengths and resources,
strive to identify, utilize, establish, and strengthen people’s existing advantages and
capabilities.18 Guided by the “strengths perspective”, poverty relief work pays more
attention to the advantages of tapping into, and building capacity of the poor, as well
as building a suitable climate for the best practices.
1.3.1.4 From General Analysis to Differentiated Analysis
Approaches and attitudes to work often indicate work ethics. Due to the lack of in-
depth understanding of the actual poverty condition and of organizational support
from the institutional environment as well as social and cultural issues, early poverty
alleviation work took a more holistic view, without classifying the aid recipients by
stratum, region, gender, and group. Such framework makes it impractical to have
differentiated and targeted schemes tailored to the conditions of various regions and
groups, resulting in insufficient localization of theories and methods, mismatches
between services and demands, substandard and invalid services, etc. After joining
in the poverty alleviation cause, social workers tried treating varied poor areas and
groups of differently, putting them into different categories, exploring causes of
each impoverished case in relation to their unique conditions and coming up with
tailored schemes to each for implementation. By doing so, various differentiated
perspectives and approaches came into being covering subareas like urban poverty
alleviation social work, rural poverty social work, women’s poverty social work, etc.
Accordingly, whether it “conforms to the regional context” and “meets the actual
needs of impoverished groups” has become key indicators when evaluating how
efficiently the poverty relief work has been done. Following that, poverty allevia-
tion social work also attends to the individualization and differentiation of poverty
relief methods, considering not only regional and group-specific disparities, but also
differences between individuals in order to fulfill targeted poverty curbing tasks.
18Textbook Compilation Team for the National Social Worker Vocational Examination. Social
Work Practice (Intermediate) [M]. Beijing: China Social Sciences Publishing House, 2014: 8.
1.3.2 Practical Path of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
China’s poverty alleviation social work has grown from scratch with professional
social workers being proactive in participation and gaining experience through
success, which has, in turn, been reflected in areas such as diversified paths of
critical practice and competence, multi-polar channels of intervention, specialized
service methods, a generally positive attitude toward practice, and systemized work
models.19
1.3.2.1 Diversified Paths of Practice
In recent years, the coverage and business scope of poverty alleviation social work
have been continuously expanding, with its service recipients and paths of practice
gradually diversifying. Owing to continuous practice and exploration, the area and
the base of targeted recipients that have benefited from social work have become
broader and more diverse. As its service becomes more refined and holistic, social
work plays an increasingly important role both in local need and local governance.
At present, impoverished regions, especially poverty-stricken areas, are all reachable
by poverty Alleviation social workers; the assistance recipients include not only key
underprivileged groups such as women, the elderly, children, and the disabled, but
also all the poor and the marginalized. In terms of work, in addition to providing finan-
cial aid and material assistance to the poor, the social workers increasingly engage
in offering psychological and spiritual support to support people, as well as bringing
their value and competence building to bear on the marginalized groups. Meanwhile,
besides at the micro-level, they also made their efforts on the meso- and macro-
levels. On the basis of individual capacity building, it incorporates into its work an
improved policy environment with higher cultural values, a better conservation of
the environment, thus generating a richer content of work.
The Guangdong Green Farming Social Work Development Center launched their
poverty alleviation enterprise in 2001. From then on, it has successively implemented
a couple of social work projects including Yunnan Pingzhai rural project, Hunan
Tongdao ethnic project, Sichuan Ya’an disaster project, Guangdong Conghua rural
project, and Guangdong Hongxing rural project. This service coverage has gradually
expanded from its point of departure in Central and Western China to the eastern
coastal cities. In the service process, the center not only actively connected social
resources to improve the economic conditions of the poor population, but also fully
tapped into the potential and capacity of the poor areas to raise income through trials
on the village collective economy and land leasing, etc. Environmental protection

and cultural inheritance have also been included in the poverty reduction work, and
the scope and content of the practice are constantly being enriched.20
1.3.2.2 Multi-Polarized Channels of Intervention
With little governmental support and social recognition, early social work had very
limited channels and means to access poverty relief resources. The government-
led model made it hard for social workers to intervene in public services. Most
social workers and institutions were reduced to directly contacting poor groups and
areas. As the initiative “Big Society and Small Government” was developed amid
government action, it enabled transformation and provided for social work in poverty
relief participation. Practical opportunities for poverty alleviation social work thus
increased, with indirect channels opened up such as undertaking relief projects funded
and assisted by the government, the free market, and social organizations. In short,
two additional channels were opened for social work to intervene in poverty relief:
one to offer direct services to the poor, and the other by indirect channels such
as undertaking poverty alleviation projects from the government, the market, and
social organizations. The enrichment and optimization of these channels provides
opportunities and means for social work to function better in poverty relief. By the
two channels, social work not only offers professional services to the poor group from
poor areas, but also proves conducive to improving the efficiency and effectiveness
of various departments, organizations, and institutions in their campaigns combating
poverty.
This evolution of social work’s interference in poverty relief is well reflected in
the practice of the Chengdu Shuguang Community Development Capacity Building
Center. Initially, direct intervention dominated in the early stage; for instance, the
Kangding County’s21 participatory capacity building for community development
pilot project and Mianzhu’s post-disaster reconstruction project were both accom-
plished via direct contact with service recipients. Later on, this organization estab-
lished a partnership with the government, which enabled it to undertake more govern-
mental projects, implementing many poverty alleviation pilot projects between NGOs
and the government, making indirect channels its main way of addressing poverty
issues.
1.3.2.3 Specialized Service Methods
Quite a bit of work has been done by social workers and institutions alike to raise
public recognition of poverty reduction social work and to set China on the path
20 Guangdong Green Farming Social Work Development Center. [EB/OL]. http://www.lvgeng.org/

project/.
21 Editor’s Note: In 2015, the name of Kangding County was disused and a county-level Kangding
City was renamed.

to eliminating poverty entirely. Summarizing and reflecting on their efforts show

poverty alleviation social work institutions and workers concrete progress in their
capacity to meet the needs of disadvantaged people. Two changes mark the progress
of poverty alleviation social work service methods. Firstly, institutional management
has been standardized. In recent years, more detailed regulations and mechanisms
have been set for the registration and management of social institutions, with multiple
policies and regulations issued for their guidance. As a result, social work institu-
tions have started to pay more attention to their internal management. With written
procedures and regulations, the means for poverty alleviation social workers to inter-
vene and be evaluated are regulated and assessed, which effectively improves the
overall professionalism and delivery of practice. Secondly, the means to intervene
have become more specialized. After fully recognizing China’s particular forms of
poverty, a working strategy emerged based upon local conditions, various causal
factors, and rigorous professional approaches. Poverty alleviation social work is
known for being flexible and practical. It adopts varied strategies in accordance with
different causes of poverty, including alleviating poverty-driven mental health issues
and psychological trauma through case work, guiding the poor into a better under-
standing of their own conditions and a better adaptability to social life by group work,
and raising their awareness and capacity to participate in community affairs through
community work. Changed methods proved more efficient by a wider recognition
from the government and the society at large.
1.3.2.4 Positive Practice Attitude
By applying the values of altruism, equality, helping others to help themselves,

and people-oriented work practice, social workers cultivate a strong belief in the
“hematopoietic” notion which stresses proper help to people on a mainly self-reliant
mechanism, as opposed to the “blood transfusion” approach from the past that
provides a single and temporary financial quick fix and material assistance. It helps
poverty groups explore their own strengths along with opportunities to have capacity-
building skills. Assistance as such not only boosts confidence and self-esteem in the
poor in robust ways, but also reduces the likelihood of their returning to poverty
and welfare dependence. Meanwhile, being “participatory” is like a second nature of
poverty alleviation social work. It called for participation by poor groups and ended
up with higher efficiency, while assistance prior to this was granted in a top-down
way and unilaterally from the government.
In the case of Guangdong Green Farming Social Work Development Center, years
of hands-on knowledge from poverty relief have grown into “community based” and
“cultivating the weak” work ethics, with stress laid on “development”. Take the
“Conghua Rural Social Work Project” and the “Red Star Rural Social Work Project”
for instance, long-lasting measures are taken, such as building capacity in the poor,
cultivating diverse and sustainable livelihoods, and preventing a comeback to poverty.
1.4 The Space for and the Paths to Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty … 19
1.3.2.5 Systematic Work Models
Gradually accumulating experience and learning lessons from actual work, China’s
social workers have blazed their own path, tackling poverty in a systematic multi-
pronged approach combining economy, psychology, beliefs, culture, ecology, etc.
Special models include a financial path that uses rural micro-credit to raise income for
poverty group, an individual path via group therapy, group workshops, and individual
counseling aimed at improving their psychological and mental health, a cultural path
regarding cultural inheritance, cultural advancement and conservation via passing
on positive values, an ecological path advocating environmental protection, green
growth, disasters prevention strategies, and touristic appeal. While the financial and
individual paths are well developed, the cultural and ecological paths are well under
development. Multiple models work together to form a systematic, sufficient whole
catering to various situations by operating separately or in combination, to ensure a
desired outcome for poverty alleviation social work.
1.4 The Space for and the Paths to Social Work’s

Involvement in Poverty Alleviation
1.4.1 The Space for Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty

Alleviation
Institutional exclusion on the part of market economy and risk-aversion on the part of
some people conspire to create poverty. “Economic deprivation” and “social exclu-
sion” not only reduce poor people to material scarcity but also to social isolation,
resulting in severe psychological and mental trauma.
Besides, extreme poverty may also bring about social conflicts, putting national
and regional security, stability, and sustainable growth in potential peril. In addition
to macro-level policy mapping and system construction, it takes a “victim perspec-
tive” to solve the problems, such as regarding highly the subjectivity of the poor by
giving differentiated and people-oriented service. This is exactly where the hands-on
experience from poverty relief by social workers could contribute greatly.22
1.4.1.1 Biologically, Social Work Has Its Roots in Poverty Relief
Social work is homologous with the roots of poverty relief. Early social work germi-
nated in charity campaigns and grew into a profession, major, and discipline amid
the gradually standardized and institutionalized rescue operations. The task of social

work is to help people. Social work has its foundational mission in helping those in
need, and that’s where it takes off and what it lives for.
1.4.1.2 Historically, Poverty Alleviation Ran Through the Complete

History of Social Work
It is constant battles against poverty that created the need for social work, which in
retrospect is easy to understand. It is in combating poverty and many other social
problems that the idea of social work was slowly conceived and improved together
with its various professional approaches. Social workers are there to offer material
and mental help, to ensure that people in poverty and misfortune have their basic
survival needs met, and their potential properly nurtured for a better adaption to
social life. This in a way softens the tension and conflicts from impoverishment and
many other social issues and promotes social stability and development. Social work
is by nature against poverty, as is fully embodied in its development history.
1.4.1.3 Conceptually, Poverty Alleviation Implies the Value of Social

Work
Social work offers a helping hand in a value-driven professional manner, with human-
itarianism and social justice being the central pillars. It aims at meeting human
needs and helping individuals and institutions out of social plights, with its strategy
implemented to facilitate self-help and mutual assistance toward better social adap-
tion. Therefore, “helping those in need to help themselves” is a defining mission
of social workers, with “helping those in need” representing their actual work duty,
and “to help themselves” being their professional ideal. Contemporary social work
is a multi-level, wide-ranging service system with universal coverage. It caters to
poverty-stricken people or vulnerable groups susceptible to poverty, with the goal
being to help those groups out of their actual hardships, to improving their skills
and access to social capital to better fit in with the society. “Social work is a service
activity guided by altruism, a set of scientific skills and scientific methods”.23 This
definition proves poverty reduction as absolutely pivotal within the value system of
social work.
Specifically for China’s practice, it is inevitable24 to have social work introduced
to poverty reduction as the latter is in need of the former in the following ways.
23 Wang [9], p 12.

1.4.1.4 Social Work Values
Social work is meant to help people, with its institutions and workers providing
material and mental help for victims to overcome various difficulties. However,
it’s not about one-sided giving or a simple benefit. It believes in the potential to
overcome difficulties in individuals, groups, communities, and even society and in the
certainty of problems solving themselves once such potential was brought into play.
Therefore, the essence of social work is to raise hope, confidence, and determination
in the victims while fully activating their initiative, enthusiasm, and creativity to help
themselves for personal accomplishment in the course of self-help.
1.4.1.5 Specialized Approach and Techniques of Social Work
Social work is a problem oriented occupation since social problems urges people to
seek solutions. It has evolved from non-specialization to specialization, which can be
seen in the changed role of social workers: from benevolent helpers to professional
helpers, from the modified working process—from driven by kindness and compas-
sion with little professionalism, and from the improved status: from the primitive
stage of being benevolent, unfocussed, unprofessional, and non-specialized to the
modern form of being rational, organized, professional, and specialized. On the one
hand, professional social workers directly solve social problems by various methods
including case work, group work, and community work; on the other hand, they
can prevent or indirectly solve social problems within its possible means by social
work administration, which prevails over social welfare administration and security
policies. In addition, they can establish a social support system for social members
by exploiting social resources.
1.4.1.6 Social Participation
The basic goal of poverty relief is to adopt economic and social policies that work well
for reducing poverty and gradually creating an environment with the right economic
and social conditions for the ultimate eradication of poverty. Whether the masses
can be effectively mobilized, called upon, and organized to participate in poverty
reduction, with their initiative and creativity brought into full play for self-help
with governmental support, is something largely dependent on how deeply involved
the government, the market, social institutions, and the general public are. Facts
have proved that various non-official organizations like the NGOs and community
institutions work well with high flexibility for integrating and mobilizing poverty
reducing resources. It takes everyone to combat poverty, and social work is evidently
well-suited adept for deploying and integrating essential resources.
1.4.2 The Paths to Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty

Alleviation
Social work has a broad space to administer intervention in the field of poverty
alleviation, and its possible tools to intervene mainly include the following.25
1.4.2.1 Fostering People-Oriented Work Ethics
Social workers must take the needs of the poor as priority, striving to understand
their living conditions and demands, in order to direct resources to solve their most
concerned, relevant, and keenly-felt issues, and then to address those issues of highest
concern and urgency in a practical manner, carrying out the people-oriented principle
in each and every move toward poverty relief.
1.4.2.2 Constructing a Social Work Intervention Platform
It is the inner drive from within a community that social workers should cultivate and
mobilize to combat poverty. Give scope to the community’s role in initiating, orga-
nizing, integrating, and promoting poverty alleviation, make it a process of enhancing
social capital, and make the community an important agent to alleviate poverty.
Thanks to its special organizational structure and operating mechanism, a commu-
nity can have every member connected by a natural bond through which the members
relate themselves to the community life and its management. Such connective nature
makes community a key participant in reducing poverty and allows it to play the
role of a mobilizer, organizer, integrator, and facilitator, making poverty relief a
process of improving social capital. Meanwhile, community is a key agent in charge
of implementing social policies. Social workers can enhance the social capital of
a community by putting its public goods and services into commercial use, and
improve social harmony on a community level. In addition, groups, households, and
social institutions are other likely possible platforms to deal with the key concerns
of the community.
1.4.2.3 Building the Capacity of the Poor
Attention should also be paid by social workers to the capacity building, education,
social capital accumulation, and environment building of the targeted population.
Because to enlarge the pool of knowledge and skills to improve personal capacities
enables a better self-fulfillment on individual, group, and community levels; educa-
tion helps the recipients adjust their attitude and behavior for the better to fit in; to

keenly increase social capital can facilitate the incubation of self-help organizations
for the poor and expand their social networking and supporting system to create a
favorable social condition for poverty eradication.
1.4.2.4 Promoting Social Participation by the Poor
Social workers should lift the poor into greater participation by improving their
skills and galvanize them into sustaining their interests to unleash their subjectivity
in poverty relief. It is crucial to note that poverty reduction is not a one-sided govern-
mental campaign, but a joint effort involving the government, the poor, and the
non-poor. Poverty reduction needs the poor not only as passive help receivers but
also action takers. Experience shows that participation by the poor can substantially
achieve better poverty alleviation outcomes.
1.4.2.5 Providing Services with Professional Values and Methods
Problems faced by the poor can be so complex as to require professional guidance,

whereas self-abasement and fatalistic mentality can make them less willing to seek
help. Therefore, social workers should take initiative to reach out to the poor. First,
to teach them the importance of receiving professional help, as well as of the char-
itable nature and procedures of social work; second, to reveal their challenges, the
situations they are in, and the possible ways out for them to work on, so as to steer
them onto the track of self-help and self-reliance. In addition to case work, group
work and community work are also commonly taken as a way of assistance. For
example, social workers may organize a development group made up of poor chil-
dren to foster mutual help and acceptance, cultivating their positive attitude toward
life, sound life values, and healthy interpersonal relationships.
1.4.3 Challenges Facing Poverty Alleviation Social Work
China’s poverty reducing social work keeps improving as a whole, and has regis-
tered remarkable progress in both theory and practice; it is far from flawless,
though, insufficient professionalism, low recognition, and lack of independence.
These inadequacies constitute the four challenges to its further development: insuffi-
cient professionalism, low social recognition, obscure positioning, and poor working
model.26

1.4.3.1 Insufficient Professionalism
Professionalism is what sets social work apart from government-run services in the
first place. It is embodied in the principles and methods of social work, as well as in
the management and personnel structure. At present, shortage of talents hits China’s
social work and particularly, poverty alleviation social work very hard, making it
difficult to give full play to the professional advantages possessed by social work
when it comes to poverty reduction. In terms of organization and administration,
unreasonable norms and formalistic manners are still prevalent, regardless of the
policy-driven trials to build rules and regulations into management. Somehow this
constitutes a restraint on professionalism of social work.
1.4.3.2 Low Social Recognition
Low recognition is a key challenge to today’s poverty alleviation social work. It

refers not only to governmental attitude but also to the society as a whole. Lack of
cooperation and space for social work in poverty relief and the difficulties for policy
incentives to materialize are the major issues at the government level. With social
work playing an increasingly important and specialist role in poverty relief, govern-
mental recognition is now gradually increasing. But there remains a long way for
it to go to achieve universal recognition throughout the country. At the societal level,
little understanding, support, and trust are shown by individuals, groups, enterprises,
social organizations, and other subjects toward the social work engaged in the poverty
alleviation battle. Due to little acceptance, the social work is prone to “floating devel-
opment”—institutions and staff can hardly take root, which is not conducive to the
survival of social work institutions, but to the professional development of social
work as well.
1.4.3.3 Obscure Positioning
Under the advocacy of “social poverty relief” and “cooperative poverty relief”,
the government is no longer the sole commander in chief in combating poverty,
the social forces get involved in it more and more. As a highly specialized organiza-
tion or institution, independent of the government and poor groups, social work takes
a third-party stance as independent of, but cooperative with, various poverty allevi-
ation agents. However, as the government-run model hasn’t been phased out yet,
the administrative power takes absolute dominance with substantial resources under
its control. This narrows the room for social work organizations or agencies to
get involved and easily puts them in obscure positions, with their independence
undermined by the administration power and their professionalism and third-party
strengths somewhat suppressed.
1.4.3.4 Poor Working Model
Remarkable progress has been made by the social work during its poverty allevi-
ation practice, as was showcased by models like “hematopoiesis (blood making)”
capacity building, “participatory” interaction, etc., pushing the battle to a higher
stage in a concrete manner. However, some issues need further optimization such as
over rigidity in application and lack of flexibility to comprehensively suit various
working methods to specific conditions of poverty, severe dysfunction. Defects
with these model designs and operations restrain the efficiency of social work and
undermine its credibility.
1.4.4 Tactics for Developing Poverty Alleviation Social Work
Boasting strengths like scientific ideas, professional methods, and a unique status,
social work is expected to play an increasingly important role in combating poverty.
How to give full play to its advantages requires both government and society
to work together. Three pillars shaped the evolution of poverty alleviation social
work: the degree of specialization, the scale of governmental investment, and the
degree of social recognition. They are the main factors affecting its development.
Effective strategies are made accordingly to promote the development of poverty
reducing social work, including to deepen professional values and strengthen capacity
building for social workers, to raise social recognition, and to build intervention
platforms for poverty reducing social work, while improving relevant policies and
systems.27
1.4.4.1 Implementing the Value Concept of “Helping People to Help

Themselves”
Beyond economic assistance to improve the living conditions of the poor, poverty
alleviation social work also intervenes by financial, psychological, social, cultural
means, to improve their skills for economic gain and mental fulfillment through self-
reliance and to create an enabling environment for self- realization. To achieve this
goal, the social workers should better apply the idea of “helping people to help
themselves” to each and every bit and piece of poverty relief, having a developmental
vision toward the issue while helping raise the awareness of self-reliance in the poor
and enhancing their ability for personal development. This is meant to ensure a long-
term triumph over poverty and to reduce the negative impact of poverty-related
culture and social exclusion.

1.4.4.2 Defining the Role of Social Work
With a strategic third-party status, social work enjoys not only a “bridge” role to
foster interaction and cooperation among various poverty relief agents, but also a
professional advantage for serving poor groups. However, given the current situation
in which the role of individual poverty alleviation subject is not clearly defined,
it is difficult to give full play to the professional advantages and impact of social
work. By establishing and improving relevant policies, systems, and regulations, the
relationship boundary between various poverty alleviation subjects can be clarified,
and their responsibilities, rights, and obligations can be identified by code of conduct.
This is meant to have the roles of various poverty reducing subjects sorted out so as to
ensure productive cooperations among them and to reduce resource dependence of
the relevant social work to avoid its being heavily administrative.
1.4.4.3 Enhancing Capacity Building for Institutions and Workers
With a brief history and insufficient practical experience, China’s social work falls
short of professionalism and efficacy in its participation in poverty relief. There-
fore, to improve on the two bottlenecks is essential for bringing such social work up
to a higher level. To strengthen social workers and institutions’ capacity building,
not only are better management and higher standardization needed, but also an
increased “people-oriented” sense of service in social workers is needed. By so doing,
their specialized approaches such as empowerment, resource linkage, and advantage
mining can upgrade such work to a more specialized, institutionalized, and perma-
nently functioning level. In addition, more governmental support is needed to provide
more room and hands-on opportunities for such social work to better understand
China’s poverty conditions, before its better development can be attained.
1.4.4.4 Attaching Importance to Social Participation by Poor Groups
The government-led model of poverty relief presupposes a top-down relation-

ship with the public, by which the poor groups are intended as a passive bene-
ficiary and unable to reveal their actual demands to the helpers. This leads to a
mismatch between what is needed and what the government offers, undermining the
effect of poverty relief. As a “link” connecting various concerned parties, poverty
reduing social work has in its duty to promote the exchanges and coordination among
these parties. Therefore, for social workers, it’s all the more important to get the poor
group’s voice heard so that they can keep themselves updated with their difficulties
and needs and based on this, they can formulate a sustainable “personalized” package
to optimize relevant policies and systems. This way not only has the supply–demand
mismatch avoided, but also nurtures a higher participation in the masses whose sense
of “master” will be enhanced, thereby reducing the odds of declined self-esteem and
welfare dependence that may occur in the one-way aid-giving model.
References 27
1.4.4.5 Improving the Recognition by the Government and Society
A better recognition by the government and society can foster a friendlier political and
social environment that makes social workers and their institutions more empowered
to combat poverty, thus clearing away institutional, administrative, and social barriers
in their process of participation. On the one hand, stronger publicity is required on the
achievement of poverty reducing social work to raise their credibility and enhance
their social recognition; on the other hand, social workers should cooperate more with
officials, sharing information of work, offering suggestions for policymaking, so that
the government will be able to get a better idea of advantages and achievements of
social work in this regard and give them higher recognition.
1.4.4.6 Promoting the Institutionalization of Social Work
Limited platforms and channels for social workers’—to partake of the poverty alle-
viation work are mainly caused by insufficient institutionalization of the work.
Despite vigorous promotions of “social poverty alleviation” and “cooperative poverty
curbing”, to systematize the work is something that did not happen until recently,
along with the calling for simplified administrative procedures and delegated power,
as well as accelerated process of functional transformation. Actually, there is an ample
scope for social work in the poverty reducing battle, without proper institutional
support; however, the breadth and depth of its participation appear very limited.
Responsibility lies with the government to raise voice for poverty curbing social
workers by incorporating the social work into the poverty combating work system in
an institutionalized manner and to give full play to the role and value of social work
in it.
References
1. Xiang D, Huang C (2013) China Poverty alleviation Development Report (2012). Huazhong
University of Science and Technology Press, Wuhan, p 68
2. Gao F, Xiang D (2016) The possibility and feasibility of professional social work in targeted
poverty alleviation. J Social Work (3)
3. Liu J (2013) Evolution of the range of British-American social work practice and the
construction of the conceptual framework of modern social work practice. J Soc Work (3)
4. Zhang H, Yang X, Gu X (2008) Strength perspective in rural social work: a practice-based
model of capacity and assets building in rural China. Sociol Stud (6)
5. Wang S (2015) Proactively developing rural social work. China Social Work (7)
6. Xiang D, Yao X (2009) Social work in poverty alleviation: opportunities and approach. Teach
Res (6)
7. Yao X (2009) Poverty alleviation and social work intervention. J Social Work (7)
8. Xiang D, Hua X, Jin Y (2017) Perspective conversion and approach innovation:localized
practices of social work in poverty reduction. Soc Work Manage (6)
9. Wang S (2006) Introduction to social work, 2nd edn. Higher Education Press, Beijing
10. Hangsheng Z (2003) New revision of introduction to sociology, 3rd edn. China Renmin
University Press, Beijing, p 2003
Chapter 2
Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social
Work
Poverty alleviation social work is an embodiment of applying social work theory to

development-oriented poverty reduction practice. It relies on specialized methods and
skills to help address issues concerning poverty-stricken people and their communi-
ties by meeting their demands and guiding the community toward a more sustainable
development. Poverty alleviation social work is applicable in many ways and it is
part of a wider context in which targeted social action and differing theoretical guid-
ance are performed. As for who is in charge of poverty relief, the main arguments
lie in three distinct but overlapping direction claims: “welfare pluralism”, “the third
sector”, and “poverty governance”. All these three necessitate an interactive coopera-
tive approach among the interested parties; they reflect the multi-dimensional poverty
reality they face in the population by and large. Only by making joint efforts can we
ensure that no dedicated resource is wasted, and no mismatch is detected between
what is provided and what is needed by the poor when helping them achieve accept-
able living standards and greater success in reducing poverty. As for the market-based
environment of service, it is argued that poverty is a product of social construction and
is closely related to social structure and community environment. According to this
argument, it is not difficult to see the internal and external factors creating the behav-
iors of the poor and the causes of their poverty. This argument is further explored in
the “system theory”, “social support”, and “regional development” sections of the
theory, by which a more holistic and comprehensive perspective is taken to explain
how impoverishment happens and in what ways it can be solved by social resources.
Regarding service recipients, stress must be laid on the mentality and capability of
social workers to deliver needed solutions and support for the most vulnerable in
society. Instead of viewing the recipients simply as “problematic” and “vulnerable”,
they are expected to adopt a “strengths perspective” in both the process and method-
ology of reducing poverty. Specifically, social workers should aim to “empower” the
poor by enriching their “human capital” and “social capital” as well as exploring
their potential to achieve endogenous development. It is worth noting that for the
purpose of academic analysis, the above-mentioned theoretical perspectives can be
30 2 Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work
categorized, but it does not mean they are isolated, disconnected, or applied in isola-
tion. Social care is a “whole systems approach”, and these theories and practices
are designed to be unified, their interdependence nature requiring a comprehensive
application without leaving each unattended.
2.1 Multi-dimensional Subject Theory of Poverty

Alleviation Social Work
Poverty relief is a comprehensive strategy of the government, business and corporate

enterprises, and social organizations. Historically, poverty governance goes through
three stages: folk charity, government intervention, and partnerships among govern-
ment agencies, business enterprises, and social organizations.1 This is a multi-
disciplinary approach whereby recipients and care-takers work together. In poverty
relief practice, no single subject alone has sufficient knowledge and resources to solve
every problem alone. Only by relying on each other, coordinating and cooperating on
resources can we overcome poverty sooner.
This section investigates “Multi-dimensional Poverty” via social work to explore
the theoretical basis and targeted approach that are employed in combating poverty
together.
2.1.1 Multi-dimensional Poverty Requiring Multi-agent

Collaborative Governance
Poverty relief requires the collective wisdom and interactive cooperation of all
involved parties, including social workers. This is due to the multi-dimensional nature
of poverty itself and the social nature of poverty alleviation efforts. A consensus has
long been reached that poverty entails suffering and insecurity, which are manifest
in hunger, malnutrition, food shortage, and lack of disposable income. However,
poverty is not necessarily attributed to low income. Any poverty analysis would
fail if it took a purely objective and judgmental approach to poor people’s feelings
and the circumstances they find themselves in. That is why it is absolutely neces-
sary to define the meaning of poverty in a comprehensive and factual manner. In
1985, a famous economist, Amartya Sen, systematically expounded the “capabil-
ities approach” concept in his book Commodities and Capabilities, namely, when
evaluating a person’s advantages, we should consider the importance of his or her
actual freedom. This examines how capable he is in converting his resources into
realizable value activities. Since then, a consensus has been reached in academia
to view poverty from a multi-dimensional perspective rather than focusing solely
on personal income. Following Amartya Sen, many other scholars began setting up
1 Tian [1].
2.1 Multi-dimensional Subject Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 31
indicators for Multi-dimensional Poverty in their own ways. The core argument of
Multi-dimensional Poverty claims that human poverty is not only about income, but
also about other objective indicators such as availability of drinking water, infras-
tructure such as roads, sanitation, and general feelings of wellbeing.2 Thus, poverty
is a multi-construction based on a complex relationship network.
In addition to economic income of course, many other indicators are considered
to judge whether individuals and households are in poverty, such as health status,
educational attainment, meaningful work, and living standards. This comprehen-
sive overview or multi-dimensional approach is of better validity and reliability for
evaluating the progress made by a country or region in raising living standards.
Clearly, poverty has historically been associated with low income. However, the
fact that modern society has evolved through capability, culture, rights, and even
freedom, equality, and value construction, and proves it to be way beyond a single
economical fact. It is an overall portfolio connecting to cultural values, social struc-
ture, political rights, and social allocation of relations and positions accepted by
different individuals or groups. Poverty is by nature something social that reveals one
person’s status in relation to others.3 Earlier definitions and explanations of poverty
only served to check its economic side by value norms such as material wealth and
monetary income, resulting in a misguided obsession with tangible uptrend in facili-
ties and temporary income rises at the expense of other factors. Likewise, the causes of
poverty are not single, either, with each perspective leading to a different conclusion.
The complexity of poverty causes and individual plight poses severer challenges to
poverty alleviation actions, be it individual poverty from poor health, limited earning
capacity, and overly conservative mentality, or occasional poverty from geograph-
ical disadvantage, natural disasters, and accidental injuries, or structural poverty from
system design, cultural traditions, and social exclusion.
Poverty Alleviation action has grown out of a western dominated system with
growth models and historical experience found in developed countries. This approach
disregards the pursuit of individualism and liberalism as core value and the instru-
mental rationality of “means and ends” as the code of action for the poor to achieve
happiness. Secondly, it takes economic growth, technological progress, and better
economic decision-making among the poor as the principal means for poverty relief,
and it uses an upward linear view of development as the goal of effective poverty
relief. Thirdly, the poor is categorized as “the other” by modern poverty alleviation
discourse. This means actions are often top-down in which the target group is seen
as a problem requiring “discipline” and control. Under such a framework of action,
poverty relief has had its focus narrowed down to individual poor areas and the
economic growth, technology transfer, and “discipline” of the poor in those areas.
To this end, various top-down projects for poverty alleviation were carried out to
help bring a better life to the poor by targeted planning, specific funding, and skills
training, as well as help with understanding modern values and ideology. By altering
2 Wang and Alkire [2].

3 Zhang [3], p. 4.
the lifestyle of the poor, it attempts to bring them into a modern social structure.4 In
spite of efforts made on the economic side of the job and the value orientation of the
intervener, poverty alleviation action as such has failed to consider the social side of
the picture.
The sociality of poverty relief involves the relationship between self and others
and that between individual and society. It does not regard the poor and external
bodies as separate and distinct individuals, but as part of a common solution that
comprises action and external support. Viewed from a sociological perspective,
poverty relief contains four important components: first, subjectivity or intersub-
jectivity. Poverty reduction is not a personal action, but a purposeful and intentional
behavior directed to others and organizations; second, structural orientation. The
action of a subject is heavily dependent on its own development structure and the
inherent social structure of the outside world, which directly guides the poverty-
reduction choice by the subject, thus affecting the result of poverty reduction; third,
systemic functionality. Different subjects are in different systems. Heterogeneity of
the system entails complexity, but if properly adjusted by the subjective initiative
of action takers and social systems, it will bring new functional integration and
improve the efficiency of poverty reduction; fourth, reflectiveness. Not only indi-
viduals but also organizations themselves should be reflective. This introspection of
their own actions and the external environment can better ensure the continuity and
professionalism of poverty relief.
In short, given the multi-dimensional nature of poverty itself and the social nature
of poverty alleviation actions, it is desirable to mobilize all sorts of resources and
parties to the battle by cooperation and jointly assisting the poor.5 This is not only a
process for social forces to join in the governance of poor regions, but also an effective
channel to change the traditional single action mode of the government and realize
the equality of rights of all interest groups. It requires the diversification of poverty-
reduction subjects and the decentralization of power and interests in the poverty
relief context. Poverty relief is more than economic assistance by the government, it
is also a process of readjusting and integrating the poverty alleviation structure and
relationship of all those involved, including social workers.
2.1.2 Theoretical Basis for Social Work to Participate

in Poverty Relief
The theoretical basis for social work participation is made up of welfare pluralism,
involving the third sector, and poverty control. Its core argument lies in the supply of
action that drives a coordinated approach among government, the market, and social
organizations. By maximizing the strengths of all parties, it meets the diverse needs
of the people.
4 Zhang [3], p. 169.

5 Liu [4].
2.1.2.1 Welfare Pluralism
Welfare pluralism is a theoretical paradigm that emerged in the 1980s to solve the
debt crisis in western welfare state countries. It advocates a diverse source of social
welfare and believes that supply of resources should neither be completely dependent
on the state nor on the market, but a product of all social forces6 requiring mobilizing
the whole of society for support and improvement. Welfare pluralism is also known as
“mixed welfare economic” support based on the ideas of the British scholar Richard
Titmuss who constructed a welfare system composed of social welfare, fiscal and
tax welfare, and occupational welfare. He regards the three elements as coterminous
with each other. However, he did not specify who was responsible for providing the
three kinds of welfare (“where does welfare come from?”), which makes him only a
pioneer of Western social welfare pluralism theory, rather than its founder.
Prevailing academic thought is that the welfare pluralism theory originates from
a debate on “welfare sources” initiated by British scholar Wolfender’s report in
1978 entitled “The Future of Voluntary Organizations” which calls for “including
voluntary organizations in the ranks of social welfare providers”. What pushes the
debate to a climax is a book published in 1979 by the National Council for Volun-
tary Organizations of the UK, titled Gladstone’s Voluntary Action Organization in
a Changing World, which claimed that “effective welfare supply should rely more
on voluntary action”. Then came the founding father of welfare pluralism Richard
Ross, a British scholar, who defined the term “welfare pluralism” and specified
two core connotations—diversification and decentralization—in his book Common
Goals but Different Roles: The State’s Contribution to the Welfare Mix. Specifi-
cally, they each indicate the diversification of welfare supply subjects and the non-
monopoly of welfare resource allocation. Following that, he put forward the theory
of multiple combination of welfare: a welfare society should be mixed, that is, a
mixed welfare society, in which the family, the market, and government act as three
distinct providers, and the total social welfare delivery is a composite total of all
three providers.7
The core of welfare pluralism is to balance the relationship among the state,
the market, and the society, with independence and autonomy of the society being
the focus and to build a sound interaction between the state and society through
the supply of open government policy space and the cultivation of various social
forces. The establishment of multiple welfare supply organizations and interactive
platforms can bring together various social resources from civil society to actively
and reasonably express the interest and demands of the grass-roots groups, drawing
upon collective action to jointly promote the poverty reduction agenda. The theory of
welfare pluralism is of positive significance for social work to participate in China’s
poverty-reduction crusade which forms an integral part of the people’s wellbeing. It
takes the active participation of social work and specialized supply of public service
to combat poverty.
6 Peng and Huang [5].

7 Xu [6].
2.1.2.2 The Third Sector
“The third sector” refers to organizations that are neither public nor private, neither
governmental nor market organization and that often operate on a not-for-profits
basis. The idea was first proposed by American scholar Theodore Levitt, who advo-
cated three pillars8 for modern society, the public sector (government), the private
sector (enterprise), and the third sector. In the West, it represents a social intermediary
mechanism based on the dual construction of public/private fields, which not only
plays a social affairs management function different from that of the government, but
also performs a social service obligation different from that of general commercial
operation. As early as the 1970s, the role of the third sector in public administration
had already been talked about by sociologists from the USA as a practical approach
to social management. Since the 1980s and 1990s, following reforms in the welfare
system in Western countries and the development of the social economy concept, the
third sector, which participates in public policy and manages the government’s social
policy initiatives, has once again become a critical topic for academia. These topics
include the review of the development history of the third sector and the elaboration
of its role in poverty reduction action. The activities of the third sector are neither
based on a mandatory norm, nor are they profitable by exchanging services or goods.
The third sector is a legitimate organization that aims to deliver tangible benefits for
public benefit by being non-profit and often voluntary. It is often more flexible than
the government sector and public sectors, not only because they have the freedom
to be innovative in delivering solutions and policies, but also because they provide
localism and stronger grass-roots participation. In particular, their involvement in
the field of social welfare provision meets the needs of “citizen participation”, and
they have, to some extent, softened or resolved the tensions inherent when solutions
are imposed upon people by distant government organizations. At the same time, the
third sector also promotes the improvement of social ethics and social integration
through altruistic activity, and social welfare best practice. Its effective information
feedback system (interaction with the public) and rational decision-making system
(introduction of expert system) often make it an ideal model in the implementation
of social welfare services.9
The existence of the third sector helps a country better cope with twin problems of
perceived “government failure” and “market failure” in social and economic develop-
ment, by making up for the deficit in the needed supply of public resources by bringing
together social forces, thus meeting the particular needs of different interest groups.
In Western countries, the third sector has its own unique way of action and targeted
room for implementation of strategic initiatives and human capital development.
This is partially due to their time-honored tradition of citizenship and democratic
consciousness, and a second reason is insufficient public service supply by govern-
ment and the market, which creates a gap for the third sector to flourish in. The third
sector can help the government provide more abundant and flexible social services,
8 Yao [7].
9 Xiong [8].
improve living conditions of vulnerable groups, and can also actively resolve some
social conflicts in grass-roots communities to promote social harmony and stability
and to meet people’s various social needs. The third sector model provides a theoret-
ical template for China’s social work to participate in the cause of poverty reduction,
but the way it helps in the West is embedded in their sophisticated economic and social
development environment and the relatively developed civil society. Given China’s
vastly different national conditions, constant adjustments are needed to ensure that
the practice is sustainable and capable of achieving its aims. At the same time, the
third sector also has its own limitations for development, and therefore, it still needs
to actively cooperate with other organizations and people to ensure interaction and
achieve complementary goals.
“The third sector” takes the view that no governance subject is equipped with
sufficient knowledge and resources to combat poverty by itself. Only by relying on
each other with coordination and cooperation and adopting multiple control methods
can various parties beat poverty together. This requires that those who take the wheel
and the way their power is exercised have to be diversified and must be adapted from
single solutions to more complex and complementary goals. There must not only
be government providing public goods and services for the poor through adminis-
trative or market means, but also commercial organizations doing the job through
market-oriented means and social workers being the third party taking marketization
or social mobilization means to address the issue. In this process, effective partici-
pation by all social forces can enrich rural poverty alleviation resources, effectively
protect the interests of vulnerable groups, and improve the integrity and flexibility of
rural poverty reduction work. Anti-poverty emphasizes that the actors should estab-
lish a partnership of cooperation and consultation under the guidance of common
goals. This kind of partnership not only means that the members within the poverty
alleviation system can share resources to meet each other’s needs, share development
achievements, but also means that these members should solve their problems and
disparities through interactive consultation, share risks, and create a broader poverty
reduction space for the poor.
2.1.2.3 Governance and Poverty Control
The word “governance” in the West originates from ancient Greek and Latin and
originally means “to steer, guide, and manipulate”.10 Its historical form has evolved
from primitive democratic governance, ancient Greek city state autonomy, and
medieval social and religious governance to “multi-polar negotiated governance”,
“joint governance”, “social autonomous governance”, and other modern governance
models. Its manifestation has gone through three stages: “authority-dependence-
obedience”, “contract-cooperation-discipline”, “service-trust-negotiation”. From a
10 Weng and Gu [9].

ruling perspective to a governance perspective, its development in the West is essen-

tially a process of gradual development, maturity, and improvement.11 In China,
the term “governance” also has a long history of development. Ancient China has
been through the stages of “Five Emperors’ Governance” and “Scholars’ Gover-
nance”, before the “Peace and Harmony” in the Han Dynasty, “Rule by Law” in the
Tang Dynasty, “Rule by Government” in the Song Dynasty, “Reference to Gover-
nance” in the Song Dynasty, “Police Supervisor in the Yuan Dynasty”, “Restoration
of Official Governance” in the Ming Dynasty, and “Discrimination of Governance”
in the Qing Dynasty. Of course, this is mainly from the perspective of national
governance. After the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the “omnipo-
tent national governance model” and the “endogenous evolution model”12 of social
management innovation were adopted, respectively, before the modern governance
finally took shape with the Third Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee
of the Communist Party of China putting forward the general goal of comprehen-
sively deepening reform, emphasizing the need to promote the modernization of the
national governance system and governance capability.
But it was not until the concept of “governance crisis” in the report “Sub Saharan
Africa: From Crisis to Sustainable Growth” issued by the World Bank in 1989 that
“governance” became widely studied and used in academic theories. Since the 1990s,
Chinese and Western scholars have made a more in-depth explanation of “gover-
nance” based on their reflection on the welfare state crisis, globalization, and other
practical issues and initially formed a governance theory. Existing research results
show that these studies are mainly divided into two categories: “the interaction
between multiple subjects” and “the adjustment mechanism of power resources”.
The first type of research mainly starts from the limitations of the government in the
allocation of social resources and believes that governance is a networked interac-
tive process of multiple subjects. According to James N. Rosenau, the main founder
of governance theory, governance is an activity supported by common goals and
rules and is the sum of many ways in which various public or private organiza-
tions, individuals, or institutions manage common affairs. It is a continuous process
to reconcile conflicting or different interests and take joint action.13 Roots believes
that governance refers to the network structure among organizations, including self-
organization. It complements the limitations of market and bureaucratic organizations
and can better control and coordinate resource allocation.14
British scholar Gary Stoke has further enriched and expanded the theory from
five aspects15 : the pluralism of governance subjects, the ambiguity of governance
responsibilities, the interdependence of power among subjects, and the modernity
of governance tools of autonomy of governance networks. Kuiman emphasized that
11 Wei [10].
12 Li and Ren [11].
13 Rosenau [12].
14 Weng and Gu [9].
15 Gerry Stoker. Governance as a Theory: Five Arguments [J]. Hua Xiafeng, trans. International
Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition).

governance is not a fixed arrangement, but a new way for the state and society to
interact to cope with the growing social problems and the complexity, diversity, and
dynamics of policy issues.16 Researchers in this regard focused on the flexibility and
networking of the way power is exercised in national governance and believe that
governance is a network management system17 formed by face-to-face cooperation
between the government and social forces and is a multi-form social cooperation
network system guided by the nature of problems and effective management. The
mechanism and organizational structure of dialogue, consultation, resource sharing,
and mutually beneficial cooperation can effectively resolve various governance prob-
lems and improve the coordination between the supply and demand to achieve action
and ensure efficiency of resource utilization.
The second type of research believes that governance is an adaptation that grew
out of criticizing and reflecting on neo-liberal institutionalism and can be regarded
as neo-liberalism adapted. It represents a system that takes the wheel18 by better
balancing the supply of public and collective goods.
Developed as a result of criticism and reflection on past experience, it can be
regarded as an adaptive neo-liberal theory, which alludes to the mechanism that
controls the social system to achieve its goals, and it can better balance the supply of
public goods and collective goods. Oliver E. Williamson, key representative of the
American New Institutional Economics, elaborated on governance from an economic
perspective in his book Governance Mechanism. He refers to governance as an oper-
ation to evaluate the effectiveness of various alternative organizational models, with
the goal being to establish proper controls and administrative orders through the
central governance mechanism. The governance structure can be regarded there-
fore as an institutional framework in which the integrity is determined of a trans-
action or a group of related transactions.19 In his book Comparative Institutional
Analysis, Japanese scholar Masahiko Aoki also analyzed the diversity and charac-
teristics of transaction governance mechanism from the perspective of economics.
After summarizing the discussion on various transaction governance mechanisms,
he believed that private, public, formal, and informal governance mechanisms, as a
complex of institutional arrangements, could take effect simultaneously as market
economy advances.20
Some Chinese scholars distinguish governance from governance, administration,
and management and placed governance between the politics responsible for gover-
nance and the management responsible for specific affairs, and it is a substitute for
the traditional administration based on Weber’s bureaucratic theory.21 Yu Keping
believes that governance refers to the use of public authority by official or private
public management organizations to maintain the use of power to guide, control, and
16 Kooiman [13].
17 Johnson and Kettl [14].
18 Rosenau [15].
19 Williamson [16].
20 Aoki [17].
21 Mao et al. [18].
regulate civil activities in various institutional relationships for maximizing public

interests and meeting public needs.22 In fact, this kind of interpretation mainly focuses
on the institutionalization and modernization of governance and creates a more
reasonable and effective governance model through reflection on earlier government
and market operation mechanism.
In short, as complimentary to the limited rationality of government and market,
governance has its own developmental history and cultural tradition as a framework
to define the needs of structural changes in modern countries. It aims at fostering
a coordinated and interactive relationship between multi-disciplinary areas such as
the state and society, governmental and non-governmental organizations, and public
institutions and private institutions. It is a social development process that empha-
sizes the active participation of all actors under the guidance of scientific and stan-
dardized rules and regulations.23 It offers robust theoretical guidance to poverty
governance to real-world poverty reduction. Poverty governance is an integral part
of social governance, and effective poverty governance can promote economic and
social development in poor areas and effectively prevent or alleviate social conflict.
Since the reform and opening up movement, China’s rural poverty Alleviation work
has accomplished greatly. The rural poor population has continued to decline, with
living conditions of poor farmers continuously being improved and rural infrastruc-
ture steadily being bettered. However, deep-seated contradictions that restrict the
development of poor areas still exist. Traditional poverty research based on a single
income is not enough to understand the complex situation faced by poor people.
Relative poverty and social exclusion have gradually replaced absolute poverty as
key concern in poverty research. Poverty shown in other indicators than income has
now become more prominent.24
The Multi-dimensional Poverty situation and complex poverty governance envi-
ronment as such are in urgent need of more targeted and effective governance guid-
ance, as well as better cooperation and communication to boost the efficiency of
poverty governance.
2.1.3 Theoretical Implication of Social Work’s Participation

in Poverty Relief
To apply social work can enable us to re-examine the existing poverty-reduction

cause in three ways. First, poverty reduction is not entirely governmental, but takes
the whole of society to accomplish. Poverty alleviation is not composed of a single
government subject, but a network, an interactive structure of cooperation among
government, market organizations, social organizations, and the public. Secondly, it
is a process that involves multiple subjects to jointly carry out poverty alleviation
22 Yu [19].
23 Xiang and Su [20].
24 Wang and Alkire [2].
projects and to coordinate and integrate various poverty resources. It calls on all rele-
vant stakeholders to coordinate in poverty-reduction action to achieve mutual ends
with everyone closely connected and deeply engaged. Poverty reduction is more
than a political action forced by the government or an economic action achieved
through higher income, but a social action embedded in the social network. While
establishing this interactive relationship, all parties can better integrate poverty alle-
viation resources, expand the development opportunities of poor groups, and enhance
their ability for self-reliance. Thirdly, the overall effect of poverty relief is to reduce
the poor population and their degree of poverty, improving the balance of social
development and poverty alleviation efficiency. To achieve the balance of social
development in poor regions, it is necessary to constantly adjust the existing poverty
alleviation strategies to adapt to the unique social and cultural development condi-
tions in poverty-stricken regions. In addition to tailoring specialized measures for
various people and regional conditions, attention must also be paid to specific poverty
conditions and its severity in different regions. Targeted poverty alleviation poli-
cies and measures should be taken for each region to ensure concrete solutions are
achieved.25
Poverty is a social problem, and its solution depends on the joint efforts of various
organizations. The promotion of external resources is an important factor to effec-
tively and rapidly alleviate poverty. Allowing the masses to share the benefits of
reform and development is an essential requirement for socialism, a strong manifes-
tation of the superiority of the socialist system, and the CPC’s fundamental purpose
of serving the people wholeheartedly.26 Only by establishing a pattern of coordinated
poverty governance can we achieve the goal of shared development. At present, in
poor areas, especially poverty-stricken ones, the endogenous elements and structure
of poverty relief are not fully developed and take a long time to build and improve.
Both market players and charitable organizations play an indispensable role in the
fight against poverty, providing solid strength for achieving the goal of poverty Alle-
viation in poor areas. Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the party
and government have always attached great importance to poverty Alleviation, and
this has led the people to make great efforts in the eradication of poverty and the
structural causes of poverty. The government has shown strong leadership in greatly
improving China’s poverty reduction with powerful results. However, this model
contains defects not conducive to sustainable development and lasting progress such
as insufficient financial resources, low efficiency, inadequate public services and
bureaucracy, and susceptibility to corruption.
As a public welfare policy, development-oriented poverty relief is best delivered to
the poor through top-down organization and management of governments at all levels
and the individual services of various welfare institutions. It is the norm to integrate
policy operation into social administration, while individualized style is relatively
new technologies for the government. However, this “last mile” technology is exactly
the key to success for poverty Alleviation, which also provides the conditions and
25 Guo and Wu [21].

26 Research Institute of Party History and Literature of the CPC Central Committee [22].
foundation for social work to intervene when necessary to do so.27 As a social force,
social work carries its own unique advantages when it comes to poverty reduction. It
is capable of leveraging more local and international resources for a more efficient
usage by innovating governance, improving the accuracy of spotting poverty, and
actively responding to the diversified needs of poor groups.
Social work can expand social capital for the poor and build their capacity by
setting up grass-roots social networks. It can also build an ever-running engine of
poverty relief by empowering the poor with greater business opportunities, greater
power, and more security.28 Therefore, social work has its own poverty Allevia-
tion advantages and actively participates in addressing the disadvantages and short-
comings in governmental actions to improve efficiency and structure of poverty
relief.
2.2 Systematic Support Theory of Poverty Alleviation

Social Work
Poverty relief is a systematic project. Poverty alleviation social work is a systematic,

scientific, and professional service comprising targeted measures to tackle the roots
of poverty and the causes of poverty as well as the development needs of poor groups.
It mainly emphasizes that poverty is a product of social construction that is closely
related to social structure and community environment. Therefore, one cannot solely
focus on the living habits of poor people to pinpoint the causes of poverty. This
part of the theory is mainly proposed by “system theory”, “social support”, and
“regional development” that emphasizes the necessity of adhering to a holistic and
comprehensive perspective and analyzes the causes of poverty and how to solve it
by social resources.
2.2.1 Theoretical Background of Poverty Alleviation System

Support Theory
Two arguments dominate concerning the causes of poverty: the individual view
and the holistic view. With the individual argument, individuals have only them-
selves to blame for being poor because of lifestyle, ignorance, fear of change, etc.,
and therefore, no excessive governmental intervention is deemed necessary. With
the holistic perspective, however, poverty is seen as something comprehensive and
structural, intertwined with not only the ecological, cultural, and social environment
the poor groups are living in, but also external factors and low resource allocation.
In fact, poverty is by nature “systematic” and involves not only a single or personal
27 Gu [23].
28 World Bank [23].
2.2 Systematic Support Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 41
phenomenon, but also the internal hierarchy, governance level, socio-economic level,
and even the overall social transformation of the poor regions.29
First of all, ecologically speaking, the formation of poverty is closely related to
its physical and geographical conditions. The “spatial poverty” theory puts forward
a “geographic capital” concept, as in comparison with physical capital and social
capital. “Geographic capital” integrates multiple differences into spatial geograph-
ical location; for instance, gaps between urban and rural areas, the rich and the
poor concerning education, health, social security, and politics are all generalized to
different endowments of spatial geographical locations.
The more remote an area is, the lower the geographical capital formed by the
combination of natural, economic, social, and other factors to promote local devel-
opment. On the contrary, a more favorable location carries a higher geographical
resource capital. It is precisely the poor spatial and geographical endowment (or low
geographical capital) that farmers are in that reduces them to poorer self-reliance
and the “poverty trap”.30 The ecological environment in poor areas is harsh and
fragile. Western China has all the unfavorable geography in one-major mountain
range, plateaus, deserts, Gobi, bare rocks, glaciers, and permanent snow-covered
areas, where the cold and warm temperatures and the dry and wet seasons vary
greatly.31 Such complex and diverse geographical condition makes it susceptible to
frequent natural disasters. Because of local people’s poor ability to prevent risks,
their backward infrastructure, and the vulnerability of the local environment caused
by poverty, natural disasters often have a greater destructive effect on these areas than
would otherwise be the case, especially on agricultural production, which seriously
threatens the maintenance of people’s livelihood and the development of the local
economy which in turn aggravates the vulnerability of poor areas.
Secondly, culturally speaking, poverty is a lifestyle unique to poor regions demon-
strating the financial status of its residents and their way of life. Their behavior,
customs, psychological patterns, attitudes, and values are shaped by the poor envi-
ronment, and this has a profound impact on their lives. This leads ingrained cultural
poverty, lack of ability, loss of opportunities, social exclusion, and other hardships
which not only makes it difficult for them to get out of poverty, but also gives rise to
lasting and deepening poverty.32
The term “poverty culture” was coined by anthropologist Oscar Lewis, who
believes poverty culture is a social subculture with its own structure and rationality.
It shows an established historical and social context, in which the poor lead their life
in a way different from mainstream society. It also constitutes a self-adaption by the
poor to their marginal status in society which inhibits their escaping from their fate.
Other factors restricting poverty reduction include low literacy, low education level,
scarcity in specialized talents, scientific and technological personnel, and relatively
29 Li and Guo [24].

30 Chen and Cheng [25].
31 Wang [26].
32 Zhou [28].
outdated cultural facilities. Moreover, some traditional cultural norms put restrictions
on livelihood by posing heavier pressure on the fragile ecological environment.
Lastly, the social environment that causes poverty can be viewed from two aspects.
At the macro-social level, some policymaking initiatives concerning administration
processes may inadvertently exclude the poor, thus depriving them of an equal access
to enter mainstream life, and thus creating additional poverty. The unfavorable condi-
tions they are in also give rise to a poverty culture that becomes inborn and deeply
ingrained in attitudes and behaviors.33 From a micro-community governance view,
the persistent “brain drain” in rural areas creates a shortage of human capital resource
for fighting the culture of poverty; we have seen a “hollowing out” and “three left
behind” issues in the remaining population. The pull factors creating this exodus
are faster social changes and mobility, accelerating urbanization and the drift of
educated youth moving to bigger cities. In short, poverty lies in more than one single
factor which necessitates a comprehensive and inclusive approach in regard to their
living environment. For this, we can use the social ecosystem theory, general system
theory, social support theory, and regional development theory in social work theory
to collectively carry out poverty alleviation work step by step.
2.2.2 Theoretical Connotation of Poverty Alleviation System

Support Theory
From a poverty relief point of view, system theory, social support theory, and regional
development theory are similar in that they all emphasize integrating the action of
various poverty alleviation initiatives to enhance self-reliance and improve capacity
and capability in poverty relief outcomes. And this requires robust analysis of the
environment and resources of development in poor areas plus the needs for self-
awareness and supported development in habits and of the local people.
System theory
The system theory originates from the general system theory in management and
psychology. The dual focus of social work and environment, the comprehensive
investigation of many factors, and the emphasis on relevance have all been incor-
porated into the comprehensive model of social work and have become the basic
elements of mainstream social work practice. In social work, system theory is
mainly divided into social ecosystem theory and general system theory.34 The former
addresses the interaction between human behavior and social environment. This
theory regards the social environment in which human beings live (such as families,
institutions, groups, and communities) as an ecosystem, stressing the importance of
the ecological environment (human survival system) for analyzing and understanding
human behavior, with attention paid to the interaction between environment systems
33 Xiang and Huang [29], p. 81.

34 Gao [30], p. 32.
and humans as well as their impact on human behavior, which is one of social work’s
“pillar” theories. It studies people in relation to their environment and questions how
the ecosystem interacts with people and affects their behavior, including the impact of
family and social class on personal growth. In 1935, British ecologist Arthur George
Tansley, inspired by a Danish botanist named Eugenius Warming, made an in-depth
investigation on how an ecosystem is composed before proposing the concept of
social ecosystem for the first time, as a “systematic” whole. This whole includes not
only an organic complex, but also the entire complex of physical factors that forms
the environment.35
At the beginning of the twentieth century, two prominent social work pioneers
claimed that society is a macro-social ecosystem requiring the intervention of social
work. One was Mary Ellen Richmond, leader of the Charity Organization Society
Movement. Besides identifying the people most in need of social work, she advocated
adopting “social diagnosis” to examine the interaction between individuals’ and his or
her environment, so as to improve adaptation to the environment by the individual.
The other was Laura Jane Addams, who ran the Good Neighborly Organization
Movement that organized community residents to help themselves by building a
better community with higher engagement in social reform to improve live quality
at individual and household levels. Both of them considered the role of society and
community as a critical to empowerment. The method of “social diagnosis” and
“people in situations” carries considerable ecological metaphors.36
Charles H. Zastrow, Professor at the Department of Social Work, Whitewater
University in Wisconsin, USA, is one of the key figures in modern social ecological
theory. In the latest edition of his book Understanding Human Behavior and Social
Environment, he claims that our living environment is a complete ecosystem: a func-
tional whole composed of a series of interrelated factors, including family, friends,
work, career, social services, government, religion, etc. Human beings constantly
interact with various ecosystems around them. Not only are they affected by various
social systems, they also interact with other systems continuously and vigorously.
He divided this human social ecosystem into three basic types: micro-system, mezzo
system, and macro-system. The micro-system regards a seemingly single individual
as both a biological member, but also as a social and psychological member of the
social system; the mezzo system refers to small-scale groups such as households,
professional groups, or other social groups, whereas macro-system means relatively
larger social system than small-scale groups on cultural, community, institutional,
and organizational levels.37 Different types of groups affect individual lifestyle roles
and ways of action by interactions in between.
According to the system theory, individual development is the result of close
connection between individuals and surrounding systems. By being part of the
environment, one develops a unique personality. Four ecosystems constitute such
an environment: micro-system (closest to individual, including family, school, and
35 Wen [31], p. 224.

36 Wen [31], p. 225.
37 Shi and Fan [32].
community), mezzo system (connection and interaction between different compo-

nents of the micro-system, including family-school bonds and community voluntary
service team), external system (in no direct connection with the individual, including
parents’ social network and community neighborhood committee), macro-systems
(affecting individuals at the organizational level, including views of culture and
values). Because these systems directly or indirectly affect the survival and devel-
opment of individuals, their relationship with people is expected to be mutually
beneficial. The goal of social work therefore is exactly to foster a better match
between people and their living environment by connecting people with their desired
resources, services, and opportunities and changing the systems to better satisfy
personal needs.38
In contrast, the general system theory is keen on monitoring changes within indi-
vidual systems, such as the reciprocal relationship inside a closed or open system
and the entropy or coordination within a system. It takes a system as a relationship
between a group of objects and the characteristics of these objects. An open system
means that the energy within the system can interact beyond its boundaries, allowing
interactions and exchanges between internal capabilities, data and resources, and the
external environment, while boundaries can penetrate each other. A closed system
refers to an entity in which the energy cannot interact and communicate with the
external environment beyond its boundaries because its boundaries are fixed and
the system and the environment are completely interdependent.39 If we apply the
general system theory to understanding the community environment of the poor, the
conclusion might be that the poor community is a system with a unique structure
and communication methodology, with systemic boundaries and multiple subsys-
tems. The best adjustment of the community environment lies in cooperation. The
smooth communication system of the community depends on the smooth reception
and recovery of information transmission channels. Formal and informal resources
are equally important to the community. The balance and maintenance of the commu-
nity system depend on the cultivation of the internal operation and communication
skills of the system itself.40
The system theory responds to the tradition of social work to improve the psycho-
logical and environmental conditions of the case owners and to propose an inte-
grated framework, which focuses on the relationship between individuals and the
environment, believing that the difficulties for the case owners are life problems. It
attaches importance to the exchange between people and the environment, examines
the system as a whole, and pays attention to the pressure and balance inside and
outside the system, so as to redirect the attention of social workers to the interaction
between people and the environment instead of separating them.
38 Wen [31], p. 230.

39 Wen [31], p. 228.
40 Gao [30], p.32.
2.2.3 Social Support Theory
In social work theories, social support is a general term referring to any action that
helps others obtain emotional support or material resources by external assistance.
Its earliest academic discussion can be traced back to Durkheim’s social solidarity
(social integration) idea in On Suicide. Durkheim believes that social solidarity is a
bond that unites individuals. It is a state of contact between individuals and groups
based on common emotions, morality, beliefs, or values and characterized by combi-
nation or attraction. It is dividable into mechanical and organic solidarity. As a key
term, social support officially became part of the theory in the late 1960s and early
1970s, stemming from concerns about mental health and stress as a result of living
in poverty. Research back then discovered that the same stress situation showed
different impacts on different subjects. Relatively speaking, those who can get more
support from family or friends have stronger psychological endurance and better
health, whereas those who rarely get such support are weaker with less endurance
and poorer physical and mental health.41
Social support helps the needy for free by deploying social networks through
certain material and spiritual means.42 It is an interactive activity between support
providers and receivers. With interactivity and response being the focus, it is incom-
plete to have only the provider because assistance requires acceptance by the receiver
to be effective. Social support is an intimate interpersonal relationship that allows
for mental or material help. It is intended to help individuals achieve their goals or
satisfy their needs in a particular situation. Its completion hinges on the success of
certain other factors—for example, family members, friends, colleagues, and other
formal and informal factors. A key factor is the emotional, informational, material,
and companionship it engenders within the people it is aiming to support.43 Social
support theory values the developmental potential to be brought by existing interper-
sonal bonds between receivers and the environment they are in. It requires different
types of support to match different roles the receivers play, with the type of support
strategies dependent on individual personality. It also adopts a voluntary connec-
tion and mutual assistance network strategies, to help the needy build a “one-to-
one” supportive connection with non-professional help givers while bringing people
with problems, interests, and abilities in common, to foster a healthy interactive
relationship among them and the people around them.
It is the relationship between individuals and other systems in their ecological
environment that social support attends to. The larger the network, the better a recip-
ient can cope with challenges from the environment. But most case owners have no
competitive edge in this regard and are in need of social workers’ help to learn how to
build and use social support networks. Social support can be tangible or intangible,
including not only the objective, material, or quantifiable type we receive, but also
how these supports make us feel subjectively. It is also critical for mental health.
41 Wen [31], pp. 206–207.

42 Chen [33].
43 Wen [31], pp. 210–212.
In the face of adversity, one finds strength and confidence in a good social support
system; in favorable circumstances, it can also make one feel happy and fulfilled.
Because of different perspectives and perceptions, we may perceive and use social
support differently because it is often imposed upon us by the outside world without
due consideration of its impact and effectiveness.
Social support networks for the poor can be broadly categorized into three types:
first, geography based that highlight direct service by mobilizing relatives, friends,
neighbors, and volunteers within a community; secondly, mutual aid groups made
up of recipients themselves who can help and support each other by self-help;
thirdly, community emergency support networks that help individuals or families
prevent accidents or crises. Social support theory emphasizes resource skills acqui-
sition by interpersonal connections and dissemination to help people view problems
from a macro-perspective; achieving aims through intervention and resolving in a
micro-manner and providing all-round services to the needy by evaluating the case
thoroughly and immediately whenever a conflict occurs and taking corresponding
measures accordingly.44
Regional development theory
Community work needs many practical models, and behind each model, there are
different practical theories. Jack Rothman, an American scholar of social work, advo-
cates interpreting and defining community work in three modes: “regional develop-
ment”, “social planning”, and “social action”. These three modes cover different
variables in the definition of community work, including concept of community
work, a problem analysis perspective, specific work strategies, and even the analysis
of different roles of community workers. It has important reference value for the
development of community work theory. The regional development model empha-
sizes the participation and cooperation of residents and the management or use of
community resources through collective organizations to solve problems and meet
welfare needs on the community level, so as to enhance community cohesion and
sense of belonging.
The regional development model has several key assumptions. The first one is
about individuals. The assumption considers people as originally capable of staying
united in cooperation and living by their original values and beliefs in their natural
communities. However, as modernization, industrialization, and urbanization deepen
and the bureaucratic structure of modern social organizations takes the lead, citizens
have gradually fallen into a cold, isolated, and closed state and are increasingly absent
from the closely-knit ties of traditional communities. As a result, they become short
of enthusiasm and motivation to actively participate in social public affairs. Thus,
people become increasingly helpless and vulnerable, and problems become more
difficult to resolve at both the personal and community level.
The second is about social formation. This model claims that the natural bonds in
traditional communities are slowly shrinking. And in their place, an institutionalized
organizational relationship and market exchange relationship that features modern
44 Gao [30], pp. 37–38.

instrumental rationality have begun to reign, leading to social stratification, dislo-

cation, and polarization. For the depressed regions though, whether opt to join the
market-based system or to engage in the country’s public service structure doesn’t
materially change their status of being dependent on more developed central regions
which will over time nibble away at their original culture, knowledge, confidence,
and ability.
The third is about behavioral motives. In this assumption, individuals have a
tendency to unite and cooperate rather than compete and confront. To assume individ-
uals as willing to communicate and participate in democratic processes enhances effi-
ciency in solving community problems better than compared to centralized decision-
making. Although rational pursuit of maximizing personal interests is inevitable for
individuals, a sense of collective belonging and identity can be cultivated as long as
individual needs and motivations are not neglected by collective group actions. In the
right circumstances, people can be encouraged to help each other, and the behavioral
motive for individuals to participate in community activities on an emotional and
value-driven scale becomes desirable, preferable, and achievable.
Among various community types, the regional development model mainly copes
with the effects of declining, chaotic, and dwindling communities. Through facili-
tation, coordination, and catalysis, community workers can cultivate the ability of
self-help and mutual assistance in the community, promote participation by residents,
define their own needs, and take action to solve local problems, thereby changing
the community.45 Regional development is a process of organization and educa-
tion, and its action can be divided into task-focused goals and process-driven goals.
The former mainly refers to substantive work or local problem-solving actions as
reflected in community-level economic and social development, public infrastruc-
ture, and cultural construction. The latter is to establish a long-term system and orga-
nization to promote the fundamental change in community relations. For example,
re-establishment of various social networks in the community, increased frequency in
residents’ interaction and communication, improvement in neighborhood relations,
the reconstruction of close ties between residents and groups, and recognition by resi-
dents of the importance of getting involved with willing to take responsibility that
makes residents better identified with and engaged in community affairs. By solving
problems of common concern, community workers can improve life quality for citi-
zens and encourage every individual to play their potential to the fullest, creating
community awareness.
Core strategies adopted by the regional development model have had success
in mobilizing internal resources, participation, and action, supplemented by the
help of external resources and technology introduction. Through public engagement
and participation and mutual assistance and cooperation, this model unites people
and enables discussion at community level. Through communication, dialogue
and discussion mutual self-help groups are a good model for expanding public
interest among locals. Out of the same concern, it calls for consultation, compro-
mise, and cooperation among community organizations while to invite, unite, and
45 Wen [31], pp. 194–195.

support community elites; it invites common community residents into development

campaigns with greater tolerance, with consensus strategy adopted to avoid conflicts
and competition in jointly solving community problems and enhancing community
awareness.
2.2.4 Practical Application of Poverty Alleviation System

Support Theory
Examining poverty relief from the system theory, the social support theory, and the
regional development theory of social work, one can gain a bird’s eye view of the
poverty-reduction issues faced by poverty, and professional intervention methods
can be used to recognize and solve longstanding poverty problems. First, of course,
being poor is something inseparable from their neighborhood. It is unfair to attribute
poverty to individuals alone or to their households because insurmountable obstacles
and lack of resources are critical to their condition. Individual hardships come from
their daily lives and the environment they live in. So for any understanding and
decision concerning poor people to be rational, it is necessary to consider their living
conditions and environment. Secondly, problems experienced by poor individuals or
households often result from a dynamic interaction between multiple variables that
deserve equal attention when it comes to assessment by social workers, in particular
life events in past situations and the relevant social structure that can undermine
personal fulfillment. They all have a part to play in creating a meaningful life for
poorer people. Therefore, it is a must for poverty relief to keep an eye on the socio-
historical events and past experiences of case owners. Third, poor groups are born
diplomats who share a common understanding and interact with the people and
surroundings to form a mutually beneficial harmony. Social workers should therefore
begin their intervention by turning firstly to personal life experiences of people
and examine the influence of an informal system for help first and then call for
positive connections and life experiences to raise awareness of personal competence
and self-confidence, enhancing their ability in self-adjustment upon environmental
changes, and to recover the natural adaptation by the poor to the environment. Of
course, the path to adaption means a continuous exchange of information, energy,
and other resources between people and the social and physical environment. It is in
social workers’ duty to help the poor modify their adaptation to the external social
environment. Specifically, by using system theory and social support theory, social
workers can do their job in the following steps:
Firstly, to play the role of advocates in policy design and assist officials in formu-
lating poverty alleviation policies. There are five principles to follow to improve the
living conditions of poor groups by introducing inclusive policies in poverty relief:
systematic integrity principle, relevance principle, hierarchy principle, dynamic prin-
ciple, and openness principle. Inclusive poverty alleviation policies mean to coordi-
nate natural, economic, and social development goals, to consider disparities between
urban and rural, various regions, and industries, to balance the interests of different
groups, so as to create an inclusive policy environment. In this process, social workers
can help poor, and disadvantaged groups obtain fair opportunities for development
and prevent social exclusion and problems with mobility to help them out of poverty
though self-improvement and better adjustment to the volatility caused by the market
economy.
Secondly, to incorporate four systems in poverty reduction. This involves the
following: a change agent system that consists of social workers and their professional
institutions, a recipient system that comprises individuals, groups, and institutions
seeking help and working with people from the change agent system, an objective
system that is made of the goals to be accomplished by the agent system, and an action
system that captures the purposeful work of the agent system itself.46 Social workers
can assess what kind of difficulty an individual is in by observing their interaction with
the four systems approach and therefore better understand the complex interaction
between him or her and all the relevant social and physiological systems and what
such interaction would mean to that individual. At the same time, they can take efforts
to modify the personal and social environment toward a positive interaction between
the two. In acute practice, not only should they abide by the concept of helping
others to help themselves, they could also deploy professional intervention measures
to better understand the condition poor people are in, for example, group work,
casework and community work, case counseling, group skills, community resource
mobilization, consultation, training, etc. By assessing their needs and providing them
with appropriate training for capacity building, social workers can help the poor out
of their plight with improved ability to fit in and to adapt better to their lifestyles.
They can especially boost social cohesion by mobilizing community members and
resource recombinations which will raise people’s awareness and access to helping
with community affairs.
Thirdly, to set up a social support system for the poor. Social workers are advised
to build a system before organizing their help around it. They should take the initiative
to evaluate relationships in order to boost their awareness of available surrounding
resources to their benefit and for properly coping with challenges and stressful situa-
tions including setting up a social support system by multi-dimensional thinking and
input from various resources. The next step is to prepare for negotiations with “the
important other” who are connected to the poor about events that the case owner (the
poor group) find interesting. This would entail the third step of drawing an ecological
map of the case owner (the poor group) in childhood to identify their likely basic
needs and strengths within the case owner’s ecosystem assessment. It is essential to
combine the issues affecting the case owner with social empowerment, to coordi-
nate and communicate with the significant others in the owner’s ecosystem, so as to
proceed with reform through collective actions.
In effect, the system for the poor is an integral and structural existence. The
balance and harmonious operation of the system depends on the effective input of
external resources and the management of communication and cooperation between
46 Gu [22].
different internal subsystems. Social workers should apply professional skills to the
creation of a stable and dynamic system for the poor that is flexible and dynamic
with an ability to generate or expand in order to achieve the goal of poverty relief.
2.3 Empowerment and Empowerment of Poverty

As General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed, “Development in poor areas depends on

their endogenous strength. It is easy for poverty relief staff to create a new village
from thin air. However, such an approach in poorer regions will achieve limited
goals because without an innate inner drive and a return of rural labor to sustain
the momentum after financial help is ended and no additional will be forthcoming.
Only by nurturing local industries to employ local labor will that new village thrive
on its own”. This is the way to proceed with successful poverty relief—endogenous
momentum for development of built up among the poorer population.
Staying people-centered and activating the motivation and inner drive of the poor
to escape poverty marks the key to success for poverty relief, as well as its primary
strategy and goals. Currently, China has entered a critical stage of that battle against
poverty, conquering cities and villages and opening up the “last mile”. At this stage,
the focus has shifted from quantity to quality, namely more efforts are made to
attain a higher standard of progress by improving the comprehensive capacity of
the poor, building a sustainable livelihood framework, addressing relative poverty,
and achieving endogenous development of poor communities. Currently, poverty
Alleviation operation has also changed from a single top-down “blood transfusion”
by the government to a bottom-up “hemopoiesis” involving multiple subjects, with
more efforts put in offering equal opportunities of development to the poor and
building a social environment for sustainable development. Reflecting upon the “last
mile”, poverty relief could draw upon social work theories such as Amartya Sen’s
“ability poverty” and “capability”, empowerment and advantage perspective theories,
as theoretical guidance.
2.3.1 Theoretical Background of Empowerment Theory
In the poor group’s eyes, the defining feature of poverty is shortage. They are short
of material resources, income, and other tangible goods. In essence, they are lacking
in access to various social resources and development opportunities.
As General Secretary Xi Jinping noted in the Report of the 19th National Congress
of the Communist Party of China, “Development makes the foundation the key to
solving all the problems of our country”. And our development must be scientific
2.3 Empowerment and Empowerment of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 51
and guided by the vision of innovative, coordinated, green, open, and shared devel-
opment. The sustainable development idea must reign in poverty relief to avoid the
trap of a bluff or balancing the book by the people. To attain sustainability, it is
necessary to maintain capacity building in the poor for higher self-reliance. At the
symposium on poverty Alleviation in deeply impoverished areas held on June 23,
2017, General Secretary Xi Jinping remarked that due to historical reasons, many
poverty-stricken regions often remain isolation and trapped from the outside world
leading to a reluctance in the majority of the poor to change the status quo and lacking
insufficient internal impetus to combat poverty. This calls for more intense cultiva-
tion of endogenous momentum of growth. General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed that
poverty reduction begins with reducing the educational gap and increasing personal
confidence. Without internal motivation, relying only on external help, no external
amount of help could beat poverty once and for all, irrespective of whether it takes
wisdom and ability to eradicate poverty. Confidence refers to the determination to
overcome poverty ideologically and the courage to beat poverty which requires a
firm belief in “poor people being ambitious”. There’s nothing to fear about poverty
itself. Rather, it is the illusion of being destined to live permanently in poverty that
drives people to distraction.
For development-oriented poverty reduction, “welfare dependence” is not some-
thing new. It assumes that social relief affects the recipient’s behavior, so much so
recipients become overly dependent on external help—be it preferential policies or
material supply—that they start to live on outside assistance only, reluctant to go job
seeking and neglecting self-development. In developed western countries because of
considerable and progressive welfare policies, governments are also having a hard
time addressing the passive dependence culture. Beyond eroding their inner drive
for self-reliance, it cultivates or even aggravates the grass-roots mentality in welfare
recipients, demonizing them and engendering a feeling of isolation being stigma-
tized.47 In some poverty-stricken households, the symptom is “waiting, relying and
wanting” with almost total reliance on external help and the depressing mindset
of “being poor I feel honored” and “I am poorer than anyone else”. A collective
conscience that has little notion of the market economy and continues the conserva-
tive view of favoring stability over rejecting changes, which inhibits their aspiration
to escape poverty. Meanwhile, they are generally less educated, which has limited
their perception of themselves and their self-development. Due to lack of endowment
and acquired ability, many poor households have poor access to outside resources,
which not only undermines their confidence of regaining wealth by working hard, but
also has the “waiting, relying and wanting” idea consolidates. Therefore, an internal
impetus approach requires mobilizing the initiative and creativity of the poor, with
the focus being to cultivate basic skills needed by production line and business oper-
ation, to combat poverty. Attention must be paid to awakening the intrinsic vitality
in the poor and poorer regions to improve self-development ability.
In addition, for a long time, poverty alleviation goals have been characterized by
instrumental rationality. This means being pragmatic is essential for any governance
47 Han and Guo [34].

means to take effect. Under this framework, action takers regard individualism and
liberalism as value orientation and thus find it difficult to arrive at a common set of
universal principles for problem solving. In order to survive and win competition,
an action taker must be efficient and pragmatic, which often entails ego-inflation
in instrumental rationality, triggering value-related irrational behaviors. Moreover,
obsession with instrumental rationality makes it the ultimate goal of poverty allevi-
ation, while communication mechanism, as the original primary goal, now becomes
a means to an end.48 Help givers regard economic growth, technological progress,
and an educated people as the basic means of poverty alleviation and look to a linear
development vision. Specifically, mandatory input by the government dominates,
with little sensitivity to handling the poverty issue, which hugely hinders sustainable
balanced development.
Social work values comparative advantage. While bringing social resources to
poorer communities, social workers effectively bring their potential to full play and
encourage people to participate in all local community decision-making. And such
participation is regarded as essential in the fight against poverty. Social work focuses
on the sustainable development of the ecology, culture, and order of poor commu-
nities, emphasizing the initiative of the poor groups themselves and the benefit of
their dominant position. By allowing them more rights to choose and practice, a
shared dialogue mechanism is built to achieve common progress and development
for all groups with vested interest in the community. In terms of targeting mecha-
nism, project formulation, implementation, and evaluation, social work highlights
poor groups’ active participation and facilitates team working among various interest
groups. In this process, it adopts a bottom-up governance mode with stress laid on
improving poor groups’ capacity for development and builds a poverty alleviation
model that conforms to the local development situation. In addition, it has also
changed the backward mindset of the poor by various community-based projects
and professional means of governance. This has raised their awareness of devel-
opment and improved their capacity, living standards, and life quality. Social work
focuses on the capacity building of the poor groups, attaches importance to cultivating
their enthusiasm to be part of the community, and tries to foster greater initiative in
the poor groups. Progressive and solution focused makes social workers attentive to
balancing income promotion and environmental protection; through adjusting dispar-
ities among poor groups, for example, a gender perspective with equal rights given
to poor women has become the key to ensure the sustainable development of poverty
alleviation projects.
2.3.2 Introduction to the Theory of Weighting and Energizing
From the beginning, lacking in survival skills, develop knowledge, social resources,
and emotional management skills are a partial reason of poverty. It paralyzes poor
48 Niu [35].
people’s attempt to play an important social role. Therefore, empowerment is to

nurture and restore the initiative and creativity in poor groups, so as to make them
aware of their condition and to pursue their ideals of improvement. There are three
main research orientations on the empowerment of poor groups.
1. Capacity poverty perspective
Before the 1980s, understanding of poverty was mainly from a capital perspective.
However, poverty is a process, which changes with time, space, and people’s ideas,
and is closely related to human development and human power. Capital perspective
regards poor groups or individuals as the objects of passively accepting poverty-
reduction policies or measures, which largely ignores the subjectivity of people and
the development of individuals. Amartya Sen put forward the theory of capacity
poverty. He believes that the essence of poverty is the deprivation of the basic ability
of the poor and the loss of development opportunities. If we want to achieve an all-
round development for the poor, we must give them substantial freedom to choose
a valuable lifestyle. Specifically, five instrumental freedoms are needed to improve
the income of the poor, their living conditions, health status, knowledge, and social
ability to achieve poverty Alleviation and development of the poor eventually, namely
political freedom, economic conditions, social opportunities, transparency guarantee,
and protective guarantee.49
In the very first chapter of Ethics and Economics, Amartya Sen clearly stated that
“economics originates from an interest in human life rather than commodity produc-
tion”. Nevertheless, by chasing capital gain for development, a capital perspective
disregards human life itself. By Amartya Sen we must go beyond the traditional and
narrow-minded view of measuring growth by gross national product, especially a
rigid outlook on poverty that has its rating done mainly by income level. His concern
is subjectivity of individuals in development, and he believes in a micro-approach
when talking about development, especially that of vulnerable groups, with their
freedom being the focus when judging the overall development of a person. In order
to explain more deep-seated reasons behind poverty, Amartya Sen had two terms
coined, “substantial freedom” and “feasible ability”. “Substantial freedom” refers to
the “feasible ability” to enjoy the kind of life desired by human beings, or better, the
“feasible ability” to live a desired life that one is willing to lead. It includes a feasible
skill to avoid hardship, such as hunger, malnutrition, avoidable diseases, and prema-
ture death, as well as the capacity to read, count, and enjoy political participation.
“Feasible ability” closely related to “substantial freedom” refers to a combination of
various possible functional activities that can be achieved by an individual. “Func-
tional activities” are the achievements that a person technically attains. Therefore,
feasible ability is the combination of various mutually substituted functional activ-
ities of a person’s choice. In a word, feasible ability includes two meanings: the
opportunities that an individual is entitled to in a given circumstance and the process
for him or her to ensure freedom of action and decision-making.
49 Xu et al. [36].
When analyzing poverty, Amartya Sen sticks to substantial freedom and regarding
poverty as the deprivation of basic feasible ability instead of simply low income. He
makes a comparative analysis of two perspectives on poverty: one of low income
and the other of deprivation of feasible ability. Firstly, he examines the two-way
relationship between low income and the deprivation of feasible ability, arriving
at the conclusion that low income is an important reason for the loss of feasible
ability and can be a major reason for hunger, malnutrition, and illiteracy. He believed
that to improve the feasible ability of a person may bring higher productivity and
earning ability, and that “better education and health would help to obtain higher
income”. Secondly, by analyzing the differences between the instrumental definition
of income and the constructive meaning of feasible ability, he claims that income
is an important tool for generating feasible ability, but “not the only tool”. The
same amount of income has different effects on the viability of different people
with “heterogeneity” under different circumstances and conditions. Only reducing
income poverty is not the destination for poverty Alleviation policies. A feasible
ability perspective pays close attention to the subjectivity of individuals. Amartya
Sen believes that individuals can effectively decide their own destiny and help each
other if they have the right amount of freedom. They should not be regarded as
passive recipients of interests from some well-designed development plans, but as
active subjects to build their own life path. In Amartya Sen’s view, the contribution
of the feasible ability perspective is to strengthen our understanding of the nature of
and causes behind poverty and deprivation by turning our attention from means (and
a specific means that is often exclusively noticed, namely income) to the purpose that
people are entitled to have a pursuit and accordingly to the freedom that can enable
these purposes to be achieved. Therefore in his opinion, poverty means not only low
income, but also a lack of capacity.50
2. Empowerment theory
In the Social Work Dictionary, empowerment is defined as the process of helping
individuals, families, groups, and communities improve their personal, interpersonal,
socio-economic, and political abilities, so as to achieve the goal of optimizing their
own destiny. Although the empowerment-oriented social work practice flourished in
the 1970s, it cannot be denied that the pioneers of social work in previous eras have
opened up a path for it in the concept, knowledge, and action of social reform. Tradi-
tional social work values believe that without deficiency in themselves, some people
would not have turned into “vulnerable groups”. Social workers treat the case owners
as “patients” and help them make plans for “returning to normal”. From the perspec-
tive of empowerment theory, the reason why the vulnerable groups have serious
problems is that they lack sufficient energy and confidence. What social workers
should do is to “empower” the case owners, helping them regain self-confidence and
enhancing their self-awareness.
Since 1960, the Civil Rights Movement has been a catalyst for the rise of empow-
erment theory. Barbara Solomon’s book Black Empowerment: Social Work in
50 Xiang and Huang [29], pp. 71–72.

Oppressed Communities, published in 1976, marked the birth of the empowerment-

oriented social work practice theory. In this book, the term “empowerment” is explic-
itly applied to a situation in which the black minority in the USA feels powerless
due to the long-lasting negative evaluation by peer groups, dominant groups, and the
macro-environment. At the same time, she advises social workers to focus their inter-
vention on strengthening the power of black people, so as to relieve the oppression
and alienation imposed by “institutional racism” in society, to enhance self-efficacy
of case owners and strengthen the power of social reform.
In an academic context, “to empower” and “to energize” are combined in one as
“empowerment”. It advocates giving equal rights to the target group through external
system design and having them equipped with the skills to defend their own rights. Its
basic assumptions are: the state of personal powerlessness or loss of power is caused
by the oppression and exclusion of the external social environment; the direct and
indirect obstacles in the external social environment hinder individuals from using
their own abilities. However, the problem is not that individuals are incompetent,
but that they lack the right opportunity as platform. With appropriate assistance,
individuals can fully improve their rights and capabilities.51
Empowerment as a theory includes the following aspects: first, to enable individ-
uals to control their own lives; secondly, to enable individuals to obtain the resources
they need; and thirdly, enable individuals to develop and fight for themselves. As a
method, it requires challenging repressive individuals and systems—because these
systems hinder individuals and communities from obtaining important resources to
meet their basic needs. The primary purpose of empowerment is to help the case
owner obtain the right to decide and act on his own life by lowering social and indi-
vidual barriers in the exercise of existing powers, enhancing the ability and confidence
to use those powers, and transferring power from certain groups or individuals.52
Empowerment is therefore to view every poor person as a social individual with
potential; abiding by the principle of autonomy, self-help, and potential develop-
ment; and using the intervention of multiple participants (governments, enterprises,
social organizations) across multiple levels (individuals, interpersonal, and political
levels) and the supply of social resources. By doing so, it provides the poor group
with concepts, role models and generates ideas, strategies, opportunities, and skills
for development, while cultivating their thinking and shaping a more inclusive social
environment. This will also awaken their consciousness and help guides them out of
their plight. In this way, they are expected to gradually gain or enhance control over
their own life and continuously improve their life quality.53
3. Advantage perspective
The concept of advantage perspective came into being in the 1980s in the USA,
focusing on personal ability, family, and excavation of community resources, with its
core merit being insight into the advantages and resources of case owners. As Dennis
51 Cheng [37].
52 Wen [31], pp. 281–283.
53 Wang and Tan [38].
Saleebey, professor of the School of Social Welfare of the University of Kansas,

argues in his book Advantage Perspective: A New Model of Social Work Practice, “the
advantage perspective is centered around the strengths and advantages. When helping
the case owners, social workers have their attention on maximizing case owners’
strengths and capacity and applying these merits to self-help and self-development.
In 1982, Professor Charles Rapp and his team first tried to provide treatment service
for patients with chronic psychosis guided by advantage perspective. They regarded
patients as those who had problems but strengths as well. They exploited community
resources to the fullest for patients’ integration into community life and achieving
remarkable results. In 1989, American scholars Wake, Rapp, Sullivan et al. had
their article Advantage Perspective of Social Work Practice published, marking the
official debut of advantage perspective. In 1992, Advantage Perspective: A New Mode
of Social Work Practice written by Saleb was published as a major text to explain the
advantage perspective. In 1998, Rapp proposed the “Advantage Case Management
Model”, combining the advantage perspective with the case management model.
Corresponding to the advantage perspective is the problem perspective, also
known as defect perspective. It identifies a problem by its description and anal-
ysis from the client’s point of view and then makes a set of action plans to help him
or her based on positive attributes of his or her problems. The problem perspective
approach creates a certain distance between a service provider and the recipient.
Because of this distance or status gap, the former often ignores how the recipient
actually thinks and feels. Given such circumstances, there is no way for the recip-
ient to save face, enhance their sense of self-esteem, or maintain dignity against the
helper. The “advantage perspective” focuses on people’s internal strengths and supe-
rior resources, and is attentive to the advantages and resources from themselves and
their surroundings. With stress laid on these factors in the process of helping others,
social workers abandon a problem–solution vision of the principal and pathology.
Advantage perspective believes individuals’ abilities, and internal resources allow
them to effectively cope with challenges in life. Almost everything can be regarded
as an advantage in certain conditions, including not only the qualities and virtues of
a person, but also his or her skills, and even the environment and resources within the
community. When people struggle and fight against disease, confusion, and oppres-
sion, they can not only rely on their own strength, but also ask for help from others
and thrive after experiencing pain or distress. Instead of problems and pathology,
social workers have the strengths and resources of individuals and their environment
to focus on. Social workers should start therefore from developing and utilizing the
strengths and resources of the case owners, to help a case owner to explore all the
favorable factors that contribute to their improvement and assist them in using these
advantages to achieve their goal.
2.3.3 The Practical Application of Empowerment Theory

in Poverty Alleviation
From the perspective of empowerment and advantages, it is lack of knowledge, skills,

experience, and other elements of the poor group that creates poverty, resulting in their
sense of powerlessness or areas have a relatively closed environment, less developed
education, and a low literacy of population. Such conditions make them susceptible
to the vicious circle of “poor-low education-low literacy-poor”. Therefore, in order
to get rid of poverty, we must focus on improving the ability and cultural level of
poor groups.
What social workers should do is to empower the poor groups, help them regain
self-confidence, find advantages, and improve their sense of self-development. To be
specific, they should accurately identify the needs of case owners first and formulate
an empowerment plan. It means the intervention of social work in poverty relief, and
they must get to know their causes of poverty in order to come up with solutions
matching their needs in a detailed empowerment plan.
The second is to connect resources. The premise of social work service is to
analyze the resource system of poor groups and link their formal resource system
with the informal one as a solution to their problem. In the view of social workers,
the resource system is actually a support system that contains material, spiritual, and
social resources. Social workers can take various measures to mobilize, link, and
intensify resources, so as to better use positive factors for poverty eradication.54
The third is to provide specific and social support to the poor, teaching skills,
fostering higher participation, and improving their overall quality based on cultural
and educational training. According to the theory of human capital, low literacy and
lack of professional and technical skills are the main hurdles restricting poor groups’
development. Social workers should focus on improving the comprehensive quality
of poor groups covering knowledge, skills, culture, and other aspects and cultivate
their self-help ability.
Fourth, we should rely on autonomous economic organizations to tap the endoge-
nous impetus for poverty Alleviation. In economic activities, people’s mastery of
social capital determines to what extent self-fulfillment could be attained. Social
workers can strive for poverty Alleviation funding and organize project teams to
intervene with management consultancy, connecting various parts of a project, galva-
nizing local sages and elite organizations to get involved, so as to realize self-
empowerment among poor households55 ; they may also call for social organizations
to participate and set up a social support network through mutual assistance and
cooperation of community group members to resist various social risks. In empow-
erment practice, social workers and case owners are supposed to work together as
a team to come up with clear-cut goals and solutions by information gathering and
assessing toward strategies formation, so as to get the case owners more involved and
54 Wang [39].
55 Cheng [37].
keep the impact of their concerned events and defining moments under control. The
scope of empowerment practice goals can extends from individual to interpersonal
and then to politics. As a team, social workers can play a variety of roles together
with the case owner by partnership and can apply intervention in many ways like
“one-to-one, family, group, organization, community, country”, etc.56
2.4 Social Integration Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social

Work
The social integration theory is mainly to address social exclusion faced by poor
groups. By evaluating the outcome of empowerment practice and responding to the
needs of poor groups, social workers maintain and promote changes in poor groups
and analyze the causes of social exclusion from policy design, social structure, and
cultural traditions; by investigating and analyzing the social environment poor groups
are in, social workers bring the poor back into normal social life by calling for greater
inclusiveness—more inclusive in policy design and cultural context building, more
positive interactions to build between the poor and non-poor groups, governments,
enterprises, social organizations and other different groups, maintained and expanded
livelihood sources for the poor, and more harmonious social relations.
2.4.1 The Theoretical Background of Social Integration

Theory
Social exclusion is a phenomenon worth exploring for poverty relief. The term “social
exclusion” stems from “new poverty” studies. As a concept built on “poverty”, “new
poverty” refers to an unprecedented type of poverty that has its roots in the trans-
formation in social and economic structure in the late 1960s and early 1970s when
major western economies experienced hyperinflation and severe economic depres-
sion. Those who are not covered by traditional social security system are major
sufferers of new poverty, including single parents, the disabled, the unemployed,
and other vulnerable groups. Since social justice, diversity, and protection of rights
are all highly sought-after theme in “social exclusion” study, “new poverty” showed
an immediate impact right after its advent at mainstream discourse of development,
while attracted attention from many other disciplines.
Two sharper types of exclusion dominate in the contemporary world: one toward
grass-roots people including the poor who are deprived of major opportunities
provided by society; the other is a voluntary exclusion by the upper class known
as “elite rebellion”—the rich group “living in seclusion” from public institutions.
While the former is “involuntary”, the latter is “voluntary”. Through further analysis
56 Chen [40].
2.4 Social Integration Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 59
of these two types of exclusion, Giddens claims that it’s more than economic concern
to eradicate the upper class type of exclusion because it carries both material and
cultural connotations; similarly, the exclusion from the lower class can regenerate
itself as well. This being said, he advocates policymaking as necessary to cut off
the vicious circle of poverty. For example, to help adults lacking in basic skills and
qualifications to obtain them, to help people whose skills have fallen behind to renew
them, and to rekindle confidence of those in pessimism and disappointment due to
long-term unemployment.57
Because of different views in defining social exclusion, domestic and foreign
scholars differ in their understanding of the reasons behind, and their views are cate-
gorized into five subtheory: self-responsibility generation that attributes exclusion
to behavior and attitude problems in the poor themselves; social structure gener-
ation that blames the unequal social structure for intentionally or unintentionally
depriving some groups of a normal social life; social policy generation that identi-
fies a biased system design as habitually providing resources only to some groups
and neglecting others, creating participation gap in social life, and then survival
difficulties and exclusion; labor process generation which highlights an “outsiders”
issue from the rapid growth of science and technology and resultant new round of
labor division that facilitates only internal connection at emerging departments (i.e.,
interpersonal communication, employee participation) with little benefit brought to
outsiders, leading to separation of professional circle from social life circle as a
major reason for social exclusion; and ideological recognition that in the name of
traditional “morality” that finds nothing wrong in allowing certain social groups
extra benefit, offers preferential policies to advantaged group but “stigmatization” to
others, leading to a “moral” exclusion.58 In short, social exclusion is not only a social
fact and problem, but also a mechanism and process of marginalization. Poor people
suffer in up to five dimensions of social exclusion, economic, political, cultural, social
life, and welfare related. Their complex interplay with some other factors leads to
regenerating of poverty in some rural areas, which puts rural poverty in a terrible
intergenerational transmission and circulation. Under the lasting and strong influence
of external social factors, a separate social circle and survival culture from the outer
world has emerged among the poor people, with exclusions in both subjective and
objective forms coexist. Situation as such is in urgent need of reform via change of
social concepts, support from social forces, and the innovation of poverty-reduction
strategies.
57 Xiang and Huang [29], pp. 68–69.

58 Yin [41].
2.4.2 The Theoretical Connotation of Social Integration

Theory
Social integration is to ensure equal opportunities through proper measures, so that

everyone is entitled to reach their full potential with no hindrance by their back-
ground. These measures include policies and actions to promote equal access to
public services, as well as to allow for greater civic voice in the policymaking that
affects their lives. As a concept of social policy, social integration originated from
European scholars’ research on social exclusion. The socially excluded groups are
usually vulnerable ones, mostly the grass roots. The primary reason for their vulner-
ability is inherent defects in themselves. Without proper protection from society,
they will be easily abandoned, alienated, and excluded from the mainstream social
life. Therefore, their protection appears the entry-level ethics of a society. However,
social exclusion is seen as rejection and alienation across the social stratum, as well
as the social distance among individuals and groups.59
According to the vulnerable groups’ theory, the existence of human vulnerability
does not require all vulnerabilities to be eliminated for a perfect human image.
Rather, it calls for human respect to and protection of vulnerability. Our special duty
to underprivileged group comes exactly from their vulnerability as an inevitable
part of life, or social arrangements. Responsibility lies with us to not only care
about vulnerable families and friends, but also vulnerable groups in general in a
broader moral sense. Because of their inborn obstacles, they are short of necessary
competence to cope when exposed to social competition or natural disasters.60
Human vulnerability and poverty go hand in hand, with the poor susceptible to
economic shock and other forms of upheavals. Poor individuals or families are more
likely to suffer from certain risks that result in wealth loss or decline in life quality.
Such a correlation has two manifestations: first, upon the outbreak of social risks,
the poorer the people, the more deprived they will be; second, the poor are highly
vulnerable and lacking the ability to cope with risks and recover very slowly after
being hit. A bulk of the poor are in extreme poverty, lacking resources and capacity
to deal with risks.
The classic definition of social integration is mutual assimilation and cultural iden-
tification, that is, “individuals or groups penetrate and merge with each other, while
gain each other’s memories, feelings and attitudes, and finally integrate them into
a common cultural life by sharing history and experience”. According to domestic
scholars Ren Yuan and Wu Minle, social integration is coordination and adaptation
between different individuals, groups, or cultures. Instead of unchanging single-
dimensional concept, it is a dynamic, progressive, multi-dimensional, and interac-
tive process.61 In 2003, the EU defined social integration in its joint report on social
integration as follows: it is a process that ensures equal opportunities and resources
59 Gao [30], p. 312.

60 Huang and Ga [42].
61 Song and Tao [43].
2.4 Social Integration Theory of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 61
to be obtained by groups in danger and social exclusion. Through these resources

and opportunities, they can fully participate in economic, social, and cultural life
and enjoy a normal life and social welfare from the community they belong. Social
integration must assure more decision-making opportunities for them to participate
in life and obtain basic rights. As Cameron Crawford remarks, social integration
contains at least two meanings: first, to be seriously regarded and cared for by their
community in social, political, economic, and cultural life; second, to have inter-
personal relationships of mutual trust, appreciation, and respect in family, friends,
and community. From the above definition, it can be seen that the concept of social
integration emphasizes a state and goal, with its purpose being to seek welfare for
the people and to allow everyone equal rights before a state of mutual integration
and equality can be reached eventually.62
2.4.3 Practical Application of Social Integration Theory

Social integration theory tries to explain how each poor individual comes out of the
original life field and adapts to the new mode of production and life and cultural
inheritance and seeks balance between tradition and modernity. It involves three
levels of practices: first, it originated from Durkheim’s social solidarity theory and
Marx’s social communist thought, and later it evolved into social integration theory
by Parsons, Lockwood, Habermas, and Giddens. This theory aims at changing
the adverse situation faced by poor groups through macro-institutional norms and
cultural norms; second, regarding the social relationship between the immigration
groups and the local residents in the inflow area, it is necessary to change the living
environment of the poor groups in order to effectively avoid the conflict of inter-
ests between various subjects and get rid of various types of social exclusion and
endow the poor groups with their due rights in the new living environment, enhance
their economic development ability and social adaptability, and achieve endoge-
nous development; third, psychological construction of social integration operates
on micro-level in that it studies social inclusion and acceptance by observing individ-
uals’ exertion of their subjective initiative, their desire to fit in, their proactivity, and
enthusiasm and believes that individual desire and capacity are the key to achieve
social integration.63
The lesson here is that a progressive approach is necessary to eliminate discrim-
ination and stigmatization in poverty Alleviation practice. Different from welfare
dependence of the poor, poverty discrimination comes from the outer world with
negative stereotype being a major symptom. For illness-caused and disaster-caused
poverty families, that sudden trauma often has the household thrown into depres-
sion with a lingering mental burden and a following unfavorable position in social
62 Chen and Sun [44].

63 Huang and Ga [42].
interaction. Under chronical stress, they become autistic, shy with low self-esteem,
indifferent to social interaction, and lacking in organizational and mobilizing skills,
which is neither conducive to the active integration of the poor people into society, nor
to a more efficient and productive poverty Alleviation. The actual key lies in breaking
off the dependence mentality in the poor by improving their self-development skills,
their confidence, and mental performance, as well as input of resources and oppor-
tunities. Meanwhile, an environment of kindness that rewards mutual care and help
has to be fostered to achieve a sustainable development of the poor.
“Relocation” is another option for poverty Alleviation. Linguistically, “poverty
Alleviation relocation” is a name with Chinese characteristics, and its counterpart
in western tradition is “ecological migration”. Its essence is to systemically view
the relationship among the living environment, living cost, and lifestyle of the poor
groups. It means in areas where “one piece of land and water cannot provide for
its original residents”, a systematic and overall relocation of the people has to be
adopted. For the relocated population, however, adaption to the new home means
more than one challenge. It also includes cultural norms, production and life styles,
identity and mental state, and social integration, to name just a few. Given migrants’
memory of the past, collective sentiments and home experience and how to help them
fit in is absolutely pivotal for poverty-reduction policy to succeed.
“Relocation” by nature is a “modern assimilation” from rural (traditional) life to
urban life that involves economic, social, and psychological efforts by the poor immi-
grants to adjust their original rural customs and cultural perception to urban life. In a
Marxism context, social integration is a two-way subjective practice—involving both
the mobile population and the local population experiencing an inflow of migrants.
Adapting to each other and developing respect for each other’s customs and social
norms enough as to develop a universal social bond in their social interaction; mean-
while, social integration is also a two-way exchange during which material goods
are shared while equality and mutual assistance according to social status is prac-
ticed—all social members stay symbiotic in behavior mode and organization mode
which helps to foster a positive integration mechanism featuring equality, cooper-
ation, mutual benefit, and complementarity as beneficial to an all-round and free
development of the people.64
In the early days after relocation, poor groups may experience higher vulnera-
bility, a poor sense of integration, and multiple livelihood risks because their original
livelihood has been “destroyed”, and no replacement has been found. Therefore,
while carrying out relocation policy, it is necessary to raise poor people’s awareness
of active participation, to maintain diversified strategies of livelihood and capital
allocation, to advocate social forces’ involvement in emotional adjustment for the
relocated people, and to establish a long-term mechanism of adaption and enrich-
ment of livelihood capital. Only by doing so could the overall effectiveness of relo-
cation be maximized with poor groups’ vulnerability sufficiently lowered.65 Social
workers can help the poor groups in three ways “access to services, self-management,
64 Ding and Jiang [45].

65 Ye and Su [46].
2.5 Social Capital Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work 63
participation in community services and management” by striving for fair employ-

ment opportunities, educational policies, and community service opportunities for
them and connecting resources from all sides, to build communication platforms
for different groups. They should adopt professional social work methods, carry out
community work activities, recognize the self-identity of relocated households, and
build a community inclusion atmosphere with mutual assistance among neighbors to
solve the problems and difficulties they encounter. All these efforts would allow the
poor to better fit into local life, participate in community services and governance,
and achieve self and social acceptance.
2.5 Social Capital Theory of Poverty-Alleviating Social

Work
Modern market economy systems regard lack of financial competence and opportuni-
ties as well as poor performance in labor market as one of the inducements of poverty.
The social relations of reciprocity, social cooperation, mutual trust, and assistance
embodied in social capital can constitute a support mechanism that enhances poor
people’s competence to adapt to a volatile market economy and help the poor to
prevent and resolve various risks by mutual assistance and cooperation. When the
poor suffer from unexpected risks such as diseases, accidents, and market changes,
social capital can be transformed into the development resources they need and
provide necessary humanistic, material, and financial support to reduce the cost of
obtaining resources and ultimately help the poor out of poverty.
2.5.1 Poverty in the Perspective of Social Capital
As for the role that capital plays, exploration of the causes of poverty has been
through three stages, the material capital paradigm, human capital paradigm, and
social capital paradigm. Early poverty researchers’ concern about income level was
guided by the material capital paradigm. They attributed poverty to lack of material
goods which blocked access to daily necessities in the poor. By such logic, a major
poverty Alleviation path would be to boost GDP and income of the poor. Later,
Theodore W. Schultz and some other scholars began to examine poverty from a
human capital view. He believed that “the root cause of lagged behind economy in
poor countries is not the shortage of material capital but human capital and their
contempt for it”. This human capital vision was then universally recognized by
scholars and experts all over the world. Therefore, to educate and train the poor
became a major action in poverty relief and an academic hit as social capital theory
flourishes.66
66 Zheng [47].
For the poor, social capital is the social relationship and trust embedded in their
daily work and life. Social capital is not the capital circulating in society, but the
social connection, trust, and code of conduct generated from human activities. It is
a social network that is formed and improved through interaction among various
social institutions and members and that carries the characteristics of public goods,
reinforcement in use, non-transferability, transmissibility, and convertibility. Due
to the insufficient development and incomplete functions of market in poor areas,
social capital appears complementary to some extent and plays a role forbidden to
the market in some areas, such as self-supervision, risk and information sharing,
and mutual help, which does an institutional favor for poor families. Proper social
capital is conducive to improving the output benefits of material capital and human
capital, leading to economic gains at different levels, such as individuals, enterprises,
regions, and even countries. It is a “chain” or “adhesive” that connects the inputs of
various poverty-reduction elements, which further affects the efficiency of poverty
Alleviation work by affecting the output benefits of various elements.67
Lacking in social capital is an important reason for poverty. Certain amount of
social resources implies certain social status which has social resources under control.
People are social animals who belong to a certain group at a specific position in the
hierarchy within a social network, while all classes and groups tend to strive for more
benefits for that team that they are in and competition is unavoidable. Poverty is born,
while multiple social groups are competing for limited resources. Those groups with
high social status or at the core of the network often take the lion’s share by virtue
of their own power and resource advantages and keep resources sharing among
their team members, reducing vulnerable groups to only a small or little amount of
resources. For poor inferior rural households, lacking in social capital restricts their
actions, their access to general and poverty relief benefits through social capital,
thus worsening their life condition.68 The mutual impact between social status and
social resources has brought two consequences: one is social exclusion by superior
groups over weak groups; the other is a further widening gap between the rich and the
poor. Strong groups can maintain vested interests by superiority, while others can’t,
leading to a broken relationship between the poor and the rich, blocking the poor
from obtaining resources by means of the former’s network. Like their small social
network, the daily activity radius of the poor is smaller as well, with less contact with
the outside world. As a result, they lose access to information from outside of their
families and communities. The lack of social capital paralyzes their ability and inner
drive to strive and escape poverty. At the same time, shortage of capital not only
gives rise to poverty but also a vicious cycle mechanism that gets the poor poorer
over time, resulting in possible intergenerational transmission of poverty.69
As China’s market economy advances rapidly, transformation is at play from
traditional to modern society, while marketization deepens in rural areas alongside
an exponential growth in migrant farmers population. Resultantly, the integrating
67 Li et al. [48].
68 Zhou [49].
69 Lin and Tao [50].
role traditional morality used to play in rural network is in decline, and villagers feel
less bound by the circles of kinship and clan. Social capital as tied to the traditional
rural hierarchical order is shrinking. The economic or capacity value of the poor
group has dropped so rapidly that a reciprocal chain they used to maintain with more
superior groups can endure no more, with no other group in reliance on them and
their engagement in social network going down.
In contrast, the advent of commercialized service makes the dominant richer
less dependent on mutual assistance and less often in contact with other groups,
lowering mutual trust.70 This has pushed the poor into a disadvantageous position in
the social structure, affecting and restricting their sustainable development. Therefore
for poverty relief, social capital is the next spot worth investing in after physical
capital and human capital. Initiative is also needed to enlarge the pool of social capital
stock for the poor and improve the social adaptability and development competence
of the poor.
2.5.2 Introduction to the Social Capital Theory
The origin of social capital can be traced back to Hanifan (1916).71 Since then,
Jacobs (1961) has used the concept of social capital in a figurative sense,72 and
O’Connor (1973) has also adopted this term.73 None of these attempts have attracted
much attention from the academic circle. It was not until French scholar Bourdieu
published his Essay on Social Capital in 1980 that social capital was noticed by the
academia.74 Bourdieu believes that social capital is a collection of actual or potential
resources that are related to the lasting network formed by mutual acquiescence or
recognition, and such network is more or less an institutionalized one that provides
support for members out of collectively owned capital. This kind of resource is built
upon membership and social networks that prerequisites mutual understanding and
cognition. Coleman believes that social capital is the relationship between individ-
uals. It consists of trust, obligations, expectations, information networks, norms, and
authorities, exists in interpersonal relationships, and can facilitate the realization of
personal goals, by being both structure and public goods.
According to Coleman, once created, social capital will benefit all individuals
within the concerned social structure; by using different forms of social capital,
subjects can not only achieve their personal goals, but also collective action goals.
Patnam defines social capital in this way: social capital refers to some characteristics
of social organizations, such as trust, norms, and networks, which can improve social
efficiency by promoting cooperative action. Social networks and norms are crucial
70 Li et al. [51].
71 Hanifan [52].
72 Jacobs [53].
73 O’Connor [54].
74 Chen [55].
to social cooperation, especially networks among friends, colleagues, and neighbor-

hood which are usually linked with universal norms of reciprocity by mutual obliga-
tions and responsibilities. Civil society organizations such as trade unions, churches,
and community groups play a very important role in the production of social capital.
They bridge social cracks and unite people from different backgrounds and values
and promote the development of “mental habits” such as tolerance, cooperation, and
reciprocity, so as to foster an intimate, rich, and active social foundation.75
Douglas North believes that social capital mechanism is mainly realized through
structural social capital and cognitive one. For the former, social networks is set
up and social roles defined through rules, procedures, and precedents to promote
information sharing, collective action, and policy formulation; the latter refers to
shared norms, values, trust, attitudes, and beliefs.76 Lin Nan defines social capital
as a resource embedded in a social structure that can be absorbed or mobilized in
purposeful actions. In his opinion, the social resources people may acquire from their
league at the social ladder that are vastly different, and these resources of hierarchical
ownership can be absorbed and shared through weak ties.
To sum up, social capital is not the kind of capital that circulates in the society,
but the social connection, trust, and code of conduct generated by human activities.
It is a social network with productive characteristics generated and developed by
the interaction of various social institutions and social members, a collection of
obvious or potential resources, and a social network relationship with interactivity
and conducive to achieving personal goals.
Social capital is by nature a capital whose utmost feature is generating wealth
by information sharing, mutually beneficial collective action, and decision-making.
Most of the networks that poor groups access in the labor market are secondary
market and mostly in labor-intensive industries, which contains not much scarce
resources. Resultantly, the return gained from such networks by the poor is very
low via social capital such as information sharing, mutually beneficial collective
action, and decision-making. It is believed that social capital for poor groups can be
constructed, and poverty Alleviation practice can induce social capital. At the same
time, social workers need to strive for seeking, mobilizing, using, and connecting
personal assets, community organization assets, community groups and third sector
assets, natural resources and material assets within each poor each community, to
promote and encourage their development. Social workers should make efforts to
cultivate and utilize the internal and external social capital of poor communities,
achieve the renewable social capital, and help poor groups to build a broad social
support network, to enhance their ability to withstand risks and achieve greater social
integration.
75 Zhou [56].
76 Li et al. [51].
2.5.3 Practical Application of Social Capital Theory

Social capital represents the real or potential resources that an individual possesses
in social relations, which is embedded in social structure. How to acquire and use
such resources hinges on the subjective initiative of the action taker. Not until indi-
viduals are aware of the existence of resources and that they have or can obtain
resources, can they capitalize them.77 From the perspective of social capital, we can
build a multi-coordinated poverty Alleviation mechanism, expand poverty allevia-
tion participation, and build a network as interactive communication platform among
poverty alleviation subjects. To tap and broaden the community’s social capital stock,
community elites must be given full play to their role, while attention must be paid
to improving the development capacity of other community participants, including
poor women and young people, so as to foster an endogenous and sustainable poverty
Alleviation.
Trust is pivotal for poor rural areas’ social capital. Villagers in absolute poverty
areas are way more close-minded, so the trust formed by long-term repeated transac-
tions within the villages makes players opt for cooperation, which can solve the “free
riding” problem by itself and provide better public services. During marketization,
a trust-based social network has also played an important role in farmers’ access
to non-agricultural employment opportunities and raised their income. Specifically,
the primitive social capital based on blood, geography, and industry, as well as the
social network of external input places, makes a complement to the official system
by facilitating labor mobility and helping them land higher-earning jobs without
migrating to the city, thus saving them from absolute poverty. As social capital can
find farmers job opportunities with long-term secure income by reliable sources, so
as to accumulate material and human capital, it can not only help them get rid of
short-term poverty, but also of long-term poverty. Poor groups can use social capital
to reserve food and obtain credit funds to resist such shocks as diseases, bad weather,
and government investment cuts. The social network can work as a substitute or
complement to material capital to improve the labor productivity of poor families
and increase their income. Income growth as such can in turn strengthen the social
skills of poor families, thus enlarging their social network capital pool. This virtuous
circle is likely to eventually help them out of the absolute poverty trap.78
Under the current guideline of targeted poverty alleviation, social workers can
reconstruct social capital by rebuilding social trust, improving supply standards,
expanding the relationship network, and adjusting the role of government, so as
to inject new thinking and vitality into development-oriented poverty alleviation in
poor areas. On the one hand, social workers need to curb the lack of social credit in
poor areas and rebuild it among different poverty alleviation subjects from various
aspects. The government should consciously withdraw from certain campaigns of
77 Zheng [47].
78 Zhou and Ye [57].
targeted poverty alleviation to give way to commercial and social organizations. By

combining social forces in poor areas and following a clear-cut goal and guideline
for social participation, social work can properly channel investment of social funds
and resources to the most needed places as to accelerate targeted poverty alleviation
by targeted measures. On the other hand, social workers can build a network of elite
locals who migrate to the city for work, business, political, or teaching careers by
drawing upon bonds between relatives, fellow villagers, and classmates, to build
connections for greater labor export and returning-home business starters. More
grants are needed for building better e-commerce platforms as a key medium for poor
areas to relate to the outside world. Relying on public praise of e-commerce platforms,
social workers can match outer market demands with farm produce, tourist attrac-
tions, and other resources from poor areas, improving the reputation and commercial
value of specialty resources.
In short, not only is short-term material earnings the aim of poverty alleviation
action but also skills training, building social capital networks, and timely satis-
faction of other needs such as education, medical care and housing, and system
design, so as to change the lack and solidification of social capital in poor groups.
Upgrading poverty alleviation actions is necessary from simple economic support
to demand orientation, because the top-down mechanism means only taking care of
the majority by the government is possible given limited services pool, leaving those
with personalized needs unattended to. In contrast, diversified helpers represented
by social workers can provide better services for varied types of poverty according to
their own resource advantages, degree of specialization, and the actual needs of poor
groups, constantly transforming from “blood transfusion” to “blood production”,
from “material poverty Alleviation” to “diversified governance”, so as to improve
the efficiency and pertinence of poverty reduction.79
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Chapter 3
Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
3.1 Overview of the Social Work Value System
3.1.1 Values and Value System
The term “value” originates in economics, but it has since evolved into various defini-
tions in different academic fields. In Marx’s political economy theory, it refers to the
undifferentiated labor of producers condensed into commodities usually embodied
as commodity value. It means the use, or importance of, a certain item and consti-
tutes one of commodity’s basic factors.1 In philosophy, value is not perceived as
an entity; but above all, a corresponding relationship between certain human demands
and the utility of an object, namely, the capability of things (objects) of meeting
certain demands or needs of people (subjects). In other research fields, the sociolo-
gist Timos divided value into seven categories, including an objective group norm,
a symbolic cultural ideal, a set of evaluation criteria for human behavior, a belief in
something remarkable, an aim, an inclination, and a generalized attitude.2
In comparison, the value system has a deeper connotation. According to John
Dewey, a famous American philosopher and educator, the value system is a set of
guidelines or standards for the chosen and desired behaviors. He clearly points out that
“we cannot treat anything we enjoy as value…we must use enjoyment as the result of
some intelligent action to explain what we understand by value”.3 Value is a word to
describe the characteristics of something that indicate the speaker’s general idea of the
objective reality we perceive around us (humans, events, objects) and its significance,
individuality, or importance. It is this criterion by which people understand and
1 [Germany] Karl Marx. Capital (Volume I) (Das Kapital). The Bureau for the Compilation and
Translation of Works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin under the Central Committee of the
Communist Party of China. trans. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 2004: 102–103.
2 Timms [1].
3 Dewey [2].
72 3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
evaluate objective things around them. On the one hand, it sets standards for judging
whether or to what extent something is valuable by measuring the thing itself. On the
other hand, through observed value and assessment of the results, a correct, objective,
meaningful code of conduct is established that is in accordance with the yardsticks
set by the rating.
The value system is both an inner yardstick and a social consciousness. It is a point
of departure for people to observe, to get to know, and to understand something, and
it acts as a guidance on behaviors that both affects choice of actions and/or restricts
behaviors. In other words, a value system means either internalizing the pursuit and
standards of value, or it externalizes actions associated with it.
3.1.2 Professional Value System of Social Work and Its

Functions
The value system of social work is the value standards and codes of conduct that
social workers abide by in practice which ensure all their actions are well grounded
and correctly guided.
The professional value of social work is recognized by employers and scholars,
and their professionalism is assessed by long-term experience and observation from,
and research into, social work. The system of social work not only represents their
universal ideals, missions, and beliefs, but also is a faith in human welfare, fairness,
justice, and dignity,4 indicating the very essence and purpose of social work. As
Goldstein noted, “the definition of social work is based on value… It occupies a core
position within the social work framework”.5
According to Charler S. Levy, “social work major is value-oriented and it operates
on what is valuable and how to achieve that value…It’s full of idealistic ambitions
and ideas about how human beings should be treated…any operation and care that
ordinary people usually dare not fancy can be expected from their efforts (social
workers)”.6
The American Association of Social Workers regard the social work value system
as a “belief set” for guiding workers through their mission. It is embedded in human-
itarianism, fully reflecting an ideal pursuit to be loving and helpful to mankind,
while maintaining and raising fairness and justice and fostering harmonious rela-
tionships with the social environment. It galvanizes and guides social workers in
their specific operations, including the content and methods of their services, pursuit
of social justice, respect for personal dignity, maintenance of interpersonal relations,
and requirements of social workers’ behaviors and abilities.
The value system of social workers both creates vision and drives behavior in the
course of their duties. From a specialized point of view, it derives from the mainstream
4 Xu [3].
5 Wang [4], p 105.
6 Levy [5].
3.1 Overview of the Social Work Value System 73
social beliefs and the unique pursuit of social workers, and its significance for social
work is fully revealed in both theory and practice.
Theoretically, as a prerequisite for the discipline to exist, the value system of
social work defines the missions or purposes of this academic field and constitutes
the core of research and education on social work. It is a special belief summed up
and refined from the realization that social work objectives conform to professional
norms and requirements and is the very premise and basis for its practice.7
Practically, the value system of social work requires and expects professional
ethical standards considerably to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of social
work and to ramp up development and skills of social workers. As a positive and
upbeat view toward life, it provides the recipients with a sense of optimism that helps
them out of difficulties and helps to reshape their value system. At the same time, the
value system of social work is pivotal in balancing what’s expected from and what’s
eventually offered by social work professionals, which can foster a greater sense of
social harmony and a sound development of common social values system.
The key role that the value system plays in social work manifests itself in the
following four ways. First, throughout its trajectory of evolution, social work has
been tied up with value, even with the specialized modern form of social work that is
fully developed and advanced with its own strong sense of direction; secondly, value
is essential for social work to operate on and make sense as a value-based area of
study; thirdly, there is an inner vision and drive that a well-trained ideal social worker
cannot live without. For them, it is imperative to understand and put into practice
the value system of social work and to internalize them into their own beliefs and
behaviors; and fourthly, value affects the applying and upgrading of technology,
methodology, and theoretical researches that social work calls for. It is only through
a solid theoretical basis and varied practical experiences that social work can achieve
its self-worth.8
It’s also worth mentioning that when discussing the value system of social work,
we cannot sidestep the ethical side. Generally speaking, value and ethics have both
similarities and differences; they are bonded together, yet not always harmonious
or identical. Value has its focus on the positive orientation of the human mind
toward truth, goodness, beauty, humanity and social significance, etc., whereas ethics
is more concerned with one’s attitude toward the feudal order of importance or
seniority in human relationships, appropriateness, and objective correctness. The
former indicates the beliefs and lofty pursuits in our minds, while the latter is about
how to perceive and adopt these ideas. At the core, they share “the right” and “the
kind”. Ethics is about having consistent values and transforming those ethics into an
operational form and code of conduct that transforms those values into actions.
7 Huang et al. [6].

8 Li [7].
3.2 Development of the Value System of Social Work
The value system of social work goes back to the age of classicism and was found
in ancient Hebrew, Greek, and Roman societies. Primitive notions of good and evil,
equality, fraternity, and care for others are to be found throughout the doctrines of
almost every religion in those early times for example in Judaism and Christianity.
Their religious commandments encourage virtue and altruism and helped to sow the
seeds of social work from service conception to implementation.
After the Middle Ages came the Renaissance and later the Reformation that
ushered in the age of ideological emancipation where humanistic ideas became more
widespread, and the concepts of equality, liberty, democracy, and fraternity were
honed. The newly created bourgeoisie began to advocate getting rid of the old reli-
gious bondage and restrictions in favor of advancing human emancipation, personal
value, and dignity. Equal status among individuals, personal problem-solving, and
fulfilling individual needs all became highly sought-after as legitimate aims. Amid
advancing ideological emancipation and progress, core conceptions of social work
gradually took shape. In general, the value base of western social work mainly
includes the protestant ethic, humanitarianism, utopian thinking, and ideas on social
welfare thinking.
By liberating minds, the protestant work ethic encourages people to attend to
realistic interests and those causes close to them; meanwhile, as the old religious
hierarchy began to fade out and the concept of “everyone being equal before God”
began to prevail, awareness of equality was raised across the country. Social work
values such as helping people to help themselves found an echo in some Protestant
tenets like “humans can overcome the evil in their nature through willful action” and
“society should incentivize unsuccessful individuals to work harder to change their
lives”.9
Humanitarianism refers to a philosophical value system that put people at the
center. It advocates human rights and humanity rather than theocracy and divinity,
and it coined the term “human rights” and “humanity”. Humanitarian values in its
broadest sense mean to care for the life and happiness of human beings, to prioritize
their personality rights, their self-worth, and their dignity; with its principle, ethical
maxims being to love, respect, and care for fellow people. Humanitarianism is the
backbone of the basic values of social work and the cornerstone of its value system.
The blueprint for “the Republic” (the Ideal Kingdom), “the ideal society” as
described in utopian ideology represents mankind’s unremitting strive for a higher
social ideal. Despite its utopian nature, this vision has appealed to numerous social
groups, organizations, and even individuals motivated to build their preferred utopia
here on earth through a series of meaningful explorations and practices. By seeking
social order and integration for the whole of society’s sake, the utopian vision aims at
a better living environment for individuals, enabling an easier path for social services
expansion that enables the progress and development of a robust social work value
system.
9 Wang and Xia [8].

3.2 Development of the Value System of Social Work 75
Social welfare thinking lies at the heart of social work value system and is an
extension of the concepts of humanitarianism. Alongside the exponential growth in
the middle class, industrialization and urbanization stand various social problems
that are ever present and seemingly ubiquitous and complex. A production boom
and uneven distribution of wealth creates the conditions for a widening gap between
the rich and the poor leading to new social hierarchies as well as growing poverty and
unemployment. Living conditions of those in underprivileged classes were seen as
problematic and in need of welfare intervention and social help. The increasingly high
frequency of these thorny issues eventually led to the emergence of social welfare
thinking and poverty-reduction initiatives. By that point, social assistance was no
longer a personal problem within the poor community, but a shared responsibility for
the government and society as a whole, while at the same time, social welfare system
also started to shift from stop-gap solutions to becoming an all-inclusive priority for
tackling social needs. Social work as a discipline hinged on the development and
maturity of social welfare notion for its advancement as well as its right to succeed.
Between the end of nineteenth century and the early twentieth century, western
social work values systems went through a serious of gradual but continuous
improvements, which are divided into four stages (as noted by Frederic G. Reamer).
Stage 1 (end of the nineteenth century to the 1920s) is when social work value
ethics began to be systematized and recognized. While social work study was taking
shape, its issues and values started to emerge. Public concern at this point was mainly
about making people aware of their duty to show respect, individual values, self-
determination, equality, justice, etc. In fact social work values were more about
practicing moral values as distinct from separate from actual operations of social
work.
Stage 2 (1920s to the 1960s) refers to the early development phases of social
work value ethics and procedures. As social work expands as a social discipline,
experience accumulated incrementally slowly both in theory and in practice, gaining
more and more public attention and traction over time. Consistent with this trend,
social work value system gradually became more and more professional, with society
and academia working together to reach some consensus on its core values essential
to tackling the evils of poverty. In 1960, America’s first code of ethics for social work
was discussed and approved by the American Association of Social Workers.
Stage 3 (1960s to the end of the twentieth century) is about rethinking the value
ethics based of social work. As social work services have kept expanding in scope,
more and more ethical and moral dilemmas have loomed large in the minds of society
and government. It was from this period onward that American scholars began to
address ethical and intractable “catch-22” issues facing social work. By doing so,
they had in-depth discussions over tough choices in complicated dilemmas that social
work ethic is confronted with, which pushed them to reconsider the standardized
value system proposed earlier.
Stage 4 (end of the twentieth century to the present) is about in-depth discus-
sion on the value standard of social work and its associated risk management-based
approach. With improved professional standards and relevant laws, as well as better
legal knowledge in the wider public at large, people have greater awareness of their
rights and privileges. Many individuals are increasingly inclined to resort to seek
legal remedies to address dereliction of duty of care in which professional ethics
and value standards are involved making ethical standards in social work more liti-
gious and rules based. At the same time, considerable progress has been recorded in
preventive research on behaviors that violate the value ethic and related behaviors.
Given such circumstances, stress is laid on ethical risk management skills in teaching
and training of social workers who are made aware of the moral and ethical dilemmas
facing the profession and the need for more professional attitude toward defending
the rights and interests of the clients.
3.2.1 Basic Values System of Social Work
Framework of the Values System in the Social Work Discipline

DuBois and Miley believe that value ethical standards can drive behavior. As a profes-
sion, social work’s ethical norms and standards are the operational embodiment of
the social work value system. Through regulations like service standards and ethical
codes, they reflect how social work is viewed and judges the worth of individuals,
interpersonal relationships, and relationships between people and society, which is
what we call social work values system.
At present, a widely ratified value system of social work is as follows.
First, we must consider Bistek’s social work value system. Its main arguments
are: (1) human dignity and self-worth are paramount; (2) human beings have natural
potential and rights in a physical, intellectual, emotional, social, esthetic, and spiritual
sense; (3) human beings are inborn with drive and obligation to realize their poten-
tial; (4)human beings are capable of making choices, and because self-realization
is obligatory, they are entitled to make decisions for themselves; (5) every person
is entitled and obliged to regard himself or herself as an individual; (6) in order
to realize potential, human beings have the right to require appropriate means; (7)
everyone needs to achieve a balanced development regarding rights and opportuni-
ties provided by society, so as to meet his basic needs physically, psychologically,
economically, esthetically, and spiritually; (8) participation in social activities is
important in human beings’ struggle for self-realization; (9) society is responsible
for promoting self-realization in social members; and (10) each social member has
the right to get better-off by contributing to society.
In Teicher’s study of the social work value, we can see system that he advocates:
(1) everyone has dignity and value as an individual; (2) everyone should be respected
and treated in a considerate manner; (3) everyone should participate in decisions that
affect themselves; (4) everyone should develop his own ability and talent freely; (5)
everyone should share the control of goods and services fairly; and (6) everyone
should have full and free access to the information necessary for rational behavior.10
10 Wang [4], p. 54.

Thirdly, a complete set of social work values proposed by Morris and Chevy argued
that: (1) everyone, rich or poor, enjoys his inherent value and dignity; (2) everyone
has the ability and motivation to pursue a better life; (3) everyone should care for
other social members in addition to being responsible for themselves; (4) everyone
has his share in the common demands of mankind while reserving his own unique
preferences and needs; and (5) everyone needs to feel they belong by helping each
other and acting in groups instead of alone. On social values, it claims: (1) society is
responsible for offering the opportunities for everyone to maximize their potential to
enrich people’s spiritual and material life; (2) society should provide for its members
to prevent them from hunger and coldness, sickness, and sufferings, school dropout
or discrimination; and (3) society is in charge of allowing everyone equal access to
social activities and creation of a new world. On social work value system, it remarks:
(1) it should exclude nobody from care and respect; (2) it should ensure everyone
can maximize their chances to design their own life path and lifestyle; (3) it should
assist everyone in building a society to their expectations by mutual help; and (4)
it should approve the unique personality of each social member and avoid holding
stereotyped views toward anyone.11
3.2.2 Value Ethics of International Social Work
International social work value ethics

The international community has codified and summarized the value system of social
work into the following six aspects: (1) Service. Social workers should provide
professional services for others beyond their own interests. (2) Social justice. Social
workers should pursue social change, especially working with vulnerable groups, and
seek social change on their behalf. (3) Personal dignity and value. Social workers
should show concern and respect for each individual client and be aware of individual,
cultural and ethnic disparity. (4) The importance of interpersonal relationships. Social
workers should recognize interpersonal relationships and intragroup relationships as
important tools for changes. (5) Integrity. Social workers should always adhere to
their professional mission, values, ethical principles, and ethical standards and carry
out their practical work accordingly. (6) Ability. Social workers should constantly
strive to improve their professional knowledge and skills and apply them to practical
work.
Guidelines of the International Federation of Social Workers
In 2018, The International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW) has formulated its
own code of ethics for social work that draws upon this research and includes the
following best practice: (1) recognizing of the inherent dignity of human beings; (2)
promoting of human rights; (3) promoting social justice; (4) promoting the right to
11 Li [9].
self-determination; (5) promoting the right to participate; (6) respecting confiden-

tiality and privacy; (7) treating people as a whole; (8) ethical use of technology and
social media; and (9) professional integrity.
3.2.2.1 Social Work Value Ethics in Other Countries
While taking shape and improving as a discipline, social work has witnessed different
ways to define its core according to different countries and regions. Among them,
the most representative value ethics is as follows.
Social Work Values and Ethical Principles of the U.S.
In the National Association of Social Workers’ Code of Ethics, the values and ethical
principles of social work were explained and defined like this by the American Society
of Social Workers.
Firstly, the social work service. A prerequisite of course is to help people in need
solve their problems using the resource of social workers who are expected to serve
them beyond their own self interests. By deploying professional knowledge and
technologies, social workers are committed to helping the needy and solving social
problems. They are also encouraged to volunteer part of their professional skills
without expecting economic returns (in effect, giving their services free of charge).
Secondly, social justice. Social workers are expected to challenge injustice in
society by speaking up for, and organizing, underprivileged and disadvantaged indi-
viduals and groups. To promote social progress, they are encouraged to put their
efforts primarily into poverty-reduction strategies, unemployment awareness, and
the promotion of social justice. These factors seek to increase their sensitivity and
awareness of social oppression, cultural, and ethnic diversity. They are responsible
for assuring their clients receive proper access to necessary information, services,
resources, and equality of opportunity, as well as meaningful participation in national
decision-making.
Thirdly, personal dignity and value. Social workers should at all times respect the
inherent dignity and value of every individual, treat everyone with enough care and
respect, and pay particular attention to individual, cultural, and ethnic diversity. They
should at all times foster socially conducive decisions in the clients’ best interest,
encouraging them to assert their needs and improve their ability for self-improvement
and advancement. They should be aware of their dual responsibilities to both the
individual case and to the wider interests of society at large. They seek to practice
social duties and address the gaps between the interests of the recipients and society
guided by their professional efficacy and skills, personal values, ethical principles,
and high standards.
Fourthly, the importance of interpersonal relationships. Social workers should
always stay conscious of the paramount importance of interpersonal relationships
and the way this impacts on people and the potential for transformation and benefits
to society.
It is by being their partner that social workers help a case. With purposeful efforts,
they try to tune the interpersonal relationships of a case (the recipient), in order to
enhance, restore, maintain, and promote the wellbeing of individuals, households,
social groups, organizations, and communities.
Fifthly, integrity is everything. Social workers ought to be honest, trustworthy, and
discrete in their behavior and keenly aware of the mission, values, ethical principles,
and standards of their profession before putting them into practice. They are supposed
to fulfill practical tasks that are in line with ethical rules and assigned by their
organizations through sincere and accountable operations.
Sixthly, it is about ability and capability. It is fundamental within the scope of their
professional competence that social workers should perform service tasks compe-
tently, professionally and have the capability and capacity to do so. They must contin-
ually upgrade their professional knowledge, competences, and expertise in order to
function professionally at all times and to apply their skills in their duties. In addition,
they are also expected to be self-driven and motivated in contributing to an uplift in
skills development and to create a shared pool of expertise.
The above set of rules by the American Association of Social Workers gets
approved and widely advocated by the international community upon its formulation.
Social Work Values and Ethical Principles of Canada
The Canadian Association of Social Workers (CASW) proposed ten ethical standards
for social work values in 1983: (1) social workers ought to care for each person they
serve; (2) to perform professional duties and obligations as social workers; (3) to be
sincere; (4) capable of performing their duties; (5) holding a diligent and conscien-
tious attitude; (6) respecting the intrinsic value of each recipient; (7) confidentiality;
(8) social workers should prevent external interests from interfering with their profes-
sional judgment, independence, or ability to fulfill the duty; (9) to create, maintain
standard working conditions and policies, and comply with work ethics; and (10) to
take action on a sound development of social work discipline.
Social Work Values and Ethical Principles of the UK
The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) stipulates that social workers
shall follow five professional value ethics code: (1) to acknowledge the worth and
dignity of each person, regardless of their origin, nationality, status, gender, age,
belief, contribution to society, with disability or without; (2) obliged to encourage
and raise self-awareness and due altruism in the recipients; (3) to alleviate and prevent
hardships and sufferings (by providing services to individuals, households, groups,
and communities); (4) professional responsibility is to evaluate methods and policies
by changes in demands; and (5) to propose to the government, society, and institutions
for the clients’ sake.
3.3 China’s Social Work Values
3.3.1 Localization of Social Work Values
Different from the west, China’s social work started later and has a shorter history.
To speed up its development in China required building a value-based system that
matched China’s national conditions with actual and practical needs. A major chal-
lenge, however, for creating a value system unique to China, is how to integrate and
localize those initially western-born values and concepts into everyday situations.
This responsibility lies with home-grown social workers and researchers.
“Local” as in the word “localize” implies not simply the geographical and regional
sense of environment; but more of the cultural, historical, and social sense within. As
Professor Wang Sibin pointed out, to localize social work is a matter of process that
requires keeping it functioning as tuned to local needs by assimilation into domestic
cultural norms as originally envisaged in western-born social work models (a set
of economic, political, social, and cultural systems). He insisted on distinguishing
localization from locality. The former refers to the adaptive changes in a foreign
idea as it enters and becomes mainstream in unfamiliar social and cultural territory,
while locality, he argued, is a home-grown solution that takes account of local norms,
issues, and concerns specific to regional and cultural factors predominantly in China.
Localization is to locality what an outsider is to an indigenous person.12
For China, localizing social work has no lack of historical precedence or indeed
specific reference points.
The Book of Rites describes the “Great Harmony” proposed by Confucius in
which “everyone loves and respects his or her own parents and children, as well as
the parents and children of others. He writes about the caring and protection for the
aged until their last days; there is appropriate employment for the able-bodied; and
there is nourishment and education for the children and youth. There is kindness
and compassion for the widows and widowers, for the orphans, for the childless and
for all who find themselves alone in the world, as well as for the disabled and sick.
Everyman, as well as every woman, has an appropriate role to play in the family
and society. Although nobody likes to see natural resources and wealth wasted on
the land, no one keeps it for oneself either. Nobody likes wealth which is not the
creation of one’s own labour. Moreover, nobody does things just to benefit oneself.
A devotion to public service leaves no room for idleness; intrigues and connivances
for ill gain are unknown. Villains such as thieves, robbers, rogues and rebels shall no
more exist. The door of every house needs not to be locked and bolted during day
and night. The above-mentioned are the characteristics of an ideal world called the
commonwealth of Great Unity”.
Similarly, Mozi and others advocate that “love others the way you love yourself”,
“Let him who has strength be alert to help others, let him who has wealth endeavour
to share it with others, let him who possesses the Dao (the way of nature and life)
12 Wang [10].
3.3 China’s Social Work Values 81
teach others persuasively. With this, the hungry will be fed, the cold will be clothed,
the disturbed will have order. When the hungry are fed, the cold are clothed, and the
disturbed have order—this is procuring abundant life”.
All of this reveals the extent of traditional social welfare beliefs and practices
in ancient China. In a modern context however, though, what has been developed
in China is mainly about administrative protocols and non-professional approaches
social work that are under-resourced, underskilled, and reliant mostly on the well-
meaning services provided by the All China Women’s Federation and the Ministry
of Civil Affairs. Although their work is technically professional, many practitioners
have received little or no professional training in social work.
Locally-born social work value systems and codes of ethics are in no shortage
either, including those by public service institutions. Nevertheless, whether formal or
informal, they are all deeply rooted in China’s traditional culture, ideas, and concepts;
and there remains a gap to bridge between what we have now and the best practice
that is globally accepted in other parts of the world.
However, it should be noted that such localization is absolutely pivotal. Despite
China’s ideological attachment to the values of modern social work, there is always
the possibility for cultural shocks and ethical dilemmas to stand in the way of specific
application and practical operation. To judge by economic structure, China has a long
agricultural past dominated by small-scale peasant farmers and farming practices that
are associated with a rural economy that combines agriculture and cottage industries.
If judged by social structure, China is traditionally a family-group-based structure
that combines life and work in a household unit; in terms of administration structure,
traditional society is often patriarchal and clan based with members related by blood
ties and governed by patriarchal rules and political authority. Regarding cultural
value systems, ancient China still has a philosophy of life built around Confucianism,
Buddhism, and Taoism with the first being the supreme. It stresses “respecting the
ancient and the elderly” and “family and filial piety”. People from the past are
generally confined to a relatively closed circle of relatives and friends which forms
a close-knit “face-to-face-society”, with even greater emphasis on “family and filial
piety”, later blooming into a strong sense of family awareness, which to some extent
hinders the development of “individualism” and “social spirit”. In addition, the fact
that “family” as a social unit presupposes certain “identity” gave rise to the value
concepts of “identity orientation” and “relationship orientation” early on and does
not conform to the modern beliefs of fraternity and equality.13
This shows the necessity to localize the values system of social work through a
targeting specific problems in working practices that includes both academic research
and practical implementation. For a western-originated social work value system to
blend in better and faster, it is both imperative and inevitable that we adopt localization
in both its theories and practice if we want acceptance from the people we are serving.
13 Jin [11].
3.3.2 The Professional Value of Social Work in China
3.3.2.1 Theoretical Foundation
Apart from the aforementioned traditional norms and ethics, China’s professional
social work also draws upon other beliefs for developing its value system, such as
socialist humanitarianism, valuable social ideals, and social welfare ideas developed
at home and abroad, as well as from Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, and
Deng Xiaoping Theory.14
Socialist humanitarianism grew out of criticism of capitalist humanitarianism.
Admittedly, the latter has significantly promoted the liberation of mankind and civi-
lization; nonetheless, certain limitations are inherent. For example, recipients of
“fraternity” and “human rights” are confined to the bourgeoisie, with the huge prole-
tariat largely ignored. In other words, bourgeois humanitarianism, to a large extent,
only considers the rights of their own rank and i.e., leaving its “equality” ideas
partial, unfocussed and narrow-minded in scope; in contrast, socialist humanitari-
anism attends to all social members, the society, and the whole country, theoretically
safeguarding the rights and interests of humanity and putting everyone on an equal
footing.
Marxism Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, and Deng Xiaoping Theory are gems
of wisdom accumulated through years of hard struggle by numerous Chinese revo-
lutionary predecessors. Proven to be conforming to China’s actual conditions, they
make an ideological and theoretical system that guides the Communist Party of China
to move forward, providing the theoretical base for China’s social work values. Its
essence is to build socialist thinking in Chinese characteristics, to safeguard people’s
rights and interests, to ensure people’s wellbeing, and to build a harmonious socialist
society.
3.3.2.2 China’s Social Work Values
Out of a pool of universal values, China has chosen both those representative of
social work’s core beliefs and of mainstream thinking in Chinese society with its
conforming to cultural norms and conditions. These beliefs combined help underpin
China’s own social work values and its main ideas, as follows.
First, help others to help themselves. “Helping others to help themselves” is the
core value of social work. It demands that in addition to fixing actual problems,
social workers can facilitate personal development (especially working vulnerable
groups in society) in recipients to help them identify early interventions. This is one
of the critical long-term goals of social workers. Short-term help can solve temporary
problems; nonetheless, such help cannot be sustainable, if root causes of their poverty,
such as lack of competence and motivation are not resolved, because recipients may
fall again when a new situation arises. Only by helping recipients toward a saner
outlook on life and values, stronger personal skills, better resources against crisis, can
14 Li [7].
social workers expect a lasting and sustainable outcome that relies on self-identity,
self-dependence, and self-reliance. This is also one of the areas where professional
social work is different from general social services and voluntary services.
Secondly, empowerment. Also known as “power and energy enhancement”; the
term empowerment was first proposed in 1976 by Barbara Solomon in Black Empow-
erment: Social Work in Oppressed Communities, marking the arrival of empower-
ment theory in social work. It refers to the process and means by which an individual
or group’s sense of entitlement or ability is raised, namely the importance of power or
authority endowment that ensures equal rights to recipients through laws and creates
institutions to defend those rights. It is also about imposing professional deeds that
helps those most unfairly treated to fight back, lowers their sense of incompetency
and powerlessness, while increasing their purpose and capacities. Through empower-
ment, the recipients get to know what rights they are entitled to and how to exercise
them with greater identity and motivation, for example, as participating in social
affairs, employing social resources, building supportive social networks, etc. Such
benefits work at both individual and societal levels. In the former, social workers help
the recipients to improve their self-knowledge, get to know their rights, and be more
confident about combating deprivation and the causes of deprivation. By restoring
and rebuilding network and social connections, social workers are helping recipients
to climb higher up the social ladder, which forges fairer social bonds by which they
can access the social resource they deserve and getting rid of their underprivileged
social tag and truly fitting in.
Thirdly, respect. “Respect” is part of the universal good for mankind that’s not
confined to professional values of social work. Recognizing the worth of a man
goes far back in the founding missions of early humanitarianism which advocates
cherishing our life, caring for our happiness, and paying particular reverence to the
personality right, beliefs, and dignity of every human creature. Out of the same moral
maxims of “loving”, “respecting”, and “caring for” human lives, social work aims at
fixing temporary and malign effects on recipients by defending their dignity, rights,
and capabilities. It is also stipulated in China’s social work guidelines that service
providers should respect recipients’ rights, say the right to know, and ensure while
the service proceeds, the recipients are informed of their rights, responsibilities, and
obligations and those of the institution, as well as their access to the service and its
prospective consequences.
At the same time, social workers should respect the privacy of recipients and keep
confidential the personal information collected without violating the law and the
legitimate rights and interests of others or the state. In addition, the values of “accep-
tance” and “individualization” mentioned later are also largely based on “respecting”
recipients. Only via “respect” can the helper aspire to work with the recipient in an
equal, positive manner and to effectively help them out of the plight. Only by mutual
“respect” can a more natural interaction be fostered between helpers and recipients.
Only by “respecting” the professionalism of social work can “altruism” be truly
realized in practice; and only if equality and “respect” are appreciated can social
work become an indispensable engine to tackle social problems and maintain social
harmony.
Fourthly, dedication. The Socialist Core Values requires citizens to be “patriotic,

dedicated, honest, and friendly”, which enshrines why “dedication” is much more
important to the CPC administration than perhaps in other sectors or occupations.
It is a life attitude that bonds everyone together. This is absolutely vital for social
workers in that they are dedicated to not only professional pride, credibility, and
reverence for scientific spirit, but also accountability for the job they do, the case
owners, the institutions, and the government and society they serve. In addition,
the acquisition of greater expertise is another attribute essential to social care. Social
workers should constantly internalize and practice professional maxims, enlarge their
pool of specialized knowledge and skills, improve professional competence, and aim
for higher professionalism and increased reputation. Only by earnestly performing
“dedication” can social workers better fulfill their duty in a realistic, pragmatic, and
diligent manner while maintaining a professional image of honesty, integrity, and
accountability that maximizes values of social work.
Fifthly, acceptance. This word in a social work context means in front of a case
owner, social workers must hold a fair, understanding, accepting, and tolerant posi-
tion. To a deeper level, it reveals trust, care, and respect toward the case owner. It is
however something that is easier said than done. Nevertheless, to be truly “accepting”
is a lofty aim worth striving for. In life of course, there are as many individual recip-
ients as there are vastly different life stories, value orientations, and lifestyles. Given
such circumstances, social workers may easily fall into the trap of unconsciously
stereotyping and labeling people. To be truly objective about their cases means to
stay “accepting” and get to know their actual problems first. It’s worth mentioning
that “acceptance” does not mean unconditional or without reservation when taking
sides. In fact, where there is wrong or deviant behaviors, social workers are expected
to point it out by declaring their own stance, taking a positive but resolute tone in
helping them steer it back in line with expected social norms. If the job of a social
worker is to stay understanding, tolerant, and professional while working with them
on how they can out of trouble, however, regardless of the situation they are in, social
workers are trained to maintain equality and acceptance in their attitude in moral or
value judgment and to not refuse or discriminate from personal stance toward a
recipient.
Sixthly, people orientation. The idea of putting people first has existed in China
since ancient times. As early as the pre-Qin era, Prime Minister Guan Zhong
mentioned in his ruling of the country, “A prospective overlord regard people as
the roots. Solid roots make a firm regime, whereas malnutritioned ones undermines
it”. In a modern context, it means a policy turn from “number orientation” to “people
orientation” with the measurement of progress being more on people’s wellbeing
and a greater sense of balance between humans and society. As declared at the Third
Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee, people orientation is paramount
for development and requires people who are respected at all times, heard, and cared
for, and that their various needs are all met one after another, while their all-round
development is the supreme goal of development. By nature, a general term of social
governance, it can also attend to every other field of society, so as to be a key concern
for the development of social work. As mentioned earlier, one of the core ideological
sources of social work is “humanitarianism”. Its essence lies in respecting human

worth and measuring values by human needs. Social work recognizes individual
values and needs and attaches importance to cultivating personal competence and
fostering self-realization. The logic behind it is to “help people” who are supposed
to be taken care of by society and enjoy all the rights as human beings, especially the
right to survival and development. In practical work, social workers never fail to put
the recipients first, taking their personal development as a key lifeline of their work
while pursuing harmony and unity among people and society.
Seventhly, individualization. It means treating everyone as unique—treating each
case separately as an integral, complete, and unique need, and giving where possible
a “tailored” service to everyone according to his/her needs. This mode of social work
is mainly casework-driven. Even in group work and community work patterns, it can
serve a limited group size. Therefore, unlike social services and social governance
at the macro-level, social workers take differentiated and individualized approaches
far more often than national generalized policies. By early definitions of social work,
as Mary Ellen Richmond put it, it is only by adjusting to the situation a case owner
is in that social workers can steer him or her back on track regarding personality
and family ties. The life and the environment in which they grow up in are often
vastly different from each other that they each carry a very personal problem. Being
personal is not only about intervention methods, but also protecting the privacy
of a case owner. It is precisely out of respect for individuality that social workers
keep details about case owners’ personal information and specific circumstances
confidential. Specifically, social workers are prohibited from prying into a client’s
privacy, unless such information is necessary for providing services and conducting
assessment or research. Once such personal information is disclosed, social workers
should instantly start acting upon confidentiality clauses, including not discussing
sensitive information about person in public or in semi-public occasions (such as
corridors, waiting rooms, elevators, and restaurants). In legal proceedings, they are
also required to keep this information confidential unless required to disclose it by
law.
Eighthly, social responsibility. Social workers take accountability for case owners,
their profession, and the discipline, but more importantly, for the whole of society.
Because it is solving social problems and improving social welfare, they take as their
ultimate goal the ambition of “helping others to help themselves”. As stipulated in The
National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics, their social responsibility is
to improve the general welfare of society, to advocate informed participation among
the public, and maximize adequate professional services to the masses in public
emergency. What’s more, social workers should actively participate in social and
political actions and call for providing all people with equal access to resources,
employment, and services and to enable their all-round personal development. They
should stay sober-minded about how politics may affect social work practice and
should appeal for more appropriate policies and laws to improve social conditions,
meet basic human needs, and raise social justice.15
By China’s value system of professional social work, the responsibility part is
divided into four sections: first, to civilize. Social work increases socialization by
cultivating those in need or left behind to socialize or adapt into becoming a more
qualified social person who has better mastered the basic skills of everyday life,
internalized social norms, and adapted to social life patterns; second, both in welfare
system and economic system, social work is a key component that coordinates and
provides for the basic survival needs of social members; thirdly, to develop. Social
work has its vision in the long-term needs of people and society which requires that
people maximize their potential toward self-realization and to stay in harmony with
society as science and technology progresses; and fourthly, to protect. Social workers
should take effective measures to maintain a sound and stable social environment by
defending the rights and safety of social members.
Apart from what has been noted above, they are also expected to join in the
formulation and amendment of relevant policies and regulations from their profes-
sional perspective and expertise, in order to maintain social fairness and justice and to
promote public participation in social construction under proper guidance. Moreover,
they should strive to popularize professional services and to facilitate effective trans-
mission and distribution of social resources, so that their services can truly benefit
the entire population. While performing their duties, social workers shall abide by
the relevant Constitution, laws, and regulations, implement the policies of the CPC
and the state, practice the core socialist values expected of them, and follow their
professional ethics. Their social responsibility outlined above reflects their worth
and their role to play in the whole of society.
3.4 Application of Social Work Values in Poverty

Alleviation
In the era of winning the battle against poverty and building a well-off society, social
work plays a key role in poverty Alleviation. The values system of social work must
be carried through in poverty Alleviation practice.
3.4.1 People Orientation
According to The Outline of Poverty Alleviation and Development in Rural China’s

(2001–2010) definition, China’s overall objectives for poverty alleviation and devel-
opment are as follows: to secure adequate food and clothing for a small impover-
ished group as soon as possible while consolidating what’s been achieved; to further
15 Social Worker China Network. “National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics”. http:/
/laws.swchina.org/foreign/2014/0401/12714.shtml.
3.4 Application of Social Work Values in Poverty Alleviation 87
raise basic production and living conditions in poor areas; to strengthen infrastruc-
ture construction in poor villages to create a better ecosystem so as to narrow their
living standards gap in comparison to those from larger social averages economically,
socially and culturally. Obviously, it’s China’s basic strategy of development-oriented
poverty relief to tackle lack of income in the poor and promote their self-reliance
for sustainable growth. Such ideas coincide with the “people orientation” part from
social work value system.
People orientation is the core value of poverty alleviation action. It means to take
human rights, needs, and interests seriously and deal with them properly. Rights
to subsistence and development are the defining rights of human beings. But their
exercise is suppressed in the case of the poor population who have neither access to
sufficient means of subsistence, nor to education and skill training, nor to adequate
possession and application of social resources.
On the one hand, poverty alleviation social workers proceed from reality, working
hard at being targeted with practical measures toward higher income and life quality;
on the other hand, they insist on improving overall strength and competitiveness of
poor individuals, to get them away from the passive perception of “waiting, relying
and wanting”, toward greater underlying strength and self-regulation.
To pursue “people orientation” requires social workers to pay attention to the
individual needs of the poor population and take effective measures to resolve
their most urgent difficulties. Since none of them is lacking in potential, personal
strengths, or self-development skills, they deserve targeted help in getting to know
and employing their potential, before transforming personal competitiveness into a
self-sustaining narrative. This requires that social workers stick to “people orienta-
tion” when performing their duty, be keenly aware of and do their utmost to meet,
the most urgent needs of the poor.
3.4.2 Helping Others to Help Themselves
“Helping others to help themselves” is the core value of social work and is consis-
tent with the “hematopoietic” (blood making) poverty relief concept from ancient
wisdom “Teach others to fish and they will fish for a lifetime”. “Hematopoietic” is
about a sustainable approach that activates the inner drive in poor people and regions
by improving their overall strength and self-sufficiency across the generations and
helps to foster greater self-reliance. The logic behind it is that like “blood trans-
fusion”, temporary effort in relief, equal distribution, short-term help are no more
than emergency measures that cannot eradicate poverty once and for all; worse still,
it may even breed a habitual dependence of negative nature in the poor. Only by
advocating the idea of “helping people to help themselves” can social workers make
the poor aware of self-reliance. In addition, this belief can foster the required aware-
ness and ability to use resources to their advantage, create wealth, and give back to
society, thus building a two-way interaction between the help giver and receiver in a
sustainable way.
China’s poverty alleviation policy focuses on “helping the poor to improve their
internal impetus (inner drive)”, as stipulated in “The Outline of China’s Rural Poverty
Alleviation and Development (2001–2010)”: throughout we should give full play to
the enthusiasm and creativity of the people and the masses in poor areas and get rid of
backwardness mainly on our own by self-reliance and “working like a horse”. Also
emphasized in “The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
China and the State Council on Winning the Fight against Poverty” is the importance
of a development-oriented vision. Poverty relief effort has to center around the people,
how to stimulate their internal impetus, how to keep a balance between self-reliance
and outer reliefs by government and society, how to carry forward the banner of
self-reliance, hard struggle, and diligence as means for a better-off living, and how
to fully mobilize the enthusiasm and creativity of cadres and people in poor areas
to focus on poverty relief by education toward better self-development of the poor.
“The Opinions of the General Office of the State Council on Further Mobilizing All
Aspects of the Society to Participate in Poverty Alleviation and Development” again
specified reverence for people’s initiative: both the helper and the receiver deserve
due respect to their will for working together, while more exchanges and interactions
are desired to activate the internal impetus in the poor, so as to have all parties join
in the battle with pride, passion, and enthusiasm.
Social work insists on respect for the rights and values of human beings. This is
reflected in their claims of “helping others to help themselves” and “empowerment”.
Their fundamental belief is to build a stronger man with greater overall strength. This
is achieved through individual orientation, fuller self-achievement and easier self-
realization. In a modern governance framework of poverty relief, “helping people
and helping themselves” by social work and “hematopoietic” approach by poverty
Alleviation specialists create important strategies to boost the inner drive of the poor
and their capacity of self-development. Through capacity building, social workers can
help recipients better accomplish their own salvation, thus changing their perception
from being a help receiver to a self-helper.
3.4.3 Multi-dimensional Recognition
Social work claims “acceptance” and “respect” which corresponds with “accurately
identifying the target” principle by which we mean poverty alleviation. As the battle
entered a new phase, indicators for poverty diagnosis have shifted from regional GDP
to multi-dimensional identification. The “13th Five Year Plan for Poverty Allevia-
tion” clearly states that its overall objective is to ensure, by current criteria and by
2020, no concerns in the rural poor about food and clothing, guaranteed compulsory
education, basic medical care, and housing security (referred to as “two no worries
and three guarantees”); the per capita disposable income for farmers in poverty-
stricken areas more than doubling that of 2010, a higher growth rate than even the
national average, and the indicators of major public services close to the national
average; by current criteria, we will ensure that poor villagers and counties are all
lifted out of poverty, and that regional overall poverty relief is attained.
Multi-dimensional identification corresponds to the above goals. It measures
education, medical care, housing, employment, and other indicators in combination
rather than economic income alone, when it comes to accessing the living standards
of the masses. “The Implementation Plan for Establishing the Working Mechanism of
Targeted Poverty Alleviation” clearly points out that greater efforts are needed in top-
level design, communication, coordination, guidance, and service by targeted poverty
alleviation departments; industry-related departments should maximize their func-
tions and industry advantages through the division of labor and offer more concrete
assistance to poor households and villages by building proper platforms to guide and
mobilize social forces in targeted poverty reduction. Therefore, a comprehensive and
systematic perspective is desirable for social work to identify poverty and to improve
the accuracy and precision of poverty alleviation efforts.
In the process of fighting against poverty, the key is how to accept recipients with
different needs and establish stable supportive relationship with them. The goal is to
improve individual competence as a tool for poverty relief, getting rid of the poverty
tag, and eventually raising human welfare and harmony in society. Therefore, social
workers should take an “acceptance” stance to recipients from different backgrounds
while performing their duty and strive to meet their various needs. They should also
take a more multi-dimensional approach to identify recipients’ diverse needs and
preferences because of their varied cultural backgrounds, treat them equally with an
inclusive and receptive attitude, and analyze their causes of poverty with an objective
mindset, including their living and family environments, cultural and educational
background, local customs and habits, so as to provide targeted services for them.
3.4.4 Targeted Measures for Different Groups
Targeted poverty Alleviation requires that adequate and efficient steps be proceeded
to accurately identify, help, and manage the targets in a way that matches the specific
regional and personal conditions of poor farmers. After The Implementation Plan
for Establishing a Targeted Poverty Alleviation Working Mechanism was released,
targeted poverty Alleviation was officially launched nationwide. It basically means
that policies and measures should be tailored to factually poor families and popu-
lation and eradicate various triggers and troubles that lead to poverty by steering
assistance to the intended poor groups to achieve the goal of sustainable poverty
Alleviation.16 Precision is the lifeline for targeted poverty reduction which demands
that the three questions of whom to help, by whom, and how all be answered properly
in order for the assistance to reach those truly in need, deliver genuine outcomes, and
overcome poverty without falling back, in order to make our triumph over poverty
more sustainable by enabling the poor a greater sense of fulfillment.
16 Wang and Guo [12].

Targeted poverty Alleviation needs to achieve “Six Precisions”, namely precision

of target, measures to the household, use of funds, stationing of first village secretary,
and effect of poverty Alleviation. It demands that differentiated intervention plans be
formulated according to the different causes of poverty per household. “Individual-
ization” in social work means to match policies to particular problems of the owner,
which corresponds with the “targeted poverty Alleviation” idea as a whole. This is
especially stated in The Implementation Plan for Establishing a Targeted Poverty
Alleviation Working Mechanism: social forces as relief participants are required to
be more precise and efficient in their efforts, and units of paired-up assistance (indi-
viduals, enterprises, social organizations) are encouraged with guidance to organize
diverse relief activities in poverty-stricken areas.
Focus has to shift to the grass-roots level on individual poor villages and house-
holds to ensure assistance matches specific problems with sustainable outcomes and
for social assistance to be accurate and adequate. “Individualization” as a core part of
social work can help popularize the relief policy of “accurate identification, accurate
assistance, and precise management” that demands particular situations of individ-
uals and households to be addressed by categorized and targeted measures to ensure
proper remedies going to each case to maximize relief efficiency.
3.4.5 Increasing Confidence and Knowledge
To win the battle against extreme poverty, efforts must be intensified to help those
who have emerged from poverty build up adequate self-belief with better access to
education and services. It is essential to fully mobilize the enthusiasm and initiative
in the poor and to instill and guide them toward a sense of mastery of their own
fate with the spirit of self-reliance instilled so that they could take the wheel them-
selves to combat poverty. To cultivate endogenous power, a combination of efforts is
needed for poverty Alleviation, increasing people’s confidence and enriching their
knowledge and skills. The “blood transfusion” model must shift to a more sustained
self-motivation of “hemopoiesis” model. The poor must be given a leading role to
play if we are to develop their self-development and competence.
As pointed out in The 13th Five Year Plan for Poverty Eradication, the basic
literacy and professional skills of the poor and households must be continuously
increased. Because it’s unlikely to block the intergenerational transmission of poverty
without radically upgrading the least developed area of education. Similarly, the
Decision of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on Winning the
Battle against Extreme Poverty calls for accelerating poverty relief by education. The
offspring of poor families deserve fair and good quality education, and a paired-off
assistance scheme is needed to block the intergenerational transmission of poverty.
To combine poverty relief with increasing people’s confidence and enriching their
knowledge reduces the likelihood of poverty returning. For poverty reduction to be
fully taking effect, we need to shift the focus from simple material aid to improving
competence. The purpose of social work is not only to get the poor out of mate-
rial shortage, but also spiritual barrenness and lack of ability and rights—through
empowerment. Social work must insist on the combination of poverty Alleviation
with increasing people’s confidence and enriching their knowledge, providing profes-
sional services and social opportunities such as ideological, cultural education, and
skills training for poor groups and improving their internal impetus and development
ability.
From intellectual support to aspirational support takes the transformation from
“addressing education poverty” to “helping the poor through education”. It is neces-
sary to reverse the passive taker attitude in the poor and cultivate their sense of
ownership. For social workers, poor groups have always been the key player. They
advocate reaching consensus with the poor by working together with them to over-
come difficulties on the basis of communication and understanding. They not only
focus on solving the immediate problems of the recipients, but also devote themselves
to helping them build self-confidence and self-esteem. In poverty relief practice,
social workers can help the poor become aware of the importance of confidence and
knowledge building by combining it with the empowerment theory form social work
value system, so that the poor masses can realize the transformation from “being
passively cooperative” to “active participation” in both ideology and action.
3.4.6 Protection of Rights
To combat poverty is not simply about solving problems, but also a process of culti-
vating ability. Social workers strive to explore and employ advantages and capacities
of the poor groups. According to “rights poverty theory”, poverty occurs because of
a lack of rights or opportunities. In his book Poverty and Famine, Amartya Sen noted
that poverty in essence means to be short of opportunity and of income generation
ability, with the root cause behind being deprivation of both.17 The main reason why
the poor stay in poverty is that lack of opportunities has reduced many of them to
a state with no right to development, self-management, or career choice. In order
to achieve social equity and justice, the market is in charge of supplementing these
deficiencies by creating basic social opportunities.18
The key to overcoming poverty is to protect and realize people’s social rights.
Poverty alleviation governance has always emphasized empowering the people and
building their capacity. It has raised poverty Alleviation from simple and formal
condolence and relief to capacity training and empowerment of the underprivileged,
enabling people to understand their own value and to regain confidence in poverty
alleviation, improving their ability, and granting them equal access to resources.
Being a participant in poverty governance, social workers are supposed to make
full use of values and advantages of their profession by specialized conceptions
17 Sen [13].
18 Guan [14].
like “advantage perspective” that helps the recipients recognize their own strengths,
personal competence and qualities, and available resources. For example, they may
teach the recipients to reasonably attribute poverty to external factors so as to take
initiative in exploiting outer resources for a change. Specifically, they may tell the case
owner not to take it too personal because the plight they are in is due to restraints from
environment or inadequate application of their skills. By this logic, the poor groups
have to regain confidence while get to know what internal and external resources are
at hand by individuals, households, and society before they can change their status
quo. Only by sufficient knowledge of one’s legal rights and proper exploitation of
personal skills can one transform temporary predicament and crisis into prospective
life-changing opportunities.
To sum up, the value system of social work is the ideological core guiding the
actions of social workers and their spiritual engine. In poverty alleviation practice,
social workers especially need to carry out values, advantages, and characteristics of
their profession, prove their professionalism worthwhile, and contribute their bit of
efforts to a better strategic system of and victory over extreme poverty.
References
1. Timms N (1983) Social work values: an enquiry. Routled & Kegan Paul, London, p 121
2. John D (2004) The search for certainty—research on the relationship between knowledge and
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3. Xu L (2004) Case work. Higher Education Press, Beijing, p 76
4. Wang S (2006) Introduction to social work, 2nd edn. Higher Education Press, Beijing
5. Levy CS (1976) Social work ethics. Human Science Press, New York
6. Huang W, Zeng H, Wang H (1995) Social case work. Wuhan Publishing House, Wuhan, p 85
7. Li Y (2010) Introduction to social work, 2nd edn. China Renmin University Press, Beijing, p
54
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p 86 [India]
14. Guan H (2001) Labor law. China Renmin University Press, Beijing, pp 60–61
Chapter 4
Methods of Social Work in Poverty
Alleviation
The emergence and development of social work methods are closely related to
poverty alleviation as those methods originated from poverty relief in the late nine-
teenth century and early twentieth century. Now, the targeted groups of social work
have expanded from marginalized groups including the elderly, orphans, and people
with disabilities who were extremely poor or in severe distress to people who were in
deep water, and the key topic extended from poverty reduction to personal improve-
ment and harmonious society. To this end, professional methods of social work
have developed from initial case work to a combination of methods including case-
work, group work, community organization, social work administration, social work
supervision, and social work research.
As tools, these methods should serve the objective and purpose of social work,
that is, to practice social justice and support the poor, vulnerable groups, and other
people in distress. Methods that contribute to achieving these goals should be included
within the structure of social work methods for standardization and perfection, as
well as in the domain of poverty relief. In this chapter, the main methods of social
work will be presented with an introduction to the application of those methods
in poverty reduction. On top of that, the characteristics of social work methods in
combating poverty will also be explored to seek innovative, comprehensive, and
practical approaches.
4.1 Main Methods of Social Work
4.1.1 Origin of Social Work Methods
The exploration of solutions to poverty has never stopped since the inception of
social work. And arguably, the history of social work development is one of fighting
poverty. The industrial revolution led to significant changes in human society. The
innovation of technology altered traditional ways of production and also the economic
94 4 Methods of Social Work in Poverty Alleviation
structure and social form that are based on them. Massive production completely
replaced small-scale ones, which was followed by a sea change in the lives of the
general public. For farmers who have experienced that transition, industrialization
has revolutionized their lives. Due to the intensified movement of enclosures, those
who worked the fields for generations and lived on agricultural production ended up
losing everything and being displaced. People living in rural areas were forced to
migrate on a large scale to cities for survival, starting a new life completely different
from their ancestors and facing problems with no previous experience for reference.
Meanwhile, mass migration also brought changes to cities and the lives of urban
residents. Although differences existed between both groups, adaptation was the
challenge in common for both when they were faced with new environments and
lifestyles. Among them, farmers away from home suffered more.
For these migrants, they were under multiple pressures. First, the recession of
the ability to make a living. In the traditional agrarian society, individual ability to
make a living was mainly reflected in one’s knowledge of farming and proficiency
in skills with a positive correlation. However, in the industrial era, even a master
of farming could not meet the basic needs for survival and living standards as the
knowledge and skills the person had were obsolete. In the face of new and massive
production, the person was still empty-handed with previous knowledge and skills
worthless in the new era, which impaired his ability to earn a living. Second, the
loss of subsistence for the family. Previously, the family was both a production unit
and a basic unit providing security for individuals, which was built on the division
of labor and cooperation. After that, such a unit was overturned, leading to a sharp
decline of resources possessed and almost loss of subsistence for individuals, which
was particularly evident in the transition period with no national and social security
network in place at that point. Third, the breakup of social support networks. Tradi-
tional farming communities were mainly acquaintance-based with social capital,
which could form effective and stable social support for both families and members.
However, migration disbanded original communities and broke the support network.
Besides, homogeneous city clusters led to convergent social resources and weaker
social support.
Multiple pressures put massive migrants into a state of poverty from which they
could hardly lift themselves. Compared with the previous agrarian society, the feature
of poverty experienced a fundamental change. Structural factors like production
patterns became the main contributors to poverty marked by its prevalence, large
scale, and diffusion. As levels of poverty escalated, voluntary and scattered ways to
help the poor could no longer meet their needs. Under the circumstances, the Eliza-
bethan Poor Law was issued that for the first time in Western history, the government
officially admitted its responsibility for poverty relief and formalized earlier policies
and practices, thus establishing the mode of government-run assistance.
The Elizabethan Poor Law has brought both effects and drawbacks. It has been
proven that a single Poor Law could not eliminate poverty once and for all or bring true
welfare to poor people. Given some provisions such as compulsory institutional aid,
some far-sighted scholars in England who highly valued human rights criticized the
Poor Law and set up philanthropic organizations to make up insufficient government
4.1 Main Methods of Social Work 95
aid to poor people. Among them, a great example is the Charity Organization Society
(COS) in London. COS was proposed by Reverend H. Solly and established in
1869 to solve the problems of division of labor and cooperation within countries
and the efficiency of almsgiving brought by the emergence of other philanthropic
organizations with “friendly visitors” as their main method, later spreading to other
major cities in England.1
The practices of COS directly impacted the professional methods of social work
in later years in ways as follows. Firstly, COS emphasized scientific principles by
sending “friendly visitors” to visit alms applicants to know their social backgrounds,
pinpoint measures, and classify them by individual circumstances after surveying
every person and family applying for alms. Such an individual-oriented method was
the origin of social casework. Secondly, COS has facilitated the coordination and
cooperation among all relief agencies and philanthropic organizations for poverty
alleviation and laid a solid foundation for the emergence and development of commu-
nity organizations and social work administration.2 Almost in the same period, the
Settlement Movement was on the rise in the UK, focusing on solutions to growing
poverty and rapidly expanding to the USA. In 1866, Neighborhood Guild, the first
neighborhood association in the USA, was set up in New York. In 1889, Laura Jane
Addams founded Hull House in Chicago which was a huge success that promotes
the Settlement Movement to the whole country. Different from the individual- and
family-oriented COS, the Settlement Movement set the community as the target
group in the face of a broader range, pioneering the methods of group work and
community organization.
4.1.2 Characteristics and Classification of Social Work

Methods
From the development of social work, it can be concluded that social work methods
have been gradually enriched as poverty alleviation with main features as follows.
Firstly, practical solutions as the goal. Whether it was a “friendly visitor” or commu-
nity organization, it was an appropriate solutions adopted in light of the character-
istics of the poverty problems then with clear objectives and unconventional ways.
Therefore, the flexible selection of measures made solutions to poverty more effec-
tive. Secondly, equal attention to both material aids and psychological care. Such
a feature permeated all the details of social work measures, making it have a real
impact on the people, boost their well-being, and improve the quality of their lives.
For example, given the principles of the aid of those philanthropic organizations,
the mind and character of those seeking help were the main efforts as only if their
mind and character could be influenced, their future lives could be stable.3 Thirdly,
1 Chengren [1].
2 Wang [2].
3 Bosanquet [3] quoted in Chengren [1].
emphasis on the integration of resources. It was new in human history that poverty
reached a large scale and a great extent with structural characteristics. When trying to
cope with this situation, social workers in the early days had no principles to follow,
thus encouraging many far-sighted people to work together in fields like religion
and education. Besides, they also pushed forward the legislative process for social
fairness and justice, including the first law of juvenile court established by Laura
Jane Addams in person and eight hours working mechanism. There were interfer-
ences both for individuals and family members with previous social workers. There
were both individual and family and also the group and community, which was more
comprehensive and abundant considering different types of resources and ways of
interference.
Generally, there are two views on how to categorize these professional methods.
On the one hand, they could be divided into the direct method and indirect method
according to the order of emergence and the relation with their target groups. Case-
work, group work, and community organization are three traditional social work
methods, mainly used in practical work in the direct face of target groups, thus
gaining its name. Social work administration, social work counseling, social work
supervision, and social work research are methods formed later acting indirectly on
the objects.
On the other hand, based on the types of knowledge and skills needed for service
recipients, social work methods could be divided into micro-social work methods
from the perspectives of management of individuals, families, groups, and cases and
macro-social work methods from the perspectives of organizations, communities, and
policies.4 Micro-social work methods, including casework and group work, refer to
professional services that help individuals, families, and groups to confront and solve
problems or get rid of stress and then integrate those methods into social commu-
nities. Macro-social work methods promote the coordination of the organizational
functions of social communities and organizations in response to the common needs
and problems of the general public, including community organization and devel-
opment, social work administration, social work research, social work supervision,
and social work counseling.5
Regardless of the classification criteria, professional social work methods devel-
oped in practices, especially in the process of poverty alleviation, which in turn has
driven the development of poverty alleviation.
4.1.3 Traditional Social Work Methods
Generally, casework, group work, community organization, social work administra-

tion, and social work research are the most used methods.
The casework method is the first well-developed method. It is a method for social
workers to apply their values, knowledge, and skills to help individuals or families
4 Meihua and Jun [4].

5 Wang [2].
4.1 Main Methods of Social Work 97
manage their relationships with the environment, enhance their abilities in the face
of dilemmas, and improve the quality of life for individuals and families.
The group work method is aimed at a group of people with the same or similar
problems. Communication, exchanges, and support among group members could
improve the ability to cope with problems. Group work is both a process and a
means of promoting the change of their attitudes and improving their abilities, which
emphasizes the interaction among group members and the impact on them via the
process of group work and impetus.
Community organization serves the communities and their members. By orga-
nizing and encouraging them, residents could jointly define the needs of their
communities, explore internal and external resources to solve problems, improve
the environment and quality of their lives, and boost the overall development of their
communities. This method emphasizes the cultivation of the sense of belonging to
the community and the concept of self-help, self-determination, and cooperation of
residents, improving their awareness and ability to negotiate and participate to form
a stable and developmental intrinsic motivation of communities.
Social work administration is an indirect and practical method that shows the
process of transmission from social policy to social services, which is also an embod-
iment of explaining and implementing the functions of policies. To be more specific,
social work administration is the internal administration and coordination activities of
social service organizations, including planning, organizing, personnel, coordinating,
and controlling.6
Social work research refers to the study of the knowledge and subjects related to
social work. Based on social work and social research ethics, it uses social research
methods to collect and analyze data related to social work, improving and perfecting
theories and practices of social work for better performance of functions of social
work. Social work research must follow the basic ethics of social research, gener-
ally adopting two paradigms, quantitative and qualitative researches, and integrating
various specific research methods to ensure the accuracy of the research structure.
Among all these methods, casework, group work, and community organization
are known as the three direct methods of social work. In the process of development,
casework is the first to emerge, followed by group work and community organization,
and the order of mastery is the same during the application. Casework could help
social workers to be sensitive to the individual characteristics of service recipients,
grasp and respond to their individualized needs, and provide more direct and effective
support. Group work focuses more on the reaction among group members, providing
diverse support while cultivating their abilities to communicate and coordinate. Such
group motivation is vital to solving problems. Community organization challenges
the overall control of social workers. Through the comprehensive usage of various
methods, the ultimate goal of community work is to improve the holistic ability inside
communities, which is reflected in the improvement of the awareness and ability
of residents to participate in community work and the effective implementation of
community consultation and autonomy.
6 Teaching Materials Writing Groups of China Accreditation Test for Social Workers [5].
Social work administration and research are common indirect methods of social
work. Social work administration is a series of activities that transform policies into
practical services. Effective social work administration could not only facilitate the
smooth implementation of social policies so that the target groups could fully enjoy
the benefits brought by the policies, but also accumulate experience through profes-
sional services, give back to social policies, legislations, or decisions, and enhance
the quality of social policies. And, social work research could help to improve the
specialization of social work, enhancing the quality of services and gaining expe-
rience through research. In the current context of social work localization, it is an
important topic of social work research to construct local social work methods,
seek means of intervention compatible with national conditions, culture, traditions,
behaviors, and habits of China, and solve current problems in society.
Traditional social work methods are widely used in poverty alleviation work in
China. During practices, mainly community work, the combined mode of casework
and group work is the most common one. As an imported concept, in the face of local
issues, professional social work still needs to take into account both disciplinary and
local characteristics, pay close attention to solutions to local problems, and respond
to important topics in local society. As an area where social work should and will
definitely make a difference, poverty alleviation is the nation cause in current China
and the main topic representing the characteristic of socialist prosperity for all, which
is related to the well-being of the general public. Thus, social work methods in poverty
reduction should also summarize the experience and improve themselves in concrete
past practices.
4.2 Practices of Social Work Methods in Poverty Alleviation
Social work methods are created in the process of responding to practical problems
and are also improved and perfected in the process of solving them. At the same
time, social work methods are different from the methods in natural sciences and
have distinctive local characteristics and contemporary features in concrete imple-
mentation. The four basic systems of social work practices, i.e., service recipient
system, action system, target system, and medium-changing system, have different
choices of goals, ways of interaction, behavioral habits, and meanings of actions
in different cultural traditions and also differ in the application of specific methods.
This section presents the background of the development of poverty alleviation social
work by sorting out the characteristics of current poverty reduction work, introduces
the application of traditional social work methods in poverty combating work, and
identifies the development trend of poverty easing social work methods.
4.2 Practices of Social Work Methods in Poverty Alleviation 99
4.2.1 Practical Background of Social Work Methods

The social work methods in the field of poverty alleviation should be able to effec-
tively respond to the current goals. With the steady progress of poverty eradication in
China, people’s knowledge of poverty and poverty combating methods have under-
gone a transformation from experience-oriented to science-based ones, which is a
prerequisite for the improvement of the effectiveness of social work methods in the
poverty reduction field and needs to be clarified.
In the fields of concern, poverty alleviation work focuses on both absolute and
relative poverty. In the early practices, the general perception of poverty remained at
the level of absolute poverty, and the early social work methods were directly applied
to the socially disadvantaged groups, mainly the poor, so that more attention was paid
to financial and material aid. With the progress of society and the development of
the poverty elimination cause, people’s understanding of poverty has changed from
absolute poverty to relative poverty, and they have turned to the living conditions of
people who are below the average social level, becoming more humanized in their
understanding toward poverty. In the Decision of the CPC Central Committee on
Major Issues Concerning Upholding and Improving the System of Socialism with
Chinese Characteristics and Advancing the Modernization of China’s System and
Capacity for Governance deliberated and adopted at the Fourth Plenary Session of the
19th Central Committee of the CPC, it is clearly noted that the long-term mechanism
to eradicate relative poverty should be established to nail down the key point and
direction of poverty management after 2020. The transit of perception of poverty
requires the interference of social work to respond not only to the basic substance
and psychological needs but also to social inequality from a macro perspective.
In terms of causes of poverty, poverty alleviation work has shifted from a single
attribution to a comprehensive analysis. In the analysis and explanation of the causes
of poverty, there are two opposing views. One believes that everyone has relatively
equal opportunities from the perspective of individuals. People have the responsibility
to earn the opportunity to develop and live a better life through their hard work. Once
falling into poverty, one must examine himself or herself. However, the other explains
from the perspective of social structure that individuals remain weak in the face of
an undesirable social environment. Irrational social structure and institutions are the
main causes of poverty. These two views both have simple orientations, attributing
the reason for poverty either to individuals or to society, whereas according to long-
standing poverty combating practices and studies, the causes of poverty are rather
complicated that cannot be summarized by one single factor. The multi-dimensional
and refined analysis of causes of poverty has posed a tougher challenge to social work
methods, requiring social work to respond to more complex and integrated goals in
specific methods.
In terms of intervention theory, poverty alleviation work has shifted from the view
of problems to the view of strength. Under the influence of the problem perspective,
poverty alleviation work tended to focus on assessing and exploring the undesirable
factors in the individual, social, and cultural environment that might lead to poverty
and then addressing these undesirable factors to solve the problems of the service
recipients. With the development of society and the advancement of poverty reduc-
tion, the inadequacy of the problem perspective has become increasingly evident. In
addition, social work interventions under the problem perspective overly mobilized
resources besides service recipients to solve problems, which led to serious passivity,
rising dependence on outside assistance, and insufficient motivation and capacity.
Therefore, the strength or advantage perspective arose in response to that situation.
Under the theoretical view of advantage perspective, social work of poverty allevia-
tion focuses more on exploring the advantages of impoverished groups, building the
capacity of service recipients, and cultivating and improving the internal motivation
of the poor through the external environment when using external resources. It also
requires social work approaches to place greater emphasis on effective empowerment
techniques and to assist in the overall enhancement of their awareness and capacity.
In terms of analytical dimensions, poverty alleviation work has shifted from
general analysis to analysis of differentiation. In the early days of poverty
combating practice in China, it was mostly carried out at a general level with
universal applicability. In the face of a large number and scale of deeply impover-
ished people, extensive and unified resource mobilization and intervention targeting
common poverty causes could help to quickly improve the living conditions of poor
people and meet their basic living needs. However, as the poverty reduction cause
advanced, the remaining unsolved problems were often not explained by the universal
causes of poverty, and poverty alleviation work has needed to be carried out according
to the regional characteristics of the poverty-stricken areas and the special character-
istics of the poor. At this stage, social workers should adopt a differentiated analytical
approach to poverty-reduction practice, make detailed distinctions among different
regions and groups, explore their causes of poverty and available resources according
to their actual situations, and then form specific poverty-reduction programs so that
poverty-reduction work can shift from net casting to precise assistance with person-
alized poverty Alleviation programs in a targeted manner. This shift from general
conditions to individual differences requires a more scientific and precise approach
to the individualized intervention of social work methods.
4.2.2 Application of Traditional Social Work Methods

in Poverty Alleviation Work
First of all, the use of casework in poverty Alleviation work. As mentioned earlier,
the casework approach, as the first mature professional approach in social work,
has been developed and refined in poverty Alleviation practice, and the current case-
work approach has relatively well-established values, ethical principles, and practical
skills. In the poverty Alleviation practice, casework mainly provides individualized
support and services to individuals or families in need, which is especially applicable

in the stage of implementing the strategy of precise poverty Alleviation and erad-
ication. It is widely acknowledged that poverty Alleviation should be achieved by
increasing people’s confidence and helping them to acquire knowledge and skills. To
poor individuals and families, it means the improvement of their consciousness and
ability for self-development, which was the weak point in the conventional “blood
transfusion” poverty Alleviation model. Firstly, the casework approach follows the
concept of individualized services, providing a series of services such as targeted
assessment, planning, and intervention for individuals or families, and thus could
more accurately grasp the characteristics of individuals and provide targeted services.
Secondly, the casework approach helps to arouse the individual’s inner motivation
for development. Through intuitive and close contact with service recipients, social
workers work with them to help clarify and reasonably modify their behaviors and
motivations. Thirdly, the analytical paradigm of “person in context” in casework helps
to balance and integrate the inner and outer aspects of them, thus enhancing their
abilities for self-development. Finally, case management provides a better solution to
the complex causes of poverty and the need for resources. Finally, case management
provides all-around support for service recipients with complex causes of poverty
and needs for multiple types of resources, which is more convenient to meet the
diverse needs of service recipients.
Second, the application of the group work method in poverty reduction work.
According to the actual situation of the poor, social workers can recruit targets with
the same or similar characteristics to form a group and achieve specific goals through
group activities. Compared with casework, group work focuses more on the role of
group motivation in facilitating the transformation of service recipients and relies
more on interpersonal relationships within the group to change misconceptions and
behaviors of target groups in order to achieve other goals such as socialization,
problem-solving, or social action. The different models of group work have different
emphases and can be used flexibly according to the different performances of the
poor. The social goal model aims to inspire social conscience, foster a sense of social
responsibility, and promote social transformation, which can be used to solve the
problem of weak public awareness. The interactive model focuses on the ability to
interact and the expression of interactive behavior between group members, which
could be used to incubate poverty reduction self-organization. The organization and
environment model aims to find ways to solve problems by understanding the char-
acteristics of individuals, their social functions, and the social environment in which
they live, provide ways or opportunities for individuals and their environment to
change so that they can better adapt to society,7 which can be used to guide targets
to explore and use their own resources to seek change, and also the cultivation
of poverty reduction self-organization. When social workers applied group work
methods to poverty reduction work, they introduced livelihood improvement factors,
7 Wang [2].
which effectively increased people’s motivation to participate. However, it is impor-

tant to note that livelihood projects should be used for group incubation and nurturing,
which should not be the only goal of group work.
Third, the use of the community work approach in poverty reduction work. The
community work approach is a macro-social work intervention that can perform the
following functions: adjusting or improving social relationships in the community
to reduce conflicts, seeking an effective match between social welfare needs and
resources to improve the quality of life in the community, and improving the alloca-
tion of resources and power in the community. The current government-led poverty
reduction work takes the community as the basic unit for allocating resources and
shares the same goal with professional community work, namely, to change the face
of the community and substantially improve people’s living standards. But, there are
also differences in the specific working methods. The professional community work
approach places equal emphasis on both task and process goals. What’s more, in some
cases, more emphasis is placed on the achievement of process goals, while the tradi-
tional administrative intervention approach focuses more on the completion of task
goals. The difference in focus may result in differences in methods and emphases for
social workers and administrative staff on the same problem of poverty. Under such
circumstances, social workers should carefully assess the needs and resources of the
community, take the initiative to strengthen the liaison and communication with the
administrative staff, absorb effective and localized working methods, and be flexible
and community-oriented instead of rigidly copying theoretical models. In addition,
the application of community work methods in poverty alleviation work should avoid
falling into the misconception of “activism”, i.e., pursuing the so-called coverage and
influence of community activities, which is superficial and lack improvement for the
overall development capacity of the community and relations among the community.
Fourth, the use of social work administration in poverty reduction work. Trans-
forming policies into concrete services in poverty reduction work is a key step, and to
some extent, the quality of transformation determines whether national policies can
bring “the sense of acquisition” to poor people. As a macro-approach to social work,
social work administration does not directly target groups but rather supports the
smooth implementation of front-line services through administration. There are two
main types: government-level social work administration and institution-level social
work administration. Social work administration at the governmental level imple-
ments central policies and provides policy support and resource support for the imple-
mentation of social work practice through the administrative system in accordance
with policies and laws. Social work administration at the institutional level provides
supervision, support, and guarantees for front-line social workers through profes-
sional internal organization and management, so as to effectively provide services to
people in need.
Fifth, the use of social work research in poverty alleviation work. Front-line social
workers, experts, and teachers in the field of social work have conducted a series of
studies on the intervention model, methods and techniques, theoretical basis, and
problems of social work in poverty combating work and published relevant research
results. Social work research follows the logic of evidence-based research, focusing
on the analysis of the intervention process and the effects of the intervention. It
is noteworthy that the poverty elimination practice in China has remarkable local
characteristics, which are different from western social work in terms of policy
settings, intervention methods, and mechanisms. Therefore, this is worthy of further
exploration and summary so as to provide experience for the development of local
social work.
4.2.3 Developmental Trends of Poverty Alleviation Social

Work Methods
As mentioned earlier, the development of social work methods is closely related

to the development of poverty alleviation causes. And in China, poverty alleviation
social work has also experienced development from scratch. The social work profes-
sion is facing the problem of localization in China, and the professional approach of
social work needs to find a practical way that is more suitable to local conditions,
cultural traditions, and institutional settings. With the deepening of the poverty elim-
ination work, the relevant social work method is also developing and improving, and
the following developmental trends have emerged.8
First, the direction of practice has diversified and refined. In recent years, the
coverage, target groups, and work content of social work for poverty reduction
have been expanding, from the initial unitary poor people to different groups with
different characteristics including geography, gender, age, physical condition, and
self-development ability. These changes require social work methods to respond.
Against this background of development and needs, the specific practices of social
work methods have shown a trend of diversification and refinement. Such social
work covers almost all poverty-stricken areas, especially the hardest-stricken areas,
and its service targets not only cover women, the elderly, children, the disabled, and
other traditional and socially disadvantaged groups, but also all marginalized people
in poverty. The service approach extends from the development of the community
as a whole to the precise intervention of individuals and from the development plan-
ning at the village level to the units of poor households and poor people so that
the effect of poverty reduction would link up more directly with the improvement
of people’s actual living standard and well-being of the whole. The service content
has developed from material support to individual physical condition, psychological
condition, self-development ability, and resource possession, showing the charac-
teristics of all-around services. The complexity of service targets, service methods,
and service contents requires social work to respond to them at the practical level
through diversification and refinement of methods.
Second, the professionalization of methods has been substantially improved. In
order to improve social awareness and recognition of poverty Alleviation social work
and promote the process of such social work in China, social work organizations
8 Deping et al. [6].

and social workers have carried out a large number of practices. By summarizing
and reflecting on these practices, social work organizations and social workers have
effectively improved their own professional service capacity. The professional devel-
opment of such social work service methods can be reflected in two aspects. One
is the standardization of institutional management. In recent years, the state has put
forward clearer requirements for the registration, enrollment, and management of
social organizations in terms of policies and regulations and institutional design and
has issued many policies and regulations to guide the management of social organi-
zations. Under the guidance of the policies, such social work organizations have paid
more attention to internal management. Besides, through the establishment of rules
and regulations, contents like the intervention methods and evaluation indexes of
such social work have been defined in a standardized manner, which has effectively
improved the disorderly state of early similar practices and enhanced the profes-
sionalism of the practice. The other is the specialized intervention method. After the
realization of the special characteristics of poverty in China, such related social work
has formed a working strategy based on the actual local situation, different poverty
causes, and the professional methods of conducting social work. By far, flexibility
and practicality are the two main features running through the current social work.
According to different causes of poverty, the social work in this dimension will adopt
different strategies, including casework to alleviate the mental pressure and psycho-
logical problems brought on by poverty, group work to improve the awareness of
their own situation and of their own ability to adapt to social life, and community
work to improve their awareness and ability to participate in community affairs. The
change in service methods has made poverty-reducing social work widely recognized
by both the government and the society.
Third, the concept of practice has become more positive. By applying the social
work values of altruism, equality for all, helping people to help themselves, and
people-centered concept in practice, social work sets up the “blood-making” notion of
alleviating poverty, which is mainly to help poor people to establish self-help mecha-
nisms, abandoning the previous “blood transfusion” approach in the way of providing
single, temporary financial aids and material assistance. Instead, help is given to the
poor groups to explore their own advantage and build their own capacity. This not only
can effectively enhance the self-esteem and self-confidence of the poor but also can
effectively reduce the possibility of falling back into poverty and avoid the problem
of welfare dependency. At the same time, such social work entrenched the concept
of “participation” and emphasized the participation of the poor groups in the process
of eradicating poverty, which has changed the previous top-down model of assis-
tance, i.e., from the government to the poor groups, and improved the effectiveness
of such work.
Fourth, the systematization of the working model. By accumulating experience,
learning lessons, and taking into account China’s national conditions, social work
has formed a set of systematic and perfect working models to carry out the poverty
reducing work from economic, psychological, cultural, and ecological aspects. The
financial poverty-reduction model was thus developed to alleviate poverty through
microcredit in rural areas, improving the income of the whole group. Then, comes
4.3 Innovation of Poverty Alleviation Social Work Methods 105
the individual poverty-reducing model, which addresses the psychological and

mental problems of the poor through group healing, group workshop, and case-
work tutoring. The cultural poverty-reducing model transmits positive cultural ideas
through cultural heritage, cultural development, and cultural conservation. And, the
last one is the ecological poverty-reducing model, which promotes environmental
protection and green development to reduce the incidence of disasters and increase
the attractiveness of tourism. Among them, the first two models have been developed
in a relatively mature way, while the final two are still under construction, and in need
of further improvement. Through the cross-use of these different working models,
the effectiveness of the social work is guaranteed, and the solid foundation in China
is also strengthened.
4.3 Innovation of Poverty Alleviation Social Work Methods
While following the pace of poverty reducing practice, the social work should also
consider how to guide and actively promote its approach in alignment with the profes-
sionalism of this discipline. This requires us to carefully reflect on and summarize
the characteristics of poverty-reducing social work methods and to make creative
improvements on the existing ones.
4.3.1 Characteristics of Poverty Alleviation Social Work

Methods
Taking into account the experience and the ongoing trend of poverty alleviation
practices in China, as well as the professional characteristics of social work and
its operational mechanism and methodologies, the features of social work methods
can be summarized as follows.
The first feature is to set the improvement of the poor’s self-development ability
as the most important goal. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that we should
stay committed to development-driven poverty alleviation, using development as the
fundamental approach to eliminating poverty both to help the poor and to boost their
will, mobilizing their enthusiasm, and improving their development capacity to play
their major roles. “They can also get rich as long as they are confident”. Poverty is not
the destiny that cannot be altered once and for all. “Poverty should not chill ambition.
And poverty alleviation requires a change of attitude”. We should do a good job in
the way of publicity, education, training, and organization cadres in poverty-stricken
areas, warm their hearts and stir them into action, and guide them to keep firm in their
mind the concept that it is better to put in hard work than to spend more hard years
waiting. Let them rely on self-reliance and hard work to change the backwardness.
Impoverished people are not only the object but also the principal part of poverty
eradication. Escaping poverty means not only getting rid of poverty in the material
sense but also breaking away from poverty in consciousness and mentality. “Poverty
alleviation requires the support of education, and the first and foremost step is to
eradicate ignorance and illiteracy”. We should not only fill their pockets but also
enrich their minds.9 General Secretary Xi Jinping has made a general statement on
the importance of self-development ability to the impoverished group and poverty
alleviation work, and these statements are intrinsically consistent with social work’s
emphasis on “knowledge is the best charity”. Raising the awareness and capacity
of the poor for self-development can give the poverty alleviation work a stable and
long-term impetus and truly raise the status of the poor as dignified and capable
human beings. Therefore, in poverty reducing practice, the focus should be put on
the enhancement of self-development ability of the poor, and all resources should be
mobilized to promote the accomplishment of this goal.
Diversified resources in the market include charitable donations, volunteer
services, and other forms of assistance and aid. If these resources can be utilized to
the full, it will be very conducive to realizing the goal of poverty eradication. If these
resources are all going their own way without a unified platform for raising funds,
there will be a waste of resources, and an unbalanced distribution. Those impover-
ished people who managed to call people’s attention to their state of living received
a lot of external resources, while some others who were in the same situation had
difficulty in obtaining external resources because of the lack of effective communi-
cation with the outside world. Some informal resources also lacked transparent and
credible supervision when they were used for poverty reduction, which discouraged
social donations and went against the grain of poverty alleviation. In the face of this
situation, social workers should rely on their own advantages in resource mobiliza-
tion and strive to obtain resources from various channels instead of just getting inured
to waiting for the formal resources to be provided by the government. They should
integrate various types of assistance provided by the society and the market and use
these resources in an integrated manner so as to avoid any waste or omission of the
resources and achieve the best effect.
Finally, a flexible deployment, summary, and refinement of social work methods.
Social work methods emerged and developed in the process of responding to Western
social problems, and the academic research on them also bears obvious imprints
of Western characteristics. This makes them sometimes less relevant when they
are applied to solve specific problems in the Chinese context. In addition, there are
many approaches with Chinese characteristics when they were applied in practice
that can effectively address the poverty-related issues in China. This requires us to
flexibly employ professional methods and refine some local methods. The flexible
application of these methods is based on the understanding of the meaning of profes-
sional methods; social workers should develop what is useful, and discard what is not
among these methods. For example, the first step in the general process of casework is
9 Chengwei [7].
to take a case, i.e., to process a request for service. The reason for such a setup is that,
in Western societies, it is common for people to seek help from formal institutions.
If a person has a problem in life, he or she will consider seeking help from a social
worker as an alternative. However, in China, these behavioral habits are not very
common. There are many reasons why it is not common for Chinese people, espe-
cially in rural areas, to seek help actively and explicitly from social workers amongst
others, low awareness of social work and the different types of resource mobilization
that Chinese people currently use to cope with problems. Contemporary Chinese
people tend to turn to informal resources such as family and friends for support
when they encounter real-life problems. Therefore, the section on case-taking in the
general textbook is not very applicable to the current poverty alleviation context
in China. In such cases, social workers need to be pliable, in using social work
methods. As was shown by the example mentioned above, although the sources of
service recipients are different, in this stage, the core task of the social worker is to
establish a rapport with service recipients. Thus, whether it is a voluntary individual,
or a person identified by the social worker through outreach work, the most important
thing is to establish a professional relationship. As long as the social worker grasps
the skills and handles the precautions when establishing professional relationships,
the casework has begun.
In addition, there are many types of practices with Chinese characteristics, which
can be summarized and refined to enrich the practice of social work. For example,
in the Chinese institutional context, cadres have a special power to mobilize people,
which is similar to the role of “backbone” in professional social work. But, the core
role and meaning of the two are different. Such power can play a significant role
in resource mobilization, resource allocation, and resource mobilization, especially
in the context of China’s traditional way of engaging with people, and its power to
promote the realization of goals cannot be underestimated. This special power in
China’s poverty alleviation field is not yet covered by professional methods, which
requires us to summarize and distill it in our practical work and discover the Chinese
elements that may wield some influence on poverty reduction.
4.3.2 Innovation of the Methods of Developmental Social

Work in Poverty Alleviation
Developmental social work derives from social work practice. It applies produc-
tive activities and social investment strategies to the professional practice of social
work, emphasizing economic development as well as enhancement and improve-
ment of human well-being. As a member of the developing countries, China needs
the involvement of social work in poverty reduction. Developmental social work has
a huge potential for intervention in China’s poverty alleviation practice, especially
as its poverty alleviation work has entered a new era—targeted poverty allevia-
tion stage, which requires social work to participate in precise identification, assis-
tance, and management to improve the effectiveness of poverty reduction. In recent
years, some social work organizations in China have applied developmental social
work theories to guide their poverty reduction activities. In China, such social work
should aim at integrating social and economic development, take the community as
the basic intervention unit, use multiple social work interventions as the method-
ology, and use “capacity building and enhancement” and “sustainable livelihood” as
the strategy.10
First, set the goal to integrate social development with economic development.
Developmental social work focuses on the unification of social and economic devel-
opment. The needs of the poor lie in not only basic material and economic needs, but
also developmental needs. Poverty is multi-dimensional, and the causes of poverty
are diverse, including income poverty, capacity poverty, cultural poverty, spiritual
poverty, etc. However, the results of poverty are consistent and can be measured by
income level, which requires the social worker to pay attention to the adjustment
of the impoverished and the environment. When restoring and improving the social
function of the poor, social workers should also take into account the improvement of
the income level and living standard of the poor. To this end, social work should not
only provide services like psychological guidance, care for basic living needs, educa-
tion, and safety to the service recipients but also pay attention to the empowerment
and capacity enhancement of the poor so as to truly realize “helping people to help
themselves”. For some families who suffer from poverty due to illness, disability,
and tuition fees, the most urgent need is economic support to alleviate the difficul-
ties in medical care, rehabilitation, and education. Besides, they need to help build
confidence in poverty alleviation and enhance their capacity. Thus, these require
social work to emphasize the coordination and integration of social and economic
development. The pursuit of developmental social work coincides with the pursuit of
economic and social development in China. Guided by the concept of developmental
social work, poverty reduction social work needs to respond to the real dilemmas
and problems encountered by poverty-stricken groups in order to solve the problem
of equity and justice in the process of development.
Second, set the community as the basic unit of intervention. To a certain extent,
welfare dependency can reduce the motivation of service recipients to develop them-
selves. At the same time, due to the lack of resources and opportunities, even if
impoverished people have the will and motivation to participate in labor and work, the
jobs available in poverty-stricken areas are very limited. Developmental social work
should highly emphasize the employment problem in poor rural areas for poor people,
encourage poor groups and disadvantaged groups to start their own businesses, and
promote the development of the community. As a fundamental component of society,
the community is the basic unit of developmental social work intervention. Therefore,
10 Deping and Ling [8].

social work services in the field of poverty reduction should be provided based on
the community to facilitate the integration of the poor into community life at various
levels, such as economic, political, cultural, and facilities. Poverty alleviation social
work can adopt a community-based social investment strategy to directly address
the poverty problem in the community and link the economic development of the
community with the poverty reduction of community members in order to eliminate
the poverty and backwardness of the community and its residents in response to the
needs of the community and its residents and the improvement of their economic
and living standards. By utilizing and tapping into the internal resource advantages
and power of the community, poverty alleviation social work can build a link with
the resources outside the community, improve the living conditions of residents, and
enhance social economic development. It is also possible to link community building
with productive community organizations, such as mutual aid of basic living suste-
nance, professional cooperation in agriculture, and handicraft workshops with equal
participation, to expand the mode of service delivery. Also, by mobilizing the endoge-
nous power of the community and giving full play to the enthusiasm of community
members, developmental social work could promote the sustainable development of
the poor and the community through mutual help and self-help.
Third, set multiple social work interventions as methods. Developmental social
work needs to integrate multiple approaches to promote coordinated economic and
social development, achieve social change, and promote social progress. In terms of
professional approaches, social work service delivery needs to focus on the devel-
opmental goal of poverty reduction and integrate casework and group work on the
micro-level, community work on the intermediate level, including community anal-
ysis, planning, and development, as well as social policy, social work administration,
and social work research approach on the macro-level, to achieve the integration of
approaches in practice. In terms of practices, the multiple intervention models empha-
sized by social work, such as poverty reduction and sustainable livelihood strategies,
family-centered strategies, community-based strategies, community education and
organization strategies, social policies, social planning, and policy advocacy, can
be applied to the poverty Alleviation practices in China. Furthermore, social work
is needed in the areas of economic aid and care services for the poor, cultivation
of farmers’ cooperative organizations, support for livelihood projects, microfinance
for poverty alleviation, and relocation of poor households. At the intervention level,
social work interventions in the poverty alleviation field can be carried out at the indi-
vidual, family, community, and social levels to improve the livelihoods of targeted
groups. At the individual and family levels, social work mainly responds to the needs
of the poor, including the enhancement and improvement of knowledge, education,
capacity, and awareness to realize the concept of “helping people to help them-
selves” at the micro-level. At the community level, social work should consider the
overall needs of the community, including economic development, public infras-
tructure construction, and community culture establishment, to achieve the goal of
“helping people to help themselves” at the intermediate level. At the community
level, social work should respond to the overall needs of the community, including
community economic development, public infrastructure construction, and commu-

nity cultural suggestions, to achieve “helping people to help themselves” at the inter-
mediate level. At the social level, social work should respond to the needs of social
development, pursue social justice, and promote social progress.
Finally, set capacity enhancement and sustainable livelihoods as strategies. Devel-
opmental social work emphasizes linking social and economic development in
pursuit of a kind of strategy that can promote both economic and social development.
In this way, developmental social service programs of social investment strategies
that promote economic development can replace therapeutic social work services.
In terms of specific intervention strategies, on the one hand, social work services in
the poverty alleviation field need to incorporate more productive activities and focus
on sustainable livelihood development strategies. For example, social workers can
help communities to explore their assets and select livelihood development projects.
Besides, they can take advantage of resource links and integration to connect social
capital in order to seek community economic improvement and development and to
achieve the goal of coordinating economic development with the social development
of the community. On the other hand, poverty alleviation social work needs to pay
more attention to the work strategy of capacity enhancement when designing social
work service programs. While pursuing income growth, poverty alleviation social
work can also maintain and improve the health of service recipients, increase their
access to education, and enhance their ability to participate in livelihood projects
to achieve sustainable livelihoods through human capital investment strategies and
capacity building. At the same time, it focuses on social capital-building programs
and asset accumulation programs at the individual, organization, and community
levels to enhance the social participation of the poor, thus contributing to community
development.
4.3.3 Integrated Practices of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
In actual poverty alleviation work, social work needs an in-depth cooperation with
other professional fields to solve many problems, which is determined by the institu-
tional characteristics in China. In fact, engaging in poverty alleviation work can, and
has become, an important way for the social work profession to develop in practice.
In this section, the integration of social work with multi-disciplinary management,
integration with social work research, and integration with psychological treatment
methods are presented to show the integrated practices of poverty-reduction social
work.
4.3.3.1 Multi-disciplinary Management: Case Management
The integration of poverty reduction social work approaches with multi-disciplinary

management is represented by case management. Case management is an integrated
approach between direct and indirect social work services, sometimes referred to as
“integrative social work”. In the current poverty alleviation field, it is an effective
method of professional intervention.
There are two broad definitions of case management: system-oriented and process-
oriented. System-oriented case management views it as a way of linking and coordi-
nating the operation of different service systems to ensure the best way to meet the
needs of the target groups being cared for. However, process-oriented case manage-
ment emphasizes that it is a coordinated process of coordinating and accessing
resources to assist service recipients who are facing a variety of problems that result
in unmet basic living needs, disillusionment, and unfulfillment. In other words, case
management is an approach to service delivery that a professional social worker
assesses the needs of the poor and their families and arranges, coordinates, monitors,
evaluates, and advocates for a set of services with multiple programs to meet the
complex needs of specific people. Thus, it requires the social worker to work with
other fields and departments that have different resources to achieve the goals.
Case management has the following characteristics. First, the problems encoun-
tered are multiple in nature. The target groups of case management usually have two
common characteristics: complex problems that require the collaboration of profes-
sionals from multiple fields to solve them and special difficulties in accessing and
using potential helping resources, which are more difficult to obtain. Second, the case
management approach is holistic that needs to find the network of services needed
to deal with multiple problems and coordinate services within that network. In other
words, it focuses on individual needs and how well the entire network of services
can work together to solve the problems. Third, the dual function. The dual func-
tion of case management refers to the coordination of services to achieve a rational
allocation of services, that is, through the planning and coordination of different
service providers to establish relationships with service targets to ensure the most
appropriate and complete services. Another function is to emphasize the efficiency
of services, the use of social resources, and the provision of relevant services under
the principle of cost-effectiveness.
These characteristics of case management suggest that this approach is particu-
larly well suited to micro-level poverty alleviation, which targets at impoverished
people or households. In general, they are highly vulnerable and have complex causes
of poverty, particularly low capacity for self-development. To address this charac-
teristic of poverty, the holistic and resource-integrated services provided by case
management are more suitable.
When using case management in poverty alleviation social work, social workers
need to pay attention to the following aspects.
First, it emphasizes the participation of impoverished groups in the process. Case
management emphasizes that service recipients and social workers work together
in the assessment of needs, the planning and organization of all-around services,
and the facilitation of services, all of which are decided by both parties. Service
recipients need to be involved in the whole process of case management instead of
passively accepting. Also, they are expected to express their needs and opinions and
to have a significant degree of choice and self-determination in the process. Such an
arrangement allows for the provision of services that correspond more to their needs
and habits of them. Therefore, social workers need to establish a trust-based partner-
ship with service recipients. In the field of poverty alleviation, social workers should
pay attention to and listen to the needs and aspirations of the poor, encourage them
to express their own views on poverty reduction paths, collect their opinions when
adopting specific measures, and respect their opinions. The participation of service
recipients is conducive to highlighting and consolidating their status as subjects of
poverty alleviation, enhancing their sense of self-efficacy and autonomy, and making
them take their empowerment in the whole process of poverty alleviation seriously.
Second, the assessment must be comprehensive and accurate as assessment is
the core task of case management, which includes examining the people’s needs,
physical conditions, social environment, informal network, and even personal pref-
erences. The purpose of assessment is to effectively provide services that meet the
needs of service recipients and maintain service equity. Accurate assessment requires
a comprehensive understanding of the situation of the poor before the interven-
tion, similar to but not limited to the standardized operation of poverty registration.
The assessment can be carried out according to the characteristics of the poverty-
stricken areas and the impoverished groups, and the accuracy and precision of the
facts reflected are the key consideration of social workers.
Third, service coordination. The role of social workers in case management differs
from that of traditional direct service providers in that it places greater emphasis on
coordination. In the service design process, this role is characterized by an emphasis
on the need for social workers to coordinate resources to provide “whole-person”
services, rather than limiting themselves to providing direct services to a particular
need. This is similar to the multiplicity of problems as the problems and needs are
multiple and complex. Thus, assuming the role of coordinator, social workers need
to integrate different resources and work with multiple agencies and professions.
Fourth, all-around services and professional collaboration. All-around services
refer to the design of a set of services after the needs assessment and identification
of available resources and teaching service recipients to be independent through
the linkage of various services. For example, in the current poverty Alleviation
work team, there are social workers, government workers, members of autonomous
organizations, members of economic cooperatives, members of self-organizations,
charitable organizations, and market entities. Participants with different characteris-
tics respond to the differentiated needs of impoverished people based on their own
resources.
In the current poverty eradication field, case management is a more appropriate
micro-social work method of intervention. Compared with the micro-level casework
method, case management responds to a broader range of issues and mobilizes more
diverse resources. Besides, the functions undertaken by social workers shift from
being traditional enablers, counselors, and therapists to being educators, coordina-
tors, and advocates, being able to provide a full range of services that better reflects
the precise nature of poverty eradication work.
4.3.3.2 Integration with Social Work Research: Action Research
Since its inception in 1944 by Kurt Lewin, the concept of action research has been
used in a variety of disciplines, including social work, education, psychology, and
healthcare, and its content and methods are still evolving and developing. Action
research is mostly used in practical or practice-oriented disciplines, where it is
hoped that the results of the research can provide substantive suggestions for policy
and guidance for practices and actions and even that our knowledge and activities
(including research itself) can better serve local communities and people. In the
current context of large-scale poverty eradication, practical action research is of
special significance for summing up the local experience.
In action research, the researchers are no longer confined to one single identity
but participate in research and action with all other people involved in the problem.
They apply the research findings directly to action, intervene throughout the whole
process, and thus improve their ability to change social practices. Action research
belongs to the category of social work research and is a special kind of indirect
social work method. The main characteristics of action research are as follows. First,
emphasis on practice-oriented studies. Action research aims at solving problems in
practice and using the results to directly serve the improvement of social work prac-
tices, and its direct goal is to optimize the practice process. For poverty alleviation,
timeliness is particularly important, and practitioners need to find practical solutions
to real problems to achieve poverty alleviation goals. Second, the research field and
the practice field are integrated. The researcher in action research is a practitioner,
who can act and research, do it again, and integrate that into his or her own practice.
The research results are applied by the practitioners and the researchers themselves,
and the field of application is also the workplace of the practitioners. This high degree
of unity between research and practices makes the research highly targeted, which
is especially important for precise poverty alleviation. Third, emphasis on demo-
cratic participation. Action research focuses on the partnership between researchers
and actors. In the concrete operation process, practitioners, scholars, experts, and
service recipients are encouraged to interact equally and to jointly promote prac-
tical development. This characteristic means that action research should focus on the
empowerment of the poor and their lives and experiences.
Action research is particularly suitable for ongoing poverty alleviation work. As
an indirect method of social work, action research has the dual functions of theory
construction and theory criticism. The strategy of combining research with action
integrates theory and practice, which is conducive to summarizing experience and
putting forward theories. The eight important principles of action research are as
follows: (1) action research combines research and action; (2) action research is
the collaborative research of researchers and participants; (3) action research must
construct theoretical knowledge; (4) action research is formed in the hope of social
transformation and in pursuit of social justice; (5) action research must have high
reflexivity; (6) action research should explore a variety of pragmatic knowledge; (7)
action research for participants will lead to powerful learning; (8) action research
must situate knowledge inquiry within a broader historical, political, and ideological
context.11 Action research has strong pragmatic concerns and very clear goals. On
the other hand, action research itself is a social practice. Through the process of
research, the researchers explore ways to intervene and change in order to change
existing social systems and institutions, get rid of social oppression, eliminate social
inequality, and promote social ideals of equity and justice. To achieve these ideals, the
action research process needs to emphasize learning from the public, promoting the
work of empowerment, and producing critical knowledge at the level of knowledge
production.12
In poverty Alleviation social work, not only do front-line social workers actively
engage in theoretical thinking and explore the development path of localized social
work while engaging in practical work but also experts in the field of social work
are engaged in practice, not only deepening and promoting practical work, but also
producing a series of research results and accumulating the theoretical basis for local-
ized social work, which are all fruitful results of action research. Professor Zhang
Heqing of Sun Yat-sen University and his team have played an important role in the
development of the Center for Advancement of Rural–Urban Sustainability. While
the Rural–Urban Sustainability Initiative has been deepening and expanding, Zhang
Heqing’s team has produced a series of academic results, which have also been gener-
ally recognized and praised by the social work practice. Academic research and prac-
tice are mutually reinforcing, which strongly promote the development of poverty
Alleviation social work. One of the important reasons for using action research in
poverty reduction practice is that it focuses on change. The poverty reduction practice
applies action research to the self-development capacity building of the poor, i.e.,
it focuses on the selection of effective paths for self-development capacity building
and enhancement. Through joint efforts with the poor, it helps the poor to build
feasible paths for self-development capacity building, and the focus of poverty reduc-
tion social work research will be on the practice-based paths for self-development
capacity building of the poor.
4.3.3.3 Integration with Psychological Therapies: Rational Emotive

Behavior Therapy13
Social work and psychology have a close relationship, not only in terms of the
theory that uses research results of psychology for reference but also in terms of
working methods. And in poverty alleviation-oriented social work, the combination
with psychological therapies is quite common. In the following section, we take
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy as a representative example to illustrate how to
combine poverty alleviation social work with psychological therapies.
11 Somekh and Lewin [9] quoted in Hokbun [10].

12 Hokbun [10].
13 This part of theory is derived from the handout of the first Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy
Counseling Methodology Workshop sponsored by the Chinese Social Work Education Association
and presented by Professor Wu Zizhen. Herewith a note of thanks and appreciation.
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), founded by American psychologist

Albert Elis in the 1950s, is one of the most widely used cognitive-behavioral theories
in counseling and social work practice.14 On the basis of this theory, Elis established
REBT, which belongs to the school of cognitive-behavioral theory and emphasizes
the focus of this approach on “rational/irrational” beliefs. This theory argues that the
greatest constraint to achieving a clear goal of poverty eradication within a limited
time is the lack of endogenous motivation which is spiritual poverty in nature.15 The
“rational/irrational” emotions that are the focus of the REBT approach refer to the
spiritual aspect, and it is of practical significance to use this approach to intervene
in the spiritual aspect, especially to address the problem of insufficient endogenous
motivation.
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy believes that facts themselves do not cause
distress, but rather the person’s interpretation of the facts. The reason why an event
causes uncontrollable negative emotions and uncontrollable behaviors under the
influence of negative emotions is that the person gives the event a negative meaning
based on irrational beliefs. Therefore, adjusting the beliefs from “rational” to “irra-
tional”, i.e., the questioning and discussion sections in the REBT, is the key to solving
the problem. In the field of poverty Alleviation, when faced with the reality of poverty
and the unprecedented efforts of the state to help the poor, some people choose to do
their best to seek development, while others passively accept support or even linger
around. The such difference stems from the diversity of individual beliefs which lead
to completely different effects of policies. How to adjust beliefs so that individual
well-being and policy goals can resonate is the practical goal of Rational Emotive
Behavior Therapy in the field of poverty alleviation.
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy centers on “beliefs”, with rational and irra-
tional beliefs each having their own characteristics. Due to the translation, the purpose
of REBT is often misunderstood as helping people establish rational beliefs. In fact,
it is more about reasonable beliefs than rational beliefs. The “reasonable” here is
not “rational” in the general sense as opposed to “emotional” but contains both
emotional and rational contents. Specifically, the distinction between reasonable and
unreasonable beliefs can be made as follows.
(1) Reasonable beliefs based on the correct understanding of objective facts
depend on objective reality, while unreasonable beliefs are based on imaginary and
one-sided reality. (2) Reasonable beliefs are flexible and can be adjusted to specific
situations, while unreasonable beliefs are absolute, unquestionable, and unchange-
able. (3) Reasonable beliefs can cause moderate emotional reactions, which are
within the range of individual control, while unreasonable beliefs tend to make us
lose control, either with high emotions that cannot be calmed down or with low
emotions that are unmotivated, preventing us from finding the conditions for solving
problems and improving our problem-solving ability. (4) Reasonable beliefs can
easily help us to achieve healthy goals in life, while unreasonable beliefs will keep
14 Wen [11].
15 Chengwei [7].
us in a difficult situation and unable to escape. According to the above four princi-
ples of distinction, many manifestations of spiritual poverty can be regarded as the
consequences of unreasonable beliefs.
The main goals of REBT are to make the thoughts of service recipients more
reasonable, factual, and flexible by adjusting their unreasonable beliefs; to make
their emotions more appropriate and controllable by themselves; to make the coping
behaviors more efficient and effective; to make the state of life closer to their pursuit.
In other words, the goal of REBT is in fact a series of “belief-emotion-behavior-goal”,
rather than being limited to the change of beliefs. By stimulating the endogenous
motivation of the poor, it improves the individual ability to adapt to the environment
and obtain resources and promotes their autonomous development, which ultimately
leads to stable poverty alleviation, the policy goal in the field of poverty Alleviation.
It can be seen that both follow the path from inner to outer, with common changes
and coordinated development both inside and outside.
In the poverty alleviation discourse system, poverty is generally divided into mate-
rial poverty and spiritual poverty, and Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy focuses
more on and directly intervenes in the field of spiritual poverty. At the present stage
of poverty eradication in China, the precise poverty Alleviation, which aims to ensure
that rural poor people do not have to worry about food and clothing and have access
to compulsory education, basic medical services, and safe housing, can provide the
basic living needs for the poor. That is to say, the eradication of material poverty is an
achievable goal at present. However, it must be noted that if the problem of spiritual
poverty cannot be solved, the problem of material poverty is likely to recur even
if it is solved. The “post-poverty alleviation era” is mainly about spiritual poverty
which is a constraint to development. Numerous studies on poverty Alleviation have
found that the real cause of poverty for most poor people is “spiritual poverty”, and
more than 90% of poor people who have no hope of escaping poverty are in spiritual
poverty.16
Spiritual poverty has unique external manifestations, and different scholars have
sketched the manifestations of spiritual poverty from different perspectives. From the
perspectives of poverty-reduction goals and means, some scholars classify spiritual
poverty as “waiting for, relying on, and asking for”, which has poverty-reduction
goals yet with deviated methods, “passive and blind”, which has poverty-reduction
means but no poverty-reduction goals, and “satisfied with the fate”, which has no
poverty-reduction goals and no means.17 Some scholars have discussed spiritual
poverty in different dimensions, categorizing the manifestations into the following
forms. First, the passive and inactive view of fatalism that resigns to fate. Second,
the concept of happiness with the satisfaction of the status quo that loves leisure
and hates labor. Third, “waiting for, relying on, and asking for” outlook on life.
And fourth, the view of the economy that values settling down and emphasizes
agriculture over the commerce.18 Some scholars analyze from the perspective of
16 Tang [12].
17 Chengwei [7].
18 Tang [12].
endogenous motivation and classify poor people who have the ability to work but
not enough will to develop themselves as welfare-dependent ones, fatalistic ones,
and ones that blindly follow the crowd. The welfare-dependent poor are lazy and
passive, have stable expectations of the resource providers, and are accustomed to
not working with no motivation. The fatalistic poor are those who have lost confidence
in life due to their lifestyles and behavioral habits passed down from generation to
generation or lack of successful experience, who are content with the status quo
and lack motivation. The poor with blind conformity are those who are influenced
by others and show a lack of developmental goals and self-awareness, irrationally
imitating others.19 Although spiritual poverty refers to poverty caused by internal
reasons, it has a different manifestation compared with material poverty and is easy
to be identified with the characteristic of no vigor and energy. After recognizing that
the poor are in a state of spiritual poverty, we need to analyze this state.
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, as a short-term treatment, does not focus
on the idea of “current performance-cause analysis-problem solving”, but more on
the “unreasonable beliefs” that cause the distress of the poor to seek behavioral
strategies for achieving positive change on this basis. From the above-mentioned
manifestations of spiritual poverty, the unreasonable beliefs of the spiritually poor
can be broadly classified into the following three categories.
(1) Unreasonable beliefs about individuals/families. The external manifestations
of “satisfied with fate”, “resigning to fate”, and “fatalism” generally reflect
the unreasonable beliefs of the poor about themselves or their families. “This
is the way our ancestors have been”, “It’s my fate”, “Wealth and prosperity
are the results of our past lives”, and “You can’t force yourself when you’re
not destined to be”. These words are typical of the irrational perception of
individuals/families. Such beliefs overemphasize external factors such as fate,
ancestors, God, and past lives, which exaggerate the role played by these external
factors and form unquestionable “rules”. Under these absolute “rules”, there
is no room for human initiative, which makes it easy for people to fall into
pessimism, thus more difficult to adopt effective coping methods.
(2) Unreasonable beliefs about relationship groups. External expressions such as
“negative and blind spiritual poverty” and “blind conformity” focus on the irra-
tional beliefs of the spiritually poor about the relationship groups. Sentences
like “everyone is the same” and “don’t walk ahead” are typical expressions
of irrational perceptions of related groups. People in poverty who hold such
views overemphasize the situation of relationship groups close to them, such
as neighbors, relatives, friends, or others in the community who are in similar
situations and use the performance of these groups as the “only” reference for
their actions. By considering these groups as an important basis for legitimizing
their behavior, the poor tend to overlook the overall situation and thus have a
biased perception of reality.
19 Cheng and Xiang [13].

(3) Unreasonable beliefs about the environment. There are two types of irrational
perceptions of the environment. One is the biased perception of the external envi-
ronment itself. “If you don’t give me the money directly, it is not poverty Allevi-
ation” and “taking pride in poverty-stricken households” are typical expressions
of such beliefs. These beliefs are based on a phased misinterpretation of policies
and the environment, which seems to be a rational behavior full of “the wisdom
of life”. But in reality, they focus entirely on the existing policies and benefits,
while ignoring other development paths. Another kind of irrational belief about
the environment is the complacency of the “Ah Q” style (which is a role in the
novel The True Story of Ah Q written by Lu Xun characterized by escaping from
reality, making excuses, and self-absorption) that ignores the environment and
overemphasizes one’s own situation. One example of such beliefs is the concept
of satisfaction in one’s poverty. These beliefs narrow the attention to the internal
factors and ignore the unfavorable environment and the overall situation around
them. These unreasonable beliefs about the environment are based on a one-
sided, imaginary reality, and these biased perceptions of reality prevent the poor
from assessing their real situation and thus from recognizing and achieving their
true and healthy goals in life.
The manifestations of spiritual poverty from the perspective of the rationality of
beliefs can be broadly divided into the above three categories, namely, unreasonable
beliefs about individuals/families, unreasonable beliefs about relationship groups,
and unreasonable beliefs about the environment. In the specific case of a poor indi-
vidual, his or her irrational beliefs are likely to cover the above three levels. Thus,
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy should make a judgment in specific intervention
and start from the viewpoint that the impoverished groups agree with most, that is,
from the irrational beliefs that have the most influence on the individual.
In the following, we will introduce the practical application of Rational Emotive
Behavior Therapy from the aspects of intervention preparation and intervention
process.
(1) Intervention preparation. REBT is a humanistic approach that focuses on the

impact of the therapeutic relationship itself on the outcome. Therefore, before
the intervention, the therapist must conduct a thorough self-examination to
prepare for the intervention. In the case of interventions of spiritual poverty,
the review and reflection prior to the intervention are particularly important to
ensure the effectiveness, which is presented in the following aspects.
First, the perception of service recipients. Although the poor have received great
policy support and social attention, some stereotypes still exist. In reviewing the
literature on the manifestations of poverty, we found that negative descriptions and
evaluations of the poor are still dominant. The negative portrayal of the poor tends to
create a stigmatized perception of the group itself, and if an intervener builds a profes-
sional relationship with this perception, he or she cannot truly treat service recipients
with respect and equality, nor can he or she guarantee the effectiveness of the inter-
vention. Therefore, before the intervention, the intervener must examine his or her
own perceptions of the recipients and accept them unconditionally. The perceptions
of recipients may be very different from the mainstream perceptions of the inter-
vener and society, and the intervener should be fully aware of this different objective
reality and minimize the evaluation of this reality, neither blaming and despising
the recipients nor praising and pitying the client, both of which are subjective and
emotional evaluations that weaken the assessment of recipients’ own abilities. Inter-
ventionists should conduct self-examination before the intervention, form a correct
understanding of the recipients, remove stereotypes, maintain curiosity and concerns,
fully accept and respect the recipients, and build an equal professional relationship.
Second, the perception of unreasonable beliefs. The poverty state provoked by
unreasonable beliefs held by service recipients does not mean that impoverished
people are able to consciously discard their unreasonable beliefs, nor should the
intervener have a preconceived critical attitude toward the unreasonable beliefs held
by the poor. REBT assumes that under limited situations, people have the right to
enjoy lives as happily as possible and that their current beliefs are what they consider
to be the most reasonable choices under their current situations. This means that
interveners have to accept that what they consider to be irrational beliefs are actually
reasonable beliefs for people in poverty. Interveners should maintain curiosity about
such beliefs and adopt the method of discussion with the service recipients to accu-
rately grasp the logic behind the beliefs, therefore guiding the recipients to abandon
the irrational beliefs and bring about positive changes.
Third, the perception of the intervention itself. The formation of beliefs does not
happen overnight, and thus, the change of beliefs cannot be achieved overnight as
well. However, at the same time, the change of core beliefs can be enlightening, like
a person who has come to a dead end has suddenly figured the situation out with a
clear understanding. Besides, REBT believes that cognition and behavior are inex-
tricably linked, and the change of cognition will lead to the adjustment of behavior
while the adjustment of behavior will strengthen the change of cognition. Therefore,
the intervener should fully anticipate the process and effect of the intervention and
should not over-push the service recipients to change their cognitions, but should
also seize their changes in time, no matter how trivial, to promote them, having
flexible expectations of the intervention process. In addition, the intervener should
pay full attention to the important role of behavior, use behavior to consolidate and
strengthen the effect when the recipients’ cognitions are loosened, and guide the
recipients through behaviors to change their cognitions if cannot be loosened.
(2) Intervention process. In the poverty alleviation practice, Rational Emotive
Behavior Therapy can be used flexibly as an indication and a tool for social
workers to conduct casework. And, it can also provide ideas and methods for
the daily visits and communication of the workers concerned. In the following,
we will introduce the basic process of using the REBT in the poverty alleviation
field.
Stage 1: Building relationships through listening.

The Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy approach focuses on building a profes-
sional relationship by listening to the service recipients’ emotions, understanding
their thoughts, and establishing an equal relationship at the beginning of the interven-
tion. In the process of narration, the intervener should concentrate on understanding
the perceived facts of recipients, finding out their interpretation of the facts, and their
demands on themselves, the world, and others.
In the face of poverty, how do service recipients perceive poverty and what
meaning do they give to it? What are the causes of poverty from their perspectives?
What should the recipients, families, and the environment do with this situation?
During this process, listening is the key. To this end, the intervener should analyze
the recipients’ unreasonable beliefs and determine the type of irrational beliefs by
analyzing whether such beliefs are more oriented to the individuals/families, the
relationship groups, or the environment and analyze the logic behind the irrational
beliefs to anticipate the direction that can be explored.
Stage 2: Assist clients in detecting the standard expectations and assumptions in
their own minds.
In this stage, the intervener focuses on helping the service recipients to organize
their thoughts, assisting them to perceive their emotions and to accept themselves
from a humanistic point of view, expressing encouragement and acceptance toward
recipients, and finding their habitual thinking and perceptions.
The intervener should fully understand the beliefs and views of service recipi-
ents, accept their situations and choices, and help them accept their situations. Also,
interveners should discuss the thoughts with recipients, help them to analyze the
beliefs behind their thoughts, and assist them in sorting out the logic behind those
beliefs. Specifically, the intervener should be service recipients-centered, discuss and
organize ideas at their pace, and allow them to clarify their beliefs, i.e., help them
clarify “the situation I am in”, “what do I understand about my situation”, “what are
my desired goals”, “what are my pathways to achieve my desired goals”, and other
relevant questions.
Stage 3: Discuss their beliefs with service recipients.
In this stage, the intervener will use discussions to deepen the recipients’ under-
standing of their problems. The intervener will guide them to consider whether the
facts they have identified are true (e.g., is it really a case of “the person in the limelight
bears the brunt of attack”? Are those who took action earlier really worse off? Is it
more honorable to be poor? Is it true that the mainstream of society has a positive
opinion of the lazybones?), whether the causality they believe is logical (e.g., is it
true that “if everyone else doesn’t do it, I can’t do it? Is the behavior of others the
only motivation for my behavior?”), and whether the current choice will achieve
their desired life goals (e.g., will total dependence on policy benefits enable them to
live a happy life ever after?).
At this stage, the intervener should explore the recipients’ beliefs and the logic
behind them in a sincere and respectful manner. At this point, the intervener should
be aware of the importance of the repetition technique, which is a way of repeating
the keywords in order to ensure that the meaning is understood and to have an effect
on the service recipients. Some illogical ideas are difficult to perceive when someone
gets involved. But once these ideas are externalized and applied to the individuals,
they can easily perceive their absurdity.
Stage 4: Assist service recipients to change their mindsets.
This stage focuses on exploring the logic of the unreasonable beliefs held
by the service recipients, adding flexible, realistic, and humanistic considerations
to the original stubborn ideas. And this would bring them closer to the facts, being
more logical and positive.
At this stage, it is important to note that recipients may experience cognitive
dissonance that may lead to repeated interventions. By this time, the recipients may
show significant resistance, find more examples to justify their views, or simply
refuse to change. This is a common response to cognitive dissonance. The intervener
should anticipate this, discuss it patiently with the recipients, help them to understand
the logic behind the viewpoints, and stay sensitive to their emotions.
Stage 5: Shift expectations, reset goals, and discuss methods.
Assist the service recipients to view the same event or situation with reasonable
beliefs and perspectives and to re-set goals. In this stage, the intervener should help
the recipients to clarify their expectations of facts and people and gradually modify
these expectations into reasonable ones, adjust the goals and expectations from a
humanistic, factual, and functional perspective. Besides, interveners should help
the recipients to increase their awareness of facts and enhance their tolerance of
unchangeable facts.
At this stage, the intervener should apply the principle of individualization in a
cautious way. Each individual has different degrees and directions of conversion,
and the degree in which they can develop their resource mobilization capacity also
varies. Therefore, the intervener should take into account individual factors and
develop precise and differentiated action plans.
Stage 6: Assign homework.
Homework is a key step in the clinical application of REBT, which can shape and
reinforce new adjustment behaviors, reduce the frequency and extent of unreasonable
beliefs, and improve the service recipients’ overall ability to cope with problems. In
practice, a similar approach can be taken. Firstly, the recipients are asked to find their
habitual irrational beliefs, pause and think about them when similar beliefs appear
again. Secondly, they are given appropriate action-oriented homework, i.e., they are
asked to find certain behavioral activities that are useful to them and that can promote
changes to their cognition. And then, they are asked to practice these behavioral
activities regularly in order to better reconcile cognitions with behaviors.
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), as a clinical method that originated
from the West, has a role to play in poverty alleviation in China, but it should be
enriched in the following aspects in order to make it better serve the targeted poverty
reduction in China. First, we should explore community-level intervention strategies.
Among China’s poverty alleviation and rural revitalization development strategies,
service resources mostly rely on the community as a platform. Also, the unique
community form in rural China makes the influence of community factors on indi-
viduals not negligible. REBT is a clinical approach that is mostly used on a case
basis, but rarely applied at the community level. The exploration of community
work methods based on the principles of REBT is conducive not only to the acti-
vation and utilization of community resources to achieve better intervention effects
but also to the expansion of the boundaries to apply REBT and form a localized
intervention model. Second, we will explore more flexible intervention methods.
As a mature psychotherapeutic method, REBT has a conventional model based on
Western culture, which is relatively new to Chinese people, especially the poor.
Compared with the more formalized intervention protocols in the West, the appli-
cation of Chinese REBT should be more flexible in terms of intervention methods,
operational protocols, and communication styles.
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Chapter 5
Poverty Alleviation Social Work Pattern
The poverty alleviation pattern underpinned by social work intervention serves as

a new means which adapts to the present-day effort of eliminating poverty. Mean-
while, national policies including “targeted poverty reduction” and “winning the
fight against poverty” have provided invaluable opportunities for social work inter-
vening and doing its due part in the poverty reduction campaign. The practices from
the West have proved that professional social work enjoys innate advantages and
functions when it comes to the alleviation and eradication of poverty. As a discipline
with “helping people to help themselves” as the core value, social work has made
a systematic and holistic response to poverty issue since its inception. Specifically,
both its professional values of “helping people to help themselves” and its micro-
and macro-intervention methods ranging from casework, group work to community
work and social work administration are conducive to improving the subsistence and
well-being of the deprived ones on all fronts.
An array of domestic researchers points out that social work is highly relevant to
targeted poverty reduction. In terms of values and basic concepts, core values of social
work such as “helping people to help themselves” and “empathy” are in alignment
with the original goal of our targeted poverty-reduction strategy. Methodology-wise,
science-based intervention approaches from casework, group work to community
work are capable of cultivating and building up the initiative of impoverished people
and areas, thereby helping them to achieve long-term development. Nevertheless,
social work is still blighted by the scarcity of professional talents, the deficiency of
theoretical adaptation to the Chinese context, and the absence of relevant institutions.
126 5 Poverty Alleviation Social Work Pattern
5.1 Regional Development Assistance Pattern
5.1.1 Overview of the Regional Development Assistance

Pattern
Regional poverty, under most circumstances, is derived from uneven and inadequate
regional development caused by the long-held tiered development mode. As for
the regional development assistance pattern, the national government specifies clear
regional development strategies, plans, and targets, establishes sound development
management institutions, attaches great importance to leveraging macro-fiscal and
tax policies to aid the development of backward regions, and fosters new economic
growth drivers in the less developed regions by virtue of unique and flexible policies
of resource development.
1. The Connotations of the Regional Development Assistance Pattern
The regional development assistance pattern in poverty reduction social work refers to
the working pattern that skilled social workers have set out through philosophy advo-
cacy, policy design, guidance on participation, resource integration, and performance
evaluation, to turbocharge the development of poverty-stricken areas.
2. The Characteristics of the Regional Development Assistance Pattern
The regional development assistance pattern is local, holistic, complicated, and
advanced.
(1) Local. This pattern focuses on regional poverty issues to meet the systemic
requirements for regional development.
(2) Holistic. This pattern requires social workers to observe the symptoms and
causes of the poverty issue, identify the overall demand for shaking off poverty,
and design systemic policies specific to regional poverty Alleviation.
(3) Complicated. This pattern represents the most complex poverty Alleviation
social work pattern where social workers can intervene in a wide range of
areas through various paths. Therefore, its theoretical basis, manifestations, and
measures are quite complicated.
(4) Advanced. Compared with social work, social services come far behind
economic growth as a poverty-reduction concern, which fails to timely meet
relevant needs of the destitute such as psychological counseling and group
activities. The regional development assistance pattern of the poverty allevi-
ation social work carries forward the concept of “helping people help them-
selves” and integrates the internal and external resources of the disadvantaged,
with a view to building their resilience against poverty and contributing to their
sustained and robust development. As a result, this pattern is advanced from the
viewpoints of concepts, ideas, and methods.
5.1 Regional Development Assistance Pattern 127
5.1.2 Composition of the Regional Development Assistance

Pattern
1. Problem Analysis and Assessment

The analysis and assessment of problems in the poverty Alleviation social work
pattern include the following three steps. First, collect materials meticulously with
the help of technology to describe poverty issues through faithful and objective
narratives. The goal is to figure out who the impoverished are and where they live.
Second, research on poverty aims at not only the description, but also the explanation
of reasons behind. The poverty Alleviation social work helps to detect the major cause
of poverty and probe into the nature of this chronic affliction in a shallow-to-deep
manner. Moreover, the methods of explaining the causes of poverty include causal
explanation, functional explanation, nomothetic explanation, as well as intentional
explanation centering on the subjects’ mental activities of the poor such as their needs,
motives, concepts, attitudes, emotions, values, and goals. Third, write a research
report.
2. Policy Advocacy
The greatest value of poverty reducing social work lies in the sweeping changes it
brings about, namely the opportunity to revisit our understanding toward poverty,
deconstruct the social construction and power relations for the deprived, champion
confidence, capacity building, and self-control while empowering the poor, thus
reshaping them from dependent to independent personalities. People with “depen-
dent personalities” who often feel unconfident and incapable of getting things done
always pin their hopes on the government and others, wait to be saved, and volun-
tarily serve as tools and realize their value as tools. On the contrary, people with
“independent personalities” beef up their strength continuously, learn about their
rights or those of a particular group while respecting others’ rights, and participate
in decision-making and voice their own demand. The transition from “dependent
personalities” to “independent personalities” is also the self-empowerment process
of the impoverished who start to develop the desire to act from the inside out in this
process of spiritual transformation. Policy advocacy requires two major tasks. First,
pay heed to and meet the inner spiritual needs of the poor, especially those outside
the mainstream that need to be recognized and supported. People living below the
poverty line are more eager to seek partners to build the platform and space in support
of their survival and development. Second, put a brake on penalizing the poorest
members of society in relevant policy systems, especially the situations in which
they are “neglected”, flow policy resources, and opportunities to the impoverished,
improve the social environment for their production and life, scale up subsistence
allowances, and build up their self-development capabilities.
3. Resource Integration
Resource integration refers to the coordination of scattered internal and external
resources to make them into a whole and leverage them, which includes the proper
use and coordination of existing resources, as well as the development and utiliza-
tion of potential resources in deprived areas. The resource integration of the regional
development pattern is predicated on the mobilization, participation, and action of
internal resources with the aid of external resources and technology transfer. Specif-
ically, internal efforts should focus on extensive discussion, consensus, solidarity,
and cooperation to avoid conflicts and resolve differences; place the organization
and education of residents high on the agenda as it is all the more important to culti-
vate residents’ capability of developing poverty eliminating programs independently
than to introduce specific programs; mobilize residents to hold extensive discus-
sions; and adopt a bottom-up approach to deciding local development affairs instead
of upholding democratic elitism. In addition, it is imperative to not only promote
consultation and cooperation between community organizations based on the needs
of vulnerable groups, but also to win over, unite, and back up local elites, in a bid to
enlist the help of most residents in the community for the poverty reduction program
and engage them in the program.
4. Participating Subjects
In the process of poverty reduction social work, four basic systems have been laid
down, namely change agent system, client system, target system, and action system.
The four basic systems are participating subjects of social work, and it is the unceasing
interaction among these systems that creates synergy among one another. Likewise,
poverty Alleviation is also such a system requiring the concerted efforts of all partic-
ipants involved. The outcome of such work hinges on the combined effects produced
by capabilities of these participants, rather than the isolated effect of a single factor.
The capacity building of participants contributes greatly to the effect of poverty elim-
inating programs. Included are capabilities to manage poverty alleviation programs
and resources, to exchange poverty alleviation information, to regulate governments
and communities, to participate in poverty alleviation programs, and to build up
resilience against poverty. In a nutshell, capacity building remains the core task for
poverty reduction social work.
5. Performance Evaluation
Building on the goal-oriented, science-based, and operability-centric principles, the
regional development assistance pattern evaluates the performance of poverty allevia-
tion social work from eight dimensions which are system establishment, coordination
and integration, social service progress, precise use, information disclosure, reduced
poverty-stricken population, social capital management, and daily work assessment.
5.1.3 Case Study of the Regional Development Assistance

Pattern
1. Case Study 1: Paired-Up Education for Poverty Alleviation—CH University and

W County
W County is a national-level poverty-stricken county in Yanbian Korean Autonomous

Prefecture, Jilin Province. In order to implement the “Program of Poverty Alleviation
Through Paired-Up Education on Social Work” proposed by the State Council in
2017, the social work team of CH University paired up with W County. With career
education as the starting point, poverty reduction through education as the mainstay,
and professional methods of social work put in place, the team provided a series of
services for the local No. 4 Elementary School.
The goal of this educational program is to capitalize on the implementation of
career education in the No. 4 Elementary School of W County to promote the common
development of career education in the entire elementary and middle schools across
W County. This social service is targeted at the No. 4 graders of the No. 4 Elementary
School of W County.
Rural children are confronted with pressure of survival since middle school, and
their parents who are usually poorly educated cannot provide them with due attention
and academic help in daily life. Besides, as most young adults in W County choose
to go abroad (South Korea or Japan) to work, the majority of left-behind children are
separated from their parents for a long time, which seriously affects the development
education of students. This has long been an intractable problem faced by the principal
of the No. 4 Elementary School and the leaders of the W County Education Bureau.
The principal of No. 4 Elementary School believes that the considerable number of
low-achieving students at this stage is largely due to the lack of family education and
the deficiency of coherence between the family and the school. Despite the ongoing
endeavor to build a home-school partnership platform, it appears to have had little
effect. At the same time, teachers in the school are mostly ill-equipped, and the school
is also woefully short of campus social workers and psychological counselors.
Based on the preliminary understanding of the No. 4 Elementary School and the in-
depth dialogue with the principal, the social work team of CH University mapped out a
set of intervention plans starting from three aspects, school education, peer education,
and vocational education. By virtue of professional methods of social work, the team
members helped children to reconstruct a scientific and reasonable career planning
model in the form of casework, group work, and community activities.
(1) School education. The achievements of school education are mainly manifested
in the following two aspects: the ideology and morality of the students meet
the development requirements of the country and society and the intellectual
development of students meet the needs of social development. Thus, it can
be seen that schools hold great responsibilities for the all-round development
of students. A relevant survey reveals that contemporary Elementary School

students share a remarkable feature, that is, the people they are close to can
influence them in many ways, which indicates that the influence of the principal
and the teacher on students will be very limited if they do not feel cared and
loved by the school principal and teachers.
Some teachers of the No. 4 Elementary School once adopted improper teaching
methods. For example, they disregarded the influence of the family and social envi-
ronment and came to the conclusion that underachievers have no room for progress
based solely on their academic performance and ranking, which negatively impacted
on the learning enthusiasm of students. In this context, the social work team of CH
University intervened urgently, reported to school leaders to urge these teachers to
rectify their teaching attitudes and help them level up their teaching methods.
(2) Peer education. In the case of the No. 4 Elementary School of W County, the peer
contact is much more frequent than the family contact. With this in mind, the
CH University social work team tried to increase the stickiness of compulsory
education for school-age children by introducing peer education. According to
the field survey, social workers learned that all students in the No. 4 Elementary
School of W County would directly enter the local No. 1 Middle School upon
graduation, which, to some extent, alleviates the academic pressure of students.
However, such an easy path to middle school stifles the initiative of family
education and makes students’ goal of learning become less clear. In light of
this, the social work team of CH University established a hexagonal model
of Holland’s personality types for each student. Interests and hobbies of each
student collected in case interviews, coupled with Holland’s personality test
results, have paved the way for team members to conduct analyses, classify
students into groups with different career interests, and carry out occupational
experience campaigns for them accordingly, so that they can reexamine and
redefine their own interests and hobbies and strengthen their own interests and
hobbies with peers mutually reinforcing each other.
(3) Vocational education. Rural career education needs to take account of the early
employment of rural students. As a consequence, it is necessary to enhance
the training on the rural labor transfer, the vocational education and training
of the potential workforce from poverty-stricken families, and the training on
rural practical know-hows. On the one hand, targeted training must be carried
out prior to the employment to help the future workforce grow into qualified
workers with certain technical expertise; on the other hand, strategic training
should also be organized to cultivate the workforce needed by the society in the
future, skilled workers for production and operation, and junior and interme-
diate technical personnel in particular. To this end, the social work team of CH
University incorporated local and neighboring factories and enterprises of W
County into cooperative practice bases by integrating resources across regions,
so as to provide local students with types of work and job positions specific
to their age groups, and helps them understand new technologies and make
provision for entering the real world.
2. Case Study 2: The Power of Social Work in Suining’s Poverty Reduction
Since 2016, Suining City, Sichuan Province, has launched a range of social work pilot
programs for poverty alleviation in Chuanshan District, Anju District, and Pengxi
County through government purchase of services. Among them, six have been carried
out in Suining City, with several social work programs for poverty alleviation gener-
ating positive momentum, such as “Hand in Hand”, “Hope in Yuhe Village”, and
“Vibrant Siyiwan Village”. Over the past years, the Suining Finance Bureau and
the Civil Affairs Bureau have made poverty reduction their utmost priority, spear-
heading a city-wide campaign together with social organizations and professional
social workers to proactively intervene in the targeted poverty elimination.
By giving full play to resource integration, Suining Jiashan Social Work Service
Agency paired up with a hotel in Lanjiang Town, Anju District, in the poverty alle-
viation program in Siyiwan Village and provided 20 “Banquets of Steamed Dishes”
for local villagers. In the poverty-reduction program in Ximei Town, Anju District,
Suining Cihang Social Work Service Agency managed to raise funds of more than
RMB 200,000, improving the learning and living conditions for some 200 left-behind
children in the town. In the poverty alleviation program in Wafanggou Village, Pengxi
County, Suining Yining Women’s Public Service Club cooperated with cultural
companies to hold local festivals themed by gratitude and fortitude and encouraged
active participation of local villagers; during the implementation of the Siyiwan
Village poverty alleviation program, the retired soldier who had engaged in business
in Hainan Province was attracted to return to the hometown for planting lychees,
which were expected to bear fruits after three years, thereby reducing poverty through
developing local industries. In the poverty alleviation program in Yuhe Village, the
contact person in charge coordinated the private hospital to provide health services
to villagers, introducing social resources into the poverty-stricken village.
Social service agencies undertaking purchasing services and venture philanthropy
programs give full play to their professional advantages, carry out needs’ assessment,
analyze causes of poverty, promote targeted management, provide services such as
psychological counseling, social integration, and mutual assistance between neigh-
bors, and promote a new assistance model with subsistence allowance and psycho-
logical support, general services, and individualized services complementing each
other. Social workers from the Heart-to-Heart Social Work Service Center in Pengxi
County explored the establishment of an innovative social work method of “social
worker organization + poverty-stricken village + impoverished household” to elim-
inate poverty in Ma-ping Village, Heye Town, providing 296 poor people from 148
deprived families with assistance services.
Suining Jiashan Social Work Service Agency helped villagers to change their
mindsets by means of yard meetings and village talent training. It purchased excava-
tors and tractors with RMB 890,000 from special funds of poverty Alleviation and
rented excavators on a ten-year term with an annual rental income of RMB 80,000,
which has contributed to the growth of collective income in the village.
Going forward, Suining City will make sustained efforts to implement the new
concept of “adhering to the large-scale setup for poverty alleviation and inspiring
people in poverty to strive for prosperity and providing them with necessary educa-
tion” mentioned in the report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party
of China and will continue to support professional social workers in participating in
the battle against poverty by purchasing services from the government side.
5.2 Community Work Patterns
Community development, as a worldwide movement, attracted extensive attention

of countries around the globe once advocated by the United Nations after World
War II. In recent years, community development has witnessed rapid expansion as
it has been welcomed and advocated by an ever-increasing number of countries
and governments. In addition, it has transformed from targeting at a large number
of backward communities in emerging underdeveloped countries into serving the
community construction and development goal of various countries and regions.
5.2.1 Overview of Community Work Patterns
As a part of social work, the community work pattern in poverty alleviation social
work has a long history in the west. From the early community assistance, commu-
nity organization to the later community development movement, this pattern has
experienced hundreds of years of development.
1. The Connotations of Community Work Patterns
The community work pattern in poverty reduction social work is a development
model of impoverished communities that adopts community organization methods,
makes proper use of civil resources, and gives full play to the self-development power
of the community.
2. The Characteristics of Community Work Patterns
Poverty alleviation social work is born out of rural social work and characterized
by universality and community-specific features. In the process of poverty allevi-
ation, social work must start at the community level, build on the existing values
and methods of the community, and establish relationship with individuals and
organizations in the community. It is also essential to have a sense of commu-
nity unity and cooperate based on each other’s advantages, the purpose of which
is to promote the development of individuals and the community, and to achieve
5.2 Community Work Patterns 133
individual and community empowerment by being committed to restoring and main-

taining a “gemeinschaft” in the traditional village and by relying on the strength
of the rural community per se. In the whole process of community development,
rural social workers are supposed to play their roles as advocates and facilitators,
pointing out the direction for the equitable distribution of community resources and
participating in community construction as community members.
5.2.2 Composition of Community Work Patterns
1. Demand-Centered Poverty Alleviation Community Work Pattern

(1) Connotations. The demand-centered poverty alleviation community work
pattern signifies social workers which serve as experts to identify all the
problems plaguing poverty-stricken communities, such as poverty, unem-
ployment, poverty subculture, among others, and to delve into the culprit,
resolve problems, and stimulate demands. Also, social workers do their part
as agents to integrate resources and meet the needs of residents in deprived
communities.
(2) Characteristics. This pattern is twofold: firstly, it attracts the attention of
community residents based on the demand-centered approach, bolster them
to gain enough motivation and send a stronger message through collective
actions, in an attempt to obtain corresponding help to solve the problem;
secondly, this pattern can help enlist more external support, whereas in
the long run, poor communities will be negatively labeled, giving rise to
dependency on external resources and decline in residents’ capabilities.
(3) Basic strategy. The basic strategy of this pattern is to identify the needs of
residents, conduct science-based assessment of these needs, determine the
priority of needs in light of the severity of problems and the urgency of needs
in disadvantaged communities, release needs to the society, and integrate
resources from various parties, with a view to grappling with such problems
as poverty.
2. Asset-Centered Poverty Alleviation Community Work Pattern
(1) Connotations. The asset-centered poverty alleviation community work
pattern zeros in on the advantages and assets of the community. Starting
from “what the community has” (advantages) rather than “what the commu-
nity lacks” (problems), this pattern takes social capital such as community
“organization” and “relationship” as the driving force to spur the inner moti-
vation of the community, thereby realizing the sustainable development of
the community. The pattern can be segmented into four stages: first, mobilize
at the early stage. During this stage, efforts should be made to familiarize all
organizations and individuals in the community with the community devel-
opment plan to be implemented by social workers, in a bid to win support for
the plan and reach consensus within the community; second, social workers
and residents co-evaluate community assets, unearth community problems,
develop future community roadmaps, and identify advantageous assets in the
community (including sufficient human resources, adequate public facili-
ties, sound public security, favorable location, etc.); third, build a set of
community development indicators. Social workers work with community
residents to draw up community-based sustainable development plans based
on existing community assets and problems and set up effective indica-
tors for community sustainable development; fourth, promote autonomy
at the community level. Residents continuously participate in the sustain-
able development of the community via various means (regular gatherings,
community development websites, etc.)
(2) Characteristics. The asset-based poverty Alleviation community work
pattern is characterized by the following three features: first, the assump-
tion of the asset-based community development theory is predicated on
the firm belief in and strong reliance on the community’s strengths, assets,
and capabilities. It promotes migrant workers to create opportunities for
the local socio-economic development by identifying, tapping, and inte-
grating unrecognized resources such as people, property, and goods within
the community, eventually achieving robust development of the community;
second, asset-centered community development attaches greater importance
to pairing the micro-asset within the community with the macro-social envi-
ronment, fully mobilizing all manner of resources inside and outside the
community, and capitalizing on the strength of individuals, organizations,
and institutions to promote asset building; third, asset-centered community
development concentrates on cultivating local community organizations,
which, as the carrier of asset identification, can integrate the strength inside
and outside the community and welfare services and boost the development
of the community in an effective fashion.
(3) Basic strategy. The asset-centered poverty Alleviation community work
pattern usually comes with the strategy of “retreating to advance”. Formal
and informal community organizations and social support networks are both
regarded as the gushing vitality of the inner strength of community building,
and the internal network resources of the community prevail over forces of
external organizations when it comes to the sustainable development of the
community. As such, community development workers need to value the
power and achievements of community sharing and shepherd the community
into taking it as a turning point or breakthrough in community development,
so as to embed formal and informal network resources into social relations
and bring about positive changes in the community.
5.2 Community Work Patterns 135
5.2.3 Case Study of the Community Work Patterns
1. Case Study 1: Social Work Intervention in Wuxi’s Targeted Poverty Alleviation
In 2018, the Golden Neighbor Social Worker Agency in Binhu District, Wuxi City,
Jiangsu Province, paired up with the Renda Social Worker Agency in Qiaocheng
District, Bozhou City, Anhui Province, under the “Hand in Hand” program in which
the agency in Wuxi shared its mature social work methods and social worker training
experience to its counterpart in Bozhou and enhanced “soft poverty Alleviation” of
the expertise of social workers.
It is learned that in October 2017, the “Notice on the First Batch of Social Service
Agencies Well Implementing the “Hand in Hand” Program from the General Office of
the Ministry of Civil Affairs” was issued. Soon afterward, the Ministry of Civil Affairs
selected 100 social service agencies from the regions with first mover advantages to
work hand in hand with less developed regions to reduce poverty. Following strict
selections, the Golden Neighbor Social Worker Agency became one of the first batch
of agencies, paired up with its counterpart Renda Social Worker Agency and provided
assistance. Since then, the Golden Neighbor Social Worker Agency will dispatch two
professional social workers on a monthly basis to carry out relevant training sessions
at the Renda Social Worker Agency or provide guidance in their local community.
Moreover, online assistance channels are also made available to answer any possible
question.
Xue Mingfeng, program manager of the Golden Neighbor Social Worker Agency,
said that the environment for social work development in Bozhou is not favorable
enough. There are no special funds at the city and district levels to support the
development of social organizations, and the relevant funds can only be applied at the
provincial level. Established in 2016, the Renda Social Worker Agency, the first such
agency in Bozhou, has only part-time community workers working there without any
full-time social worker. Despite the fact that the Weiwu community where the agency
is located has been deemed one of the few local communities thinking highly of social
work, there are only two certified social workers, and residents have absolutely no
concept of social organizations and social workers. “Their staff who just switch to this
profession without enough training barely have professional background. Their daily
work mainly concentrates on providing administrative support and holding cultural
activities on a regular basis”, said Xue. Owing to the lack of relevant expertise, social
workers of the Renda Agency underperform in several aspects and are laden with
confusion about how to arrange activities, how to manage programs, and how to
organize records.
“After the pairing-up, our follow-up tasks are to transfer technology, supervise
their programs, help them build up social work capabilities, and share our mature
and time-tested experience”, said Xue. In fact, Bozhou boasts a rich history and
culture with several historical attractions situated near the Weiwu community, and
residents in the community have set up calligraphy and painting team, choir, and
drama team. “There are actually abundant resources at the ready, but their social
workers don’t know how to make full use of these strengths and involve them into
daily practices. In addition, they have very few information channels, mainly about
government funds at the provincial level, but do not know many foundations in the
society are willing to fund impoverished areas, and the national government also have
launched some supportive programs”, he said. Given the blocked information flow,
the Golden Neighbor Social Worker Agency also helped them to integrate resources,
such as applying for various foundations due to insufficient funds, or pairing up with
socially responsible companies. Xue further stressed, “even if the program is over,
we will follow up on their progress with a hope to help local social organizations
grow stronger”.
5.3 Casework Pattern
Different from group work and community work, the concept of social casework
at a more micro-level was pioneered by Mary Ellen Richmond, whose publication
of Social Diagnosis marked the general acceptance of casework as a professional
method by social workers. Casework is one of the basic methods of social work,
which, with a focus on an individual or a family, can be adopted to effectively improve
a person’s situation by means of a series of work processes, thereby realizing the
coordination and adaptation between the individual and the society.
In the poverty alleviation work, the application of the casework pattern can help
social workers get to know the basic information of the recipients or the recipient
households in a truthful, comprehensive, and accurate manner, conduct demand anal-
yses based on the collected information, and distribute policies, funds as well as the
talent pool provided by the national government to specific individuals or families,
in a bid to score the best match between assistance supplies and recipients, reduce
the waste of poverty reducing resources, and mobilize the initiative and confidence
of the impoverished to get rid of poverty.
5.3.1 Overview of Casework Pattern
Casework in poverty alleviation social work follows an individualized and differenti-

ated principle and requires social workers to offer targeted and diversified one-on-one
casework services for poor people or families. As a supplement to group work and
community work, casework lays more emphasis on objects at the micro-level such
as individuals or households with social workers intervening from the psychological
or family perspective.
1. Connotations of Casework Pattern
Professional social workers, by using the casework pattern, can estimate the poverty
situation from the aspects of recipients, resident officials, and social networks,
analyze the causes of poverty, intervene in the psychological, family, and social
5.3 Casework Pattern 137
factors resulting in poverty at the source, integrate social resources, and seek policy
support from the government, in a move to help the poor shake off poverty.
2. Characteristics of Casework Pattern
(1) Flexibility. Since the service objects of casework are usually faced with
various occasions, it is easier to grasp the problems at the individual or house-
hold level. Therefore, professional social workers can make timely adjust-
ments in lights of the specific situation of service objects while intervening,
so as to avert problems such as broken plans.
(2) Accuracy. The “individualized” principle requires social workers to provide
targeted one-on-one assistance after learning about the specific situation of
the recipient. Though the measures taken by social workers vary from one to
another, the common goal is to accurately evaluate the problems and needs
of the recipient and intervene in a swift fashion.
(3) Uniqueness. The service objects of casework are individuals or households,
both of which may live in poverty but with entirely different causes, living
conditions, and accesses to social resources, making it all the more important
for social workers to map out targeted plans during casework.
5.3.2 Composition of Casework Pattern
1. Building trust
Poverty alleviation social work practices mainly accommodate the needs of vulner-
able groups in society, and the establishment of a friendly relationship with the
recipients can contribute to the smooth progress of support programs led by social
workers, bring sufficient sense of security and trust to the poor, and encourage them
to set goals together with social workers, thereby delivering on the value of helping
others help themselves.
2. Taking stock of the situation
The estimation includes not only the family economic condition of the recipient, but
also the social relations, problems, and practical needs of the recipient. The first step
in carrying out poverty alleviation social work is to investigate the information of
individuals or households in a realistic and earnest manner, including age, health
condition, economic condition, interpersonal relationship, and psychological condi-
tion. The early establishment of a friendly relationship between social workers and
recipients will be conducive to the follow-up assistance. To understand the basic
situation of the recipient, in addition to directly communicating with them, surveys,
interviews, questionnaires, and the like can also be used to get the full picture of the
external factors leading to their predicament.
3. Analyzing causes
The causes of poverty in each household differ from one another. Some became
impoverished out of illness or disability, while some on account of backward mindset
or a combination of all the above causes. For example, those who are impoverished
due to backward mindset think they have no ability to come out of the woods and
keep relying on others, which eventually plunges them into chronic poverty.
4. Developing a plan
After learning about various causes of poverty, it is necessary to set up goals and
specific programs of different stages together with the recipient while following the
will of them and ensure their self-determination. For one thing, social workers are
supposed to increase assistance in terms of funds, materials, etc., and for another,
efforts should be redoubled to enhance psychological counseling and mindset shift
for the recipient, strengthen their confidence, change their backward thinking, so as
to lift them out of poverty at the source.
5. Implementing the plan
Social workers should carry out the plan and intervene in a timely manner according
to the different needs of recipients. The intervention process must leverage multiple
resources. While doing their due part, social workers should also pay heed to the
development of social networks and harness the power of relatives, family members,
and neighbors to provide economic, technical, and mental assistance and support.
Meanwhile, social workers should also seek policy support from the government to
protect the rights and interests of vulnerable groups from infringement, provide basic
subsistence for them, and beef up their ability to cast off poverty. The implementation
of the plan cannot be divorced from reality, and the short-, medium-, and long-term
goals should be advanced in an incremental approach and with timely adjustments
and reflections at different stages.
6. Evaluating and following up
After the end of the assistance to the recipient, social workers should evaluate the
progress and confirm whether the goals have been completed and how well they have
been achieved. After the case is closed, social workers also need to visit the relevant
family sometimes and follow up on their latest situations to prevent them from falling
back into poverty.
5.3 Casework Pattern 139
5.3.3 Case Study of the Casework Pattern
1. Case Study 1: Poverty Alleviation by Developing the Industry of Canna Starch

Noodles
Situated in the karst rocky desertification area across the Yunnan–Guizhou–Guangxi

region, the west of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region is a national-level
contiguous poor area as well as a place inhabited by ethnic minorities. Therefore, it is
a pressing task to introduce social work professionals to help with the local poverty
elimination effort. This case focuses on the engagement of casework in overcoming
poverty, which probes into how social workers forge synergy with households to
eradicate poverty and carry out individualized professional services.
The 4-year-old son of L had developed symptoms of fever and failed to recover
after receiving multiple medical treatments. On April 2, 2014, he was diagnosed with
acute lymphoblastic leukemia at the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangxi Medical
University, requiring long-term treatments and substantial medical expenses. From
April 2014 onward, all manners of examinations and treatments had never been
interrupted. In order to treat their son, L and his wife ran out of the hard-earned
money they had made over the past decade and had to turn to social support while
seeking medical help.
The causes of poverty for this social work case are as follows:
(1) The critical illness directly plunges the family to poverty, on the one hand; and
(2) The vulnerability of the family indirectly creates the plight of the family, on the
other hand.
The vulnerability here refers to appalling production and living environments,
backward means of livelihood, and weak household economic strength. The L family
has lived in the mountainous area of Dahua Yao Autonomous County in Guangxi
for generations, trying to earn a living in the barren rocky desertification area. The
vulnerability of the family coupled with the son’s critical illness has trapped L’s family
into extreme poverty. Solely relying on the restoration of family conditions cannot
address their poverty. And, L realized that only with an arduous struggle to transform
the traditional means of livelihood could the family conditions be improved.
The processes of intervention are realized as follows
(1) An in-depth field investigation and evaluation to fully understand the value of
canna starch noodles should be made. When seeking social support for his son’s
severe illness, L met a good many warm-hearted people. In November 2016,
on the advice of one of the kind people, L began to sell the local specialty of
canna starch noodles through WeChat, QQ, and other social media platforms and
obtained decent profits. However, L knew very little about the market back then.
After discussion, social workers and L reached a consensus that a comprehensive
knowledge of the value of canna starch noodles should be a must for sales.
According to the field investigation, Li found that canna starch noodles produced
in Yalong town could be sold for 25 yuan per jin and with a good reputation.
(2) An innovative integration of government and social resources to develop the

canna starch noodles industry for poverty alleviation should also be made. After
investigation and evaluation, L further understood the value of canna starch
noodles. Inspired by policy incentives, L decided to alleviate poverty by devel-
oping the canna starch noodles industry. The first step is to establish a formal
production platform to produce canna starch noodles in line with market rules
and demands. The second step is to enlist the support of “acquaintances” to
build a production base for canna starch noodles for an effective control of the
product quality. The third step is to work with the veterans who are experienced
in producing such noodles. The fourth step is to reach a cooperation agree-
ment with poor households. The company will lead the effort in setting up a
canna planting cooperative and applying for government agricultural subsidies,
to provide high-quality raw materials for canna starch noodles. In this way, the
production model of “enterprise + cooperative + farmer” has been basically
formed.
(3) Building on the strengths of the Internet to expand the market of canna starch
noodles. Investigations revealed that there are a limited number of manufacturers
selling similar products on the Internet, leaving huge room for sales outside the
region. In this context, L put more emphasis on the wider market, the demand
of green specialties from major cities in particular, collaborated with the local
logistics company, and built an online sales platform to promote canna starch
noodles to the country at large. In practice, L firmly believed that the innovation
and inheritance of traditional production craft, the commitment to producing
green canna starch noodles, and the grasp of Internet-based opportunities are
central to the value of canna starch noodles. In addition, L attached great impor-
tance to “giving back to the society with products”, which springs from the fact
that he personally had received assistance from civic-minded people.
2. Case Study 2: Social Work Intervention in the Relocation from Inhospitable Areas
Located in the contiguous destitute area of the Qinling-Daba mountains region, the
B county of H province is surrounded by sinuous ravines and rugged terrain, making
it all the more difficult to find a suitable centralized resettlement site. What is worse,
a host of local impoverished households is loath to relocate as a consequence of
the inconveniences of transportation, communication, and livelihood caused by the
unreasonable site selection by the township government, a move that brings the
relocation from inhospitable areas to a standstill.
Zhang, a 66-year-old woman who has been bedridden due to illness and unable to
take care of herself, is cared for by her husband. On knowing the upcoming relocation
to the resettlement site, Zhang felt a bit despondent. After inquiry, social workers
learned that Zhang, once a diligent and ambitious person, now could not even take
care of herself owing to ailing physical conditions, and her strong self-esteem can’t
accept that her family members move into a new home with a patient who has trouble
with walking like her.
Against this backdrop, social workers, accompanied by the rural community staff,
offered Zhang mental counseling services and persuaded her to relocate. Following
5.4 Group Work Pattern 141
analyses, social workers summarized that Zhang is subjected to the following prob-
lems: (1) Physiological problems. Zhang was bedridden due to illness and could
not take care of herself. (2) Psychological problems. Strong self-esteem results in
Zhang’s depression and emotional resistance, and the neglect of her children made
her feel lonely. (3) Family relationship problems. Zhang lives with her husband, and
her children who work away from home rarely go back home, thereby leading to
the lack of communications. (4) Service issues for disabled people. The services
are provided by the society for the physically challenged, including Zhang, and the
priority is given to material guarantee, rather than their psychological needs.
In response to the above circumstances, social workers have set out the following
intervention plans: (1) Organize volunteers to visit Zhang on a regular basis, chat and
take a walk with her, and accompany her to the hospital, so as to strengthen the social
support system, thus reducing her loneliness and ease her pain caused by physical
conditions. (2) Contact Zhang’s children to explain her status quo, encourage them
to go back home whenever they get free time, and give due attention and care to their
parents, so that Zhang can feel delighted, find her emotional sustenance again, and
finally say yes to the relocation to a temporary resettlement site. (3) Get in touch
with Zhang’s old friends, and take the initiative to invite them to visit Zhang and help
her to enrich her spiritual life and relieve her mental burden. (4) Provide services to
Zhang in light of the ground rules and counseling methods of social casework for
the elderly.
In the whole process of intervention, social workers followed through on the
people-centered concept and the principle of non-judgmental attitude, supported
Zhang in building up her resilience, helped her to weigh up the pros and cons of
moving into the temporary resettlement site, and sought for her the government’s
special policy support for the disabled. With the active help of social workers, the
relevant department leader in the county personally visited Zhang’s family to explain
the specific situation, hoping that she could understand and support the government’s
work by temporarily relocating to a public rental house before moving into a new
home. In the end, Zhang relieved her mental burden following the efforts of social
workers and her family, took the initiative to apologize to the leader for the previous
refusal to support the government work, and started to discuss with her husband
about the details of moving into a new house.
5.4 Group Work Pattern
Social work, as a helping profession, has been concerned with poverty since its
establishment, and group work is one of the three major social work methods adopted
by social workers in the poverty Alleviation campaign to enhance interactions among
group members through setting up homogeneous self-help and mutual-aid groups.
This group work pattern, designed to pool the strengths of social workers and each
group member involved, plays a critical role in the field of poverty Alleviation work.
5.4.1 Overview of Group Work Pattern
The group work pattern in poverty alleviation social work is predicated on group
dynamics and ecosystem theory. Since there are many similarities in the factors
causing poverty among group members, social workers pay more attention to
the mutual support among them, adopt the group-based approach to cultivating
supportive relationships among them, and build a mutual-aid system among indigent
groups, so as to rid themselves of the shackles of poverty and achieve prosperity.
1. Connotations of the Group Work Pattern
Group work does not refer to any group, but a mutual support group put in place
by social workers through identifying specific groups with common characteristics
and similar needs. The group work pattern in poverty reduction social work focuses
on a group of people with the same causes of poverty. Thanks to the help of social
workers, they can tap into and make full use of their respective strengths in techniques
to complement and support each other for the common goal of poverty alleviation,
in an ultimate attempt to move themselves and other group members out of poverty.
2. Characteristics of Group Work Pattern
(1) Mutual help. The group work is usually carried out within a group in which
members share similar problems and needs, and the solution of the problems
requires mutual help and complementary resources, with an aim to achieve
the group work goals together and get rid of poverty.
(2) Holistic view. Unlike casework, group work involves more than one person,
so the group plan should be developed and adjusted with a focus on all
group members, and multiple aspects should also be taken into account
when laying out group plans, to avoid biting off more than we can chew or
emphasizing one thing while neglecting another.
(3) Stage by stage. As group work is more complex than casework, social
workers ought to timely adjust and reflect on plans and goals at different
stages while respecting group members’ own decisions, to prevent some
uncontrollable incidents holding back the overall progress from emerging.
(4) Homogeneity. The prerequisite for the establishment of a group is similar
problems or needs faced by group members. For example, the members of
a group are all impoverished because of the lack of skills, which gives birth
to common goals and plans. Therefore, the group here is homogeneous.
(5) Satisfaction of individual needs. While ensuring that the common prob-
lems of group members are solved, the unique needs of special members
should not be neglected. For example, when helping group members break
away from material poverty, social workers should also remain alert to
their psychological issues, which embodies the compassionate care given
by social workers.
(6) Flexibility. Groups can be divided into open groups and closed groups, the
classification of which is determined by the nature of groups. Since the
causes of poverty are relatively simple, social workers can decide whether
group members stay or leave according to their latest living standards. In
general, group work enjoys strong flexibility.
5.4.2 Composition of Group Work Pattern
1. Initial planning
The early-stage preparation for group work is also dubbed group preparation, which
mainly includes spotting prospective group members, conducting assessment of
needs and setting goals. Through interviews and questionnaires, social workers
collect the information of potential group members such as basic household condi-
tions, social support status, causes of poverty, pressing needs, among others, in a bid
to initially determine the goals of the following group work.
2. Recruiting Group Members
The immature development of social work in China has led to the fact that social
workers take the initiative to spot the majority of group members. As a result, social
workers should mobilize the disadvantaged residents through a variety of channels,
such as seeking out help from village committees to carry out educational programs in
the village. Besides, social workers can also take an active part in finding prospective
members, introducing to villagers the nature of and activities organized by social
workers through in-person interviews, and inviting them to join the group. Finally,
social workers should sift out unsuitable members according to the goals of the group
work, giving preference for those who share the same causes of poverty and the level
of needs, so as to facilitate the integration of resources.
3. Pre-group Meeting
Prior to the first formal group meeting, social workers should prepare for the activities,
draw up a set of implementation plans, conduct psychological interventions regarding
how to seek ways out of poverty, and organize a group meeting beforehand, so as
to fully understand the basic situation of the group members and initially establish
a relationship of mutual trust. Moreover, the time, venue, and content of the first
formal meeting should also be declared to avoid a large-scale absence.
4. Writing Up the Work Plan
Before the opening of the first formal meeting, social workers should design a work
plan based on the group’s situation to better coordinate the arrangement and obtain
a clear understanding of the activities and to grasp the specific goals of the group
at different stages. For example, social workers are supposed to know how many
members will be lifted out of poverty and to what extent in the middle of the group
work and are capable of seeing the improved disposable income per capita when
the work is completed. By writing the group work plan, social workers can clearly
know the working procedures and the activity arrangements at each stage covering
the philosophy, goals, members, nature, and action plan of the group.
5. Icebreaker
The first gathering of the group holds the key to the smooth development of group
work. When meeting each other for the first time, most of the group members are
tentative with no determination to establish a relationship of mutual trust, feel skep-
tical of social workers, and reluctant to reveal their thoughts and needs easily. To this
end, social workers should showcase their solid personal qualities and fully leverage
their skills in leading the group, such as active listening, reflection, clarification, and
self-expression, to create an inclusive group atmosphere, help group members get
acquainted with each other, and make provisions for the subsequent activities and
goal implementations.
6. Implementing tasks
While the group has different goals at the early, middle, and late stages, various
conflicts may arise among group members as well. With this in mind, social workers
should fully demonstrate their professional qualities, hold holistic and accurate
expectations of the progress of group work, understand the characteristics of group
work at different stages, so as to resolve conflicts and advance group work in a prompt
manner. Furthermore, in the process of activity implementation, social workers and
group members are mutually impacting each other; therefore, social workers should
remain sober-minded to avoid falling into the trap of the group. In the early stage of
group work, social workers should focus on the reluctance of group members and
actively guide them to establish the relationship of mutual trust. In the middle stage
of group work, the already formed group may undergo a “restructuring”, thereby
leading to conflicts. At this time, social workers must tell accurately whether the
conflict is constructive or catastrophic. In the later stage of group work, social workers
should soothe the group members who suffer from the pain of departure, consolidate
their positivity, eliminate their negative sentiments, and encourage them to be more
confident and strive to extricate themselves from poverty though hard work.
7. Closing the case
The case will be closed depending on the degree of goal achievements within the
group. After the group work is completed, social workers will conduct follow-up
monitoring to protect members from sinking back into poverty after leaving the
group.
8. Evaluating the case
Following the completion of the group work, social workers will conduct self-
evaluation based on the implementation of goals and their performance on poverty
Alleviation. Meanwhile, group members can also assess the intervention measures
taken by social workers in lifting them out of poverty.
5.4.3 Case Study of the Group Work Pattern
Case Study 1: “Yiqilai”—“Hand in Hand” Program

The Yiqilai Public Benefit Development Center (hereinafter referred to as “Yiqilai”)
in Pinghu, Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province, was designated as one of the second
batch of social work service agencies participating in the “Hand in Hand” program
organized by the Ministry of Civil Affairs. In partnership with Baicaomu Social Work
Service Center in Gansu Province (hereinafter referred to as “Baicaomu”), Yiqilai
built a platform of cooperation and interaction, as evidenced by the two-year support
program in Amuquhu Town, Xiahe County, Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture,
Gansu Province. By providing services for local children in straitened circumstances,
Yiqilai hoped to improve their quality of life and learning environment and to boost
targeted poverty alleviation in the town. Amid the process, Yiqilai collaborated with
Baicaomu in setting up a local service office for left-behind children in difficulty,
providing professional supervision to meet the local needs of social work training,
talents, and services.
Situated in the northwest of Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Gansu
Province and at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau, the Xiahe County has an altitude
ranging from 3000 to 3800 m as well as an average temperature of only 2.6 °C.
As of the end of 2017, Xiahe County was home to 89,800 people with 18 ethnic
groups, including Tibetans, Han people, and Hui people. The hostile environment
here has severely weighed on the development of its agriculture and husbandry, thus
contributing to a slowdown in regional economic growth. Although Xiahe County
has been removed from the poverty list, it is still backward in areas like educa-
tion, health care, transportation due to weak foundations, and slow-paced devel-
opment. With a total of 800-plus students and teachers, the Amuquhu Elementary
School has been plagued by the backwardness of teaching equipment and shortage of
library resources. Considering this, Yiqilai pooled social resources to collect supplies
including books and clothes for the school based on its actual conditions and then
passed the love by traveling more than 2200 km to send the supplies to children in
late March, 2019.
In addition to the in-kind support, Yiqilai decided to introduce to the town the
“Warm Home” program of Pinghu City targeting families receiving rural subsistence
allowances, as the children’s learning habits and personal hygiene were below the
standard. Accompanied by school teachers and interpreters, social workers conducted
a preliminary household survey to learn about the children’s learning and living
conditions as well as the customs and practices of the Tibetan region and specify
the necessity to take concrete measures to develop the children’s all-round quality,
maximize parent–child family vacation trips, and improve home learning environ-
ment, in a bid to meet the needs of both children and families. Also, the professional
company of social workers and the sustained follow-up monitoring of volunteers are
able to help family members to develop good living and learning habits and pursue
a healthy and uplifting life.
In order to continue to provide services after social workers leave the town,
Yiqilai and Baicaomu established a social worker service station and a social work
talent incubation base in Amuquhu Town to cultivate local social work talents and
volunteers and develop news programs. Following the endeavors made by the two
parties, the Civil Affairs Bureau of Pinghu City and its counterpart in Anning District,
Lanzhou City jointly built a “social service base for interconnected regional devel-
opment” and took this as an opportunity to further enhance the engagement of social
work professionals in the poverty reducing effort of Gansu Province.
Case Study 2: Social Work Intervention in Poverty Alleviation Through Education
for Left-Behind Children (The Dandelion Program)
As the economic and social transformation develops and the urbanization picks up
pace, the mass exodus of the working population from rural areas in Shanxi Province
leads to an ever-increasing number of left-behind children, which has captured great
attention of the local government. Left-behind children refer to the children of those
migrant workers who move to cities from rural areas in search of work. As one
of the contiguous destitute areas in China, the Lvliang area of Shanxi Province has
long been economically underdeveloped. Social workers and volunteers learned from
visits, investigations, and early-stage services that left-behind children in the Lvliang
area are mainly confronted with such problems as poor living conditions, psycho-
logical imbalance, emotional insecurity, moral anomie, academic underachievement,
difficulty in environmental adaptation, loneliness, and uneven access to education.
The above problems facing left-behind children in the Lvliang area stemmed from
their ailing family economic conditions, scarcity of educational resources, lack of
mental health education, and weak healthcare system. Against this backdrop, the
dandelion program was introduced to allow social workers to harness professional
know-hows to educate left-behind children, thereby achieving the goal of poverty
alleviation through education.
The measures taken by social workers to address the problems of left-behind
children during the intervention are as follows.
(1) Improving the methods of educating left-behind children. In carrying out tasks,
social workers helped left-behind children to enhance their skills, rise above
barriers, and improve relationships in interpersonal interactions. Social workers
carried out activities such as book reading, individual tutoring, academic groups,
academic counseling, and fun sports in Zhongyang; they performed group activ-
ities that center around confidence resilience and serial reading activities (poetry
writing, recitation, speech competitions, storybook sharing sessions, bookmark
making, etc.) in the Ganzeyuan community.
Focusing on three aspects: methods, interests, and habits, the “Children’s Learning
Program” is committed to improving the learning ability and the knowledge level of
left-behind children, while “Energy-enhancing Training Camp” carries out specific
service activities on themes such as academic tutoring, interest cultivation, potential
exploration, and peer exchanges every winter and summer vacation. “Safety Class”
focuses on two themes, safe use of fire and safety in an earthquake, as evidenced by
lectures to promote understanding of fire and earthquake. In doing so, left-behind

children are guided to understand the surroundings, learn to investigate hidden risks
in the campus and home environment, and learn about escape routes. Besides, left-
behind children are helped to learn to cooperate in emergency avoidance in the
campus environment through activities such as the “Disaster Reduction Games”.
Therefore, the ability of left-behind children to protect themselves can be improved
across the board.
(2) Building a standardized social worker team. Social workers integrated school,
urban, and rural resources and provided various volunteer services for left-
behind children through volunteers from different majors. The team of social
workers is composed of teachers, graduate students, and standout undergrad-
uates of the social work major, as well as college volunteers (majoring in
clinical medicine, nursing, etc.) and local volunteers. At the same time, social
workers attached great importance to the standardized management of volun-
teers. For example, through collecting basic information of left-behind children
and communicating with them, the team provided psychological counseling and
motivation and rectified some children’s behavior, to help them better adapt to
life and set goals for healthy development.
(3) Enriching the means of poverty Alleviation through education. The “Dandelion”
program provides growth and integrated services for urban migrant children and
rural left-behind children through a tripartite linkage among volunteer service
teams, left-behind family members, and migrant parents. The program proposes
a “1 + 3” service model. By organizing a youth volunteer service team, it builds
and implements a “Hand in Hand” series of themed plans, a “Gathering Love”
series, and a “Joint Action” series, which, with “nostalgia” as the bond, aims to
improve the rural development platform.
First of all, social workers carried out an activity themed by “Heart to Heart, Hand
in Hand, Together” during which urban and rural children would draw the pictures
of each other on white hats to achieve remote interactions and recall the good old
days. Also, they conducted a “friends” group activity in which playmates now living
in different areas would be organized to pair up with each other to renew their
friendship. Besides, a club is built to create opportunities for interactions between
rural and urban children and help them share some great moments through a wide
range of activities.
What’s more, social workers carried out another activity themed by “Gathering
Love” to increase the frequency of communication between urban and rural chil-
dren and enrich the topics of their communication, thus realizing mutual interaction
and common growth among them. In addition, potted plants were distributed to all
participants who would nurture on their own and take photos for record on a regular
basis. The goal is to create more opportunities for communication and keep each
other’s company for the long run. By organizing regular festival gatherings in which
urban and rural children would prepare together for talent shows, social workers
could boost the friendship between partners living in different places, enhance their
interpersonal skills, and help them fit into the new environment.
Lastly, social workers implemented an action plan themed by “Joint Action”,

harnessing online communication technologies to surmount geographical impedi-
ments and ensure the smooth progress of services. By using a homework mobile
application, urban and rural children could learn and exchange online, while using
another social networking mobile application, friends living in different places could
revisit happy memories with the assistance from the youth volunteer service team,
so as to better cherish the invaluable friendship and grow together. In line with the
trend of urban–rural integration, the services were carried out both online and offline.
Specifically, the Shanxi Zhuren Youth Volunteer Service Team which is composed
of university volunteers would leverage the online interactive platform to reduce the
obstacles dampening interactions, realize mutual support between urban and rural
children in distress, and strive to advance peer interaction and upgrade it to nostalgic
companionship.
(4) Strengthening publicity on left-behind children. Social workers played their
active role as advocates, announced volunteer campaigns through both online
and offline channels, took advantage of government websites and volunteer
service websites for publicity, and invited China Yellow River TV Station,
Shanxi News Network, Xinhuanet and other media outlets to carry up to 31
reports, which has raised the public concern about left-behind children.
In a nutshell, the breadth, intensity, depth, and forms of social workers’ participa-
tion in the development-driven poverty Alleviation are still very limited. Currently,
as “government is the only or predominant agent” in reducing poverty and social
work forces are either absent or passively involved with no say, let alone decision-
making rights and power, the proactive exploration of a new pattern for social work
professionals to intervene in the poverty alleviation effort represents a major avenue
to consolidating and building upon the achievements of the fight against poverty and
to probing into the governance mechanism for relative poverty.
Chapter 6
Factors Involved in Poverty-Curbing
Social Work
Poverty-curbing social work encompasses four factors: clients, workers, values, and
methods. This chapter is devoted to elaborating on the composition, the main content,
and features of these four factors.
6.1 The Clients of Poverty-Curbing Social Work
Poverty means that some members of a society constantly live below the basic living
standard because of certain social background against which they have been deprived
of some essential resources for a long period of time, and as a result, they are unable to
participate in economic and social activities or gain means of livelihood as normal.1
For a long time, it has been the government that steers poverty elimination work.
Being the single force, and having to get relevant policies implemented from top
to bottom, the government shoulders immense financial burden. What’s more, the
formulation of policies is both objective- and outcome-oriented, and the impover-
ished population is therefore often too much neglected to be included in the driving
efforts, and their ability to withstand risk has therefore not been improved. Once the
social environment changes, they will fall back into poverty. To buckle such trend,
the poverty elimination social work must effectively integrate the implementation of
policies and the promotion of social work values and stimulates the poor people’s
agentive power, and bring about external changes based on internal promotion.
To understand how to stimulate the poor’s initiative into action, the clients of
poverty-eliminating social work, which refer to the poor residents, especially those
in urgent need, must be identified accurately, first and foremost. The identification
of the poor is based on the unit of household, pointing to the family members who
lack or have lost the ability to work and are incapable of lifting themselves out of
poverty through individual efforts. There are mainly four causes of poverty: lack or
1 Xiang and Xia [1].

150 6 Factors Involved in Poverty-Curbing Social Work
loss of working family members; disability; disease; and disasters. The first step of
poverty eliminating social work, therefore, is to locate the clients, that is, who are to
be helped. It is a custom in China to view personal problems from the family perspec-
tive. Therefore, while the poverty-combatting policies are being implemented, the
method is first to conduct household surveys based on which follow-up measures
will be taken. The document, The Decision on Winning the Battle Against Poverty
by the Central Committee of the CPC and the State Council, proposes the general
objectives which include making sure that the rural impoverished population is to be
lifted out of poverty according to the current standard, “impoverished” counties are to
be rid of the title, and region-wide poverty is to be eliminated. The poverty-reduction
strategy in the document suggests accelerating relocation projects, transferring rural
impoverished people residing in areas where living conditions are harsh; ecolog-
ical environment is fragile, and natural disasters are frequent. Gu Donghui divides
the poverty alleviation-clients into households and districts from the perspective
of policy implementation, believing that solutions to individual problems rely on
solving household or regional problems.2
To address the question “who needs to be supported” requires to accurately recog-
nize the impoverished. Developing a scientific identification system and an accurate
assessment mechanism can avoid resource waste caused by false identification. Preci-
sion as the work ethic should be clung to throughout the poverty-reduction program
by implementing strategies according to specific individual and household features.
Precise identification of the clients should be based on facts and statistics; the estab-
lishment of assessment mechanism should build on evidence and practice; open and
transparent supervisory mechanism should be followed while we are assessing the
poor’s background to decide who are the real clients.
Broadly speaking, the issue of combatting poverty involves both urban and rural
areas. Due to varying urban and rural developing trends, the social work to curb
poverty is accordingly divided into urban and rural poverty elimination. Although
urban residents have a higher income and consumption level than their rural counter-
parts, there are poverty problems in cities, manifested as relative poverty, that is, the
level of income is lower than the social average level, inadequate to sustain the basic
living standard. After more than ten years of development, urban poverty problems
have eased greatly, but some survival and developing difficulties still exist. Since
the reform and opening to the outside, as a result of rapid economic development,
not a few enterprises have failed to adapt to the fluctuating market and closed down
their businesses, leaving some employees either with low income or even jobless,
multiplying urban impoverished population. Currently, urban poverty displays four
distinctive features: significant decrease in the poor population; constant increase
in poverty types; diversification of the poor people; and complication of poverty
causes.3
2 Gu [2].
3 Guan [3].
6.1 The Clients of Poverty-Curbing Social Work 151
In summary, the urban impoverished mainly includes the households receiving

basic living allowances, urban fringe poor households, and others such as old people,
children, women, and the disabled who are in straitened financial circumstances.
Compared with cities, in rural areas, the impoverished population is large; the
causes of poverty are diversified; the poverty alleviation is difficult to achieve,
and the poor are stricken hard by absolute poverty. As the leader of the poverty-
combatting course, the central government has always taken into consideration “the
three issues concerning agriculture” in the process of poverty-curbing. Rural poverty-
curing social work is carried out around the object, the subject, and the strategies
of poverty reduction. To be more specific, the object of curbing poverty is deter-
mined in line with the level of economic development and by checking if the family
income is lower than the current national standard level of poverty and if it meets
the requirement of the policy “No Worries about Food and Clothing, Guaranteeing
Basic Medical Security, Compulsory Education, and Housing Security”. In rural
areas, the poor are mainly composed by the disabled, the old, women, and children.
As the leader of the poverty-curbing course, the government introduced poverty
reduction policies and helped the poor people by boosting the regional economic
development. Based on its years of experience and expertise, the central government
constantly innovates the supporting mode and optimizes the identification mecha-
nism, in order to help the poor to build self-reliance and to reduce the number of
people who fall back into poverty.
As for how to classify the clients of the poverty-curbing social work, scholars
have divided opinions. The content, clients, and service scope involved in the poverty
reduction social work in our nation keep on expanding, and the practice proper is
getting diversified. Initially, the clients of the poverty-reducing social work refer to
the people who are incapable of climbing out of poverty on their own and thus are
considered as those in dire need. With the increasing incidence of social problems
and the changing nature of social structure, the base of clients of the poverty-reducing
social work is continuously expanding and has gradually come to cover all groups
of people ranging from those who are unable to settle difficulties on their own to
their families and the communities in which they live. The social work does not offer
only personal training, as was done before; it has turned into public service open to
the whole society. In a narrow sense, the poverty-reducing social work mainly aims
to help those who lack skills and social resources and are incapable of getting rid
of poverty on their own and thus need support from the social workers to achieve
individual development. In a broad sense, the poverty-curbing social work is open
to all members in the society. Poverty problems can affect its surrounding social
systems. Therefore, such efforts must get the poor people’s families and living quar-
ters involved in. What’s more, due to shortage of certain resources and social support,
the poor people are gradually marginalized in social life. The social workers working
on such poverty-reducing efforts have to actively advocate social equity and struggle
to create a fair and reasonable social environment. Reducing poverty is a social cause,
calling for joint efforts by all social members to form a mutually supportive social
network for the poor. Therefore, it is also an important part of the poverty-reducing
social work to alter the public attitude and to enable as broad participation as possible
by members of the society.
To sum up, identified by features, the clients of the poverty-curbing social work
include the focal disadvantaged groups such as women, children, the old and the
disabled, as well as all the poverty stricken and those marginalized groups.
6.1.1 Women
In 1978, Mills, an American sociologist, on the basis of research on poverty prob-

lems, proposed for the first time the notion of “feminization of poverty”, bringing to
public attention the very issue of poverty among women. In 1995, the Fourth World
Conference on Women held in Beijing first incorporated “women and poverty” into
the key areas of focus, leading domestic scholars to conduct researches on this issue.4
Compared with other types of poverty, poverty among women is more covert and
fragile. For one thing, poverty alleviation policies in China generally take household
as the unit to reckon with; so does the supporting mechanism, leaving individuals
barely able to become the receiving end of supporting resources. For another, in
most family relations, males play the pivotal role due to their economic contribution
and physical advantage, while females are disadvantaged; when the family relation
changes, and women need to head the household solely, economic conflicts will
emerge, and poverty problems are prone to turn up.
Poverty among women is not caused solely by lack of income, but rather mainly
by deprivation of social resources such as education, culture, incentives, capital, and
so on. The problems of poverty among women can be divided into the following two
types.
Poverty related to entitlement
Unlike males, females are more likely to play the role of manager and user of the
family property, whereas males are the major income-earner in the family and make
more contributions in economic terms. Therefore, females are placed in a more
disadvantageous position in family power distribution and have no actual rights to
make decisions. Such phenomenon is all the starker in rural areas. In social relations,
as a result of inequality of property ownership, women are conferred less power than
men and, thus, are more vulnerable in the face of accidents.
Poverty as a structural problem
Due to socio-cultural factors and physical differences, women thus positioned in
the present social structure are not equally treated in terms of employment, resource
possession, and social networking and naturally are susceptible to being marginalized
and gradually fall into poverty.5
4 Liu [4].
5 Cai [5].
Take a broader look at the present poverty alleviation work. Many a poverty-
reduction policy in China have paid inadequate attention to gender equality, espe-
cially to those impoverished rural women.6 The rural left-behind population, mostly
women, are extremely vulnerable to poverty, owing to many difficulties such as
physical weakness and scant resource occupancy.
To push forward the poverty-curbing work related to rural women, one way is
to improve their existing capabilities and to cultivate their new survival skills and
abilities. Another way is to break the barriers restraining poor women from getting
out of poverty and achieving the social objective of female development and gender
equality.7 Poverty among women, compared with other types of poverty, has multiple
root causes: invisible, vulnerable, transmissible but hard to eradicate. Women play an
important role in the family and society, and their state of being will directly impact
on the development of their family and children. So, poverty-curbing social workers
need to start their work from the points of social culture and social structure and then
draw on females’ “advantage perspective” to expand women’s rights, tap into their
potentials, and protect their legitimate rights and interests.
6.1.2 Children
As hope of the nation, children are crucial to the construction of the national future.
Children in poverty, a special group in need, require care and attention from the
whole society. Poor children mostly come from low-income families including those
from welfare-receiving families, rural children with five guarantees, orphans and
handicapped children in urban welfare institutions, street children taken in by city
relief and protection agencies, and children who are plagued by disease.8 With no
ability to live independently, these children rely on their primary caretakers for a
living, so they are directly affected by the status quo of their families. More concretely,
poor children may inevitably encounter the following problems.
Educational problems
Poor children, handicapped by family economic conditions and adversely affected
by parents’ educational levels, can hardly receive education of the same quality
and under the same conditions as their peers can. And such a phenomenon often
happens to rural poor children. The government has put many policies into imple-
mentation to force school-age children to take compulsory education and has granted
a series of educational allowances to poor families to encourage their acceptance of
compulsory education, but, unfortunately, some children, under the sway of their
parents’ ideas or at their own will, still fail to have received compulsory education.
Besides, the quality of the education received by poor children needs to be improved.
6 Zhang and You [6].

7 Xing [7].
8 Zhang and Jun [8].
Restricted by regional economic development, the educational quality and conditions

of rural schools remain backward, leaving the poor children unable to enjoy the same
educational rights as normal children, and thus hindering their future development.
Safety problems
With little supervision from parents, poor children have very weak self-defense
awareness, so problems concerning their safety require attention from the whole
society. In recent years, drowning, abduction and traffic, and sexual abuse among
children have happened from time to time, which has deeply undermined the devel-
opment of poor children and makes it difficult to protect their basic rights. Absence
of family education, mental immaturity and regional backwardness in culture leave
children with no safe living environment and severely threaten their lives.
Problems related to intergenerational transmission of poverty culture
Culture, once fostered, is transmissible; so is culture of poverty. Intergenerational
transmission of poverty culture is a situation in which parental poverty, caused by
lack of social capital or by dearth of educational resources, provides the children with
a family environment that puts them in a disadvantaged position in social competition
and induces to intergenerationally transmitted poverty. The transmission of poverty
is harmful to the development of the family or the growth of children. The major
concern of poverty elimination social worker should be to break down the cross-
generation transmission and return the family to its normal function. Research has
revealed that teenagers from poor families in China are already at a disadvantage in
terms of human resources. Exacerbated by generally tense employment pressure at
present, it is very likely, in future, for poverty to transmit cross-generationally among
the young groups from poor families due to their low social status and lack of job
opportunities.9
Psychological and behavioral problems
Firstly, influenced by their education and families, poor children can acquire bad
behaviors very easily; some of them, if not restricted, might become young delin-
quents. Secondly, some poor children become easy prey to self-doubt and self-
negation which deepens their sense of inferiority and reduces their “pro-social behav-
iors”. In terms of social-emotional development, some poor children will form lower
self-esteem and lower sense of self-worth and lack positive self-identity, which will
hamper their interpersonal communication and future development.10
9 Sun [9].
10 Feng and Yu [10].
6.1.3 The Elderly
Elderly people are a special group in our society, among whom problems of poverty
occur frequently. The aged-related poverty is attributable to many factors such as
physical decline, loss of work ability, and support from adult children. Some scholars
believe that elderly poverty is caused by social changes and the social structure.
As the rural population decreases and the aging population on the whole increases
at an accelerated pace, the number of rural elderly people is getting bigger, and the
problems related to elderly poverty have come to the fore. Rural poor elderly people
constitute an important portion of the impoverished population. As a result of decline
in body functions and social status, the poverty confronting the elderly is more severe,
the situation is more dangerous, and so the measures to reduce poverty stand in dire
need of constant improvement.11 Elderly poverty alleviation involves material care,
health care, family support, and so on. Therefore, poverty-reduction programs need
to ensure basic sustenance for the elderly and to increase their income and to keep
them healthy. Elderly poverty can bring about a series of social problems related to
family support, social security, medical aid and assistance, and so on. More often
than not, the poor elderly people lack support from their children and care from the
society, suffering from both spiritual emptiness and financial pressure. The poverty
problems of the elderly who are vulnerable and incapable are covert and hard to
be detected, and so, once the problems emerge, the social welfare system should
take economic responsibilities and console the elderly people with social support
and pastoral care. Suicides and abuses ascribable to elderly poverty have occurred
occasionally. Family connection should play a major role in supporting the elderly.
Elderly people who are with no family, disabled, or childless should be specifically
attended to by giving them spiritual consolation, financial aid, and necessary social
assistance.
6.1.4 The Disabled
The disabled refer to the people who have physical defects that limit their normal
participation in social life. Due to physical deficiencies, people with disabilities are
unable to engage in employment as normal, exposing themselves to easy and quick
financial trouble. Some of them, because of heavy psychological burdens, cannot
partake of social life normally, which further diminishes their interpersonal circle
and makes their connection to the society easy to break. As it were, people with
disabilities are most vulnerable to poverty. It is easy for the disabled to fall into
poverty as a result of their disadvantages in such aspects as physical condition,
degree of education, possession of resources and social status. It is most difficult
to reduce poverty among the rural disabled.12 Households with a Disabled Member
11 Lin [11].
12 Chen [12].
exercise weak resilience against risks. In rural areas where allocation of resources
and development are unbalanced, people with disabilities are at a disadvantage in
terms of employment, education, medical care, and marriage.
Disabilities may have negative influence on individual education and employment,
bringing down the living standard of the disabled and their families, and dragging
the whole family into poverty, eventually.13 Disabilities can also create employment
difficulties for the disabled, restricting the types of job they can choose and take.
Disabilities can interfere with the development of the household due to the fact that
the disabled need care in their life, which, to some extent, affects the employment of
other family members and imposes great financial pressure upon the family.
6.2 Poverty-Curbing Social Workers
Social work has its origin in poverty relief and philanthropy and was originally
invented to tackle problems caused by industrialization. Viewed from this perspec-
tive, social work can be discerned to be inextricably related to social poverty. Social
work is an irreplaceable vital force in poverty reduction, as it were. Modern social
work sets social justice as its ultimate ideal and offers professional service for people
in need through professional ways and approaches. From a macro-perspective, social
work can reflect the basic needs of the impoverished and protect their rights by influ-
encing the framing of policies and publicizing poverty alleviation policies. From a
meso-perspective, social work, as a form of political practice, has gradually morphed
into medium of communication between government and people. In the domain of
reducing poverty, social work can effectively divert social resources, construct a
social and communal supporting network, alter public stereotypes over the poor, and
help the poor get out of poverty and get rich by drawing on their own abilities. From
a micro-perspective, the causes of poverty can be low self-motivation, institutional
defects, social exclusion, natural disasters, and so on. With the guidance of devel-
opmental therapy and through “advantage perspective”, social work empowers the
poor to grow on their own, motivates their personal agency, and helps them to acquire
self-confidence and power to change their status quo.
In summary, while carrying out the poverty-reducing work, social workers take
as the core guideline “ability acquisition” and “asset building” and adopt profes-
sional methodology to network social resources, realize linked development and
joint participation, and help the poor to better their ability of self-growth. Relying
on professional values and criteria and falling back upon scientific approaches,
poverty-reducing social workers identify the needs of their clients, coordinate social
resources, and help the poor to ease and even eradicate poverty largely on their own
initiative. Throughout the entire process, social workers normally give priority to
fostering abilities, take resource sustainability as a complement, improve the clients’
resilience to risks, and relentlessly restore their social functions.
13 Liao [13].
6.2 Poverty-Curbing Social Workers 157
6.2.1 The Roles Played by Poverty-Reducing Social Workers
Social work was created to eliminate social poverty. The poverty-eliminating social
work, therefore, includes two aspects.14
The first aspect is to undertake professional activities centering around the impov-
erished individuals. At this level, social work attributes poverty to low personal moti-
vation, believing that long-term poverty of a person or a family is caused by constant
influence of “poverty culture” which can transmit across generations and, once gener-
ated, it will have a lasting effect on the children and even people around. From this
perspective, social work should focus on improving individual capability, motivating
their potentials, driving the poor to embrace self-reliance and self-improvement,
reducing the ill impact of “poverty culture”, and assisting the poor in their efforts to
combat poverty.
The second aspect is to alleviate poverty by changing the social environment. At
this level, social work attributes poverty to social structure, imperfection of policy-
making, social exclusion, and the like. From this perspective, the major job for the
social workers to do is to report to the policies-makers, explain policies to the public,
and actively advocate fair and reasonable social policies to alleviate the pressure on
the poor exercised by the social environment in which they are living. For example,
a common reason for the poor to lose jobs is because they lack working skills, and so
social workers need to pro-actively administer supporting policies, increase the poor’s
social competitiveness, and raise public tolerance toward the poor; simultaneously,
social workers can cooperate with judicial and civil administrative departments,
offering the poor whose interests are harmed legal aid and psychological counseling
and guarantee their lawful rights to participate in social competition.
While assisting a poor person, social workers specializing in reducing poverty
are supposed to adjust their work to suit the specific circumstances, accurately iden-
tify the problems therein, mobilize all parties concerned, and achieve sustainable
development. Therefore, the roles played by poverty-curbing social workers can be
summed up to be service provider, resource obtainer, necessity assessor, policy-
making influencer, enabler, and advocate. For these multi-faceted roles, we shall
discuss them each in detail.
6.2.1.1 Service Provider
Social workers, in their beneficent activities, often act as a medium and provide direct
or indirect service to help the clients solve problems. The impoverished population,
stuck in a certain social class for a long time, fall short of some resources. Hence,
the poverty-reducing social workers should provide professional social services for
the poor by utilizing their professional approaches and skills. As for the impover-
ished individuals, long-term poverty results in their low self-efficacy and incomplete
self-knowledge, which may, in turn, lead to self-abasement and self-abandonment.
14 Sun [14].
Through direct service methods such as case work, group work, and community
work, social workers should affirm their values and give them the confidence to
change the status quo, so that they achieve psychological changes, get rid of the
passive and negative influence of fatalism, and become independent or self-reliant.
6.2.1.2 Resource Obtainer
Social work requires getting involved with other institutions and offering the clients
necessary resources to help them walk out of the plight. The biggest problem
confronting the poor is about finance. Enlarging their sources of income and realizing
their financial independence call for social workers to cooperate with social depart-
ments to build a fair and legitimate social milieu. What’s more, factors like natural
disasters, lack of education, unreasonable social structure, social exclusion, and so
on can all result in poverty. If things continue this way, a certain group of people will
get marginalized by the mainstream society, breeding a series of social problems.
Poverty can generate a strong sense of self-abasement in some of the poor people
who will reduce their pro-social behaviors and might develop anti-social personality.
Moreover, more children from poor families will drop out of school than those from
normal families. They have faint legal awareness, so their basic rights can hardly be
effectively guaranteed, which increases their vulnerability to delinquency. As can be
seen, poverty gives rise to a series of social problems. As promoters of social poli-
cies and deliverers of social benefits, social workers need to utilize social resources,
secure assistance from all parties, and solve the problems confronting the poor.
Indifference and discrimination from the society make it easy for the poor to
generate feelings of inferiority, so they might step back from social competition,
either pro-actively or passively. The tasks for the social workers are then to return
the poor people back to the social stage by seeking support from the local govern-
ment, civil affairs department, and poverty-reduction leading group office, hosting
activities and events aimed to deliver assistance and care; offering material and finan-
cial help; organizing the poor with working abilities to engage in various economic
activities such as rural cooperatives and collective operations according to specific
circumstances; and keeping in constant touch with local enterprises to help the poor
to start individual or group businesses and ensure sustainable economic development.
Besides, it is also their task to restore the sense of contentment to the poor, to make
them feel being cared and loved by the society, and to return them to the mainstream
by offering legal aid, medical care, and guarantee of education.
From the perspective of social environment, poverty is generated by institutional
exclusion of market economy and the poor people’s vulnerability to risks. Economic
deprivation and social exclusion do not only reduce the abilities of the poor to
compete for social resources, but also isolate them socially, causing severe spiritual
and psychological scars.15 Social worker should endeavor to build social supportive
network, alter the public view on poverty, and correct the bias that poverty is caused
15 Xiang and Xia [1].

by laziness. Social workers can call on people to donate money and clothing, so as
to deliver material support and spiritual care from the society to the poor.
6.2.1.3 Necessity Assessor
Lester M. Salamon holds the opinion that, to achieve the objectives of social construc-
tion, government should place some public services on social organizations, and it
only needs to provide financial support and stay on top of things.16 As a profession
of providing assistance to solve social problems and maintain social stability, social
work has become the right hand in solving poverty problems.
In the process of reducing poverty, social work can well play the role of super-
vising and assessing. With government leading the poverty alleviation work and local
departments carrying out the policies, deviations in the implementation of policies
are inevitable, and the results will directly be reflected on the poor households. It
is hard for the government which is not an “omnipotent hand” to effectively assess
the process and effects of policy implementation. As an objective and impartial third
party, social workers play an important role in poverty alleviation programs. Social
work institutions can identify the poor population, assess the process and results
of poverty-reduction efforts, and effectively supervise the conduction of poverty
curbing work, so as to prevent waste of resources and abuse of power and left the
national policies benefit the poor people.
What’s more, when applying for recognition of poverty, residents have met many
problems which require social workers to examine so that policies can be success-
fully implemented. At present, it is mainly the subdistrict offices and neighborhood
committees that grant applications for recognition as a poor household, which leads
to an admixture of the genuine and the false. Not a few relatively “rich” families are
granted the relief for the poor, while the real impoverished are rejected outside of the
government’s reach covered by the supporting policies. Furthermore, due to the fact
that applications need to be reported to governments at higher levels, and informa-
tion of the applicants must be open to the public, applicants in question will develop
a psychological burden. As assessors, social workers must regulate the assessment
process and standards in a proper way. Social workers can make household surveys to
check personal status of finance and income and learn about their genuine needs. In
this way, mistakes and negligence can be preempted or prevented, and what’s more,
psychological burdens felt by the poor applicants can be mitigated as professional
methods are utilized as intervention throughout the process of assessment.
6.2.1.4 Policy-making Influencer
To solve poverty problems and maintain social stability, the government has succes-
sively made a series of social relief and aid policies. Social workers directly engage
16 Salamon [15].
with the poor in their work and are concerned with their immediate interests. While
implementing policies, social workers can keenly detect how far the poor are bene-
fited by aid policies so that they can understand the effects produce by the policies
based on their knowledge of the needs of the poor. From the stance on whether the
poor are really benefited, social workers can report the poor people’s feedback and
advice, problems, and needs to policy makers, facilitating the revision or refinement
and perfection of social policies. Various causes of poverty require the government
to make favorable policies in many aspects for the poor, with a view to reducing the
backlash generated by poverty problems. Simultaneously, social workers can learn
about the social conditions and public opinions in time, accurately identify the prob-
lems and needs of the poor, and steer the implementation of social policies really
toward benefitting the people maximally.
6.2.1.5 Enabler
From the perspective of poverty causes, it is mainly personal factors or those related to
social environment that lead to gradual social marginalization. Social workers possess
many social resources which enable them to improve social competitiveness of the
poor. The most effective way is to encourage the poor to actively get employed, strive
for social capital which is necessary for living, lift themselves out of poverty, and get
rich. As enablers, social workers evolve their work around changing poor individuals,
especially around raising their human capital.17 On the one hand, social workers can
elevate the working skills and confidence of the poor by holding activities; on the other
hand, social workers can focus on “ability improvement”,—reduce the influence of
poverty culture, stimulate personal potentials and prompt self-change.
The poor people lack opportunities in the job market largely because of their
insufficient resources which include educational, interpersonal and labor resources,
and regional advantages. Social workers need to start with these aspects to improve
the poor’s competitiveness. In his book Happiness is Like Flowers: A Document of
Rural Culture, Women and Development, Gu Xuebing describes an example in which
social workers encourage local women to form a handicraft group, push villagers to
get more socially involved by drawing on their own advantages, orchestrate a series of
training programs and offer technical support, and arm women with strength theory to
fight against poverty, turning “cultural self-abasement” into “cultural confidence”.18
Firstly, it is difficult for the poor to find stable jobs for lacking working skills.
Social workers can set up training programs for vocational skills to increase the poor’s
social capital, enabling them to have the abilities required by the labor market. In
addition, with few social resources, the poor people can hardly get suitable employ-
ment information. Social workers can get linked with the outside world and actively
contact local human resources department. Social workers can also integrate the poor
people’s unique features and advantages, support them to start own businesses with
17 Sun [14].
18 Gu [16].
technological and financial aids and favorable policies, and improve their abilities to
participate in social life in line with the developing strategy of “introducing in” and
“walking out”.
Secondly, due to long-term marginalization, the poor may develop cultural self-
abasement and lack self-acceptance. Considering the psychological conditions of the
poor, social workers can provide psychological counseling to make them willing to
contact and get involved with the society, strip the public of their prejudice against
the poor, help them to shake off the shackle of fatalism, restore their confidence in
changing the status quo, enable them to regain the control of their own life, and
replace “cultural self-abasement” with “cultural self-confidence”.
6.2.1.6 Advocate
As advocates, social workers should focus on how to improve the social environment.
On the one hand, they should encourage the poor people to actively take part in
market competition. Social workers should call on the poor to abandon the survival
mode of “reliance”, avoid the passive living state of “waiting, relying, and begging”,
and take the initiative to change their own living conditions. Social work should
actively seek for employment opportunities, contact with relevant governmental
departments, and expand employment paths for the poor. Besides, the government
can purchasing some jobs with low technical requirements and provide the jobs for
the poor. The government can also persuade local enterprises to offer jobs to the
poor, or left the local richer people bring along the poor, enabling some to realize
self-reliance first, and thus more and more will get richer.
On the other hand, social workers should advocate a market environment with
fair and reasonable distribution. Firstly, the poor people tend to lack required skills
and knowledge, so in the labor market, their basic rights can hardly be guaranteed,
and their resistance to risks is weak, and it is often difficult for them to find effective
aids. Social workers should follow up on the poor after they take a job. Secondly,
public tolerance toward the poor influences how far they participate in social life.
Social workers should endeavor to change public attitudes to and knowledge about
the poor and create a fair and tolerant social environment.
6.2.2 The Functions of Poverty Alleviation Social Workers
It was for the purpose to solve poverty problems, realize social justice, and alleviate
social contradictions that social work was created. By using scientific technologies
and methods, poverty reducing social workers can recognize in time the dangerous
situations facing the poor and help them fully understand themselves and materialize
self-development. Therefore, helping people is one of the basic tasks undertaken by
the poverty curbing social workers.
6.2.2.1 Social Work’s Function for the Clients
The basic function of social work is to offer assistance, especially to help clients
to develop the ability to control their own life. Poverty was mostly understood as
absolute poverty in the past poverty alleviation work, and assistance was more about
finance and materials, while psychological and spiritual support was rare.19 This
is “blood-transfusing” mode of poverty-reducing. Social work follows the idea of
putting people first, fully respects the clients’ subjectivity, and has transformed
the poverty-reducing mode from passive blood-transfusing to active and devel-
opmental blood-making. Abandoning the past assistance perspective which takes
problems as the core, social work now centers on improving abilities, endeavors
to enhance the clients’ living abilities and confidence in life, and increases the
poor people’s social capital by adopting “advantage perspective”, so as to avoid
the vicious cycle of “poverty elimination–poverty-returning–poverty elimination
again–poverty-returning again”.20
First, rescuing people from crisis. Poverty alleviation social work is a practice
about rescuing people from crisis. The poor people are vulnerable to risks due to
their low ability, so it is hard for them to get out of predicament on their own, and
social workers’ interference and assistance are needed. Stopped by the idea that
“domestic shame should not be made public” or by a passive attitude toward seeking
for help, the poor people might refrain from asking for aid. Poverty reducing social
workers should be insightful when they communicate with the poor people and assess
their troubles and should provide targeted interference to prevent the problems from
getting magnified and worsening poverty.
Second, alleviating difficulties. The poor may encounter all kinds of difficulties
jeopardizing their normal personal life. Due to lack of social resources, the poor
individuals or families can hardly overcome them. Under such circumstances, support
from related governmental departments or professional poverty elimination workers
is necessary to tide the individuals or families over plights. One of the basic objectives
for poverty alleviation social workers is to alleviate the pressure on people in trouble,
pull them out of predicament, realize their personal development, and guarantee the
interests of the poor people. The social workers should accurately identify the poor,
offer reasonable aid, and improve the poor’s resistance against risks to prevent them
from falling back into poverty again.
Third, stimulating potentials. What most obviously differentiates poverty allevia-
tion social work from other similar institutions is that social work carries on targeted
aid activities according to the requirements and personality traits of the poor people
and lay emphasis on improving internal motivation and stimulating potentials in the
poor. And the social workers should help the poor by stimulating their inner poten-
tials when dealing with poverty problems. Some poor people may have a sense of
low self-worth, easy to doubt or negate themselves. They should constantly increase

20 Yang [18].
poor people’s self-efficacy and self-mastery, help them to shake off the shackle of
fatalism, enable them to tackle difficulties, and restore their social functions.
Fourth, prompting development. While alleviating poverty, social work mainly
adopts the mode of development and of blood-making which is sustainable. Relief
mode in the past largely depended on national finance security, which, in the long
run, reduced poor people’s willingness to actively get rid of poverty and led to the
phenomenon where idlers got relief and did not need to work while government’s
financial burden got heavier, and thus poverty reduction work achieved little and
even made the poor sink deeper into poverty. Social work takes helping people
as its basic idea and aims to restore clients’ social functions and materialize their
development. Compared with the traditional one-sided passive mode, social work
emphasizes clients’ initiative, helps them to exploit personal advantages to the full,
invites them to participate in the management, and enhances their abilities to solve
problems, so that they can deal with similar problems independently, improve their
finance and ability substantially, and abandon poverty perpetually.
6.2.2.2 Social Work’s Function for the Society
First, solving social problems and maintaining social stability. Since its appearance,
social work has been for maintaining social stability. As it were, social work’s purpose
is consistent with poverty alleviation. As a country of large population, China has a
great number of poor people, and poverty is the most persistent and most troublesome
problem which, if unattended, may cause inestimable social consequences. Social
workers, with professional concepts and approaches, have made a series of achieve-
ments such as improving people’s living conditions, protecting people’s interests, and
maintaining social stability by effectively integrating social security, social policies,
and social welfare.
Second, prompting social harmony and promoting social progress. At present,
poverty does not only affect individuals and families but also hampers social progress.
Poverty alleviation social workers have the function of maintaining stability and,
with solving problems as guidance, play an irreplaceable role in such poverty
curbing process. Social workers have come up with some new thoughts and new
methods for solving poverty-related problems, relieved social contradictions, and
promoted to some extent social progress.
6.2.3 The Core Competencies of Poverty-Eliminating Social

Workers
6.2.3.1 Theoretical Competency
Social workers have the competency to embed professionalism, theories, and

approaches in their work and play an important role in poverty curbing programs.
In their actual working process, the social workers not only need to firmly master
professional knowledge, but also concepts related to poverty reduction.
First, setting up the concept of coordinating the rural and urban development. The
causes of poverty in urban areas may differ from those in rural areas, so the interfering
methods social work adopts should vary accordingly. Although there are differences
between the rural and urban areas in terms of development potential, geographical
conditions and external resources, poverty Alleviation social workers should attach
full importance to the concept that rural and urban areas have equal rights to develop
and poor people from both areas have the equal potential and capacity. Social workers
should help both rural and urban poor to participate in social competition together
and prompt a fair and reasonable social environment for them.
Second, setting up the concept of common prosperity. The social work should take
the awareness of economic independence as its basic objective. By letting a small
proportion of the population who are relatively richer to help more people achieve
economic independence, social work promotes regional development and reduces
poverty and materializes common prosperity. What’s more, social work emphasizes
spiritual construction, that is, enriching the poor people’s spiritual life while helping
them to achieve economic prosperity.
Third, setting up the concept of internal motivation. To transform the poverty-
reducing mode from blood-transfusing to blood-making, the social workers should
attach great importance to the development of poor people’s personal abilities and
potentials, abandon the past poverty-reducing mode which focuses on reducing
poverty itself but neglects spiritual construction, encourage the poor to take part
in community life, discover their personal strengths, and help them to really get rid
of poverty materially and spiritually.
6.2.3.2 Abilities Related to Scientific Knowledge
While carrying on specific activities, social workers need to contact different social
departments and link varied social resources. Therefore, they should have the
following abilities.
First, the ability to master knowledge about policies. To hold effective activities
to help people according to government’s poverty-reduction policies, they can orga-
nize people to learn poverty-reduction policies and guarantee their basic rights. As
providers of feedback on social policies, poverty Alleviation social workers should
6.3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 165
adopt a problem perspective so that they can report the shortcomings of certain
policies in time and give advice to help amend and perfect policies.
Second, the ability to organize and administrate. While running poverty Alle-
viation and development programs, social workers should effectively administrate
poor areas. For example, to make decisions when carrying on a poverty Alleviation
program, they should evaluate whether the program is feasible, scientific, effective,
and universally beneficial, pick the best plans, and manage the program scientifically.
Third, the ability to apply practical skills. Professional skills are embodiment
of scientific values and concepts. Poverty alleviation social workers can adopt
direct methods such as casework, group work, and community work to build poor
people’s abilities, offer them psychological counseling, and restore their normal
social functions. Meanwhile, they can improve poverty, optimize practical skills, and
magnify poverty curbing effects by supplementary means such as policy consultation,
communal support, career guidance, education, publicity, and legal aid.
6.3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work
Poverty alleviation is a social cause and a historical project. However, whether viewed
from the texts of poverty curbing policies or from the process, poverty-reducing poli-
cies emphasize strategic construction while neglect promotion of values.21 Strategic
construction takes tasks as the guidance, emphasizing efficiency and effects; promo-
tion of values takes process as the guidance, stressing ability construction, cultural
support, and sustainable development. Traditional poverty alleviation ways attach
importance to tasks, evaluates the effects of poverty reduction by checking how
many targets have been accomplished, but lacks guidance of concepts and values.
As a result, the implementation of policies can hardly develop sustainably, the poor
people included in poverty-reduction programs are not motivated, and the burden
on the government is still heavy enough. Besides, social guidance on poverty alle-
viation and social work’s professional strength are complementary, highly coupled,
and mutually constitutive. Integrating social work’s professional values and concepts
into the implementation of policies renders policies humanized and people-oriented.
This not only has practical values but also reflects the core concept of sustainable
development. The process of fusing value construction into the practice of poverty
alleviation is called value affinity between poverty-reducing social work and poverty
alleviation projects.
As a discipline putting values first, social work, in its practice, is led by altruism,
pursues social equity and justice, and emphasizes subjectivity of the clients, which
is congruent with the values of poverty alleviation.
21 Wang [19].
6.3.1 The Core Value—Helping People to Help Themselves
Helping people to help themselves is the core value of social work. Inwords, while
helping the clients to get rid of poverty, social workers should stimulate their poten-
tials, enhance their independence, reduce their reliance, teach them the ability to solve
problems, and enable them to live independently. Applying the concept of helping
people to help themselves to the poverty reduction work, social workers should give
full play to poor people’s subjectivity, raise their awareness of poverty reduction,
take “the self” as the key factor of poverty reduction, and magnify the effects of
poverty alleviation by stimulating poor people’s internal momentum. Everyone has
a need to be respected and must fight for his own good life and materialization of
personal value. The poor people should first have the spirit of “self-help” before they
could regain control on their own life. From the perspective of rights, a person should
take more responsibility for his own life than anyone else; from the perspective of
poverty alleviation strategies, the poor are the key to the solution of poverty problems,
and their personal development directly affects the results; from the perspective of
objectives, the ultimate aim of poverty alleviation is to explore personal values and
realize personal growth; from the perspective of effects, only personal willingness to
change can ensure that poverty is really got rid of. Therefore, individuals are the core
of poverty reduction, self-help is the core of personal self-value, and the amount of
individual initiative involved will directly affect the realization of poverty alleviation.
The core value of helping people to help themselves and the pursuit of poverty
alleviation both are promoting social equality and justice and realizing common pros-
perity. If poverty curbing totally relies on government’s welfare and subsidies, the
load on government will then be too heavy, and it will hinder the efficient develop-
ment of the economy. The social workers should stimulate the poor people’s internal
motivation, turn “passively getting rid of poverty” to “actively endeavoring to get
rid”, and thus ease the burden on the government and society and achieve common
prosperity earlier. The profession of social work develops with the increase of social
problems, especially poverty-related problems. Its feature “humanization” is applied
to such work, which compensates for the lack of humanistic care in traditional poverty
alleviation work. “Being helped by others” has been turned into “helping themselves”
through exploring poor people’s internal potential.
6.3.2 The Professional Value of Poverty Alleviation
6.3.2.1 People-Orientation
Social work takes the clients’ needs as the guidance and protects people’s basic rights
and dignity. In the poverty-reducing process, social workers tackle poor people’s most
urgent problems first and actively assist them to solve current problems. Specifically,
6.3 Values of Poverty Alleviation Social Work 167
while social work intervenes, it follows the guide of process goals, emphasizes the
clients’ experience and self-growth, and stresses the sustainability of clients’ devel-
opment. Social workers should start from the present living conditions of the poor,
learn about their problems and needs, and solve their most concerned and most
urgent problems first and stick to the idea of putting people first throughout poverty
alleviation programs.22
The traditional poverty-reduction mode neglects to support the poor psycholog-
ically and only provides material assistance, so it is hard for the poor to get rid of
poverty perpetually. Involving the concept of social work in poverty alleviation work
can make the implementation of relevant policies more humanized and focus atten-
tion on individual rights, possession of resources, living situations, and so on. The
idea of putting people first shows concern for individuals, emphasizes the protec-
tion of individual rights and satisfaction of individual needs, and demonstrates the
significance of humanitarianism in resolving difficulties and prompting individual
development.
6.3.2.2 Acceptance
Acceptance means to what degree social workers accept and tolerate the clients’
background, social identity, and personality. After identifying the clients, poverty
alleviation social workers need to first acquaint themselves with clients’ basic back-
ground and accept the clients as they are without judging them, which is very difficult
for social workers while they face all kinds of poor people with varied living back-
ground, cognition, experience, and values. For example, when dealing with a client
who has fallen into poverty because of AIDS or lack of self-motivation, poverty-
reducing social workers should adhere to the attitude of accepting but not judging so
that they can handle the conflicts among their own values, clients’ values, and social
values.
In the process of “acceptance”, the social workers should handle the “degree”,
respecting and understanding the clients but not compromising principles. They
should lead the poor out of predicament with an attitude of equity and respect and
help the poor rebuild their value of life. The poor might have been rejected by the
society for a long period, so they tend to feel helpless, doubt themselves, or even deny
themselves. Poverty Alleviation social workers do not only need to accept the poor
without conditions but also must left the poor accept their own experience, current
situation, and imperfect self and form correct self-knowledge, so as to prompt the
poor to develop as individuals.
22 Wang [20].
6.3.2.3 Self-determination
Self-determination means to make decisions by themselves, which is manifested in

social work: social workers do not only respect clients’ basic rights and encourage
them to make rational choices in distress, but also respect clients’ right to make
choices. The process of improving clients’ ability to make choices is also one of
empowering them. Being excluded and marginalized by the society for a long period,
the poor have low self-identity and strong sense of self-denial. Therefore, when they
need to make decisions, they tend to choose to escape or let others decide for them,
unable to totally control their own life. The past blood-transfusing mode of poverty
reduction makes the poor used to the life-style of being assisted, and the government
gradually becomes the main role while the poor lose their subjectivity little by little
and retreat of their accord to a subsidiary position in the process of poverty-curbing.
The main causes of poverty are lack of a certain or some social resources, backward
educational conditions, and learned helplessness generated by long-term immersion
in traditional and backward culture which decreases their inclination to fight with
unfairness in their real life.
Firstly, the task of poverty alleviation social workers is to increase poor people’s
willingness to get involved in poverty-reduction efforts, not only alleviating poverty
but also raising morale. As advocates and enablers, social workers should change
poor people’s habitual way of handling things, give them confidence in changing the
status quo, and left them regain control over themselves. Secondly, when the poor
can make decisions for themselves, the social workers still need to provide necessary
social resources for them, respect their choices, and let the poor people be the main
role in reducing poverty.
6.3.2.4 Individualization
Social workers can meet all kinds of poor people in their work, so one single approach
is insufficient for the changeable situations. The people that social workers deal with
differ from one another in terms of personality, values, behavioral style, and family
background, so social workers should work on a case-by-case basis. In a broad sense,
the clients of poverty alleviation social work can be classified into those from urban
areas and those from rural areas. In a narrow sense, the clients can be divided into
women, children, older people, the disabled, and so on. Therefore, social workers
should consider clients’ varied psychological features and social environments and
individualize their intervening work.
The causes of poverty for urban people are problems generated by social trans-
formation and unreasonable social structure. In comparison, rural poverty problems
are more complicated, such as shortage of labor force and lack of education and
geographical isolation. Considering urban and rural differences, a fixed working
mode is far from enough. Social work should have varied working modes according
the clients’ personality, personal strengths, and local features. Poor individuals and
6.4 Approaches of Poverty-Reducing Social Work 169
poor groups will have different problems, so the methods must be different accord-
ingly, and the principle of individualization should be stuck to. The principle of
individualization is a transformation from “broad irrigation” to “targeted trickling”.
Social workers should find the causes of poverty by doing household surveys, follow
the principle of “providing what is lacking”, and stick to the important instruction
that it depends on the specific circumstances whether to develop agriculture, industry,
commerce, or tourism in order to help the poor improve the conditions for producing
and living.23
The objective of poverty alleviation social work is to perfect poor people’s
“hematopoietic” function, putting ability building first, and gradually turning to
capital establishment. Although the government’s policies that providing assistance
and safety net have raised poor people’s living standard, efforts to boost the poor
people’s spirits are still needed so that the results of poverty reduction can be
maintained for long. The self is the core of transformation. Social workers must
stimulate poor people’s internal motivation and personal potentials and make them
actively obtain resources in the market environment and only in this way can poverty
reduction work produce good effects.
6.4 Approaches of Poverty-Reducing Social Work
The impoverished are in a helpless state in the society. Isolation from social support
and interpersonal interaction can bring greater pressure on them and thus breed a
series of social problems and conflicts. From a macro-perspective, in order to solve
problems caused by poverty, guarantee poor people’s basic rights and facilitate poor
individual’s sustainable development, the government should design and establish
poverty-curbing policies, promote employment, perfect social welfare system, and
provide basic life security for the poor. However, the design and implementation of
policies mostly put effects first and seldom consider poor people’s psychological
state or individual potentials. The mode of pushing policies from up to bottom does
not only fail to make the poor self-motivated in poverty reduction but also brings
huge financial burden on the government.
Integrating respect for poor people’s subjectivity into its design of system, poverty
Alleviation social work offers individualized and diversified services and turns
cultural self-abasement in the depth of poor people’s hearts into cultural confidence.
In terms of working approaches, social work applies casework, group work and
community work to poverty Alleviation programs; in terms of social resources, social
work provides certain material assistance for the poor; in the aspect of behaviors,
social work prompts the poor to develop pro-social behaviors; as for psychology,
social work lefts the poor achieve self-identity; as for effects, social work material-
izes “joint social construction”. What’s more, in terms of implementation of policies,
the social work carries out supporting policies, distributes welfare payments and
23 Gu [2].
subsidies, offers vocational counsel, and promotes social tolerance through indirect
methods such as social work administration.
6.4.1 Case Work
Casework, as part of poverty reduction social work, is based on professional values

and adopts professional methods to offer targeted and individualized services to poor
individuals or households. It aims to help poor individuals and households solve
problems, improve their ability to develop, restore their social functions, enhance
their confidence in their abilities to transform, and raise their social adaptability.
Viewed from a macro-perspective, the causes of poverty can be divided into
personal ones and social ones. For individuals, the causes of poverty can be common
or special, so specific circumstances require concrete analyzes. To solve the poverty
problems confronting poor individuals or households, poverty Alleviation social
workers should see the essence from the source and propose different solutions to
concrete problems. Chalmers believes that casework is direct one-to-one individual-
ized work, should provide clients with sufficient care, and should care about, support
and understand clients instead of attributing the source of poverty to the clients.
Personal problems are inseparable from the situations, so the social workers should
pay attention to the connection between the poor people and the situations they are
in. When carrying on specific activities, they should view the causes of poor people’s
problems in the context of their living circumstances which should be changed first
before their problems being solved. As for providing resources, they should make
full use of the “natural resources” of the poor individuals or households by mobi-
lizing their family members, relatives, and friends or by turning to the society for
resources, if necessary.
While conducting case work, in addition to giving active support and respect to
the poor, the social workers should also fully mobilize their subjective initiative and
make them actively take part in the process of poverty reduction. Influenced by factors
such as the social workers’ professional status, the poor tend to put themselves in
a subordinate or passive place, while viewing them as authority and believing that
social workers are in the leading position, which makes it difficult to mobilize the
poor to take the initiative in self-development, exaggerates the social workers’ power
and impedes the realization of poverty reduction objectives. The social work empha-
sizes that the poor people are the center and to boost poor people’s confidence in
transforming themselves requires subjectification of the poor. They should maintain
an equal and mutually promotive relation with the poor, arouse the poor’s enthusiasm
and initiative, and make them actively plan for their future development. They should
let the poor realize the influence of the environment on individuals, correct their
misunderstanding of themselves, improve their ability to solve problems, and help
them really get rid of poverty.
There are some specific operation modes of casework in the poverty

curbing process such as crisis-intervening mode, task-based mode, narrative-therapy
mode, socio-psychological mode, and behavioral-therapy mode that can provide
material support and psychological counseling for poor individuals and households.
6.4.1.1 Crisis Intervention Mode
Crisis-intervening mode in poverty reducing programs refers to the method that

the social workers adopt to start from dealing with poor people’s crises, learning
about the causes and the most profound crises, and then focus on the aims and help
the poor gain accurate knowledge about their crises. When the clients fall into or
sink deeper in poverty after a crisis which they cannot handle and will affect their
future life, the social workers can adopt the crisis intervention mode to help them get
through the crisis. After recognizing the crisis, they should ease the poor’s anxiety,
work out effective solutions with them, and help them get back to normal life.
6.4.1.2 Task-Based Mode
Poverty-reducing social workers begin with the problems that the poor are most
concerned about, discuss with them and find solutions together, and emphasize the
modes and methods of solving problems. Task-based mode puts individuals in the
center, help the poor identify the problems, find the roots of their problems, and
discuss with them about how to achieve their objectives and deal with obstacles in
the process. In this mode, they need to preserve good cooperative relations with the
poor, fully motivate them to take the initiative, decrease the obstacles impeding them
from making decisions, raise their willingness to accept assistance, and improve their
ability to solve problems.
6.4.1.3 Narrative Therapy Mode
Narrative therapy mode takes daily conversation as its major tool and helps the clients
reflect on themselves as language externalizes their feelings. The social workers can
review the whole treatment process, and the poor can reflect on their attitudes toward
life and themselves. This is a mode of internalization treatment. They can lead the
poor tell their life stories, rebuild their views on themselves, others and the society,
enable them to look at themselves in a correct way, and review their present abilities
and create conditions to facilitate individual transformation.
6.4.1.4 Social-Psychological Mode
Socio-psychological mode lays emphasis on poor people’s psychological develop-

ment, analyzes the interaction between poor people’s psychological states and the
social environment, and believes that social environmental changes can bring about
changes of mentality. Therefore, they should begin their work from understanding
the social environment in which the poor live in. They should pay special attention to
poor people’s social environment, analyze the social environment that breeds poverty
in light of their connectivity and development, and improve the poor people’s situ-
ations by first changing their living environment. They can view the specific source
of problems in light of their knowledge of the state of the poor, find resources on the
level of social environment that are beneficial for the development of the poor indi-
viduals or households, and create a healthy, reasonable, fair, and supportive social
environment for them.
6.4.1.5 Behavioral Therapy Mode
Behavioral therapy mode focuses on modifying behavior, believing that behavior

can be affected by external environment, and thus, individual behavior can be
remodeled through social learning. To help the poor to learn the methods and tech-
niques for solving problems, the social workers need to set examples for them,
transform their accustomed thinking and responding patterns, and guide them to
learn proper behavior patterns. The poor should become active learners and achieve
self-transformation through improving their behavior.
6.4.2 Group Work
Group work is an activity that is done by a group. Specifically speaking, group work
aims to facilitate group members’ growth, help to restore their social functions, and
materialize the development of the members and the group through developmental
activities. Poverty brings about self-abasement and the sense of helplessness and
makes the poor unable to participate normally in social life, or to obtain social
resources to which they are entitled and thus are gradually marginalized in the society.
The poor are deprived of the right of self-development, which greatly affects the poor
individuals and their families. With professional methods and skills, group work
gives the members a sense of belonging and self-identity and helps them re-examine
themselves and gain self-worth.
Group work adheres to the principles of equality, mutual support, care, acceptance,
cooperation, and common growth, which are the basic values that the social workers
should follow. The social workers bring together a number of people with similar
experience to make up a group and encourage them to share their life stories. In the
process, group members learn to listen to each other and listen to others’ lived expe-
rience and feelings. Social workers can invite people who have lifted themselves out
of poverty by relying on their own efforts to share experiences within the group, so
as to encourage the group members with successful examples. Moreover, groups can
produce more power than all the members’ power combined through letting some
members bring others along with them to make joint efforts. Meanwhile, there is
a supportive network within the group, and by listening to and encouraging each
other, group members gradually eliminate inner self-abasement. The poor people
have little social connection. The first cause is that they have limited resources and
can be easily marginalized. The second cause is that some of them retire from the
society of their own accord and seldom contact with the outside world, so their social
relations are broken, and they are unable to get social supportive resources. The pres-
ence of groups provides the poor with platforms of mutual support and encourages
them to walk out of isolation, rebuild their social relations, actively establish their
social supportive network, and redefine themselves.
There are mainly three modes of group work that social workers can utilize to
tackle poverty problems.
6.4.2.1 Social Objective Mode
Social objective mode emphasizes the interaction between individuals and groups.
Whether individuals or groups will have problems or not is related to the normal
functioning of social system. Therefore, to solve individual problems, it requires
promoting the transformation of the social system. Social objective model is an
emphasis on fostering group members’ sense of social responsibility and, through
group development, enhances group members self-awareness, improves their self-
confidence and self-esteem, and makes them voluntarily participate in social life. As
a unified entity, the group can motivate poor people’s power to the maximum, involve
them in the process of transformation, and ultimately transform the social system.
6.4.2.2 Treatment Mode
Treatment mode aims to modify problematic behaviors. The social workers facilitate
the modification of problematic behaviors by utilizing the methods and skills of
group work. This mode suits the poor people who fall into poverty due to weak self-
motivation. The social workers make the poor recognize their problematic behaviors
and improper living attitude through group work and constantly communicate and
interact with them to raise their consciousness to change themselves. In the process,
the social workers give the poor guidance on their behaviors, change their past living
attitudes of “waiting, depending, and begging”, and modify their problematic ones.
6.4.2.3 Interaction Mode
Interaction mode makes efforts to facilitate the interaction between the individuals
and the group in the process of group work. Initially, interaction mode gathers poor
people together, but they might get resistant and unwilling to communicate with
other members. The task of the poverty Alleviation social workers is to promote
communication and interaction among the group members. The group is a supportive
system where the poor can get emotional and material support. The group members
influence and support each other and progress and solve problems together. During
this process, the poor become more willing to take part in social life, and their ability
to solve problems is improved.
6.4.3 Community Work
Community work is an intervention approach that takes the whole community as the
client. It addresses social problems through collective action involving community
residents. It reduces poverty by coordinating community resources, seeking assis-
tance from the society, and propelling community construction. It also enhances
people’s willingness and ability to participate in community affairs to strengthen
social cohesion and decrease social conflicts.24
Poverty can be regional as well as individual. It is hard to tackle large-scale
and wide-spread poverty with casework or group work, and that is why community
work is needed. It seeks social resources and involves a large number of community
residents to realize regional development which in turn will help to solve poverty
problems. The emergence of poor community is closely related to the culture of the
poor regions. Once the culture of poverty is formed, it tends to affect how people
perceive poverty. Therefore, to solve poverty problems, it requires to begin with
changing the culture of poverty. The social workers can adopt professional techniques
and methods of community work to change the poor’s fixed attitudes toward life and
ways of tackling problems and let them affirm themselves on the psychological
level. The poor individuals and regions should shake off the mental shackle of the
culture of poverty, emancipate themselves from its limitations, and really realize
their individual or regional development.
In poor communities, the residents, as the clients of poverty alleviation work,
should actively take part in the whole process of community work. The social
workers and the community residents should work together to locate the main causes
of poverty, discover the resources that the community already possesses, mobilize
social forces, obtain support from related social institutions, and eliminate the major
causes of community poverty. In the process of solving problems, the social workers
should recognize the abilities of the community residents and stimulate their poten-
tials to help them rediscover their power while attending community activities. They
24 Cheng [21].
can also use the method of empowerment and energization to increase community
residents’ power to act and boost their inner motivation to make transformations.
Through community action, the social workers can gradually decrease the influ-
ence of the culture of poverty on the individuals and set up new values and build
new behavioral patterns. Besides, social workers can scout for and train commu-
nity leaders and increase community residents’ social participation, so that they can
simultaneously resolve their destitute situation and improve the individuals’ ability
of social management.
Non-poor communities can provide the poor communities with manpower and
material support and participate in poverty Alleviation programs through volunteer
service. As a social force, non-poor communities promote a kind of fair, reason-
able, friendly, and kind social environment by calling the whole society to eliminate
discrimination against the poor. Poverty Alleviation work depends on the partici-
pation of three parties—government, poverty Alleviation social workers, and the
poor people. The common attention and joint participation of the whole society are
required to create a genial social atmosphere for poverty Alleviation work. To what
extent the society tolerate and accept the poor will directly affect whether they can
smoothly take part in the social life. The solution to poverty problems is not the result
of efforts of a certain party but of the whole society. Only it the whole society stick
together to strive for regional development can poverty problems be solved faster
and better, and the society become more stable and developed.
According to the practice of social work, Ramos classifies social work into three
models: regional development model, social planning model, and social action model.
6.4.3.1 Regional Development Model
Regional development model raises community members’ awareness to participate

in community construction and development, pushes the progress of community
through joint construction and self-management, encourages community members
to constantly get involved in the community management, and thus boosts their
willingness to take part in community affairs. By discovering and training community
leaders and competent people, the poverty alleviation social workers contribute to
the community management. To do so, they should mobilize every member in the
community to attend community activities. The impoverished should join in the
activities about self-development and social development and really improve their
ability to fight against risks through community activities. Non-poor people in the
community should also actively attend community activities, give care and respect to
the poor, offer suggestions for community development, and help to eradicate poverty
from the whole community.
6.4.3.2 Social Planning Model
Social planning model needs to rely on outside forces to achieve its goal, that is, to
invite experts in related fields to do surveys and planning; this model first conducts
experiments on a limited scale and then implement and push forward policies on a
large scale. Since the social workers are not omnipotent, they still need to depend on
outside resources to offer better services. Poverty alleviation involves many issues
such as social policies, economic development, employment trends, social education,
and so on, so professional guidance from experts is necessary. This kind of up-to-
bottom development model avoids the risks that accompany group decision-making
and makes community development more scientific and reasonable, but it might
suppress residents’ willingness to participate in community affairs.
6.4.3.3 Social Action Model
Social action model unites people in need and allows them cooperation with other
organizations to obtain support and resources and reallocate social power, status,
and resources. This model is a bit radical and if there are faults with the plan-
ning or if it is manipulated by illegal organizations, social order, and stability will
be adversely affected. Therefore, social workers should be careful with this model
and had better replace it with a more moderate model. They should also actively
gather people’s opinions on the policies, report the feedback collectively to the
policy makers, actively participate in the process of decision-making, and let the
implementation of policies benefit more impoverished people.
Community work has varied intervention methods and can make adjustment
according to specific circumstances. The social workers can begin with tackling
common problems in the community, create genial community environment, and
actively establish community supportive network. Starting from community educa-
tion, because the emergence of poverty culture might aggravate poverty problems in
the community, community work can provide education for the poor to change their
original thinking patterns and manner of handling things. The community can carry
out skill training programs and offer employment counseling in order to improve poor
people’s working capacity. The community can offer its children sufficient resources
and support, supervise and assure the implementation of “nine-year compulsory
education” policy, and make sure every child of school age is admitted to a school.
Starting from mutual support and cooperation, community work can actively mobi-
lize every member to take part in community construction. Every community member
has the responsibility and obligation to care for the people in need and create a genial
social environment. By enabling every community member to become a driving
force, community work brings the poor warmth, care, and active support for their
development and solves poverty problems through utilizing public resources in the
society.
References 177
6.4.4 Social Work Administration
The social workers are the deliverers of social welfare. They must follow the admin-
istrative procedures when they provide the poor with social assistance, help to imple-
ment social policies, and supervise the effects of social policies. They can integrate
the values of social work into the implementation of policies and need to coop-
erate with government departments, civil administration organs, and local leading
group offices for poverty alleviation and development in order to push forward the
poverty reducing work by following the legal procedure. The methods and tech-
niques of the social workers can provide the poor with guarantee on the micro-level
and change their living conditions.
References
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practice in China. Teach Res (6)
2. Gu D (2016) Connotation and practice of the targeted poverty reduction: a preliminary
explanation of social work perspective. Soc Work (5)
3. Guan X (2019) New features of urban poverty and new direction of social relief reform in
current China. Soc Sci J (4)
4. Liu X (2015) An overview of the research on female poverty over the recent forty years. J Chin
Women’s Stud (1)
5. Cai S (2016) An overview of and some thoughts on poverty problems among rural women
from the perspective of targeted poverty-reduction. Soc Sci Rev (12)
6. Zhang Y, You S (2018) Are women more vulnerable to poverty: an analysis of the CHNS rural
data of 9 provinces in 2009 and 2011. J Chin Women’s Stud (4)
7. Xing C (2020) Study on poverty alleviation efforts among rural women in village and town
factories. J Chin Women’s Stud (1)
8. Zhang S, Jun T (2009) Poor children in China: concept and scale. J Hohai Univ (Philos Soc
Sci) (4)
9. Sun Y (2005) Research on employment of the second generation from poor families in cities
in China. Youth Stud (9)
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Northeast Univ (Philos Soc Sci Edn) (6)
11. Lin Y (2019) An analysis of the construction of elderly poverty alleviation system in rural
areas. Shandong Soc Sci (12)
12. Chen Q (2019) Research on poverty alleviation experience concerning households with a
disabled member in rural China. Contemp Econ (3)
13. Liao J (2015) Disability and poverty: a research based on income poverty and multidimensional
poverty measurements. Population Dev (1)
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East China Univ Sci Technol (Soc Sci Edn) (1)
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welfare state. Translated by Tian Kai, The Commercial Press, pp 143–144
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Peking University Press, Beijing, p 2014
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social work on poverty-reduction. Soc Work Manage (6)
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tigation on impoverished countryside in Hunan province. J Postgr Zhongnan Univ Econ Law
(1)
19. Wang S (2016) Rural poverty alleviation system—an attempted discussion on capability
integration and on roles of social work. Jiangsu Soc Sci (3)
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(2)
Chapter 7
The Contents of Poverty-Reducing Social
Work
As a significant social force in the poverty-curbing field, while promoting the diver-
sity of poverty alleviation entities and the reasonable allocation of such resources,
social work can bring into full play its professional advantages and provide diver-
sified and targeted services for all kinds of people in poor regions. The document
The Guidance from the Civil Ministry of China, the Ministry of Finance and the
Poverty-Alleviation Office of the State Council Over Endorsing the Social Work as
a Professional Force to Join in the Poverty-Eliminating Effort issued in 2017 makes
special deployment about social work intervening in this line of efforts, stipulating
that social work professionals are to join in the poverty-curbing work, that is to say,
they are to participate in administering to the poor the necessary relief and support, in
forging their ability to eliminate poverty, to augment their resilience to adapt to new
relocations, and to offer pastoral care and love to the left-behind children in poverty-
stricken areas and other special groups of people in need. Specifically speaking,
on the one hand, social work can provide the impoverished with relief, assistance,
resources, capacity building, adaptation aid, and so on to boost their motivation and
confidence in eliminating poverty, elevate their ability to live and develop, and help
them to get richer as soon as possible. On the other hand, it can also offer love, protec-
tion, pastoral care, psychological counseling, maintenance of rights and interests to
the left-behind children in impoverished areas, poor elderlies, poor women, poor
disabled people, and other groups of people in need, such as offenders performing
community services and freed convicts, to support them psychologically and socially,
help them to better relations with their families and communities, and to restore and
develop their social functions.
180 7 The Contents of Poverty-Reducing Social Work
7.1 Participating in Administering Relief and Support

to the Poor
In the field of social relief, our nation has successively established such systems
as minimum subsistence allowance, relief for people in extreme poverty, disaster
relief, urban and rural medical assistance, educational assistance, housing assistance,
employment assistance, and temporary assistance which have composed a social
relief institution with complete items and content, standard procedures, and clearly
targeted clients and are playing an increasingly important role in ensuring the basic
livelihood of people in need, maintaining social stability, and promoting equity and
justice.
Currently, a great proportion of the impoverished households are dragged into
poverty by disease, disability, lack of education, or accidents. The basic need of the
poor is financial support to cover their medical care, rehabilitation, education, and
cost of accidents so that the family can maintain a basic living standard. Besides,
the impoverished also need assistance that can improve their abilities, bring them
more social support, and enhance their social functions. Actually, the administrative
poverty relief system in our nation can barely meet the basic needs of the impov-
erished. In the present design of social relief system, rural minimum subsistence
allowance gives out money to some extremely poor households, but the coverage of
the minimum subsistence allowance is not wide, the standard of relief is low, and
the needs of the poor cannot be fully satisfied. Although the basic medical insurance
system for urban and rural residents has basically realized full coverage, serious
illness relief system needs further perfection. Furthermore, although our social relief
system includes some targeted relief systems, the cohesion among the systems is
insufficient and systematic fragmentation is obvious. What’s more, the problems
that social resources invested in poverty reduction are not enough, social involve-
ment is at a low level, and participation of social forces in poverty relief is far from
full affect the overall improvement of poverty relief work.
As far as current practice of poverty relief is concerned, the need for assistance
of the impoverished, the rapid development of social forces, and the institutional
space released by poverty alleviation policies are continuously giving impetus to the
transformation of poverty relief practice and pushing social work to intervene and
extend into the field of social relief.
7.1.1 The Professional Advantages of Social Work

Participating in Social Assistance
Social work has many advantages for its scientific theories, professional approaches,
and independent status.1 Social work can give play to professional advantages,
1 Xiang et al. [1].

7.1 Participating in Administering Relief and Support to the Poor 181
while creating new relief and assistance theories and approaches, cooperating with
social relief agencies and accurately identifying and managing the targets of social
assistance.
Firstly, creating new relief and assistance theories and approaches: Administrative
social assistance is a top-dowm system to help people in emergency or distress
and mainly offers financial support to help them maintain a basic living standard.
Therefore, an unequal relationship between the aid provider and the recipient is
constructed. The aid recipients are in a passive position to accept what they are given
and they cannot take the initiative. By contrast, social work starts from altruism, puts
an emphasis on treating every client of social assistance equally, protects their dignity,
and believes that everyone has their own unique characteristics and has the potential
to change themselves, to grow, and to continuously progress. It proposes to give
assistance in an equal and respectful manner, so that an equal assistance relationship
and process can be built. Social workers should fully accept and respect the clients
when they investigate the clients’ conditions and offer help. When intervening in
social assistance, social work first stresses “rescue” and then, to take a step further,
pays more attention to “helping”,2 not only rescuing the clients from emergency but
also helping them to acquire sustainable developing momentum and resources.
Secondly, expanding the scope of assistance: On the one hand, social work has a
wider coverage of assistance, including not only the poor and disadvantaged groups
recognized by traditional standard, but also the individuals, households, groups, and
organizations who are in a crisis or feeling distressful. On the other hand, traditional
social assistance mainly offers financial support in the form of cash to the impov-
erished to help them maintain a basic living standard but neglects their immate-
rial needs such as improvement of their abilities, elimination of “spiritual” poverty,
and social integration. The objective of social work intervention is to provide the
poor with professional services through crisis intervention, reconstruction of social
supportive system, cultivation of social capital, and community development promo-
tion, which not only helps the aided and assisted clients to solve current problems
but also helps them to improve abilities, accumulate human capital, participate in
community development, and form a self-helpful and mutually supportive social
environment.
Thirdly, perfecting assistance means: While intervening in social assistance, social
workers first make communication on a one-to-one basis to learn about the circum-
stances and problems of potential clients and to make sure about their willingness
and expectation, so as to build a trustful relationship with the clients. Then, social
workers assess clients’ needs and current resources, considering not only clients’
personal and household conditions but also the helpful factors and obstacles in the
entire environment concerning the solution to the clients’ problems. On that basis,
social workers push the clients to actively participate in the assistance work, let them
play a major role, encourage them to decide how to solve their own problems, discuss
with them about the plans and strategies of problem-solving, help them understand
their capability and rights, enhance their efforts and progress in the process, boost
their sense of self-worth, and improve their abilities to deal with problems.
2 Yuan [2].
7.1.2 The Intervention Methods of Social Work Participating

in Social Assistance
In terms of the methods of assistance targeted at the impoverished, social work can
play an important role in many aspects. For example, social workers can help impov-
erished households apply for government’s relief, assist governmental departments
with relief efforts, promote and disseminate social assistance policies, and coop-
erate with other social organizations and volunteers to provide comprehensive assis-
tance services. The participation of social work effectively integrates the resources
from government, society, the third sector and other parties, makes the management
more efficient and humanized, facilitates accurate identification and management
of clients, and magnifies the effects of social assistance. Social work intervenes in
social assistance in the following aspects.
First, assessing needs: Based on full understanding of clients’ conditions and
comprehensive analysis, social workers decide to what extent clients’ needs are met
and what factors interfere with the satisfaction of their needs and then they will come
up with an assessment conclusion. The professional strength of social work makes it
good at discovering and assessing the needs of the groups receiving social assistance.
Social workers can assist the government, make up for the insufficiency of adminis-
trative resources in the field of social assistance, enhance staff’s self-motivation, find
potential clients, examine their problems and circumstances, and learn about their
willingness to accept assistance. On the level of practice, social workers can assist
the government with household surveys, need analysis, effectiveness evaluation of
relief policies according to the current official standards, and can assess the factors
influencing the clients of relief. What’s more, the professional evaluation of social
work also takes into consideration the clients’ survival needs, developmental needs,
and their willingness to eliminate poverty as well as their felt need, expressed need,
normative need, and comparative need. By comprehensively considering clients’
values, concerned problems and hopes and by combining their related problems
and the environment, social workers provide scientific basis for formulating targeted
relief policies.
Second, analyzing causes of poverty: Contemporary social assistance is a social
policy that stems from social relief and is a subsystem on the bottom level of social
security system and social welfare system. Its direct function is to deliver relief and
to meet urgent needs, providing material assistance for groups in distress due to all
kinds of causes to pull them through difficulties. As for the causes of clients’ predica-
ment, the past practice analyzes them from the weakness perspective and problems
perspective, emphasizing that the clients are incapable or useless and viewing them
as losers.
By contrast, social workers adopt a unique advantage perspective to observe and
analyze the impoverished groups. For example, ecological systems theory empha-
sizes that everyone is situated in a setting and whether a person can form posi-
tive interactions with his environmental systems will directly determine his state
of living. Therefore, the poverty problems of the clients are not simply personal,
but are affected by factors such as weak support from families and communities,
unequal social distribution, and social environmental limitations.3 Social support
theory holds that social supportive relationships are part of a person’s life process,
and that to maintain a normal social life, interpersonal support is indispensable. The
problems an individual meets in his life often results from lack of necessary social
support. The impoverished can be defined as individuals who lack supportive social
relationships or are incapable of utilizing social relationship resources.
Third, ameliorating assistance management: Social assistance management is a
complicated process including investigating and approving appliers of social assis-
tance, managing the recipients, and evaluating the performance of social assistance
work. Currently, social assistance services mostly rely on administrative systems to
conduct work from up to bottom, so the workers often act as executors of adminis-
trative power when they offer assistance services and leave the clients in a passive
position in the whole process. In specific assistance management work such as house-
hold survey, confirmation from the working place, publication, public supervision,
examination of financial conditions, democratic discussion and appraisal, and so on,
administrative departments only care about the implementation of assistance poli-
cies and make sure assistance allowances are doled out in time and in full and won’t
consider helping clients to develop, designing differentiated assistance strategies or
offering relative resources.4 Therefore, the social benefits brought about by these
assistance measures are not ideal.
By contrast, social workers not only offer their clients various material and psycho-
logical support and social services from an equal standing, but also help the clients
seek, arrange, and manage various available resources and discover clients’ personal
problems in the process of delivering assistance. Intervening in social assistance
management, social workers can help grass-roots government departments collect,
analyze, and judge all sorts of information about the impoverished and help clients,
based on actual situations, decide whether to file and lodge an application or not and to
which institution they should submit the application, so that they can receive as much
assistance as regulations permit. Therefore, in the entire assistance process, profes-
sional social workers are not just executors of social assistance policies or services
providers, but play multiple roles such as managers of resources and assistance policy
advisors.
Specifically speaking, social workers play the role of a psychological counselor
and therapist, helping clients to face problems and form a good understanding of
their problems. While evaluating clients’ needs and making assistance plans, social
workers play the role of assessors, coordinators, and planners, helping clients effec-
tively evaluate their problems, needs, and resources and acquire resources and work
out solutions to their problems. If clients’ problems are related to the communities
or even social systems, social workers will play the role of promoter, propelling
the perfection of systems and policies so as to get to the root of clients’ problems.
Generally speaking, while assisting government departments to perfect management
3 Liu and Han [3].

4 Guan [4].
of social assistance, social work can act as indirect participant of policymaking,

helping the central and local governments to formulate more reasonable assistance
policies drawing on their acquaintance with clients’ conditions. Social work can also
act as the link among the grass roots, the local and the central governments, watching
over the effectiveness and persistence of assistance policies and give feedback to
push forward the perfection of assistance policies. The participation of social work
can assist the government to improve management efficiency and simultaneously
combine management and service better.
7.1.3 The Practical Features of Social Work Participating

While participating in poverty alleviation programs, social work promotes and prac-
tices the theory and strategy of development-oriented aid which means to integrate
development into the values of poverty aid and to make development a new corner-
stone of the value system.5 In terms of intervention, social work focuses on trans-
forming the previous poverty alleviation mechanism which adopts allocation of funds
as its single means. While guaranteeing basic subsistence for the impoverished, social
work utilizes multiple means to meet the poor people’s needs in many aspects, espe-
cially the needs of the poor with potentials to take part in economic activities and
to improve their ability for self-development. Social work aims to combine basic
and development-oriented aid and to integrate material and psychosocial support,
in order to help the impoverished to get rid of vulnerability and achieve long-term
elimination of poverty. These are what composes the practical features of social work
participating in social assistance.
First, combining basic and development-oriented aid: While serving the impov-
erished, social work persists in putting people first, starts from the actual needs of
the poor, and provides the impoverished individuals and households with cash and
material assistance and all kinds of immaterial services according to national social
assistance policies. Social work lays emphasis on the protection of poor people’s
basic rights and humanistic care for them. It takes the perspective of “individual
rights”6 to inspect the contents of assistance and services and let humanistic care
permeate every parts and aspects. It avoids harming poor people’s other rights in
exchange of assistance and services and lets the poor truly feel the care and love
from the government and society.
Generally speaking, poverty is seemingly the state of one person who has a low
income and lacks materials, but, in essence, lacks opportunities and abilities. There-
fore, rather than an increase in income and relief, the impoverished are in greater
need for knowledge and skill training, elevation of confidence and concept, guar-
antee of opportunities, and increase of social capital. In addition to basic assistance
5 Liu and Han [3].

6 Yang [5].
services, social work emphasizes the development-oriented aid, that is, not merely
maintaining a basic living standard or pursuing an increase in income, while meeting
the basic needs of the poor, social work pays more attention to the provision of
services, improves the overall environment and personal abilities to help clients with
self-perfection and self-development, takes clients’ ability for full and sustainable
development as the ultimate goal, including exploring poor people’s human resources
through education, training, treatment, rehabilitation and breaking the barriers stop-
ping them from participating in economic activities, assisting the poor to establish
economic assets and accumulate social capital, and helping the poor with poten-
tials to get employed or start businesses. Development-oriented aid can facilitate
the development of the impoverished household and create opportunities for poor
individuals to display their capabilities.
Second, integrate material and psychosocial support: For poor people, the most
urgent need is material support. Especially, those who cannot maintain a basic living
on themselves need the government to guarantee subsistence. At present, the most
typical assistance systems are the system of subsistence allowances for urban and
rural residents and the rural “five guarantees” system. As the bottom line of modern
social security and welfare system, the social assistance on the level of basic subsis-
tence is an important measure to alleviate poverty and realize social “baseline equal-
ity”. The government, as the core responsible entity on this level, plays an important
role in making policies, appropriating funds, and supervising the whole process.
Meanwhile, social work can utilize its own advantages, contact different kinds
of charitable institutions and social organizations, and transfer various third-party
resources to the poor, that is, social work can start from different aspects and use
varied means to further improve the poor people’s living standard while guaranteeing
subsistence for them.
On the basis of providing cash and material support for the poor, social work
cares much more about their spiritual and social needs, so it offers psychosocial
support to solve their psychological problems. Numerous studies have shown that
the poor tend to get mentally closed, self-contemptuous, and unaspiring, so they
tend to make bad choices concerning values, working attitude, social behavior, and
even family behavior. To address this, in concrete service and practice, social work
adheres to the principle of “help people to help themselves”, adopts appropriate social
work approaches and skills, replaces problem perspective with strength perspective,
emphasizes evaluating, exploring, stimulating, and fostering poor people’s potentials,
and enhances their capability of self-development. Social workers can increase poor
people’s human capital through education and training, can increase their social
capital, enhance their political capability, and let them have greater say in community
and social public affairs through improving their social competence, interpersonal
relations and social participation, and can ultimately boost their basic qualities and
abilities, explore their potentials to the greatest extent, and help them to walk out
of the present predicament.
7.1.4 The Specific Content of Social Work Participating

In the context where the objectives of social assistance for the impoverished are being
constantly upgraded, the content of social work participating in social assistance is
also continuously expanding from assistance for subsistence to special assistance
and disaster assistance. Social work keeps on innovating its practice and improving
its assisting skills.
First, assistance for subsistence: In terms of system design, rural assistance for
subsistence mainly includes rural subsistence allowances system and support system
for extremely poor people. The specific content of social work participating in social
assistance can be divided into two aspects. As for the first aspect, social workers
participate in the design, implementation, and assessment of social assistance poli-
cies. Social workers who are the executors of assistance policies examine in the
process of execution if the policies are reasonable and the implementation of poli-
cies is fair in order to make the policies more scientific and complete. As for the
second aspect, social workers push forward the implementation of life assistance
policies based on the community. In concrete practice, social workers offer material
assistance to clients, including cash, materials, and services in line with government’s
relief policies. Social workers also offer employment opportunities for clients and
create conditions for poor individuals and households to display their abilities and
gradually reduce capable clients’ reliance on social assistance until they can get
independent. What’s more, social workers actively explore and integrate resources
from various departments and social organizations, combine governmental support
and social forces, and formulate joint efforts of social assistance.
Second, special assistance: Special assistance system aims to solve poor people’s
special difficulties in areas beyond subsistence such as child’s education, medical
care, housing, and so on. In terms of assistance with education, social workers’
concrete practice is as follows: participating in making policies which propel the
government to increase funding for educational aid; mobilizing social forces to take
part in educational aid and integrating the social resources; according to students’
personal needs, classifying assistance means into awards, loans, aids, subsidies, and
reduction; raising the effects of assistance and completing the social safety net.
In terms of assistance with medical care, social workers mainly adopt two means.
Firstly, finding the point of conjunction of social work and medical aids: On the
one hand, social workers cooperate with social security departments, buying social
insurance for the poor through medical assistance and sending to the social insur-
ance institutions their applications for the medicare reimbursement for the poor. On
the other hand, social workers cooperate with medical institutions and civil admin-
istration departments, preparing application materials for the poor who are eligible
for medical assistance, letting them see a doctor in time, and assisting them with
a second application for aid. Secondly, providing suggestions on making medical
assistance policies and perfecting the procedure of medical assistance: In terms of
assistance with housing, they mainly utilize the following two modes: first, helping
7.2 Forging Poor People’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty 187
the impoverished households apply for housing assistance, acquainting them with
local housing assistance policies and the application procedures, coordinating with
concerned institutions, and making sure that every eligible poor household within
the service area can get housing assistance; second, participating in the management
and supervision of housing assistance, assisting housing management departments,
and low income household recognition departments with establishing the dynamic
monitoring mechanism and exit mechanism, being well informed with the demo-
graphic and economic changes of the households receiving housing assistance so as
to reduce or eliminate frauds such as rental scams and concealment of property.
Third, disaster assistance: Social work related to disaster assistance mainly
includes emergency aid and post-disaster community reconstruction. In terms of
emergency aid, the service content of social workers mainly includes the following
three aspects. First, participating in emergency aid and minimizing casualties and
property losses: Under the unified leadership of the local government, social workers
help to evacuate disaster-stricken people to safe places, provide shelters for them, and
protect their personal and property safety. Second, ensuring basic living standard for
disaster victims: Social workers assist the government to raise, distribute, and utilize
daily necessities in an organized way, solving disaster-stricken people’s basic living
problems related to food, clothing, shelter, water, medical care, and so on. Third,
pacifying disaster victims’ emotions and offering them psychological counseling:
Social workers take measures to stabilize people’s emotions and use professional
approaches to give proper psychological intervention and counseling.
In terms of post-disaster community reconstruction, the content of social work
mainly includes the following three aspects: first, under the current management
system of post-disaster reconstruction and under the unified leadership of the govern-
ment, drawing on the theories and methods of social work, organizing and coordi-
nating the reconstruction and recovery of community living environment; second,
restoring normal order of social life in the community; third, restoring community’s
normal economic order and production.
7.2 Forging Poor People’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty
In 1990, the United Nations Development Program proposed that poverty is resulted
from not only low income but also lack of basic abilities for living and developing,
so in order to realize sustainable development, the poor must keep on forging their
abilities for poverty elimination. The core feature of poverty is shortage. Superficially,
the poor lack direct material resources, economic income and other direct means that
can affect their survival and development, but in essence, they lack the abilities to
acquire and utilize all kinds of social resources and lack the developing opportunities
to help them eliminate poverty and get rich. Therefore, targeted poverty reduction
should not only increase poor people’s economic income. More importantly, it should
improve their potential and abilities for self-development through empowerment
and capacity enhancement. The basic value of social work is to help people help
themselves, emphasizing respect and care. The professional strength of social work
intervening in targeted poverty alleviation lies in its adoption of the concept helping
people help themselves. Social work focuses on fostering and stimulating subjectivity
and self-developing capacity of the poor communities, households, and individuals,
pays attention to poor people’s living situations, learns about what they are thinking
about and wishing for, discovers their strengths and limitations, clarifies what they
really need, stimulates their motivation for development, and improves their ability
to eliminate poverty on themselves.
7.2.1 The Manifestations of Capability Poverty Among

the Impoverished
The developing willingness and capabilities of the poor individuals compose the
inner momentum that drives the targeted poverty-reduction program and enhances
self-development. However, the poor people are not adequately motivated or capable
enough, which has become a great barrier limiting the reduction of poverty and
development. Although the poverty alleviation preferential policies and resources
provided by the government have brought developing opportunities for the poor,
they also lead some poor individuals to form the mentality of “waiting, relying and
begging”, unwilling to develop on themselves.7
Firstly, from the perspective of poor people’s subjective manifestation, some poor
people have “poverty dependency” which means poor people, who are short of scien-
tific and cultural knowledge, have inadequate inner motivation to eliminate poverty
and get rich, little willingness to pursue progress, deep-rooted mentality of “waiting,
relying and begging”, and no strong desire to get rid of poverty and thus are trapped
in poverty for a long period of time.
Based on the perspective of capability approach, AmartyaSen defines poverty as
deprivation of capabilities, or the capabilities to avoid poverty mastered by indi-
viduals are insufficient. When the poor are incapable of self-development, most of
them tend to rely on outside assistance, gradually as time passes, form psychological
dependency and laziness and lack aspiration for poverty elimination. As a result,
their momentum to get rid of poverty will grow weak, once outside assistance is
removed, they will fall back into the trap of poverty again, and thus, the vicious
cycle of “poverty-dependency-poverty” is formulated and poverty culture character-
ized by “waiting, relying, and begging” appears. From the perspective of poverty
causes, some poor families are not short of labor force, but lack inner capacity for
development which causes their poverty. Some poor individuals who are in persis-
tent poverty have become accustomed and formed the psychology of poverty and
lack the initiative for eliminating poverty. Besides, most poor people are not well
educated, which limits their cognitive and self-developmental abilities, and have low
natural and acquired abilities, so they are unable to utilize outside resources for their
7 Zhang and Chen [6].

own good. For the poor people, the improvement of self-developmental ability stim-
ulates their inner motivation for poverty elimination, enhances their confidence, and
mobilizes them to take actions.
Secondly, from the perspective of objective environment, the poor can be easily
marginalized. Poverty means the poor people’s social status is declining, and
they have lost confidence in the society and themselves and thus feel they are
unfairly treated. The direct consequences of marginalization are the emergence
of the marginalized groups and the deterioration of their social and economic condi-
tions. Participatory poverty reduction can modify such poverty phenomenon to some
extent. On the one hand, the participation and expression of opinions of the poor
have formed an effective mechanism for the government and other external forces
to learn about their needs and provide targeted services. On the other hand, through
empowerment of the poor, participatory poverty reduction offers the poor the oppor-
tunities to learn by doing, helps to improve their abilities, enhances their sense of
ownership about the poverty alleviation process and programs, and gives play to their
initiative and creativity. In short, participatory poverty reduction can allow the poor
equally to share social wealth through government’s policy support and improvement
of personal abilities and ultimately realize poor people’s sustainable development.
7.2.2 The Intervening Paths for Social Work to Improve

the Poor’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty
A basic strategy and method of poverty Alleviation social work is to carry out
targeted poverty elimination with ability construction as the focus. According to
Amartya Sen’s capability approach, real freedom is the freedom of action based on
people’s capability, that is, one can react actively to challenges and risks in their
life and to bring themselves out of predicament and achieve development. Capacity
construction promoted by social work is not just simply fostering and developing
certain skills required by modern society; it is more of the process of fostering and
developing an attitude, a kind of value, the faculty of understanding, and critical
thinking. It is a process of mastering new techniques, methods, and skills and a
comprehensive growing process combined with the changes of personal life attitude,
living style, behavioral pattern, and world outlook. Therefore, in its poverty Alle-
viation action, social work must target on people’s transformation, set off from and
return to the concept “helping people to help themselves”, combine “teaching a man
fishing” and “give a man a fish”, carry out targeted poverty Alleviation programs
stressing capability construction, and focus on activating and fostering poor people’s
individual, household, and community competence.
First, improving individual capability by using casework: The impoverished are an
important entity of poverty alleviation programs. Poverty alleviation must be based
on people, believing that people are endowed with physical, intellectual, emotional,
social, aesthetic, and spiritual potentials and rights, constantly exploring people’s
potentials and ultimately letting them be able to solve their own problems. Case-
work should target at fostering poor people’s subjectivity and letting them become
entities capable of self-dependent development through stimulating their internal
momentum and cultivating their capacity. Firstly, social work should modify poor
people’s outdated and backward concept, help the poor transform their idea of simply
receiving assistance with poverty reduction into the idea of eliminating poverty inde-
pendently, and help them establish the idea of helping themselves and realize concep-
tual poverty elimination. Secondly, boost poor people’s initiative in poverty elimi-
nation: Social workers should go deep into the impoverished families and villages,
interact with poverty alleviation clients, lead the poor to give play to their subjective
role, actively get involved and take responsibilities, and thus realize the “blood-
making” mode of poverty Alleviation on the basis of the “blood-transfusing” mode,
train poor people’s ability to acquire resources, and ultimately achieve sustainable
poverty elimination and development.
Second, motivating the groups by using group work: Group work can connect
accurate “dots” of the same kind into a “plane”. Common experience and problems
can let the poor find emotional understanding, support, and connection in the group.
Discussion about common problems among group members can help them build
confidence. All these compose a congenial base for the empowerment and capacity
enhancement of the impoverished. Group work targeted at poor people’s prob-
lems concerning their living social environment, cultural traits, means of livelihood,
lifestyle and customs, and economic conditions can provide the poor with funds,
techniques, information, support, skill coaching, and training relating to produc-
tion, operation, and marketing. As for the defects and deficiencies of poor people’s
lifestyle, behavioral pattern, and values and concepts, social workers can carry out
group education to renew their ideas, modify their behaviors, boost their confidence
in tackling difficulties and meeting challenges, and improve their capacity to resist
risks in life and to develop their living skills.
Third, creating congenial environment for poverty elimination by using commu-
nity work: Solving poverty problems requires not only targeted empowerment and
capacity enhancement of the poor individuals and groups, but also comprehensive
and systematic social actions in the aspects of community public spiritual construc-
tion, elimination of poverty culture, and the establishment of interpersonal network.8
According to the opinions of community work, community environment does not
only include the tangible environment such as population, land, and houses, but also
soft environment such as community cohesion, sense of belonging, and interper-
sonal relationship. In impoverished areas, lack of community public spirit, villagers’
weak awareness of participating in public affairs, marginalization of poor house-
holds, passive interpersonal relationship, and poor people’s mentality of “waiting,
relying, and begging” all compose the defects of the soft environment of the commu-
nity, which confines the effectiveness of poverty Alleviation efforts to a great extent.
Social work can utilize community work which draws on community organizations
and use the skills of communication, mediation, cooperation, and mutual support
8 Xi [7].
in order to lead the poor people to identify and explore the human, material, finan-
cial, and culture resources within the community, to organize the farmers to carry
out self-helpful and mutually supportive activities, to assist them with the establish-
ment of specialized cooperative organizations and community mediation organiza-
tions, to introduce social organizations into the community to help villagers solve
production and living problems, to create positive and healthy community culture,
to increase community cohesion and sense of belonging, to boost community public
spirit, to perfect the structure of poverty governance, and to materialize community’s
self-driven development.
7.2.3 The Specific Content of Social Work Improving

the Poor’s Ability to Eliminate Poverty
When participating in the fight of poverty Alleviation, on the base of alleviating

clients’ material poverty, social work should lay more emphasis on exploring clients’
potentials, boosting their desire for poverty elimination, helping them develop social
supportive network and building social capital, improving their living and developing
skills, stabilizing their income and ultimately eliminating poverty, and helping them
get rich.
First, exploring clients’ potentials and boosting their desire for poverty elimi-
nation: Cognitive behavioral theory holds that life events, cognition of life events,
and feelings and actions in response to life events are interconnected, and cognitive
processes play a mediating and coordinating role and directly influence one’s final
actions. The poor people tend to have the wrong cognition of fatalism, helplessness,
and hopelessness in the face of predicament, so they will easily fall into despair,
resign themselves to their fate, and give themselves up. Based on its acquaintance
with poor people’s circumstances and through education and partnership discussion,
social work can change clients’ erroneous cognition and encourage them to face
difficulties with reasonable, practical, and positive attitudes and actions.
As far as social work is concerned, individuals, groups, families, organizations,
and communities all have advantages and inherent capacities, and internal and
external resources. The difficulties and challenges that poor people are facing with
may bring them harm, but can also turn into opportunities. The practice of social work
guided by strength-based approach lays emphasis on discovering clients’ compara-
tive advantages and endeavors to give full play to clients’ potentials. Based on scien-
tific assessment of clients’ needs, social work takes clients’ personal and environ-
mental strengths and resources into consideration and helps clients identify, utilize,
and enhance these strengths and resources. First, social workers have faith in clients’
potentials and see their strengths such as diligent, simple, honest, and tough traits
and down-to-earth, hardworking, and uncomplaining spirits. Second, believing that
poor people have their own basic rights, social workers enhance clients’ awareness
of rights, sense of competence, and confidence and raise their awareness of self-
dependence, development, and participation. Third, social workers improve clients’
ability to help themselves and let them, in the process of receiving assistance, realize
the importance of poverty elimination, formulate self-motivated poverty-reduction
awareness and actions, and raise the ability for self-development.
Second, developing social supportive network and building social capital: Social
supportive network is where one can get material assistance, emotional support,
service, information, and new social contact.9 Aside from economic difficulties,
poor people are more in need of psychological consolation and social supportive
network. For poor people, the stronger one’s social supportive network becomes, the
greater his security, development capacity and sustainable momentum for poverty
alleviation will be. In terms of the establishment of poor people’s social supportive
network, with professional advantages, social work can help poor people to return
to social participation and build formal and informal social supportive network by
means of mutual assistance. In terms of production cooperation and living care, social
work can integrate local community resources such as neighbors, fellows, teams of
cooperative production, specialized cooperatives, and the elder associations in order
to provide manpower support relating to production assistance and daily care. In
terms of medical social assistance, social work institutions can rely on its advantages
in resource integration and information technology and use information networks to
rapidly link resources for clients and raise money for treatment of serious disease
though online and offline payment. In terms of cultural capital, social work can offer
cultural education and skill training to remove the passive influence of poverty culture
and backward concepts.
Third, improving living and developing skills and stabilizing channels of income:
While boosting poor people’s aspirations, social work should also raise their wisdom,
effectively combining the two aspects. On the one hand, social workers can use
their own social network to actively grasp resources such as vocational training and
employment opportunities from the outside world, guide the poor to learn and master
skills for poverty Alleviation with professional knowledge and approaches, improve
the poor’s ability to use resources, and enhance their resistance against risks asso-
ciated with poverty. On the other hand, social workers can help poor people learn
scientific and cultural knowledge and let them accept social mainstream culture so
as to cultivate civilized social atmosphere, get rid of the effects of poverty subcul-
ture, raise poor people’s scientific and cultural standard, and improve their ability
for sustainable self-development. Specifically, on the base of evaluating rural house-
holds’ capacity for development, social work focuses on motivating the poor ones
who are capable of working and have potentials for development, provides them with
resources and developing opportunities, and enhances their living skills. Social work
persists in centering on the poor households and makes assistance plans based on
full consideration of their willingness for development and specific advantages. For
example, social work offers women in poor households craft skill training, sets up
female craft team and selling platforms, assists the women to open online shops, and
9 Xi [7].
7.3 Facilitating Relocated Poor People’s Adaptation 193
explores sales channels. Social work can also help the poor to acquire knowledge and
skills concerning money management and remove systematic barriers stopping the
poor from obtaining financial services and accumulating assets. For example, social
work can promote community micro-finance loans so that the poor can get loans and
financial services more conveniently.
7.3 Facilitating Relocated Poor People’s Adaptation
Relocation means to move poor people from places where the natural and living
conditions are harsh and not suitable for production and development to where the
infrastructure is fairly adequate and the ecological environment is quite pleasant,
with a view to transform their living environment and production conditions, help
them get involved in modern society and catch up with social developing pace,
provide them with more information and better education, and create conditions for
them to thoroughly eliminate poverty and get rich. From the perspective of practice
effects, relocation improves poor people’s living conditions, perfects public services,
and boosts the poor’s satisfaction and happiness. Meanwhile, relocation also faces
challenges. For example, the momentum of community development declines, the
poor people lack multiple means of livelihood and the support of social network, and it
is hard for them to get involved in the society. As a major party of poverty Alleviation
programs, social work is a supplementary power for the formulation of the ability for
sustainable poverty elimination. It can give play to its professional strengths, channel
bad emotions for relocated poor people, enhance their adaptation to new relations,
find employment resources, develop self-help and mutual-help organizations, rebuild
social supportive network, and facilitate their mingling into new community life.
7.3.1 The Major Problems Confronting Relocated Poor

People
Relocation is not simply moving people to another place where they start new homes,
but a systematic project involving economic regrouping and social reconstruction.
Relocation dissolves the traditional social and economic systems and simultaneously
rebuilds new ones. After relocation, poor people’s production and living styles and
interpersonal relationship will all change, and they will face problems concerning
livelihood, development, adaptation, and social integration for a long time.
First, relocated people’s means of livelihood are insufficient. Before relocation, the
poor generally rely solely on agriculture for income and obtain means of subsistence
through directly exploiting land. Their life and production are influenced by natural
climate to a great extent. Their self-sufficient way of production and living also
reduces dependence on outside social environment. After relocation, their traditional
living and producing style are changed, and the poor lose their original production
and life resources and face the challenges of non-agricultural employment. Most
relocated people have weak awareness of market and are vulnerable to market risks
and incapable of choosing a suitable job or starting their own businesses. They are at
disadvantage in the labor market and face the risk of unemployment. Due to lack of
human capital and weak working abilities, poor people are further restricted in terms
of financial capital accumulation. Under the background of unstable employment and
income, comparatively high living cost will inevitably increase relocated people’s
living pressure, life burden, and psychological discrepancy. They will consider more
about how to survive in a new place, instead of pursuing long-term development,
which will definitely affect the effectiveness of sustainable poverty alleviation efforts.
Second, relocated people have difficulties in adapting to new environment. Before
relocation, the poor have expectations and plans for relocated life and hope to change
former impoverished situation. However, limited by their traditional style of rural
life, closed social environment, and low educational level, they are trapped in the
self-sustaining system of poverty subculture and kept away from the social main-
stream. Closed mentality, narrow social supportive network, and weak awareness of
reform and creation all restrict the improvement of their education, skills, and social
competence and lead to their insufficiency of human capital and social capital. After
relocation, former closed social supportive network faces transformation, yet new
open social supportive network has not been shaped, and social capital is lacking. Due
to lack of sense of belonging, identification, and security in the new social culture and
interpersonal relationship, relocated poor people are easy prey to psychological pres-
sure and adaptation risks, which may extinguish their pursuit of poverty elimination
and destabilize their development.
Third, relocated people face problems about assimilation into the community.
Relocation sites are mostly in independent residential districts, which will often
constitute social interaction barriers for the relocated poor.10 Such barriers are mani-
fested in two aspects. The first aspect is spatial isolation. Relocation sites are mostly
on the outskirts of counties or towns and are far from the center. The residents are
generally poor people from different places. Such relocation style confines the social
interaction within the people of the same kind, while interaction with surrounding
residents is limited, which contributes to some degree to the differentiation between
the relocated and the local people. The second aspect is psychological isolation.
After moving into new communities, the poor households face the transformation of
concepts, production and living styles, and interaction patterns. The poor people are
conservative and disadvantaged, so there are still many obstacles to impeding them
from actively mingling into the community life.
10 Wang [8].
7.3 Facilitating Relocated Poor People’s Adaptation 195
7.3.2 The Specific Content of Social Work Facilitating

Relocated People’s Adaption
While persuading the people to relocate and letting them overcome the reluctance
to leave their hometown and willingly cooperate with the relocation effort, social
work should help the people accept relocation genuinely. From the perspective of
the effects of practice, local government’s ordinary assistance is not enough to elimi-
nate relocated people’s adjustment disorder, so introducing professional theories and
approaches of social work can provide more targeted and individualized services and
solve adaption problems on a deeper level.
First, from the perspective of individuals, social work can improve relocated
people’s ability of self-development. After moving to a new place, some relocated
people who have been in poverty for a long time can have a strong sense of helpless-
ness and discomfort, won’t believe they can change the circumstances on their own,
and subconsciously want to rely on government’s assistance or stay reconciled to the
situation. To address this, social work can start from strength perspective, help the
relocated people discover their own resources and capabilities, let them understand
where their resources and capabilities come from, and help them find a suitable
way. Social workers can also act as the resource connectors, exploring beneficial
resources for the development of relocated people’s vocational abilities, and coor-
dinating various forces such as government, enterprises, and social organizations to
propel the growth of relocated people’s vocational abilities. In vocational training
programs of the relocated people, social workers can coordinate the actions of the
government, training institutions and relocated people through conducting research
and taking measures, discover relocated people’s needs for skill training from the
perspective of clients’ understanding of developmental path, help the government
to learn about and respond to relocated people’s needs, and solve the problems of
information asymmetry through services.
Second, from the perspective of relationship, social work can raise relocated
people’s social capital. Social work can facilitate the organization of relocated
community and boost its social capital. Firstly, social work can help form good
community culture and promote mutual connection and support among residents.
Through organizing group activities, social work can enhance the connection among
the community residents, promote mutual understanding and trust, stimulate relo-
cated people’s enthusiasm about participating in public affairs, and improve their
capacity to act. Secondly, as resource connectors, social workers can push the estab-
lishment of various organizations by exploring resources, encourage the relocated
people to manage and serve themselves, and increase the social capital of relocated
community by bettering organizations. Thirdly, social work can improve the rela-
tionship between relocated people and local residents. Social workers can cooperate
with and help organizations to publicize information about relocation and acquaint
local residents with relocated people. Social workers can carry out activities involving
both relocated people and local residents to increase their communication and under-
standing. Social workers can also offer services to increase relocated people’s social
participation, to eliminate their closed or self-abased mentality, to encourage them

to actively build relations with others including the local residents, and to establish
a new community so that they can integrate into the community and local life.11
Third, from the perspective of information, social work can open the channel
of information for relocated people. Information is an important resource in modern
society. For relocated people, lack of information is one of the major barriers affecting
their development. Without enterprises’ employment information, relocated people
can hardly find suitable jobs. Unfamiliar with government’s relevant information,
they can hardly protect their own rights or obtain government’s assistance. Social
workers can act as intermediary between relocated people and government workers
to enhance their connection and acquaint relocated people with policies and the
process of policy implementation to remove their confusion. Social workers can
adopt various methods like organizing the relocated people to visit local enterprises
with a view to establishing communication between relocated and local enterprises
so that relocated people can learn more about enterprises and have more employment
opportunities and enterprises can find appropriate employees and decrease the cost
of employment.
Fourth, from the perspective of environment, social work can advocate creating
congenial environment for the development of relocated people. Social work can
promote the policy environment that is friendly toward the relocated people. As
special disadvantaged groups, relocated people require impartial policy environment
to protect their rights and interests. Social work can guide policymaking from various
aspects. Firstly, social work can do surveys and researches to push the perfection
of policies concerning relocated people by analyzing the deficiencies in the poli-
cies and in the process of implementation and driving the policies onto a tack that
unifies justice and efficiency. Secondly, social work can push the government to
invest resources and create jobs for relocated people. And thirdly, social work can
improve the impartiality of industrial policies. Industrial development may be bene-
ficial to some people but not to others. Social work advocates industrial policies that
are good for relocated people and let them have a better share of the fruits of local
economic development.12
7.4 Protecting the Left-Behind Children

in Poverty-Stricken Areas
Solving problems concerning the left-behind children in poverty-stricken areas is a

long-term, complicated, arduous, and systematic project and a crucial issue about
social policies. Currently, since the phenomenon of rural left-behind children cannot
be eliminated, the rights and interests of those children must be well protected to
minimize the negative effects of “being left-behind” on them. Social work can play
11 Xiang [9].
12 Liu and Wu [10].
7.4 Protecting the Left-Behind Children in Poverty-Stricken Areas 197
an important role in establishing and perfecting the policy system concerning the
protection of the rural left-behind children. Social workers can cooperate with rele-
vant departments and forces to follow up, investigate, and evaluate the conditions
of the left-behind children and their families, give guidance about children custody,
and urge the families to take responsibilities for custody of the children. In the
specific process of delivering service, social work takes poverty-stricken children
as its crucial clients, provides them with growth guidance, legal education, preven-
tion of risk factors for delinquency, behavior modification, social instruction, and
psychological counseling, assists the school and community to ensure that children
of school age receive compulsory education, and offers caring services.
7.4.1 The Major Problems Concerning the Left-Behind

Children in Poverty-Stricken Areas
Different from general poor groups, the left-behind children in poverty-stricken areas
show Multi-dimensional Poverty features and have problems in many aspects such as
physical and mental growth, personality development, safety and health education,
interpersonal interaction, behavioral patterns, and academic development.
First, problems about physical and mental growth and personality development:
Parents are the most important companions for children. Parents of left-behind chil-
dren have to work away from hometown, so the children can’t live with their parents
for a long time and can’t receive full parental care and love. Lack of parental compan-
ionship and emotional communication will have negative effects on the left-behind
children’s physical and mental growth and personality development. Although the
parents can keep in contact with their children by making phone calls or using network
tools, such communication from a distance without physical contact has only a little
positive influence on parent–child relationship and domestic affection. Most parents
of left-behind children feel apologetic for long-term absence and for being unable to
take good care of the children, so they expect to compensate with material satisfac-
tion and let the children spend money without restraint, which leads some left-behind
children to develop indolence, extravagance, and comparison mentality. Lacking
parental care and love for long, many left-behind children show growth disorders
and personality defects of varying severity such as self-abasement, indifference, and
eccentricity.
Second, problems concerning safety and health education: Parents’ absence leads
left-behind children to have weak awareness of safety and self-protection. While
their parents are out for work, many left-behind children are not well protected or
supervised and some even have fallen victim to school or neighborhood bullying, so
it is easy for them to become isolated, helpless, pessimistic, and lonely, to be afraid of
bullying from classmates or neighbors and to feel unsafe. Many left-behind children
are taken care of by their grandparents who are mostly of low educational level and
have ideas and thinking patterns greatly different from their grandchildren, so they
cannot well communicate. The grandparents are either too busy with keeping the pot
boiling or too physically weak and sick to take good care of the children who are
generally faced with security risks and lack of health education.
Third, problems relating to interpersonal interaction and behavioral patterns:
Long-term separation between parents and children results in the lack of emotional
life for left-behind children. Paternal absence can generate children’s timidity or lack
of self-confidence; maternal absence can give rise to children’s carelessness and lack
of kindness. Children whose parents are absent over a long period of time tend to
become timid, overcautious, self-abased, careless, and indifferent. Many rural left-
behind children lack instruction on how to interact with others. Personal interaction
can be blind, random, and impulsive, so some left-behind children may go astray for
making friends with bad people. Other left-behind children like to form cliques and
tend to go to extremes when faced with intractable problems, becoming deviant and
violating rules and laws. A few might even commit crimes such as robbery. Prob-
lematization of left-behind children’s interpersonal communication and deviation of
their behaviors bring about huge hidden peril for the future of the children, their
families, and the society.13
And fourth, problems about academic development: Due to lack of parents’
company and supervision, many left-behind children have no heart for study and are
faced with problems such as learning weariness, lack of enterprise or desire to make
progress, and poor academic performance. Parents of left-behind children seldom
make calls to ask about children’s performance at school. Being well contented if
the children won’t go hungry or cold and don’t commit big mistakes, the caretakers
just ignore them as far as academic development is concerned and seldom constrain
and discipline the children in terms of learning, leaving some children undisciplined
and disobedient to school rules. They are sometimes late for or absent from school
and surf the Internet. Limited by responsibilities and human resources, some schools
also have difficulties in educating and managing left-behind children.
7.4.2 The Major Tasks of Social Work Participating

in the Care and Protection of Left-Behind Children
Guidance on Giving Full Play to the Role of Social Work Professionals in the Care
and Protection of Rural Left-behind Children stipulates that the tasks of social work
participating in the care and protection of left-behind children are mainly divided
into three aspects.
First, assisting with provision of relief and protection: Social work should help
to follow up the conditions of families with left-behind children in rural areas, do
surveys and assessment about the family structure, guardianship, schooling, physical
and mental health, and so on, check on key clients, and ensure that each left-behind
child is taken good care of. Social work should discover and report domestic violence
13 Shen and Chen [11].

7.4 Protecting the Left-Behind Children in Poverty-Stricken Areas 199
or other forms of abuse in time and assist with emergency aid. Social work should
offer psychological counseling, pastoral love, and temporary supervision and care to
rural left-behind children who have no guardians or are abused by their guardians.
Social work should help rural left-behind children and their families to seek for social
assistance, social benefits, and philanthropic resources and lead charitable forces and
social forces such as relevant social organizations and volunteers to provide them
with material assistance, care, and love.
Second, assisting with instruction on family education: Social work should help
publicize laws on guardianship and conduct prevention education against family
violence among rural left-behind children and give instruction on family education
to the parents or guardians so that they can correctly perform parental or guardian
duties. Social work should also help mediate the conflicts in the families of rural
left-behind children, promote harmonious family relationships, and offer services to
families whose children are taken care of by their grandparents to build the ability for
cross-generational communication and interpersonal accommodation. Social work
should guide the parents who are migrant workers to show care for their left-behind
children, enhance their domestic affection, and help rural left-behind children use
phones and videos to heighten emotional connection and affectionate communication
with their parents.
And third, actively providing services of social care and love: Social work should
assist middle and primary schools and rural communities with safety education,
enhance the rural left-behind children’s awareness of guarding against unlawful
infringement, and increase their knowledge of safety to prevent accidental injury.
Social work should help with the psychological health education to promote the rural
left-behind children’s healthy development of psychology and personality by discov-
ering and correcting psychological problems early, offering services such as psycho-
logical assistance, companionship, and crisis intervention, and reducing mental pres-
sure and negative moods. Social work should offer services to help with social inte-
gration and to improve the children’s interpersonal and social adaptive skills. It should
assist with the prevention of bad behaviors and conduct early behavioral intervention
for children with misbehavior to modify their deviant behaviors.
7.4.3 The Specific Contents of Social Work Participating

in the Care and Protection of Left-Behind Children
Social work involves the theories of multiple disciplines and has the ability to connect
the macro-social problems, middle group problems, and micro-household and indi-
vidual problems and to analyze and solve problems based on multiple theories and
from multiple perspectives. Through adopting targeted theoretical approaches, social
workers find resources for rural left-behind children and provide emotional care and
psychological support which can effectively improve the children’s self-confidence,
psychological health, and ability to tackle difficulties and to develop on their own.
First, starting from the perspective of casework, social work endeavors to return
family members to their roles in the family, build family ties for left-behind chil-
dren, and establish supportive network for them with family relations at the core. As
far as the problems relating to rural left-behind children are concerned, long-term
separation from their parents renders parent–child relationship fragile, the bound-
aries between the roles of family members are blurring, and role dislocation or even
absence happens from time to time, all of which have contributed to the emotional
and psychological crisis of the rural left-behind children. Social work can help the
children build family supportive ties. On the one hand, social workers can listen to the
children’s real needs through one-on-one tutoring and, based on that, draw on struc-
tural family therapy and Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy to solve the children’s
psychological problems, lead them to form correct knowledge about themselves and
their families, and facilitate their integration into the society and return to normal
social life. On the other hand, social workers can increase connection and interac-
tion with the parents of rural left-behind children, clarify their responsibilities for
the children, and stress the importance of good parent–child relationship. Through
casework, social workers can act as the bridge and link between the rural left-behind
children and their parents, meet the children’s emotional needs, push the family
members to take their roles in the family, enhance family supportive network, and
strengthen their weaken kinship.
Second, starting from the perspective of group work, social work can build a
mutually supportive relationship among the left-behind children, increase emotional
care for them, and assist them to build relationships. Social work can give full play
to peer groups and lead the left-behind children to set up various groups. In group
activities, by promoting communication and interaction among the group members,
social workers can guide the children to freely express their needs, release their
emotions, and share their knowledge about growing up, with a view to coordinating
interpersonal relations within the group, setting up a common group objective, and
enhancing the children’s identification with the group. In addition, social workers
should take the initiative to contact school teachers, help the teachers to better under-
stand the behaviors of left-behind children, let them voluntarily help those children
reduce learning pressure, and call on the schools to give more emotional care to those
children so that a harmonious and friendly school environment that is congenial for
their healthy growth can be created.
Third, starting from the perspective of community work, social work can connect
community resources to help build a community supportive network for the left-
behind children. With the development of urbanization and market economy, rural
social supportive network based on acquaintance society is facing severe challenges.
Through community work, social work can make community support a crucial link
of the supportive system for left-behind children. Specifically speaking, firstly, social
work can help rural community members get organized, increase their communica-
tion and interaction, and foster their awareness of a unified community; secondly,
social work can fully mobilize the internal resources in the rural communities,
promote the culture of social mutually beneficial behaviors, and create for the left-
behind children a harmonious atmosphere in which people help each other; thirdly,
7.5 Offering Pastoral Care and Love to Other Special Groups of People in Need 201
under the support of community members, social work can open children or youth
activity centers which can improve the connection between the left-behind chil-
dren and other groups, increase people’s knowledge and understanding of those
children, decrease the children’s psychological and mental problems, and can func-
tion as platforms for obtaining outside social resources and improving their living
conditions.14
Social work can build diversified social supportive network for left-behind chil-
dren by assisting and tutoring them and improving the communication and interaction
among families, schools, and communities.
7.5 Offering Pastoral Care and Love to Other Special

Groups of People in Need
Apart from ordinary poor population and left-behind children, there are other special
groups of people in need such as the poor elderly, poor women, juvenile delinquents,
offenders performing community services, and freed convicts. These people are the
more disadvantaged among the impoverished and are in more urgent need of assis-
tance from the whole society. The core idea of social work is to alleviate poverty
and support the disadvantaged. Social work can furnish the elderly with special diffi-
culties in those poverty-stricken areas with services, such as spiritual consolation,
life care, guarantee of rights and interests, and terminal care. Social work can offer
women with special difficulties in impoverished areas services such as mental stress
reduction, psychological support, parenting education, and maintenance of rights
and interests. As for the teenagers with behavior problems, offenders performing
community services and freed convicts, social work can provide psychological and
social support to improve their relationship with families and communities and to
restore and develop their social functions.
7.5.1 Providing Services for the Elderly with Special

Difficulties
Establishing and perfecting the service system that offers care and love to the elderly
with special difficulties in poverty-stricken areas is a complicated social system-
atic project and requires extensive participation of various social and professional
forces. Social work can comprehensively utilize its professional theories, knowledge,
approaches, and skills to offer services to the elderly.
First, offering spiritual consolation: Targeted at the problems related to the
elderly’s cognition, moods, and emotions, spiritual consolation provides cognitive
14 Zhang and Wang [12].

adjustment, mood regulation, emotional support, psychological counseling, and real-

ization of self-esteem and self-worth to help the elderly keep healthy and happy
and enjoy their old age. The spiritual consolation services targeted at the elderly
mainly include firstly, identifying, assessing, and diagnosing the problems of the
old people concerning their cognition, moods, and emotions; secondly, offering the
elderly services such as release of bad moods, irrational cognitive correction, and
psychological counseling to help the elderly extricate themselves from mental distur-
bances like helplessness, incapability, loneliness, anxiety, and hopelessness; thirdly,
organizing various recreational activities and enriching the spiritual and cultural life
of the elderly so that they can find spiritual consolation and mutual psychological
support in the healthy and beneficial activities and from their organizations; fourthly,
based on the community, expanding the breadth and depth of the elderly’s interper-
sonal communication and helping them obtain support and respect from their peer
groups, assistance from the neighbors and care and love from the society; fifthly,
actively contact the old people’s children and make arrangements for them about
giving family support and spiritual consolation to the elderly; and sixthly, assisting
the old people with recognizing and actively adapting to their changing roles as they
age and realizing the worth of old life, enhancing their self-confidence, and helping
them learn to accept themselves and achieve self-improvement in life.
Second, providing life care: Daily life care is a kind of social work service targeted
at the old people who are in need of care and aiming to meet the elderly’s basic needs
for daily life care. The elderly in poverty-stricken areas are undergoing deterioration
of the body and have high rates of disease. Moreover, the children of many old people
are migrant workers, so the old couple have to depend on each other, or if the elderly
have lost their spouses, they have to rely on themselves. The specific content of daily
life care for the elderly includes firstly, analyzing the major problems concerning old
people’s daily life care, assessing their needs for daily care, creating a profile about
daily care for each old person with special difficulties, and managing services on the
basis of classification; secondly, according to old people’s need, providing life care
by means of finding resources among the relatives, finding volunteers among the
neighbors or other groups of people, establishing old people organizations of mutual
assistance, and directly offering services; thirdly, arranging professional training
programs to improve the caretakers’ ability so that they can provide suitable services
for the elderly.
Third, providing guarantee of rights and interests: Social work will provide policy
support and legal aid to protect old people’s rights and interests when there are
infringements on their body, mind, property, support from children, marriage, and
social participation. The main service contents about guaranteeing old people’s rights
and interests are firstly, assessing the present conditions of the elderly’s rights and
interests and providing consultations; secondly, creating congenial atmosphere in the
family and community for the protection of old people’s rights and interests through
promotion and education; thirdly, reporting in time and interfering with behaviors
harmful to old people’s rights and interests and simultaneously offering legal aid;
fourthly, helping the old people who are eligible to obtain services, subsidies, and
allowances for the elderly; and fifthly, teaching old people how to avoid various
frauds such as marketing deception, immediately reporting the frauds, and offering
the elderly legal aid.
And Fourth, providing terminal care: Terminal care is a professional service that
helps dying old people face death and makes arrangements after death. It aims to
help the elderly understand death properly and overcome fear of death, protect their
dignity of life, and assist them to pass the last course of life in peace. The main
contents of terminal care for the elderly include firstly, helping the elderly and their
family rationally understand the disease and its progress, carrying out life education,
helping the patients adopt a rational outlook on life and death, paying close attention
to patients’ emotional and psychological changes, and providing support accordingly;
secondly, assisting the medical staff and family with life care and pain alleviation
in the last life stage of the patients, avoiding over-treatment, and subduing extreme
pain; and thirdly, assisting the patients to fulfill their wishes, make a will, and bid
farewell to their family.15
7.5.1.1 Providing Services for the Women with Special Difficulties
Impoverished women are in a more disadvantaged position compared with other

groups of poor people given that traditional gender division of labor and gender
stereotypes are still universal. On the one hand, women are usually more vulnerable
to poverty than men; on the other hand, under the same impoverished conditions,
women and men experience and deal with poverty in different ways. Rural women
play multiple roles such as giving birth and raising children and participating in
household production and community activities. Women are special in many aspects
such as occupation, community participation, economic development, and family
life. Although women’s social status has been improved obviously in reality, their
rights are still limited in terms of education, community participation, resource acqui-
sition and management, reception of market information and services, reproductive
health, and so on. It is easier for women to fall into poverty or a disadvantaged
position in the family, community, market, and society. Social work can draw on
professional theories, approaches, and skills to provide related services for women
with special difficulties in poverty-stricken areas.
First, providing mental stress reduction and psychological support services: Social
work offers professional and targeted services to women to reduce their mental
stress and psychological tension generated by limitations or unfair treatment in the
aspects of family relationship, development of livelihood, and community participa-
tion, so that they can tackle the difficulties in life better. Firstly, assessing women’s
mental stress and psychological tension and identifying the causes: For example, rural
women are usually of lower educational level than men; they are in a subordinate
position in the family and marriage; they take part in public or political affairs far less
than men; the mobility of rural female labor is obviously lower than that of the male
and the rate of women involved in agricultural labor is rising; women’s entitlement
15 Yang [13].
to land and inheritance is often neglected, which reflects their legal disadvantage;
secondly, through listening and appropriate expression of empathy, offering impov-
erished women channels to release their mental stress, and teaching them ways to
manage the mood so that they can get rid of the trouble of bad moods such as loneli-
ness, anxiety, tension, and helplessness and keep happy and relaxed; thirdly, enriching
the spiritual and cultural life of the poor women and organizing various communica-
tion groups and recreational activities which enables them to tell about their fatigue
and bitterness, listen to each other, and find emotional resonance and mutual conso-
lation and support within the group; and fourthly, helping impoverished women
explore their potentials and promoting their social participation. Social workers can
lead the women to analyze the roles and importance in the family, community, and
society. On the individual level, social workers can change the poor women’s ideas,
facilitate their awakening of gender consciousness, improve their level of education
and health, ensure that they enjoy equal rights to disease prevention and medical
security, and increase their human capital. On the community level, social workers
can encourage poor women to participate in the management of community affairs,
enhance their right of speech and the right to share benefits in the development, and
increase their social capital.
Second, providing parental education: Parenting education provides parents or
parents-to-be with knowledge and skills related to parenting, parent–child commu-
nication, and parental roles so that they can be competent parents and teach their
children well. Parenting education aims to help parents to get competent and then
facilitate children’s healthy growth and development. In present China, as far as
domestic division of labor is concerned, women obviously play a more crucial role
in raising the children. Social work can offer poor women three types of parental
educations. The first type is remedial parenting education which is designed to cater
to families with serious problems and is about corrective measures. The scope of
service will cover severe family problems and child behavioral problems such as
domestic violence, child abuse, psychological disorders, Internet addiction, drug
abuse, and theft. The aim is to fix the family function. The second type is preventive
parenting education which is targeted at families with potential or minor problems.
This service covers the impoverished, single-parent, and divorced families whose
children are more likely to have problems in the future because of the family struc-
ture, children’s growing environment, or the parents’ or children’s special conditions.
Its aim is to prevent problems or discover and solve problems in the early stage to
avoid deterioration. The third type is developmental parental education. This type
is aimed at families that are normally adapted to the society. Children in such fami-
lies do not have psychological or behavioral problems in the general sense, so the
objective is to offer the parents relevant guidance, give full play to the parental
roles, raise children with sound mind and body, and promote household harmony
and happiness.16
And third, providing maintenance of rights and interests: Social work offers
support to poor women to ensure their legal rights and interests in areas of politics,
16 Liu [14].
economy, culture, society, and family, finds governmental and social resources, and
provides policy support and legal aid for women whose legal rights and interests are
infringed on. Firstly, social workers learn about the overall condition of poor women’s
rights and interests, including the maintenance and infringement. Social workers can
carry out the investigation through casework on a one-on-one basis, or through group
work in which poor women exchange ideas on the maintenance of their rights and
interests, or through community work to get acquainted with the overall condition and
promote the formation of a community atmosphere that is protective toward women’s
rights and interests. Secondly, social workers can publicize national policies, laws,
and regulations concerning the protection of women’s rights and interests among
the impoverished women so that they are familiar with relevant knowledge, raise
rural left-behind women’s level of ideological understanding, improve their ability
to safeguard their own legitimate rights and interests, and enable them to use the legal
weapons to protect themselves when their rights and interests are infringed upon.
And thirdly, social workers can offer support to women whose rights and interests are
violated, guide the women to seek assistance from All-China Women’s Federation
and other departments, and assist relevant departments to strengthen protection of
poor women’s rights and interests such as personal and property security and the
right to education.
7.5.2 Providing Services for Other Groups of People

with Special Difficulties
As for special groups of people in impoverished areas such as teenagers with behavior
problems, offenders performing community services and freed convicts, social work
can, by comprehensively utilizing its processional theories, approaches, and skills,
focus on the problems, strengthen psychological and social support for them, improve
their relationship with families and communities, and restore and develop their social
functions.
First, modifying teenagers’ bad behavior: Teenagers’ bad behavior is also called
deviant behavior which means conduct that deviates from the societal norm.
According to Law of the People’s Republic of China on Prevention of Juvenile
Delinquency, teenagers’ bad behaviors are divided into misbehaviors and serious
misbehaviors. Causes of juvenile misbehaviors are complicated, relating to many
factors such as the individual, family, friend, school, and society. As far as teenagers
with misbehaviors in impoverished areas are concerned, improper family education,
incomplete family structure, lack of care from the family, poor school management,
unhealthy social atmosphere, influence of bad friends, and weak self-discipline all
contribute to the emergence of misbehaviors. While intervening in juvenile misbehav-
iors, social workers should be familiar with teenager’s psychological characteristics,
keep track of their psychological state, prevent or modify deviant behaviors with
scientific methods, and guide them to set up correct outlook on the world, life, and
values.
Social work can comprehensively utilize three major working methods—case-
work, group work, and community work—to modify juvenile misbehaviors. Firstly,
using casework to provide one-to-one services for troubled adolescents, social
workers should have a deep understanding of the teenagers’ physical and mental
state, make targeted and appropriate plans for modification, help them to know them-
selves and the surroundings better, eliminate the deviant part in their notions, psyche,
emotions, and behaviors, and guide them to set up correct thinking and behavioral
model, so that they can achieve the unity of personality and get well adapted to
the society. Secondly, social workers can use the method of group work to create
a peer environment and, through purposeful activities, lead the teenagers to share
their experience, improve their ability to face and solve problems, enhance their
capability to adapt, restore, and raise their self-confidence, help them to form correct
moral sense and rational thinking pattern, and change their bad behaviors. And thirdly,
social workers can use the method of community work to organize the teenagers with
deviant behaviors, carry out well-planned activities step by step, offer different kinds
of training, improve the teenagers’ skills and ability to integrate into the society again,
help them to acquire the opportunity to improve their self-image and set up confi-
dence, build and strengthen their social supportive network, and lay the foundation
for them to integrate into the society.
Second, participating in community correction: When social work participates in
community correction, it is usually called correctional social work which requires
social workers to use professional theories and skills to assist offenders who are
serving their sentences in communities to transform themselves, to modify their
behavioral model, to rebuild their lifestyle which conforms to social norms, and to
restore their normal social working function. Traditional community correction puts
an emphasis on correcting clients’ existing problems and focuses on help the clients
solve their troubles. In the process, it is easy for the correctional workers to impress the
clients as superior authorities, which will easily trigger fear, aversion, and even resis-
tance from the clients. In contrast, social work adopts the strength perspective and
starts from clients’ advantages and resources rather than their existing problems, so
it can avoid the drawbacks of traditional community correction. Community correc-
tion and social work have a high degree of uniformity in terms of ideas, objectives,
functions, and intervention process, and they both manifest the social development
concept of putting people first.
While participating in community correction, social work can comprehensively
utilize various working methods and techniques. Firstly, social work can adopt the
method of casework to know what the clients think and feel. Given that the clients are
temporarily in a disadvantaged position and have special problems and needs, social
workers can draw on the strength perspective, reflecting and rewarding the clients’
advantages, transforming their passiveness into positive factors, shifting their posi-
tion from passive to active, rebuilding their confidence, reducing their psychological
burden in the process of correction, helping them to form correct self-cognition, modi-
fying their deviant values, and enhancing their ability to integrate into the society.
References 207
Secondly, using the method of group work, social work can gather clients of similar
features into one group in which the environment is equal, trustworthy, and mutually
respectful and supportive, so that through interacting, communicating, and sharing
with other group members, the clients can rediscover themselves, improve their
ability to adapt, restore their self-confidence, and enhance their social functioning.
Thirdly, social work can use the method of community work to establish a social
supportive network. Social work can explore and utilize the resources within the
community, reconstruct the clients’ social supportive network, offer the clients a
platform and environment where they can give play to their strength. Meanwhile,
social work can actively facilitate the implementation of social security policies that
are favorable for the clients, help them tackle difficulties, coordinate their family and
community ties, rebuild their connection to their family and community, and help
them gradually realize positive resocialization.
References
1. Xiang D et al (2017) Changing the perspective and renovating the approach: local practice of
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2. Yuan H (2014) The paths and strategies for professional social work to intervening in social
assistance. People’s Tribune (35)
3. Liu Q, Han F (2012) Development-oriented assistance and social work intervention. Dongyue
Tribune (6)
4. Guan X (2017) Analysis on the demand, capacity and institutional mechanism of social work
intervening in social assistance (1)
5. Yang R (2014) Social work intervening in social assistance: strategies and methods. J Soochow
Univ Philos Soc Sci Ed (4)
6. Zhang Y, Chen T (2017) Research on the six-wheel drive mode of poverty-reduction in
China’s rural areas: taking XMN Chinese Poverty-reduction and Development Programme
as an example. Res Dev (2)
7. Xi X (2018) The embedding and infiltrating ways of social work to assisting targeted poverty
alleviation. Guizhou Soc Sci (5)
8. Wang C (2018) The dilemma and countermeasures of the poverty alleviation by relocation.
Hebei Acad J (5)
9. Xiang D (2019) Social work facilitates relocated poor people to start a new life. China Soc
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alleviation migrants. J Guizhou Normal Univ (Soc Sci Ed) (4)
11. Shen G, Chen L (2018) Research on the practice mode of social work intervening in problems
concerning rural left-behind children in China. Jilin Univ J Soc Sci Ed (6)
12. Zhang J, Wang J (2016) Research on social work intervening into the problems of rural left-
behind children: a practical perspective based on relationship. J Tianjin Adm Inst (5)
13. Yang H (2019) Discussion on the types and contents of social work services for the left-behind
elderly in rural areas. J Jinggangshan Univ (Soc Sci) (3)
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Technol (Soc Sci Ed) (6)
Chapter 8
The Process of Poverty-Reducing Social
Work
As a global intractable issue, poverty is being given close attention to by the coun-
tries all across the world. Eliminating poverty and promoting the full development,
progress, and prosperity of human society constitute a common pursuit shared by
the international community. Reducing poverty and social work share the same
origin. Social work originated in giving the assistance to the poor. Currently, poverty-
reducing social work is defined as a process in which social workers, adhering to the
professional values and concepts and exploiting the vocational approaches and skills,
help the impoverished to solve problems, foster the ability for self-improvement, and
alleviate poverty. That is to say, poverty-reducing social work takes the impoverished
as its specific clients and adopts various working methods of social work. In this
sense, like other forms of social work, poverty-curbing social work has an inventive
function. However, given the fact that the impoverished are the most representative
of all special groups of population, social work that takes the impoverished as its
clients is, therefore, unique.1 Specifically speaking, the integrity of poverty-reducing
social work requires that the intervention process should not only follow the general
practice, but also make appropriate adjustments according to specific circumstances.
As a branch of general social work, poverty-reducing social work should, on the
one hand, follow the particular protocols of social work, routinize the practice, also
pay attention to specific and individualized situations, and provide targeted services
according to clients’ particularity and real needs. On the other hand, it should focus on
turning external resources into poor people’s internal self-driven motivation, further
humanize the work on rural poverty elimination and development, stimulate the rural
impoverished to take the initiative in poverty reducing efforts, effectively assist the
rural poor to lift themselves out of poverty and get rich, and help the impoverished
villages to prosper. Practice has proved that such poverty reduction social work is a
carefully planned and step-by-step process.
1 Wang and Li [1].

210 8 The Process of Poverty-Reducing Social Work
This chapter will emphatically introduce the process of poverty alleviation social
work, which falls into four different stages according to the common process model
of social work: analyzing the needs, making the schemes, implementing the program,
and evaluating the end results.
8.1 Assessing the Needs
The origin and development of social work are inextricably entwined with poverty-
reducing efforts. The reason for utilizing social work to reduce poverty is that
social work can provide for the impoverished a supportive environment (including
supportive laws, policies and social environment). Social workers take the disad-
vantaged population as its main clients and have close contact with them, so they
are more likely to be able to analyze and assess the clients’ real needs and “suit the
remedy to the case”. Whether social workers can be given a full scope to depends on
the formulation of poverty alleviation working scheme, on the establishment of social
work values and on the professional approaches to, and techniques of, social work.
Poverty problems have been impeding social progress and hampering economic
development for a long time. From traditional social assistance to the present large-
scale poverty reduction efforts through development and targeted poverty reduction,
our nation has always clung to the notion of supporting the impoverished during
different phases. “Social work can play an important role in the efforts of reducing
poverty. The poverty-reduction programs in China are still under the influence of
traditional poverty alleviation policies that focus on doling out relief. To overcome
the defects of poverty alleviation policies requires the intervention of professional
social work, which will be a great measure that can make up for the inadequacy of
such policies at present and can enhance the ability of poverty-curbing clients”.2
Therefore, an accurate assessment of clients’ needs is the prerequisite and foun-
dation of the effectiveness of social work. If there is something amiss with the need
assessment, no matter how sound and sophisticated the subsequent scheme is, it is
unlikely to really solve the clients’ problems. Need assessment of poverty Alleviation
social work requires that the social workers, by collecting and analyzing informa-
tion about the impoverished, should accurately describe poor people’s problems in
specific situations and identify their dire needs to improve their circumstances.
During this process, poverty-reducing social work puts an emphasis on viewing
the impoverished in the perspective of the empowerment theory and in the advan-
tage perspective, spurring their intrinsic potentials and helping them to “help them-
selves”. As with other types of social work, before offering services, it should assess
clients’ needs, and such assessment is the first step in the process. It mainly includes
three aspects. The first aspect is that social workers should draw on professional
measurement tools and approaches to identify and determine the problems and needs
of the clients. The second aspect is to analyze the causes and find the key root causes

8.1 Assessing the Needs 211
that trigger poverty. The third one is to distinguish between controllable and uncon-
trollable factors based on the cause analysis so as to build a solid foundation for
scheme making.
Social workers should know fairly well about the poverty conditions and socio-
demographic characteristics in the communities or among the impoverished popu-
lation, and about the causes of poverty and what kind of assistance they’ve already
got. They should conduct household-based surveys and set up a file for each poor
household and have all the details about the present conditions and needs of the
impoverished population and communities. What’s more, before conducting assess-
ment, they should have the basic theoretical presuppositions, which certainly does
not mean that they should analyze the impoverished and their poor conditions purely
theoretically.
8.1.1 What Needs Assessment Means
The primary objective of needs assessment is to clarify what are the most fundamental
needs of a local community. Next, social workers should find out the objective causes
of poverty in the communities. Is it because of the undeveloped infrastructure or low
level of education? Then, social workers should decide on the subjective causes. Is
it because of low level of participation in social labor or the mentality of “waiting,
relying, and begging”? Social workers should decide how to make the most urgent
interventions. Finally, they should, according to the reality, find the entry point of
targeted poverty alleviation by choosing the professional approaches. They can take
field trips and use questionnaires to learn about the specific conditions of the impov-
erished villages and families such as what resources they have at their disposal, what
causes the present state of poverty, and how poor they are. They can classify the
causes of poverty into different categories, like having disease, lacking labor force,
money or market experience, and having school-age children.
8.1.2 How Needs Should Be Assessed
As what needs are there should be clearly clarified, social workers should also classify
the various needs into, for example, the ones on the macro-level and the ones on the
micro-level. Needs assessment on the macro-level is targeted at the impoverished
as groups of population and requires an assessment of the overall composition of
the poor population in certain areas, the living conditions, geographical locations,
infrastructure, controllable and uncontrollable resources, social organizations, and
local elites. Needs assessment on the micro-level, on the contrary, is targeted at the
individuals among those poverty-stricken groups and requires an assessment of their
physical, mental, and social conditions.
8.1.3 The Process of Making the Assessment
Generally speaking, needs assessment should undergo the following feasible and
effective protocols: collecting and analyzing the basic information of the impover-
ished, identifying their problems, analyzing the causes of poverty, and formulating
a report.
First, collecting information: Social workers can take field trips, use question-
naires, and look up government’s documents to learn about the relevant information
about the impoverished including their personal information (age, ethnicity, level of
education, health, work, income), family information (number of members, economic
condition, family relationship, family members’ level of education, means of trans-
portation, area of land), and village information (developing history, geographical
location, population size, poverty rate, infrastructure, characteristic industries, and
culture and villager organizations). Material analysis involves combining and inte-
grating the scattered information mentioned above to discover the local connec-
tion and to get acquainted with the overall conditions of the impoverished and, on
that basis, to classify and mark up the factors that might develop into, or alleviate,
problems.
Second, identifying problems: On the one hand, while taking field trips and
collecting and analyzing materials, social workers can form a preliminary idea about
the poor people’s problems by instinct. One the other hand, during interviews, the
poor people will voluntarily tell social workers about their understanding of their
own problems. However, it is possible that neither of these ways reveals the real
problems. Problem identification requires that social workers, and the poor people
discuss and decide together. Both parties should list all the problems they can think
of, then put them in order of importance and urgency, and then settle on the real
problems.
Third, analyzing the causes of poverty: The causes of poverty are often
complex. While analyzing the causes, social workers should pay attention to the
following aspects. Firstly, they should differentiate the subjective and objective
causes. For example, is the objective cause poor infrastructure or disadvantaged
geographical location? Is the subjective cause unwillingness to ask for assistance
or low-level of education? Secondly, they should know if the poor have endeavored
to solve their own problems and why they failed. Is it because their understanding
of poverty causes goes wrong, or because their methods of solution are incorrect?
Thirdly, they should also view the impoverished from the advantage perspective.
Even the poor in predicament still have the power and ability to solve problems, so
the social workers should focus on the advantages and resources of the poor and their
environment.
Fourth, formulating a report: The report of needs assessment documents the
poor people’s basic information, problems, analysis of causes, and needs on paper
to facilitate the ensuing work. The structure of needs assessment report consists
of two parts. The first part is materials and facts which mainly describe the prob-
lems such as how long the poverty problems have persisted, who and what systems
8.1 Assessing the Needs 213
are concerned, and what is the poor people’s background of family, village, educa-
tion, and employment. The second part is professional judgment, which includes
five aspects: understanding of the materials; assessment of the problems; analysis,
understanding and explanation of the causes of the problems; judgment on the possi-
bility and benefit of transformation; summary of the advantages and resources and
the formulation of “temporary hypothesis” or “advice on action”.3
8.1.4 The Theoretical Framework and a Case as an Example
In the following part, we are going to look at the project “Research on the Supporting
Model for, and Needs of, the Aged in Less Developed Areas under the Background
of Targeted Poverty-Alleviation” conducted in Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County,
Hezhou City, Guangxi Province,4 and take it as an example to illustrate how to
use Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory to assess the poor’s needs. This project
randomly selects two towns in Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County as the object of
research, investigates the living conditions of the left-behind elderly there by means of
random sampling and field interview, and uses Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory to
analyze the old peoples’ physiological needs, security and safety needs, social needs,
esteem needs, and self-actualization needs. The project sets up a needs-level indicator
system for the left-behind elderly in Fuchuan that covers the five levels of needs:
physiology, security, social interaction, esteem, and self-actualization. Physiological
needs subsume three specific indicators: the cost of living, living conditions, and
the tap-water supply. There are four specific indicators under the rubric of security
and safety needs: medical level, health level, popularization of safety knowledge, and
supporting model for the aged. Social needs are measured by two factors: number
of children visits and neighborhood relationship. Esteem needs are manifested by
two indicators: self-evaluation and respect from others. Self-actualization needs are
gauged by three indexes: exercise habit, learning habit, and travel experience. These
needs each are analyzed in great detail.
First, physiological needs: Judging from the cost of living of the left-behind
elderly in Fuchuan, there are ten of them, i.e., 13.69% of all the left-behind old
people in Fuchuan, whose living cost is under 400 yuan; there are nineteen old
people, i.e., 26.03%, whose living cost is 600–800 yuan; twenty-nine old people, i.e.,
39.73%, have a living cost from 600 to 800 yuan; twelve old people, i.e., 16.44%,
have 800 to 1,000 yuan; three old people, i.e., 4.11%, have more than 1,000 yuan.
Viewed from the results of the survey, the life quality of more than 50% of the old
people is guaranteed, while the number of the aged living around or under the poverty
line is still large. Compared with the aged who have reached the relatively well-off
level, these old people are still in difficulties. The old couple can take care of each
other, but some left-behind old people have lost their spouses, and once they get
3 Dong [3].
4 Xiong [4].
sick or lose the ability to take care of themselves, their situation will go from bad to
worse. Viewed from the living conditions, three left-behind old people, accounting
for about 4.11% of all, live in adobe houses; sixty-four of them (87.67%) live in brick
bungalows with a tiled roof; six of them (8.22%) live in multi-story buildings. As
can be seen here, most left-behind elderly still live in brick bungalows with a tiled
roof. The climate is wet and hot in Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County. A few houses
are eroded and have mold spots. Viewed from the supply of tap water, most of the
left-behind elderly have easy access to it. Only 2.74% of the families don’t have tap
water and still practice the old way to fetch water. The researchers find in the process
of investigation that although there is tap water installed in their houses, some of
the aged cannot conveniently use it because the facilities are too old and rusty. It is
apparent that the infrastructure in the county is not in good shape; nor is the security
system complete.
Second, security and safety needs: Whether the left-behind old people’s security
and safety needs can be satisfied is determined to a great extent by local medical level.
Medical and health conditions, as a factor of security, are of particular significance for
the left-behind elderly in poverty-stricken areas. The investigations from field trips
have revealed that, in Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County, the medical level is low and
the health clinics are not well equipped; although some minor illnesses can be treated
there, serious diseases cannot. 53.4% of the left-behind elderly suffer from chronic or
serious diseases, 17.83% are not quite healthy, and only 28.77% believe that they are
in good health. The left-behind elderly spend most of their money on medical care,
and the incompleteness of relevant medical insurance system, which only reimburses
part of their medical expenses, increases their financial burden. Meanwhile, 95.9% of
the left-behind report that there have been no lectures or training programs on safety
education for years there, which, to some extent, has led to their weak awareness
of security. Currently, the traditional supporting model for the aged in impoverished
areas in China is under unprecedented impact, which has two main causes. The first
cause is that most of the young adults in poverty-stricken areas leave their hometown
for work, so there are no enough human resources to keep afloat the household
supporting model for the aged. The second cause is that the backwardness of the
ideas of the left-behind elderly increases the difficulty of providing necessary old-age
support.
Third, social needs: Most children will choose the Spring Festival or other public
holidays to come back to see the left-behind elderly. Most children, accounting for
about 91.8%, come back home once or twice a year. About 6.8% of the children
return home more than three times a year. 1.4% never come back. There are no
recreational activities for the aged in the towns of Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County.
The televisions in some households are for the entertainment of children. The ways
of entertainment for the aged are few and far between. The aged mostly rely on
chitchatting as a way of recreation to kill the time, so the neighborhood relationship
is particularly important. 87.6% of the aged said that they could maintain a good
relationship with their neighbors.
8.2 Making Schemes 215
Fourth, needs of esteem: As for the self-evaluation of the left-behind elderly,

sixteen of them, accounting for about 21.9%, think highly of themselves; fifty-two
(71.3%) think they are just average people; five (6.9%) have a very bad opinion
of themselves. Most left-behind elderly people are highly respected in their daily
life, but there are still some who are not respected. 5.5% of the left-behind elderly
think they are well respected; 76.7% think they are somewhat respected; 17.8% think
they do not receive the due respect they deserve. The survey has found that the self-
evaluation of the left-behind elderly and the respect they receive from others are
related to their contribution to the society and the country. Generally speaking, the
more contribution they have made to the society and the country, the higher their self-
evaluation will be, and the more respect they will get. For example, an old woman
who was once a women’s director in the village and a cadre of the production brigade
was more confident during the interview, and she was also trusted and respected by
others in many aspects.
Fifth, needs of self-actualization: The majority of the left-behind elderly (sixty-
eight, accounting for 93.15%) do not have the habit of doing exercises; only five of
the left-behind elderly (6.85%) have the habit. In terms of learning habits, eight of
them (10.96%) have the habit of watching news and reading newspapers; most of
them won’t study voluntarily. In terms of traveling experience, only 2.74% of them
have ever traveled, and 97.26% have no traveling experience at all. Besides, there
are few recreational facilities in rural areas, which shows that the left-behind elderly
severely lack leisure and entertainment.
8.2 Making Schemes
After a thorough investigation of the above circumstances, social workers need to

set the service objectives according to the information they have marshaled. Based
on a full understanding of the current situation of the poor and on the clarification of
the poverty alleviation goals, social workers will accordingly make poverty-reducing
schemes, which mainly include six aspects: the poor people’s basic information, their
problems and needs, the objectives to be realized, the specific methods of interven-
tion, the time schedule, and the expected risks. On the one hand, the participation of
social work in targeted poverty reduction requires social workers to leverage their
professional advantages, to perform the role and function of experts in scientifically
identifying the causes of poverty, to complete the scheduled poverty reduction tasks
within the prescribed time limit, and to achieve the poverty curbing objectives. This
demands that the social workers should unequivocally define the overall goals and
specific work objectives, work productively, and get themselves equipped with corre-
sponding manpower and material resources. On the other hand, social workers should
not go it alone or even act arbitrarily; instead, they should discuss with local govern-
ment departments, village cadres, and villagers’ representatives about the entry point
of their integration, explore the feasibility, identify deficiencies, and loopholes of
the poverty alleviation schemes, further improve them, and constantly stimulate the
participants’ participatory enthusiasm and internal agential power.
8.2.1 Setting Goals
Goals are normally divided into overall goals and specific goals. Overall goals refer
to more abstract and long-term goals which are difficult to measure with specific
indicators, such as capacity improvement. Specific goals refer to short-term goals set
to achieve the overall goals and can be observed and measured, such as how many
cases are completed.
First, overall goals
According to the principle that the basic services “lay the foundation”, the advan-
tage perspective “leads the way” and resource connection “paves the way”, social
work scientifically designs service programs to meet the basic daily needs of the
impoverished communities and focuses on stimulating the inner motivation of
the poor people to change and on realizing the long-term goal that the poor can
grow, develop, and strive, of their own accord. Even if the social workers gradually
withdraw the services in the final stage, poor people can still solve problems on
their own. Social workers should follow social work’s concept of “helping people to
help themselves”, adopt suitable social work methods and skills to provide profes-
sional services according to the practical needs of the poor people or the poor areas
to help them to solve basic survival problems, and play the basic role of service
provider as well. Social workers should adopt the advantage perspective, see the
advantages and resources of each poor individual or community, explore the advan-
tages of local community, help the local poor people to cultivate optimistic attitude
toward life, guide them to strengthen labor awareness, promote their abilities, connect
social resources for them, expand formal and informal social supportive network,
and establish long-term mechanisms and ways to help them with targeted poverty
alleviation.
Second, specific goals
Firstly, optimizing the basic services to accurately meet the needs: Social workers
should conduct in-depth and meticulous surveys so that they can accurately target at
the needs, scientifically plan the service programs, and ensure that their services are
professional and accurate. The process of social work intervening in targeted assis-
tance is also the process of providing poverty reducing social work services. Different
from the government’s services which focus on the material level, the services of
poverty alleviation social work put more emphasis on the spiritual level, stressing the
stimulation of internal motivation and potentials. Based on his field research lasting
fifteen years, Zhang Heqing points out that, while emphasizing “targeted poverty alle-
viation”, social work should effectively assist with the national poverty alleviation
cause, take root in urban and rural communities, accurately identify poverty reduc-
tion clients, and make sure that the national poverty alleviation funds are distributed
to every eligible village and household and that the poverty alleviation policies are
well implemented. What’s more, according to Zhang Heqing, social work should
use the imagination of sociology, and, on the basis of their deep understanding of
the social causes of poverty, adopt social work’s professional methods to “prescribe
the right remedy” and make the poverty curbing work practical.5 It should be noted
that social workers, local government departments, and especially, the poor people,
should all take part in the process of setting and improving the goals. The specific
goals should revolve around the overall goals and must be practical, reasonable, and
in accordance with the resources and capacities possessed by the local communities
and institutions. The specific goals must not be unrealistic or too ideal.
Secondly, establishing service programs and providing targeted services
according to the main causes of poverty in the local communities to ensure accurate
input of resources: Specifically speaking, social workers can use casework, focusing
on changing poor people’s psychology, personality, motivation, and attitude and
boosting their ambition before alleviating their poverty. They can use group work,
establishing mutually supportive groups of the poor, children tutoring groups and
mutually supportive groups involving the poor, their children, and other members of
the society so that the poor and their children can explore, accumulate and utilize
social capital, and finally break the vicious circle of poverty. They can also can
use community work, emphasizing residents’ participation, residents’ cooperation,
community self-help, leadership skills training, etc., enhancing community cohesion
and awareness and promoting social actions and community development programs
related to poverty Alleviation.6 Focusing on the primary school children in the rural
areas of the third circle of Chengdu and taking the “mobile classroom project” as the
research object, Yan Xi studies the social work service in four rural primary schools
in the poor areas of Jintang County, Pengzhou City in the third circle of Chengdu.
The research finds that the social work intervention process in the rural schools in
the third circle of Chengdu has three main characteristics: The content of interven-
tion is responding to students’ general needs; the method is mainly group work with
community work as a supplement; the form is rotating and relaying services.7
Thirdly, holding regular skill training activities for the local residents in impover-
ished communities, strengthening their psychological construction, and helping them
to establish a peer supportive network and to cultivate an optimistic attitude toward
life: While deciding what kind of skill training programs are to be provided, social
workers should consider the real needs of the poor people and the local production
characteristics and should discuss and decide together with the poor what the most
needed and most practical skills to them are, so that through skill training, the poor
can acquire the means of livelihood and gradually lift themselves out of poverty, as
a result, less poor people will refuse to take part in skill training programs.
Poverty alleviation is not only about material assistance. To preserve the results
of poverty reduction efforts requires guiding the subjective thinking of the poor
people, combining poverty reduction with education, changing the mentality of
5 Zhang [5].
6 Li [6].
7 Yan [7].
“waiting, relying, and begging”, helping the poor to set up the concept of self-
reliance, and mobilizing their initiative in alleviating poverty on their own. The
core ability of social workers is the premise for the effective provision and func-
tioning of social work services. Therefore, social workers should get well informed
on the theories and knowledge concerning poverty reduction and accurately locate
the key points of social work intervention in targeted poverty curbing. Liu Binzhi
and some others think that social workers should build their core ability system from
three aspects—values, knowledge, and techniques—which constitute the trinity of
competence framework. The values social workers should uphold include common
prosperity, urban and rural equality, and endogenous development; the knowl-
edge that they should acquire is about social policies, livelihood development, and
service management; the techniques that they should master are accurate identifi-
cation, cross-border integration, overall planning, and follow-up evaluation. Social
workers should also cultivate, improve, expand, and consolidate their core compe-
tence through professional education, continuing education, development through
practice, and policy guidance.8
Finally, connecting resources and building channels: Social workers can build a
“public trade” platform for poor communities, guide poor people to choose appro-
priate jobs according to their own advantages, realize flexible employment which
enables poor people to work from home, and increase their sources of income.
They can build social supportive network, provide services for poor people who
are willing to work, and form a long-term assistance mechanism. They can connect
external social resources to introduce and support targeted poverty alleviation poli-
cies. They can use big data information network to provide effective and timely infor-
mation for the poor and to realize information symmetry. For example, Changsha
Social Work College sent social workers to Weng village (a pseudonym) in the west
of Hunan Province to provide professional social work services for the rural left-
behind people to improve their quality of life. The social workers aimed to improve
community governance, adopted the methods of social work, built a platform for
fair urban–rural trade, used cultural guidance to lead the people, built social work
service stations, based their work on ecological cooperatives, and re-established rural
mutually supportive network.9 Here is another example. In 2009, Guangdong Green
Farming Social Work Development Center undertook the pilot rural–social–work
project called “Urban–rural Cooperation and Fair Trade, Joint Creation of Ecolog-
ical Civilization and Sustainable Life”. The site of the project is relatively remote
Xianniangxi Village and Leming Village in Conghua District in Guangzhou. Xian-
niangxi Village is located in the north of Liangkou Town which is a mountainous
area belonging to Guangzhou Liuxi River National Forest Reserve and Guangzhou
Water Source Forest Reserve. Leming Village is only 4000 km away from Xianni-
angxi Village, and there are six communities and 700 residents within its jurisdiction.
8 Liu and Lu [8].

9 Shi and Jiang [9].
There are four communities and 400 residents in Xianniangxi Village. Planting sugar
oranges and working away from hometown are the two main sources of income for
the residents in both villages. With little population mobility, the two are relatively
closed and traditional villages. Guangdong Green Farming Social Work Develop-
ment Center first settled in Xianniangxi Village and started from cultivating villagers’
organizations. The center has successively established many organizations such as
the rural hostel women’s group, ecological planting group, green plum-processing
mutual aid group, and cultural docent-guided tour group of the youth who come back.
In 2014, under the professional guidance of the teachers of the School of Architecture
of South China University of Technology, Guangdong Green Farming Social Work
Development Center assisted the villagers to renovate the oldest round house “Xin-
longwei” and made it public space in the community. The overall village construction
and promotion plan of Xianniangxi Village started from cultivating villagers’ orga-
nizations. The social workers organized the villagers in impoverished communities,
let the villager’s organizations connect the poor people and the communities, carried
out activities to discover leaders and elites among the villagers and let them play a
leading role, set up the spirit of cooperation and mutual assistance, formulated the
awareness of community participation, established a long-term and stable poverty
reduction mechanism, and laid a solid foundation for rural revitalization.
8.2.2 Integrating and Evaluating the Resources
After setting the goals, social workers should effectively evaluate the existing
resources which mainly include social work institutions and the resources owned by
the local communities and poor people. For example, social workers should match
the existing material resources and facilities possessed by social work institutions
with the resources needed to fulfill the service goals. The quantity and quality of
social workers, especially their professional competence, should be assessed too.
They should assess the local advantages relating to natural resources, take advantage
of the natural conditions and climate to develop tourism or characteristic industries
(such as agritainment and mountain vegetables in Youyang County, Chongqing). In
addition, they should assess the advantages of the poor themselves and provide them
with employment guidance or skills training on the basis of their strengths.
8.2.3 Determining the Best Plan
First, list all the possible plans through brainstorming; next, carefully compare the
advantages, disadvantages, and possible results of each plan and analyze the rationale
of each plan one by one; finally, hold a discussion and finally determine the best plan.
In this process, it should be noted that the plan must be strictly connected to the real
needs of the poor people or the poor areas and must take the needs as its premise and
foundation; the social workers and the poor must participate in the process together.
The poor themselves are experts at solving their own problems; the social workers
should emphasize the subjectivity of the poor and regard the poor as capable and
valuable individuals.
8.2.4 Making a Detailed Plan
After the above steps are completed, social workers can develop a detailed work plan
based on the information and resources they have mastered. The plan should contain
six parts. First, basic information of the poor, including personal background, family
background, and the information of the villages; second, the problems and needs
of the poor: Social workers should rank the problems according to the priority and
severity, analyze the causes, differentiate subjective and objective factors related to
the problems, and clarify the real needs of the poor; third, work objectives: Work
objectives are divided into overall objectives and specific ones. The overall objectives
should closely revolve around the real needs of the poor; the specific objectives are
the branches of the overall objectives. The formulation of work objectives requires
the participation of both social workers and the poor, which will raise poor people’s
willingness to give play to their subjectivity while implementing the plans. Fourth,
the specific methods of intervention: Social workers should utilize the three major
professional methods of social work flexibly. They can use casework to help the
poor manage their negative moods and build self-confidence. Social workers can
use group work to organize the poor people, and through group activities, raise their
awareness of cooperation, enhance organizational cohesion, increase their partici-
pation in local affairs, assist them to solve poverty problems, and realize collective
prosperity. Social workers can use community work to carry out community activ-
ities, explore the resources of the communities, expand people’s participation in
community affairs, raise the community’s capacity for development, and improve
the community’s overall conditions. Fifth, the time schedule: Social workers should
assign a time schedule for realizing the goals and tasks of each phase according to
their logical correlation and take into consideration such factors as social workers’
efficiency and the poor people’s receptivity while allocating the time. Sixth, antici-
pated risks and plans for solution: Social workers should have the awareness of risk
prevention. Before they begin their services, they should list as many problems as
they can expect and find a solution to each problem to ensure the normal and orderly
development of the activities.
8.2.5 An Exemplary Service Plan
In the following part, we will take as an example the disease-prevention group under
the project “Poverty Alleviation Through Health Assistance”, one that is conducted
by Chenjiaqiao Street in Shapingba District in Chongqing10 and that is about social
work and social assistance to introduce the writing protocols and norms of the
working scheme made by the poverty-reducing group.
First, background information
In 2011, Chenjiaqiao was administratively transformed from a rural town into an
urban street, thus becoming part of a city. All the communities under Chenjiaqiao
Street except for Xueyuan community and Guanfangsi community are either loca-
tions of relocation houses or old part of the city. Social workers gathered data
by visiting community civil affairs personnel and conducting fieldwork. Statis-
tics showed that there were a total of 85 people living on minimum subsistence
allowances, one on extreme-poverty allowance and 11 households with extreme diffi-
culties registered in the official documents in Chenjiaqiao Street. The poor people
in plight need continuous assistance from the government and society to completely
change the situation, improve their survival ability, and raise their quality of life.
Chongqing Ren’ai Social Work Service Center undertook the Chenjiaqiao Street
social assistance and social work service project which was aimed to provide profes-
sional services for the people living on minimum subsistence allowances, the people
on extreme-poverty allowances and registered households with extreme difficulties,
to assist them in solving real problems, to improve their self-help ability, and to
promote their integration into the society.
Secondly, case study (estimation)
In the preliminary investigation in the name of the project, the social workers
conducted surveys on 100 families, including low-income households, families with
special difficulties registered in the civil administration documents and families with
difficulties recorded in the community files. The research results show that 30 fami-
lies fell into poverty because of disease and the proportion reaches 30%; members
in the families receiving assistance have a high incidence of sickness; most of these
families have to spend a lot of money on medical care; more than 70% of the sick
people have “three highs” (hypertension, hyperglycemia and hyperlipaemia), ortho-
pedic diseases, cardiovascular diseases, or other common diseases. The people with
chronic or serious diseases suffer over a long period of time and have little knowl-
edge of disease prevention, rehabilitation, and daily health care. Families with finan-
cial difficulties cannot bear the financial pressure caused by their family members’
disease, so it is particularly important for them to learn health knowledge such as
disease prevention and nip the disease in the bud. To improve the disease-prevention
10 Chongqing Renai Social Work Service Center. ‘Chenjiaqiao Social Assistance and Social Work
Service Project “Poverty Alleviation through Health Assistance” by the Disease-prevention Group
as an Example.’ Please see: https://www.sohu.com/a/319867854_120059356.
awareness and self-rescue ability of the members in impoverished families, the social
workers plan to organize disease-prevention teams for the project “Poverty Allevi-
ation Through Health Assistance”, so that the members can learn more disease-
prevention knowledge, improve their health awareness, and pay more attention to
their physical fitness and prevent diseases under the guidance of the social workers.
Third, service scheme
1. The concept of service
The social workers conduct group work based on the social support theory and
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The social support theory emphasizes intervening in
individual’s social network to change its role in the personal life. The team members
have little storage of knowledge about disease prevention, rehabilitation, and daily
health care, so the social workers build this platform to connect related medical
resources for them by means of providing explanation from doctors, college volun-
teers, and social workers and letting the group members exchange their ideas, so that
their social supportive network related to health can be expanded and their abilities
to prevent diseases and rescue themselves can be improved. Maslow’s hierarchy of
needs shows that the security and safety needs of the people in this area are not
satisfied because the frequency of family members falling sick is high and various
chronic diseases occur repeatedly. The teams are designed to let them learn more
knowledge about disease prevention, rehabilitation, and daily health care so as to
meet their safety needs.
2. The group goals
The overall goal of the group is to enrich the clients’ health knowledge, helping
them learn how to prevent seasonal diseases, “three highs”, cardiovascular and cere-
brovascular diseases, and rheumatism and what daily precautions they should take,
to build a communication platform for the families so that they can improve each
other and progress together, and to enhance and perfect the social supportive network
of the families in this area. The specific group goals are as follows: (1) connecting
medical resources and giving health guidance to the clients; (2) letting the clients
learn how to prevent spring disease; (3) letting the clients learn how to prevent and
treat the diseases that tend to break out suddenly in daily life; (4) letting the clients
be acquainted with how to prevent “three highs”, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular
diseases, and rheumatism; and (5) enhancing the clients’ peer supportive network
through communication.
3. The nature of group: being supportive
4. Group members: clients of social assistance in Chenjiaqiao Street
5. Group time: 2:30–3:30 .pm., every Thursday, February 21–March 28, 2019
6. Group schedule:
February 14, 2019: Discuss with the supervisors the feasibility, theories,
overall arrangement, etc.;
February 15, 2019: Write the group plan and the section schedule;
8.3 Implementing the Project 223
February 18–19, 2019: Recruit team members and communicate with the
communities about the time, content, and sites of the activities;
February 20, 2019: Determine the list of participants, and prepare supplies;
February 21–March 38, 2019: Carry out the group activities of each section
and keep records;
April 1, 2019: Write the team’s evaluation report;
April 3, 2019: Collate and keep a file of all the materials related to the group.
7. Expected risks and the plan for solutions
Firstly, not enough members are recruited. The measure is to use the community
electronic screens, bulletin boards, WeChat groups and WeChat official accounts,
and other media to increase publicity. Secondly, shortage of funds: The measure is
to contact the local cooperative enterprises in advance, cooperate with them, and ask
for sponsorship.
8.3 Implementing the Project
“The development of professional social work in the West shows that poverty alle-
viation has always been its focus and an area where it plays an important role.
Apparently, targeted poverty alleviation and the battle against poverty have provided
rare opportunities and development space for social work to intervene and play a
role. Although professional social work in China has developed for long and its
experience of intervening in poverty alleviation efforts is still very limited, it has
gained enough experience worthy of summarizing”.11 In terms of values, the core
values of helping others and altruism of social work are consistent with the poverty
alleviation values of improving poor people’s basic life and well-being; in terms of
working relationship, both social work and poverty alleviation programs emphasize
equality and cooperation with the poor people; in terms of objectives, both focus on
stimulating the internal motivation of the poor and establishing a stable long-term
mechanism to reduce poverty. The consistency among the above aspects provides an
opportunity for social work to intervene in poverty reduction efforts and lays a good
environmental foundation for the precise implementation of the poverty alleviation
social work projects.
First of all, social workers should follow the plan and the principle of individual-
ization, carry out various activities by using the methods of casework, group work,
and community work according to the types of the poor people, solve problems for
the poor, improve the living conditions of the poor individuals and families, enhance
the ability of the local villagers and poor families to accept and identify with others
and themselves, boost the overall cohesion of the villages, and promote the villages’
overall living conditions and well-being. Secondly, they can carry out professional
but “down to earth” activities to discover “activists” and rural leaders among the
11 Li and Xu [10].
villagers, deliberately cultivate the abilities of rural talents and leaders so that they
can give full play to their leading and demonstrating roles, attract and mobilize more
poor people to actively participate in the poverty alleviation efforts, and achieve the
objective that poor people take the initiative to lift themselves out of poverty and
really eliminate poverty. Thirdly, they can actively offer psychological counseling,
hold psychological lectures, and provide psychological training for the poor, with a
view to enhance their confidence in alleviating poverty and getting prosperous and to
improve their social adaptability and exploitable capacity. Due to long-term immer-
sion in poverty, the poor are likely to develop a sense of inferiority. Social workers
can use casework which is a traditional method of social work to conduct psycholog-
ical counseling for the poor with the skills of self-disclosure, empathy, and listening
and to gradually restore their confidence. And finally, they can connect resources,
provide livelihood development services, and establish the social supportive network
for the poor. At this stage, they can lead the villagers to help themselves and help
each other, start businesses, and get rich through establishing community compre-
hensive service centers, villagers’ group activity centers, and financial poverty alle-
viation community organizations. While actively improving the living conditions
of villagers, they should effectively stimulate poor people’s awareness of reducing
poverty on their own. While building the social supportive network, they should not
only strengthen the formal support from government agencies and village commit-
tees, but also strengthen the informal support from family members, relatives, and
friends; social workers should integrate the formal and informal support, expand the
social supportive network for the poor people, and solve their poverty problems.
8.3.1 Carrying Out Individually Tailored Case Work
Casework is designed to perform the interventions that are mainly targeted at poor
people’s subjective or spiritual poverty. Most poor people ascribe poverty to ill fate,
so their willingness to seek help is relatively low, and they seldom ask professionals
for help. Meanwhile, although some poor people take welfare measures for granted
and rely heavily on social work services, most poor people have low expectations
of assistance because they believe that the relief they receive cannot eliminate the
poverty problems themselves. They think that the problems are difficult to solve and
hold a pessimistic attitude toward poverty.12
During its professional development, social work has formed such professional
working methods at different levels as case work, group work, and community
work, so that social work is able to intervene in poverty with various models and
both from the material and spiritual aspects. Differently models can be applied alter-
nately and produce synergistic effect. Therefore, while providing individual tutoring
12 Wang [11].
and services for the poor, social workers should pay special attention to the following
aspects.
1. Social workers should try their best to communicate with the poor,
explaining why to accept assistance from professionals and what the nature
and procedures of the assistance are.
In this process, social workers should be particularly careful not to hurt the dignity of
the recipients. They should never use overbearing tone or show impatience revealed
by their body movements and expressions or label the poor at will. They should follow
the principle of equality, respect, and acceptance, viewing the poor as dignified,
valuable, and unique individuals. On this basis, they can introduce to the poor the
purpose, nature, and content of the social work services, improve poor people’s
willingness to accept assistance, turn their passiveness into activeness, and make the
poor voluntarily solve the problems of poverty.
2. Social workers should establish professional rapport with the poor.
Professional rapport exists throughout the whole process of case work services.
It refers to the working relationship between the social workers and the poor that
is established during the process of offering professional services and based on
mutual understanding. Positive working relationship helps the poor open their heart
to social workers and reveal their true thoughts, making it easier for social workers to
conduct psychological counseling and guidance, assist the poor to solve problems,
and improve their abilities.
3. Social workers should focus on guiding the poor.
Social workers should discuss with the poor about their current problems, circum-
stances, and the direction of their efforts from the first moment of their communi-
cation. During the process, they should use positive words and non-critical social
work principles, give the poor positive hints and guidance, and make them believe
in themselves. They should also be good at exploring the advantages and resources
possessed by the poor and their environment, start from the advantages, modify poor
people’s negative self-cognition through professional methods, and make the poor
believe that even in difficulties they are still capable of solving problems on their
own.
4. Social workers should face the real needs of the poor.
Social workers should meet the material and spiritual needs of the poor in time
and first and foremost, meet their low-level and superficial material needs. For
example, when dealing with a hungry poor person, they should give food to him
to quench his hunger first; when dealing with a sick poor person, they should help
him to obtain treatment first; then try to meet their spiritual needs. In the process,
they must follow social work’s principle of putting life first. When people’s life
is endangered in extreme situations, they must take decisive measures and provide
emergency assistance to ensure the safety of the poor or others.
5. Social workers should heed resources coordination.
The problems of the poor are often multifaceted, so the social workers need to
coordinate the relevant social resources. The strength of social workers is limited
after all, but the poverty problems are usually caused by various reasons. Therefore,
social workers should actively mobilize the social forces because “the fire burns
high when everybody adds wood to it”. Specifically speaking, they can provide basic
assistance in kind to the poor by networking enterprise resources, provide working
skill training by connecting college resources, and carry out relevant professional
activities by marshaling volunteer resources.
In addition to providing services to poor individuals, group working is also a very
economical, feasible, and effective way. For example, group working procedures can
enable the children of poor families to form a positive attitude toward life, to forge
good social interpersonal relationships and healthy life philosophy since they are
required to accept and support each other in group work. This is one of the effective
methods of poverty alleviation and can be applied to group working service programs
for children of poor families in schools and neighborhood organizations. Another
example is that many poor households in Western countries are women-headed.
Organizing these women together in a group and letting them discuss their problems
and needs within the group can play a significant role in easing their psychological
pressure, solidifying their life beliefs and training their specific skills to deal with
difficulties.13
8.3.2 Networking and Mobilizing External Resources

and Carrying Out Community Work
Communities are like the cells of a society, and community life is the miniature of
people’s social life. Many of the needs of social beings are met through the commu-
nity or with the community as the carrier. Community development projects can
therefore help poor rural households to produce and increase income, to improve
their competence through skill training; the projects can also boost local economy
and help to eliminate poverty, prosperity, and sustainable development. China Foun-
dation for Poverty Alleviation (CFPA) is committed to community development
projects. It supports community infrastructure construction and gives assistance to
the community in improving material, cultural, and living conditions. It supports
community economic development projects, helps to raise the residents’ income,
and promotes community’s overall economic development. While implementing
the projects, it cultivates people’s awareness of voluntary participation, encourages
people to actively participate in community public affairs, and enhances people’s
13 Wang [12].
sense of belonging and community cohesion. Community development empha-

sizes the themes such as residents’ participation and cooperation, community’s self-
help and leadership skills-training initiatives, stresses coordinated development of
economy and society, and pays attention to the roles of education and organizations
in terms of methods.
Community development is an essential element in many poverty-reducing
programs in developing countries. Based on his experience as a community devel-
opment consultant in Delhi City, India, American scholar Clinard points out in his
book Slums and Community Development that principles and methods of commu-
nity development can help to solve the problems of urban slums. After conducting
an in-depth analysis and comparison of slums, he believes that slums reflect a social
and cultural phenomenon and can also be said to reflect a way of life. Slums are
usually represented by poor infrastructure, crowded and dirty environment, hard
life, and residents’ devious behaviors and indifferent personality. The residents in
slums are generally indifferent, independent, suspicious, greedy, and eager for quick
success. Due to lack of confidence, the poor often surrender themselves to destiny in
a helpless and hopeless mood. Clinard holds that slum problems cannot be addressed
solely by social welfare programs or economic employment opportunities. He advo-
cates promoting self-help education in low-income communities, cultivating local
talents, creating new organizations, and giving honor to the poor. Regional devel-
opment model is the most common community work model adopted by commu-
nity workers in poor areas. It emphasizes that villagers should, and are willing to,
participate in community affairs; and that community problems can be settled by
promoting villager’s participation, improving their communication, and strength-
ening their cooperation.14 When applying the regional development model to the
poor areas, social workers should pay attention to promoting extensive participation
by the local villagers, cultivating their awareness of mutual assistance and coopera-
tion, and gathering the community forces to tackle poverty problems together so as
to achieve common prosperity.
8.3.3 Engaging in the Design and Implementation

of the Poverty-Curbing Scheme
Social workers have engaged themselves in the design and implementation of

the schemes under many poverty-eliminating programs. Some social organizations
have played a particularly important role in executing these programs. The non-
governmental organizations (NGOs) in China started to grow relatively belatedly
and are less mature and less professional compared with the NGOs in developed
countries. Currently, the non-governmental organizations in China that partake of
poverty-curbing programs are divided into the following types: government-led civil
14 Gan [13].
poverty alleviation organizations; non-professional civil poverty alleviation organi-

zations, and professional civil poverty alleviation organizations. It can be seen from
these diverse types of organizations that the civil poverty alleviation organizations in
China are continuously developing. The Ford Foundation Beijing Office is a repre-
sentative of the non-professional civil poverty alleviation organizations. It manifests
a typical process of localization of foreign poverty reduction funds and reflects the
growth of Chinese NGOs as well as their internationalization in terms of their partici-
pation in poverty reduction.15 Professional civil poverty alleviation organizations can
be represented by the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation which was founded
in March 1989 and is a non-profit organization. It integrates and manages domestic
and overseas poverty alleviation funds to reduce poverty. Since its establishment till
2013, China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation has already launched more than 500
poverty-reducing projects and around 100,000 poor people annually have received
its assistance. The poverty alleviation projects mainly fell into seven types or 31
items.16
References
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Chapter 9
Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies
The provision of psychological therapy, spiritual care, relationship modification, and

capacity building to the impoverished is greatly aided by social work professionals.
They can help the poor get a better view on life, build their self-esteem, raise their
ability to get out of poverty, and broaden their path to wealth. These social work
forces are valued for their participation of poverty-alleviating work by the Chinese
government. And, the government has issued a series of policies to mobilize and orga-
nize various social organizations and professional forces, to participate in poverty
eradication. Meanwhile, the government, the market, and the society have all collab-
orated together to develop and promote a comprehensive poverty reduction system.
The Decision of the State Council of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
China on Winning the Battle against Poverty (Zhong Fa [2015] No. 34), the Outline
of the 13th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the
People’s Republic of China and the Notice of the State Council on Issuing the 13th
Five-Year Plan for Combating Poverty (Guo Fa [2016] No. 64) all have put forward
clear requirements of the implementation. It requires social work professionals to
serve in impoverished communities, as well as the use of professional social work
and volunteer forces to combat poverty. This chapter will examine a succession of
policies regarding the role of social work in the battle against poverty in terms of
policy evolution, objectives, content, and results.
232 9 Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies
9.1 The Evolution of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work

Policies
9.1.1 China’s Poverty-Alleviating Journey
Since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, China has pursued a
poverty-alleviating strategy with Chinese characteristics. China’s poverty-alleviating
history can be divided into the poverty-alleviating exploration stage during the
socialist revolution and construction period (1949–1978.11), the poverty alleviation
stage driven by institutional reforms after the reform and opening up (1978.12–1985),
the large-scale developmental poverty alleviation stage (1986–2000), and the poverty
eradication stage in the new century (2001–).
9.1.1.1 Poverty-Alleviating Exploration Stage (1949–1978.11)
At this stage, China’s poverty-alleviating initiatives were effectively “blood trans-

fusion” relief programs. The severity and pervasiveness of the poverty issue were
indicators that programs executed under a highly centralized planned economy were
unable to address the underlying causes of the issue. In the early years of the People’s
Republic of China, the socio-economic situation was extremely severe, with poverty
and backwardness being the most fundamental national circumstances. So how to
enable the people to afford to eat and clothe themselves, how to attain self-sufficiency
in production, and how to give the people with the most fundamental assurance of
survival were the main task in the struggle against poverty during that time period. The
majority of the government’s poverty-alleviating programs at the time were centered
on emergencies, and the majority of the policies enacted included immediate rescue
and relief efforts. It also seeks to eradicate poverty through global economic expan-
sion. These methods have reduced some economic problems and localized poverty,
but they have not been able to address the widespread and deeply ingrained problem
of poverty in Chinese culture. China entered a new era of reform and opening up
after the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Commu-
nist Party of China was held in 1978. Then, China experienced institutional reforms
in the economic sphere, leading to reforms in the social, political, and ideological
spheres. The reform can be shown that the Party and the government have promoted
the reform of the employment, housing, and enterprise systems, thereby dismantling
the country’s unified welfare system. And the purpose of the reform is to deal with
the social contradictions of the late planned economy and the social problems of the
early reform of the market economy. Since then, social work has emerged as one of
the primary welfare providers.
9.1 The Evolution of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies 233
9.1.1.2 Institutional Reform to Promote Poverty Alleviation

(1978.12–1985)
In 1979, the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Commu-
nist Party of China and the Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist
Party of China on Several Issues of Accelerating Agricultural Development signaled
the start of China’s rural economic system reform and efforts to reduce rural poverty
through institutional transformation. To begin with, rural institutional reform is the
most important driver in the fight against poverty. The transition from a collec-
tive management system based on the people’s commune to a system of household
contract responsibility system has resulted in a balance between the labor of farmers
and their interests. Thus, it greatly stimulated their enthusiasm for production and
management, mobilized their sense of competition, and released rural productivity.
Rural economic growth has undergone a significant transition with the gross rural
product growing. From the standpoint of poverty alleviation, economic growth and
prosperity are necessary to eradicate poverty. The expansion of the rural economy
has provided tangible assistance for the struggle against poverty, as well as economic
support for the engagement of social organizations in rural areas’ fight against
poverty. Second, the reform of farmers’ markets has helped to the growth of rural areas
and agriculture by increasing the purchasing price of agricultural products. Under the
premise of orderly competition, the government has fostered market development,
enhanced market flexibility, and reduced and adjusted price limits on agricultural
products in response to the increase in agricultural production. Market mechanisms
are essential for distributing agricultural resources and promoting rural economic
prosperity. Many farmers have been able to escape poverty and even become wealthy
as a result of increased trading opportunities and income brought about by free and
active marketplaces. Farmers’ prosperity has, to some extent, increased their aware-
ness of the need to combat poverty. And farmers’ mutual assistance organizations
and self-organizations have been able to play an poverty-alleviating role, providing
organizational support for social work’s involvement in the fight against poverty.
The developmental model of poverty alleviation has finally modified and adapted
the previous relief model of poverty reduction, which no longer relies exclusively
on subsistence aid to alleviate poverty. Instead, it makes a connection between the
objective of reducing poverty and the growth of the local economy and the system
for managing and producing rural areas. In this way, rural poverty can be addressed
through raising production, creating employment, and boosting income by appealing
to the immediate interests of farmers and spurring their production and way of life.1
Developmental poverty alleviation policies are more in accordance with the needs
of rural poverty reduction, and the “developmental” idea of social work offers the
conceptual foundation for poverty-alleviating.
Social conflicts were common during this crucial period of social transition, and
preserving social stability became a crucial political concern. This specific social
setting offers a vital social foundation for the development of social work. In 1987,
1 Wang [1].
the Ministry of Civil Affairs invited experts in sociology and social work, as well as
the heads of the relevant departments of the National Education Commission, to hold
a validation meeting on social work education in Madian, Beijing. This meeting is
known as the “Madian Conference” in the history of the development of social work
in China. As a result of the conference’s decision to restart social work education,
several colleges, for instance, Beijing University, began to re-establish social work
majors. Since then the social work profession was revitalized and re-established. Its
legitimate profession in the fight against poverty is also verified in the social work.
9.1.1.3 Large-Scale Developmental Poverty Alleviation Stage

(1986–2000)
Since 1985, the impetus provided by the systemic reforms has diminished, and the
pace of poverty reduction in rural China has slowed down, along with the effi-
ciency of poverty alleviation. The problem of poverty in the “old, small, remote,
and poor” regions has started to emerge at the same time because of the limita-
tions of natural, ecological, and economic conditions. Economic development has
widened the gap between regions, leading to inequality between the rich and the
poor. Natural resource, environmental, and transportation limitations have caused
rural and remote mountainous areas to lag considerably behind the plains and coastal
areas in terms of development. As a result, it is becoming increasingly challenging
to eradicate poverty in different places of the world. Under these conditions, the
past methods of general economic expansion will not be sufficient to improve the
economic situation of the underdevelopped regions. In order to improve the effective-
ness of reducing poverty and balance the socio-economic development, China has
started implementing a large-scale, government-led development poverty alleviation
strategy. In 1986, China began a planned, organized, and large-scale developmental
poverty reduction. The former State Council Leading Group for Economic Devel-
opment of Poverty-stricken Areas is responsible for organizing research and studies
on poverty-stricken areas as well as formulating guidelines, policies, and plans for
the development of poverty-stricken areas. It is also summarizing and exchanging
experiences by coordinating and resolving major issues related to poverty-stricken
development along with supervising and inspecting the relevant work.2 In addition
to establishing standards for poverty, China has launched a number of policies and
initiatives aimed at eradicating it, with a particular focus on ethnic minority and
former bases of the Chinese Revolution. Special funding has also been allocated
for the implementation of compensatory assistance, with the primary goal of “pro-
moting regional economic growth”. Between 1994 and 2000, the Chinese govern-
ment published two programming guidelines to direct efforts to reduce poverty and
promote development. These two documents are the 1994 National Poverty Allevia-
tion Programme (1994–2000) and the 1996 Decision of the Central Committee of the
Communist Party of China and the State Council on Solving the Problem of Food and
2 State Council Leading Group Office of Economic Development of Impoverished Areas [2].
Clothing for the Rural Rapidly. The proclamation and implementation of these two
documents indicate that China’s rural poverty-reduction efforts have been institution-
alized and standardized. The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist
Party of China and the State Council on Solving the Problem of Food and Clothing
for the Rural Rapidly also proposes to “insist on mobilizing social forces to partici-
pate in poverty Alleviation”. Under the guidance of these two documents, China has
promoted the development of social poverty alleviation by readjusting the criteria
for national priority support for poor counties, establishing a hierarchical system of
responsibility for poverty reduction and development, with the head of the province
taking primary responsibility.
At this period, the Party and the government have given social organizations a
greater significance in the struggle against poverty by organizing and mobilizing
them to take part in social and economic creation, as well as making greater involve-
ment in the effort. The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party
of China and the State Council on Solving the Problem of Food and Clothing for
the Rural Rapidly emphasizes that the major responsibility is to address the issue of
feeding the rural poor. Since 1997, China has established the “four provinces” prin-
ciple of “responsibility to the province, task to the province, funds to the province
and authority to the province”. Against the principle, China raised its financial contri-
butions year after year and developed programs for reducing poverty in households
and villages as well as in targeted and complementary ways. China also seeks to
stimulate society, foster participation in society, emphasize inter-regional coopera-
tion, etc. In turn, there is a solid policy foundation for social work’s participation in
the fight against poverty.
9.1.1.4 Poverty Eradication Stage (2001–)
China’s economic development has entered an entirely new phase since the turn of
the twenty-first century. To address the needs of the moment, keep up with economic
progress, and address the issue of poverty in rural regions, the Central Conference
on Poverty Alleviation and Development created comprehensive plans for poverty
reduction in the first decade of the twenty-first century in 2001. The Outline for
Poverty Alleviation and Development in Rural China (2001–2010), which outlined
the strategic objectives, directives, and detailed measures for rural poverty alleviation
and development in China for the following ten years, was released by the State
Council. In this spirit, the intention is “eradicating poverty and promoting communal
wealth” poverty alleviation and development in China is a long-term historical task
and of significance of continuing to promote poverty alleviation. The Program for
Poverty Alleviation and Development in Rural China (2001–2010) also affirms the
significant achievements of China’s poverty alleviation work since the reform and
opening up. During this time, since social forces had a great deal of space and
opportunity to strive toward poverty reduction, social organizations, as exemplified
by social work, made a substantial contribution to the struggle against poverty during
this time period.
9.1.2 The Evolution of the Policies Concerning Poverty

In October 2006, the Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party
of China on Several Major Issues in Building a Harmonious Socialist Society (the
Decision) was issued, marking the dawn of the era of professional social work in
China. The decision emphasizes the urgent need to develop a sizable team of social
work personnel as well as a well-organized and qualified social work workforce
in order to create a harmonious socialist society. The level of specialized social
services must be increased, and the country must boost social work professionals in
public services and social administration. The decision also urged the continuation
of coordinated development, the strengthening of social institutions, the reduction
of poverty, the improvement of poverty-reduction methods, and the rapid improve-
ment of the production and living conditions of poor farmers. Generally speaking,
there is a connection between the growth of social work professions and the growth
of mechanisms for reducing poverty, which offers human resources to support the
growth of mechanisms for reducing poverty.
A team of professional and specialized social work talents should be developed
on the basis of talent training and job development, with an emphasis on middle-
and senior-level social work talents according to the National Medium- and Long-
Term Talent Development Plan (2010–2020), which was published in 2010. There
should be the construction of public welfare service institutions, urban and rural
communities, social organizations, and so on. Meanwhile, a talent support program
should be implemented for remote and impoverished areas, border ethnic areas, and
ancient revolutionary districts. To promote the accelerated development of these
areas and to achieve the goal of equalizing basic public services, the country will
adopt a policy favoring job and title promotion. Every year, 100,000 outstanding
teachers, doctors, scientists, social workers, and cultural workers are guided to work
or provide services in remote and impoverished areas, border ethnic areas, and old
revolutionary areas; every year, 10,000 people are trained to meet urgent needs in
these areas.
In 2011, the Opinions on Strengthening the Construction of a Social Work Profes-
sional Workforce proposed that the emphasis should be on empowering social work
professionals at the grass-roots level. At the same time, it also proposed to train social
work professionals to provide services for special groups and groups in need in rural
areas. Additionally, the country is investigating the utilization of social workers in
townships and rural areas where conditions exist. This was done in order to meet
the requirements of building a new socialist countryside. Meanwhile, it is impor-
tant to effectively strengthen the Party’s leadership in the development of social
workers. This work falls specifically within the responsibility of the department of
civil affairs, and of other departments as well as of labor unions, the Communist
Youth League, the Women’s Federation, the Disabled Persons’ Federation.
The Medium- and Long-Term Plan for Building a Social Work Professional Work-
force (2011–2020) was jointly released in 2012 by 19 ministries and organizations,
including the Central Organization Department, the Central Political and Legal
Affairs Commission, the Central Editorial Office, and the National Development
and Reform Commission. This plan proposed that the “Plan for Social Work Profes-
sionals to Serve the New Socialist Countryside” can be carefully organized and
implemented. The document suggests that the “Plan for Social Work Professionals
to Serve the New Socialist Countryside” should be carefully organized and imple-
mented, with an emphasis on supporting key counties in the national poverty reduc-
tion and development, so that professional social work services can benefit the rural
population and promote the coordinated development of urban and rural professional
social work. In order to encourage the development of professional social work in less
developed areas, we should also carefully plan the implementation of the “Program
for Social Work”.
The Ministry of Civil Affairs issued the Circular on the Implementation of the First
Batch of Social Work Professionals Support Programme for Remote and Poverty-
stricken Areas, Border Ethnic Areas, and Old Revolutionary Areas in 2013, stating
that the Ministry of Civil Affairs would support the first batch of 1000 social work
professionals to provide professional services in counties covered by the state’s
central and western regions. It also trains 500 social work professionals for these
difficult areas. The document also notes that the implementation of the “Support
Programme for Social Work Professionals in Remote and Poverty-stricken Areas,
Border Ethnic Areas, and Old Revolutionary Areas” is a significant move by the
Central Government and an important initiative to support the development of social
work in these areas. It is critical to promote the goal of equalizing basic public
services, coordinated regional development, and the development of a moderately
prosperous society.
The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC)
and the State Council on Winning the Battle Against Poverty, issued in November
2015, emphasized the importance of improving the participation mechanism of
social forces. It encourages private enterprises, social organizations, and individ-
uals to participate in poverty reduction and development, so as to achieve effec-
tive dovetailing between social support resources and precise poverty alleviation.
Additionally, it directs social poverty curbing to change the focus and voluntarily
group villages and houses so that all impoverished households have party members,
cadres, or compassionate individuals to assist them in pairs. Absorb enterprises that
employ the rural poor population and provide them with preferential tax treatment,
vocational training subsidies, and other employment support policies in accordance
with regulations. Implement the pre-tax tax deduction policy for corporate and indi-
vidual charitable donations for poverty alleviation. Give full play to the strength
and role of the democratic parties and independents to alleviate the problem of the
lack of talents and intelligence. The Industrial and Commercial Federation organized
private enterprises to carry out targeted poverty alleviation program “10,000 enter-
prises helping 10,000 villages”. Encourage all kinds of social organizations to carry
out targeted poverty reduction from village to household through ways like govern-
ment purchasing services. Improve the system for labeling leading enterprises in
reducing poverty, and enhance their ability to radiate and increase the income of
poor households. Encourage qualified enterprises to set up public welfare funds and
trusts for poverty reduction . Emphasize the role of the “October 17” National Poverty
Alleviation Day in mobilizing the society. Implement the program of poverty reduc-
tion volunteers and social work professionals serving poor areas. Make efforts to
build a public welfare brand for poverty alleviation, make public the donation infor-
mation in a comprehensive and timely manner, and improve public credibility and
reputation. Build an information service network for poverty alleviation, and explore
the development of public welfare crowdfunding.
The Outline of the 13th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Devel-
opment of the Peoples Republic of China, issued in 2016, emphasized: it’s necessary
to improve the cooperation between the east and the west on poverty alleviation and
the designated poverty alleviation mechanism by Party and government organs, the
armed forces, people’s organizations, and state-owned enterprises. Encourage and
support private enterprises, social organizations, and individuals to participate in
poverty alleviation, guide social poverty alleviation to shift its focus downward, and
effectively align social assistance resources with targeted poverty reduction. Develop
new models of participation, encourage the establishment of industrial investment
funds and public welfare trust funds, and implement the program of poverty alle-
viation volunteers and social work professionals serving poor areas. Make efforts
to build a poverty alleviation public welfare brand. In March 2016, the Ministry
of Civil Affairs has adopted “Developing Social Work and Helping poverty Alle-
viation” as the publicity theme of the 10th International Social Work Day, and the
publicity campaign was organized throughout the country. During the event, a sympo-
sium on Professional Social Work and Poverty Alleviation was held to discuss the
role, direction, path, mode, and mechanism of professional social work in poverty
alleviation.
The Notice of the State Council on the issuance of the 13th Five-Year Plan on
Poverty Alleviation, issued in November 2016, clearly pointed out that the role of
social work professionals and volunteers in poverty Alleviation should be further
given play. It formulates special policies to support professional social work and
voluntary services in poverty alleviation. Implement a series of plans of social work
professionals serving poverty-stricken areas. Encourage social work professionals
and social work service organizations in developed areas to set up professional
service teams and social work service organizations to train and select social work
professionals for poverty-stricken areas. Implement the plan for voluntary services
in poverty alleviation. Encourage and support young students, professional and tech-
nical personnel, retirees, and people from all walks of life to participate in volun-
teer activities. Give full play to the role of voluntary service organizations such as
the China Federation of Voluntary Service, the China Volunteer Association, the
China Youth Volunteer Association, the China Foundation for Voluntary Service,
and the China Association for the Promotion of Voluntary Service for Poverty Alle-
viation, and build a voluntary service network for poverty Alleviation. The Guiding
Opinions on Further Strengthening the Coordination of Poverty Alleviation in the

East and the West, issued in December 2016, pointed out that the society should
be mobilized to participate in the poverty reduction work. That is, provinces and
cities should encourage and support private enterprises, social organizations, and
individual citizens in their administrative areas to actively participate in the coordi-
nation between the east and the west and pairing assistance. Make full use of the
National Poverty Alleviation Day and platforms like China Social Poverty Allevia-
tion Network to organize all sectors of society to carry out poverty alleviation activ-
ities in the western region, including donating money to help students, providing
charitable medical assistance, supporting medical and teaching services, performing
social work, and providing voluntary services. Implement the plan of social work
professionals serving poverty-stricken areas and the plan of poverty alleviation volun-
teers. Support the social work organizations, voluntary service organizations, social
workers, and volunteers in the eastern region to work in pairs to help poverty-stricken
areas in the western region, so as to provide professional personnel and services to
the western region. Emphasize the strength and role of the military and armed police
in poverty alleviation in the western poverty-stricken areas to provide assistance
according to the local conditions. Actively organize private enterprises to participate
in the targeted poverty alleviation program of “10,000 enterprises helping 10,000
villages”, and carry out pairing assistance with poor villages in the areas to be helped.
In 2017, the Guiding Opinions of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and Finance and The
State Council Poverty Alleviation Office on Supporting Social Work Professionals
to Participate in Poverty Alleviation clearly stated that winning the battle against
poverty requires the participation of all sectors of society. Social work professionals
are emerging forces providing psychological counseling, spiritual care, relationship
adjustment, and ability improvement for the poor people. They can play a positive
role in helping the poor change their ideas, build confidence, broaden the path to
prosperity, and improve their ability to alleviate poverty. The CPC Central Committee
and the State Council attach great importance to the work of social work professionals
who serve in poor areas. The Decision of the CPC Central Committee and the State
Council on Winning the Battle against Poverty, the Outline of the 13th Five-Year Plan
for National Economic and Social Development of the People’s Republic of China,
and the Notice of the State Council on Printing and Distributing the 13th Five-Year
Plan on Poverty Alleviation set forth clear requirements for implementing the plan
of social work professionals serving in poor areas and supporting professional social
work and voluntary service to participate in poverty reduction.
In 2018, the Guiding Opinions of the CPC Central Committee and the State
Council on Winning the Three-year Battle against Poverty pointed out that enter-
prises and social organizations should be encouraged to alleviate poverty, namely,
the implementation of the “Plan of Professional Personnel Serving Three Districts”,
the “Pairing Plan of Service organizations”, and the “Plan of Education Alleviating
Poverty” to provide the poor with professional services such as livelihood develop-
ment, ability improvement, and psychological support. Strengthen the guidance and
management of social organizations for poverty alleviation. Improve the environ-
ment, integrate forces, and create new ways to improve the effectiveness of poverty
alleviation. Implement the pre-tax tax deduction policy for poverty alleviation funds.
The document also pointed out that voluntary services should be carried out to alle-
viate poverty. That is, mobilize and organize various voluntary service teams and
good-hearted people from all walks of life to carry out voluntary services. Imple-
ment a series of plans of social work professionals serving poor areas. Support and
guide professional social work and voluntary service personnel to actively participate
in targeted poverty alleviation. Institutionalize voluntary services for poverty allevia-
tion, establish a pool of volunteers, and encourage state organs, enterprises and public
institutions, people’s organizations, and social organizations to form regular and
professional service teams. Formulate and implement policies to support voluntary
services for poverty reduction.
The General Office of the Ministry of Civil Affairs issued the Notice on Printing
and Distributing the Implementation Plan of the Central Financial Support for
Social Organizations to Participate in Social Service Projects in 2019, issued in
2019, pointed out that the central financial support for social organizations to carry
out social work service activities was planned. That is, social assistance targets,
urban floating population, rural left-behind people, the elderly, children and adoles-
cents, the disabled, prisoners, entitled groups, and the disaster-stricken people are
the key service targets. They will be provided with social work professional services
including conflict management, humanistic care, psychological counseling, behavior
modification, relationship adjustment, etc.
With the introduction of poverty-alleviating policies on social work at the national
level, local governments have formulated a series of poverty-alleviating policies,
attaching importance to the role of social work in poverty reduction and constantly
encouraging the professional role of social work in poverty reduction and develop-
ment. Social work should be closely linked with poverty curbing and be constantly
used to improve the intrinsic motivation of the poor people so as to promote their
subjectivity.
9.2 Objectives of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies
Social work is a service activity guided by altruism, based on scientific knowledge and
adopting scientific methods to help others. Social work professionals are professional
service providers who master certain professional knowledge and skills of social
work. Social work plays an important role in solving poverty problems, providing
more professionals and professional skills for the ongoing poverty Alleviation work
in China. The fundamental objectives of the poverty-alleviating social work policy
are to pay attention to the actual needs of the poor, improve their intrinsic motivation,
strengthen their capacity building, etc.
9.2 Objectives of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies 241
9.2.1 Attending to the Actual Needs of the Poor
The purpose of attending to the actual needs of the poor is to implement “targeted
assistance” through “precise identification”. By virtue of its professional advantages,
social work actively participates in the work of “precise identification”. It can realize
the goal of “precise policy implementation” through “precise identification” and
give maximum attention to the needs of poor people.
First, meet the poor people’s need for survival. The basic needs of the poor are
mainly reflected in the aspects of clothing, food, housing and transportation, etc.
According to the Outline of Poverty Alleviation and Development in Rural China
(2011–2020), the overall objective of poverty Alleviation in China by 2020 is to
ensure that poverty Alleviation targets have adequate food and clothing and that they
have access to compulsory education, basic medical care, and housing. The Central
Conference on Poverty Alleviation and Development held in November 2015 stressed
that the objective of poverty Alleviation during the 13th Five-Year Plan period is to
ensure that the rural poor has no shortage of food and clothing and that they have
access to compulsory education, basic medical care, and housing by 2020. At the
same time, the growth rate of per capita disposable income of farmers in poor areas
should be higher than the national average, and indicators in major areas of basic
public services should be close to the national average. Poverty-alleviating social
work always puts people first and provides targeted service. The work scientifically
assesses the needs of poor people, formulates individualized assistance plans, effec-
tively allocates poverty Alleviation resources, flexibly chooses serving methods, and
carries out targeted services for individuals, groups, and communities to help targeted
poverty Alleviation and eradication.
Secondly, solve the spiritual problems of the poor. Poverty is multi-dimensional.
It is manifested in the aspects of material and economy, as well as spirit and
culture. Some poor people have a serious “waiting for, depending on and asking
for” mentality, excessively depending on poverty alleviation resources. Others have
backward ideas, and they distrust themselves and dare not get rid of poverty. The
spiritual poverty of these poor people is a serious problem, which will not only affect
the realization of poverty alleviation objectives, but also bring about the hidden
danger of returning to poverty and even the transmitting of poverty across genera-
tions. Therefore, addressing spiritual poverty is the key to improving the quality of
poverty alleviation work and building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.
“The spiritual problems should be addressed to help the poor”. Social workers pay
attention to the psychological and spiritual support, give education on value and
ability improvement to the poor people inpractice. Using the theory of “helping
others aid themselves” and “vantage perspective”, social workers should provide the
poor people with mental rehabilitation, psychological counseling, humanistic care,
and other services. Through group counseling and treatment as well as individual
counseling, social workers should encourage the poor people to change attitude and
spiritual outlook, to face difficulties with positive attitude, to enhance the aware-
ness of active poverty alleviation, to improve the enthusiasm and initiative of agen-
tial participating in the enterprise to curb poverty, and ultimately to solve the problem
of spiritual poverty.
9.2.2 Improving the Intrinsic Motivation of the Poor
Improving the intrinsic motivation of the poor is the key to eradicating poverty.
While considering the basic needs of the poor people, social work places special
emphasis on their intrinsic motivation. For one thing, the participation of social work
in poverty alleviation can effectively mobilize the initiative of the poor. The construc-
tion of professional service relationship between social workers and poor people can
help examine the situation of poor households and their family members, accurately
assess the causes of their poverty, explore their own intrinsic strength, encourage
them to actively participate in production, change the poverty situation, and improve
their living standards. Social work makes good use of poverty alleviation resources
to guide the poor to actively engage in this campaign, changing “negative poverty
relief” into “active poverty relief”, and “blood transfusion” into “blood creation”.
For another, the participation of social work can boost the morale of the poor people.
The CPC Central Committee and the State Council have clearly pointed out in the
Strategic Plan for Rural Revitalization (2018–2022) that it is necessary to consoli-
date the achievements already made in poverty alleviation, emphasize the nurturing
of the minds and spirits of the poor, guide them to overcome the idea of “waiting
for, depending on and asking for”, and gradually eliminate spiritual poverty. Such
participatory poverty alleviation can effectively stimulate the enthusiasm of the poor
people. Such type of participatory poverty alleviation means that in the design, plan-
ning, implementation, supervision, and acceptance of poverty alleviation projects,
the poor people are supposed to be fully involved, their will is respected, and appro-
priate methods to reduce poverty are selected according to their needs. This sort
of participatory poverty alleviation changes the traditional “top-down” decision-
making mode and action mode, regarding the poor people as the targets of aid and
giving scope to their own subjective initiative. Social work should value the partic-
ipation of poor people, mobilizing their enthusiasm and increasing their intensity
of participation through professional methods and means. First, through case work,
social work helps the poor people to understand their own advantages and potential,
and mobilize their enthusiasm to participate in poverty reduction. Second, by means
of group work and community work, and through group cooperation, mutual assis-
tance, and mutual benefit, social work can help the poor people to rationally analyze
the current situation, plan for the future, and arouse their enthusiasm to immerse
in the development cause.
9.3 Main Content of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policy 243
9.2.3 Strengthening the Capacity Building of the Poor
Capacity building emphasizes that by improving development capacity, one can get
rid of dependence on the outside world and achieve internal development. Capacity
building is an important way to help poor people achieve independent development.
The capacity building of poor people is mainly reflected in two aspects: cultivating
feasible ability and accumulating human capital. Amartya Sen argues that poverty
must be seen as deprivation of basic feasible ability, not just low income.3 Schultz
believes that the root cause of poverty lies in the low quality of human capital. To erad-
icate poverty, it’s necessary to improve the population quality, enhance their knowl-
edge and skills, and improve population literacy.4 Therefore, social work must
comprehensively utilize various approaches such as poverty alleviation in culture,
education, and employment to improve the feasible capacity and quality of human
capital of the poor population and to combine capacity cultivation with poverty allevi-
ation. The poor’s ability to participate and to engage in this work is also an important
part of capacity building. Social work should encourage the poor to participate in the
formulation, implementation, and evaluation of poverty-alleviating projects through
“empowerment”, so as to increase the subjects’ consciousness and voice of the poor,
and realize joint contribution and shared benefits.
Social work focuses on exploring and cultivating the abilities of poor people,
developing their inner potential, and transforming external support relying on admin-
istrative coercion into independent development relying on poor areas and poor
people. Social work helps poor people to change their mindset, explore their potential,
and eliminate their dependence on assistance through targeted professional services
such as case work, group work, and community work. Meanwhile, social workers
can help poor people learn skills to make a living, develop livelihood projects, and
use methods like group counseling to provide vocational skills training as well as
poverty reduction and entrepreneurship knowledge for the poor people, so as to culti-
vate their awareness of reducing poverty risk, improve their self-development ability,
and finally realize independent poverty reduction.
9.3 Main Content of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policy
Social work continues to respond to social problems and needs. The social work team
gradually grows up, and the system of social work policies and regulations gradually
takes shape in this development process, with more and richer contents. Generally
speaking, since the reform and opening up, the social work policy was developed
from scratch, from being broad to being detailed, from being comprehensive to being
more specific and specialized .5 In 2017, the Guiding Opinions of the Ministry of Civil
3 Sen [3].
4 Schultz [4].
5 Li and Li [5].
Affairs and the Ministry of Finance and The State Council Poverty Alleviation Office
on Supporting Professional Social Work Forces to Participate in Poverty Alleviation
clarified the main contents of the poverty-alleviating social work policy. The main
spirit of the document is summarized as follows.
9.3.1 Overall Requirement
To support professional social work forces to participate in poverty alleviation work,

it’s necessary to adhere to the guidance and coordination of the Party and govern-
ment, to include the development of professional social work in the overall arrange-
ment of local Party committee and government about poverty alleviation, and to
work together with other work also in this dimension. Always put people first and
provide targeted services, scientifically assess the needs of poor people, formu-
late individualized poverty alleviation plans, effectively allocate poverty alleviation
resources, flexibly choose service methods, and provide targeted case services to
promote targeted poverty reduction and eradication. Uphold east–west coordina-
tion and extensive participation. Give full play to the advantages of social work
professionals and resources in the eastern developed regions to help the western
poverty-stricken regions develop and expand professional social work forces and
perform professional social work services by means of targeted assistance, pairing
assistance, and joint construction. Always put the masses in the central position, help
others aid themselves, give full play to the advantages of social work professionals
in organizing, coordinating, resource linking, publicizing, and advocating, stimu-
late the intrinsic motivation of the poor people, help them establish a sound social
support system, and support them to improve their capacity for poverty alleviation
and self-development.
9.3.2 Clarifying the Service Content of Social Work

Professionals Participating in Poverty Alleviation
Under the leadership of Party committee and government in poverty-stricken areas,

professional social work forces should focus on the following services to meet the
actual needs arising out of poverty alleviation.
First, participate in poverty relief and assistance. Work with social assistance orga-
nizations to assess the needs of the poor, analyze the causes of poverty, and formulate
relief plans, promote the precise identification and management of the targets of assis-
tance, and promote the precise alignment of the needs of the poor and poverty Allevia-
tion resources. Provide psychological counseling, social participation, group mutual
assistance, publicity, and advocacy services for social assistance targets. Promote
the improvement of a new model of social assistance, which combines material and
financial assistance with psychological support and supplements basic assistance

services with specialized and personalized services.
Second, participate in the capacity building of the poor. Cooperate with relevant
departments and other social forces to help the poor who are able to work change
their minds, strengthen their confidence and intrinsic motivation, encourage them to
give full play to their potential, improve their skills, help each other, actively find
jobs and start businesses, and get rid of poverty and get rich by increasing stable
incomes.
Third, promote the integration and adaptation of the poor who have been relocated
from inhospitable areas. Help poor people who need to relocate due to poor natural
conditions to dispell negative emotions, strengthen relationship adjustment, seek
employment resources, develop self-assistance and mutual assistance organizations,
and rebuild social support networks to promote their better integration into new
community life.
Fourth, participate in the care and protection of left-behind children in poor areas.
Work with relevant departments and forces to carry out follow-up monitoring, inves-
tigation and evaluation, guardianship, and guidance for left-behind children and
families in poor villages. Urge and guide families of left-behind children in rural
areas to assume the main responsibility of guardianship. With children in difficulties
as the focus, services such as growth counseling, legal education, crime preven-
tion, behavior modification, social interaction guidance, and emotional counseling
are provided. Cooperate with schools and communities to provide “dropout control”
and growth care services for school-age children.
Fifth, provide care services for people with special difficulties. Provide spiritual
comfort, life care, rights and interests’ protection, hospice care, and other services
for elderly people with special difficulties in poverty-stricken areas. Provide women
with special difficulties in poverty-stricken areas with mental relief, psychological
support, parental counseling, and rights and interests’ protection services. Strengthen
psychological support for young people with bad behaviors in poverty-stricken areas,
community prisoners, people released from prison, and other special groups to help
them improve family and community relations as well as restore and develop their
social functions.
9.3.3 Supporting and Strengthening Professional Social

Work Forces in Poverty-Stricken Areas
First, support poor areas to strengthen the construction of social work professional
team. Civil affairs departments and poverty alleviation agencies at all levels should
include the construction of social work professional team in their agendas and include
social work professional courses in relevant training activities. Civil affairs depart-
ments in poverty-stricken areas should speed up the training of local social work
professionals. Personnel engaged in social management and service work in social
service department, grass-roots self-governing mass organization, rural community

service organization, grass-roots mass organization, and relevant public institutions
and social organizations should be included in the scope of professional social work
training. Encourage qualified personnel to take the national vocational examination
for social workers and receive education for academic degrees in social work, so as
to enhance their ability to apply professional concepts, knowledge, and methods
of social work to the work. Local governments should support poverty-stricken
areas in attracting social work professionals through the rational creation of public
welfare posts, institutional dispatch, temporary job training, pairing assistance in
construction, and urban and rural co-construction.
Second, support poor areas to strengthen the construction of social work organi-
zations. Give full play to the role of national social organizations and provincial-level
social organizations in the field of social work, such as China Federation of Social
Work, China Association of Social Work Education, China Association of Social
Work to promote the development of social organizations in the field of social work
in poverty-stricken areas. Accelerate the development of social work service organi-
zations in poverty-stricken areas. Encourage social organizations, voluntary service
organizations, public welfare and charitable social organizations, enterprises, public
institutions, and individuals in the field of social work to support the development
of a number of social work service organizations in poverty-stricken areas through
pairing assistance in construction, project cooperation, targeted assistance, and dona-
tion. Rely on township (town) social assistance stations and comprehensive service
facilities to build a number of social work service stations.
9.3.4 Supporting the Implementation of Key Projects

by Social Work Professionals Participating in Poverty
Alleviation
First, carry out the program of social work education to alleviate poverty. Give
full play to the promoting role of the China Association for Social Work Education.
Support and encourage social work departments in college to cooperate with poverty-
stricken areas in establishing bases for professional training, teacher practice, and
student internship. Help poverty-stricken areas to train professionals in social work.
Support college teachers majoring in social work to carry out professional supervi-
sion in poverty-stricken areas, and guide students majoring in social work to carry out
social practice in poverty-stricken areas. Support and encourage social work grad-
uates to seek employment in poverty-stricken areas. By 2020, at least 200 colleges
will establish bases for professional training of social work, teacher practice, and
student internship in poverty-stricken counties.
Second, carry out social work service organization “hand in hand” program. From
2017 to 2020, a total of 300 social work service organizations with standardized
management, professional service, and strong credibility will be selected from devel-
oped areas. They will be paired with and help organizations in poverty-stricken areas
like social work service organizations, child welfare organizations, elder welfare
organizations, relief and protection organizations, assistance and support service
organizations for the extremely poor, preferential treatment and placement service
organizations, welfare and service organizations for the disabled, and children’s
homes in rural area community. Raise the level of social work services of the targeted
organizations to a new height through talent support, project support, supervision
support, training support, etc.
Third, implement the plan of social work professionals serving outlying and
poverty-stricken areas, border areas inhabited by ethnic minorities, and old revo-
lutionary base areas. In accordance with the procedures and funding arrangements
stipulated in the Implementation Plan of the Special Plan for Talents for Social Work
in Remote and Poverty-Stricken Areas, Border Minority Areas, and Old Revolu-
tionary Base Areas (Minfa [2012] No. 170), with continued support from the central
and provincial-level financial departments, 1000 social work professionals will be
selected each year (from 2017 to 2020) to work in poverty-stricken areas in central
and western China and take root in poor villages to provide social work services.
Fourth, carry out the demonstration project of providing social work service for
poor areas. Every year, use funds from various channels to support the implementa-
tion of a number of demonstration projects of providing assistance for rural popula-
tion with special difficulties, focusing on providing livelihood development services
for poverty-stricken people who have lost their sources of livelihood due to disasters,
disabilities, and diseases. Support the implementation of a number of demonstration
projects of providing social care for left-behind children in rural areas and children
in difficulty, focusing on providing growth support, spiritual care, and social protec-
tion services for children in poor areas. Support the implementation of a number
of demonstration projects of providing social work services for elderly people with
special difficulties in rural areas, focusing on providing daily care, social participa-
tion, life care, and spiritual comfort services for elderly people in extreme poverty,
those who live alone, those who lost their only child, as well as those who are disabled
and incapacitated.
9.3.5 Strengthening the Organizational Guarantee

of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work
First, strengthen organizational leadership. Departments of civil affairs, finance, and

poverty alleviation should strengthen communication and cooperation and work
together to discuss and solve key and difficult problems. Civil affairs departments
at all levels should give full play to their role in coordinating and promoting the
development of social work, take the lead in studying and formulating specific imple-
mentation opinions, further strengthen the construction of professional social work
talents, organizations, and platforms in the vast number of poor areas, support and
guide professional social work forces to participate in the implementation of poverty
alleviation projects and services, solve practical difficulties, and provide necessary
guarantees for social work professionals working in poverty-stricken areas. Finan-
cial departments at all levels should give full play to the role of government in
purchasing services, improve the cost accounting system for social work services,
and provide support for social work professionals to participate in poverty reduc-
tion. With government funds as a driving force, integrate various charitable funds
and social funds into poverty alleviation services. Poverty alleviation departments at
all levels should strengthen macro guidance, overall planning and coordination, and
incorporate professional social work forces participating in poverty Alleviation into
overall work plans. Also, in accordance with the requirements of the Guiding Opin-
ions on Further Strengthening Cooperation on Poverty Alleviation in the Eastern and
Western Regions (Zhongbanfa [2016] No. 69), poverty alleviation departments at all
levels should work with the Ministry of Civil Affairs to incorporate the participation
of professional social work forces into the scope of east–west cooperation in poverty
alleviation and pairing assistance. Encourage relevant departments to include the
participation of professional social work forces into the task of economically strong
(cities) and poor counties “joining hands to build a moderately prosperous society”.
Second, strengthen service coordination. Establish a sound mechanism for social
work professionals and volunteers to cooperate with each other in poverty reduction,
give full play to the role of social work professionals in recruitment, registration,
training, and management of volunteers, mobilize and organize volunteers to carry
out voluntary services in an orderly manner, accelerate the incubation and cultivation
of voluntary organizations for poverty alleviation, and support voluntary service
organizations to carry out voluntary services projects through purchasing services
and public welfare venture capital. Support poverty-stricken areas to establish a
sound mechanism for connecting rural communities, social organizations, and social
work to speed up the formation of a pattern in which social work professionals work
jointly to participate in poverty alleviation. Make social work professionals a strong
supplement to charity resources, and encourage the recruitment and use of social
work professionals in charitable poverty curbing social organizations and service
projects.
Third, strengthen the incentive guarantee. In accordance with relevant regulations
of the State, social work professionals and organizations that have made important
contributions and outstanding achievements in poverty alleviation shall be rewarded,
and social work professionals with outstanding performance and contributions shall
be rewarded in national and local levels. Encourage qualified enterprises, social
organizations, and individuals to set up incentive funds to support social work in
accordance with the law, which can be used to reward social work professionals and
organizations that have made outstanding contributions to reducing poverty. Strictly
implement tax relief and other supporting policies for social work organizations that
provide services for poverty-stricken areas and help the poor increase employment
opportunities and income. For outstanding social work professionals who volun-
tarily work in poverty-stricken areas for a long time, local civil affairs and poverty
9.4 The Effect of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies 249
reduction departments should assist them in housing, schooling for their children
and employment of their spouses in accordance with relevant policies.
Finally, strengthen publicity and guidance. Make full use of all kinds of media to
publicize typical and excellent cases of professional social workers helping poverty
reduction through various channels and angles, constantly stimulate the enthusiasm
of professional social workers serving poor areas, and strive to create a social atmo-
sphere of caring and supporting professional social worker helping with poverty
reduction. People in poor areas should be guided to seek help from social workers
when they have difficulties, so as to promote the coordination and mutual assistance
among “social workers, poor people and non-poor people”.
In July 2017, the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry
of Finance, the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League, the All-China
Women’s Federation jointly issued the Guidance on Giving Play to the Role of
Social Work Professionals in the Care and Protection of Rural Left-behind Children.
The document pointed out that social work professionals are an emerging force to
carry out the care and protection of rural left-behind children. They can play an
important role in reacting to the needs of psychological services for rural left-behind
children and promoting all-round health of left-behind children in rural areas. The
document also clarifies the main tasks of social work professionals in the care and
protection of rural left-behind children, namely to assist in the rescue and protection
work, to provide guidance for family education, and to actively develop social care
services. In addition, the Party and the government also continuously strengthen the
support of social work forces to meet the needs of other groups, providing a strong
organizational guarantee for poverty-alleviating social work to play a professional
role in poor areas.
9.4 The Effect of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies
As a series of national strategies have been put forward, from building a moderately
prosperous society in an all-round way to deepening reform in an all-round way,
from social construction to social governance, the Party and the government have
increasingly realized the unique advantages and possible contributions of social work
in dealing with the problems of social transformation and realizing these strategic
tasks.6 At present, it is necessary and urgent for social work and other forces to get
involved in poverty-alleviating practice because of the serious situation of poverty and
various congenital deficiencies of administrative mobilization of poverty alleviating.7
The poverty-alleviating social work policy provides guidance and basis for social
work to participate in poverty Alleviation and has achieved remarkable results.
6 Feng and Peng [6].

7 Li and Guo [7].
9.4.1 Providing Guidance on Social Work

in Poverty-Alleviating Activities
Based on the poverty-alleviating social work policy, the participation of social work
in poverty-reducing has clear directions, objectives, tasks, and content. Social work
forces are playing an increasingly important role in poverty-alleviating activities.
For one thing, poverty-alleviating social work policies expand the accessibility of
poverty-alleviating social work. Accessibility refers to the matching degree between
poverty-alleviating social work intervention services and poverty alleviation targets,
including the following aspects: The first is time and space accessibility, also known
as approachability, that is, poverty alleviation targets have a timely and convenient
access to social work services; the second is economic accessibility, also known as
affordability, that is, minimizing the economic cost of social work service borne
by the targets of poverty alleviation. They can even enjoy relevant services free of
charge; the third is content accessibility, also known as availability. That is, social
work services meet the needs of poverty alleviation targets and poverty allevia-
tion requirements; the fourth is mode accessibility, also known as the suitability.
That is, the poverty alleviation targets adapt to and approve the mode of supply of
social work services; the fifth is the accessibility of results, also known as satisfia-
bility. That is, the poverty alleviation targets are satisfied with the improvement of
their poverty alleviation ability and living conditions while getting involved in the
poverty-alleviating intervention services. As far as the supplier is concerned, factors
like institutional environment, resource allocation, fiscal and tax support, service
capacity, supply process will affect the accessibility of social work involvement in
poverty-reducing services. On the demand side, the factors influencing accessibility
are mainly embodied in the personal characteristics of poverty alleviation targets
(such as education level, understanding, and attitude toward social work services)
and the socio-cultural environment.
For another, the poverty-reducing social work policy has improved the service
system of poverty-alleviating work. Poverty-alleviating social work policy is an
important basis to gauze the effect of social work involvement in poverty reduc-
tion. The poverty-alleviating social work needs to promote the fine development
of its own service system and comprehensively improve the professional level of
service while finding its proper role, giving full play to its comparative advantages,
and facing practical difficulties. First, in terms of the approachability of poverty-
alleviating services, through strengthening the top-level design and improving the
specific system construction of social work involvement in poverty-alleviating,
promote the localized professional social workers and organizations to be distributed
evenly, to reach out to grass roots and to provide constant service from the level of
national development strategy and overall planning. Second, in terms of ensuring
the affordability of poverty-alleviating services, through improving fiscal and tax
support policies, set up special development funds, while increasing the govern-
ment’s purchase of relevant services, explore alternative economic sources such as
social donations, public welfare venture capital, online crowdfunding, and social
9.4 The Effect of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work Policies 251
enterprise funding, so as to safeguard the principle of public welfare. Third, in terms

of achieving the availability of poverty-alleviating services, through strengthening
capacity building, improve the professional level and professional skills of social
workers, build a normative governance structure and service network brand of social
work organizations, and carry out a series of “down-to-earth” intervention activi-
ties to meet the actual needs of poverty Alleviation targets. Fourthly, in terms of
realizing the suitability of poverty-alleviating services, through the innovation of
service supply mode and strategy, while strengthening the publicity of public opinion
and improving poverty Alleviation targets’ acceptance of social work, cultivate the
cultural sensitivity of social workers, promote the community-based poverty Alle-
viation mode, and promote the poverty Alleviation targets to improve their poverty
reducing ability through community participation. Fifth, in terms of achieving the
satisfiability of poverty-alleviating services, through strengthening quality moni-
toring, evaluation, and feedback, while improving the government’s supervision
system of poverty-alleviating services in social work and strengthening the self-
discipline and restraint of social work organizations, improve the social supervision
mechanism and introduce a third-party supervision and evaluation system, so as to
improve the accomplishments of poverty Alleviation targets.
9.4.2 Making Plans for Rural Social Work on Poverty

Alleviating
The poverty-alleviating social work policy not only considers the problem of social
work involved in poverty alleviation, but also aims at the development of social work
in the poverty-alleviating cause. Such policy makes plans and deployment for social
work to participate in the cause.
First of all, promote the construction of rural poverty-alleviating social work
teams. Under the guidance and support of relevant policies, professional teams of
social work in colleges actively carry out capacity building of social organizations and
social work organizations in poverty-stricken areas. Through training, exchange, and
internship, cultivate local social work forces, including a group of local social work
organizations and local social work talents. Local governments actively attract local
students who are registered and majoring in social work to return to their hometowns
after graduation, cultivate local teachers for social work, and solve the problem of
weak social work forces in poverty-stricken areas. Poverty-reducing social work
also supports poverty-stricken areas to attract social work professionals to provide
services through the creation of public welfare posts, institutional dispatch, temporary
job training, pairing assistance in construction, and urban and rural co-construction.
Support and develop a number of social work service organizations in poverty-
stricken areas by means of pairing assistance, project cooperation, targeted assistance,
and donation. Rely on township (town) social assistance stations and comprehensive
service facilities to build a number of social work service stations.
Secondly, establish a social support system for the poor people. Since social work
has been involved in such an undertaking, it has implemented a series of assis-
tance projects for people with special difficulties, providing livelihood development
services for poverty-stricken people who have lost their sources of livelihood due
to disasters, disabilities, and diseases. Provide developmental support, spiritual care,
and social protection services for children in poverty-stricken areas; provide daily
care, social participation, life care, and spiritual comfort services for elderly people
in extreme poverty, those who live alone, those who lost their only child, as well as
those who are disabled and incapacitated. Establish and improve a low-cost but effi-
cient social support system with broad assistance coverage based on the protection of
basic rights, and promote the effective connection among targeted poverty alleviation,
social security, and social services.
9.4.3 Injecting Professional Strength into the Cause

of Poverty Alleviation
The poverty-alleviating social work policy provides the policy basis for social work
to intervene in the endeavor and injects professional strength into it.
First, developmental social work plays an important role in poverty alleviation.
Developmental social work takes action and change as its orientation, focuses on
productive activities and social investment strategies, and promotes overall social
welfare through social work practices that are conducive to economic and social
development.8 The solution to the poverty problem needs the participation of social
work. Under the guidance of developmental social work, our social work in the field of
poverty alleviating takes integrating social development and economic development
as the objective, community as the basic intervention unit, multiple social work
intervention as the method, and capacity improvement and sustainable livelihood
as the strategy. It has continuously improved the poverty-alleviating ability of poor
areas and poor people and achieved remarkable results.
Second, innovative working methods have a positive impact on poverty allevia-
tion. Social work has explored a series of innovative working methods in poverty-
alleviating practice. It attaches great importance to the evaluation of problems.
According to the evaluation results, formulate appropriate service plans, apply profes-
sional work techniques and skills to carry out services, and examine the service effect
through the tracking feedback mechanism to ensure the realization of service objec-
tives. Through formulating targeted service program, flexibly using professional
methods such as group work, case work, and community work and adopting multiple
intervention strategies, such as case counseling, group skills, social resources mobi-
lization, consultation, and training, social work can provide appropriate services for
the poor. Social work can extensively mobilize social forces, link social resources
for the poor, establish a relationship network, and construct a social support system.
8 Xiang and Cheng [8].

References 253
It can also provide targeted services and help for poor people according to profes-
sional methods, develop their potential ability, enhance their self-development ability,
and help them alleviate and get rid of poverty.
Thirdly, multiple intervention channels play a significant role in poverty alle-
viation. Social work is an important force involved in poverty Alleviation and an
important component of building a large poverty Alleviation pattern featuring the
joint participation of the government, the market, and society. Social work can inte-
grate internal and external resources, connect various forces, coordinate poverty
Alleviation methods and poverty-reduction capacity. In addition, it can complement
other poverty reducing entities and jointly raise resources, so as to give full play
to the systematic and comprehensive effect of poverty reduction. The enrichment
and optimization of intervention channels provide opportunities and ways for social
work to play a better role in poverty reduction. By intervening through various chan-
nels, social work not only improves its professional capacity, but also improves the
efficiency and benefit of the government, market, and social organizations in this
work.
The involvement of social work is an important part of the practice of social forces
participating in targeted poverty curbing. The participation is an inherent requirement
and inevitable product of socialized and cooperative poverty reduction.
References
1. Wang C (2008) Thirty years of development-oriented poverty alleviation in rural China: policy
practice and theoretical retrospection. J Guizhou Univ Fin Econ (6)
2. State Council Leading Group Office of Economic Development of Impoverished Areas (1989)
An outline of economic development in china’s impoverished areas. Agricultural Press, p 14
3. Sen A (2002) Development as freedom (trans: Ren Z, Yu Z). China Renmin University Press, p
85
4. Schultz TW (1961) Investment in human capital. Am Econ Rev (1)
5. Li Y, Li B (2016) Development of social work policy in china in the latest decade. J Soc Sci (12)
6. Feng Y, Peng H (2016) Background, power and value of social work policy development in
China. Acad J Zhongzhou (1)
7. Li Y, Guo Y (2018) On promoting social work to be part of the efforts in the targeted poverty
alleviation practice. J Renmin Univ China (5)
8. Xiang D, Cheng Ling (2019) The path and features of the developmental social work and its
application in poverty-alleviating. J Northwest Normal Univ (Soc Sci) (2)

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Poverty-Alleviation and Social Work in China

Social Work for Poverty

ISSN 2731-5924 ISSN 2731-5932 (electronic)

1 An Overview of Poverty Alleviation Social Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

2.1.2 Theoretical Basis for Social Work to Participate

3.4 Application of Social Work Values in Poverty Alleviation . . . . . . . . 86

5.3.3 Case Study of the Casework Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

7.3.1 The Major Problems Confronting Relocated Poor

9.2.2 Improving the Intrinsic Motivation of the Poor . . . . . . . . . . . 242

As underscored in the document entitled “Guideline on Approving Social Work

1.1 Relations Between Poverty Relief and Social Work

1.1.1 China’s Experience in Tackling Poverty

2 Xiang and Huang [1].

Secondly, a strong leadership. “Government leadership” is a defining feature of the

1.1.2 Intrinsic Consistency Between Targeted Poverty Relief

1.1.2.1 Common Concern for Individual Sufferings

3 Gao and Xiang [2].

1.1.2.2 Shared Conscious Pursuit of Greater Social Justice

1.1.2.3 Reverence for Scientific Methods

Social work is a value-driven profession that expertly delivers services, specialist

1.1.3 New Demands for Targeted Poverty Alleviation

1.1.3.1 Returning to Rural Social Work as the Central Task

5 Gao and Xiang [2].

1.1.3.2 Building Professional Personnel Committed to Rural Social

1.1.3.3 Building Service Outlets for Rural Social Work

1.2 Significance and Role of Poverty-Alleviating Social

1.2.1 The Significance of Poverty-Alleviating Social Work

8 Xiang and Yao [6].

First, a single force. In a government-led poverty alleviation model, social partici-

1.2.2 The Role of Social Work in Alleviating Poverty

11 Xiang et al. [8].

communications and to coordinate social networks, to address social problems, and

1.2.2.1 A Systematic Set of Values

Social work is a highly specialized activity based on systematic technical know-how.

1.2.2.2 “Systematic Vision” and “Strengths Vision”

13 Xiang and Yao [6].

a “systematic vision” in mind, it works on improvement in individual capacity, social

1.2.2.3 Specialized Approaches and Techniques

1.2.2.4 Specialized Platforms

1.3 Concepts and Methodologies of Poverty-Alleviating

1.3.1 Concepts of Poverty Alleviation Work

1.3.1.1 Equal Importance Attached to Absolute Poverty and Relative

14 Xiang et al. [8].

1.3.1.2 Single Attribution to Comprehensive Analysis

1.3.1.3 From Problem Perspective to Advantage Perspective

Be it the individualistic, the structuralist, or the cultural explanation of poverty, they

1.3.1.4 From General Analysis to Differentiated Analysis

1.3.2 Practical Path of Poverty Alleviation Social Work

1.3.2.1 Diversified Paths of Practice

19 Xiang et al. [8].

1.3.2.2 Multi-Polarized Channels of Intervention

1.3.2.3 Specialized Service Methods

20 Guangdong Green Farming Social Work Development Center. [EB/OL]. http://www.lvgeng.org/

City was renamed.

to eliminating poverty entirely. Summarizing and reflecting on their efforts show

1.3.2.4 Positive Practice Attitude

By applying the values of altruism, equality, helping others to help themselves,

1.3.2.5 Systematic Work Models

1.4 The Space for and the Paths to Social Work’s

1.4.1 The Space for Social Work’s Involvement in Poverty

1.4.1.1 Biologically, Social Work Has Its Roots in Poverty Relief

22 Xiang and Yao [6].

1.4.1.2 Historically, Poverty Alleviation Ran Through the Complete