ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the impact of neoliberalism on social work and social work education. It identifies the varied contexts and interpretations of the consequences of neoliberal hegemony and outlines some of social work’s social and political responses. Social work has accommodated some aspects of neoliberalism with little challenge, whereas other aspects have brought disgruntlement or fundamental resistance. Drawing on a neo-Gramscian portrayal of hegemony as contested, the chapter examines the complex and changeable processes of hegemonic formulation and maintenance and articulates the instability of neoliberal ideological consensus that provides the possibility of resistance for social work. Language forms what A. Gramsci terms, the ‘vernacular materialist turn’, where the common sense of hegemony is unified through language. The dominance of neoliberal knowledge to neoliberal ideas reflects an erosion of the depth and breadth of ideas. Neoliberalism also seeks to change the working role and practices of professions by curtailing and regulating independent expertise and political authority.
