ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses how eco-social work that includes Nature-based intervention, therapy, or healing and is rooted in eco-centric worldviews can play a central role in shifting our current human-centred paradigms towards eco-centric paradigms, where humans live in more reciprocal and respectful relationships with Nature and each other—and where the rights of Nature are recognised. In May 2022, the International Federation of Social Workers adopted a new policy for social workers, ‘The Role of Social Workers in Advancing a New Eco-Social World’, recognising that the interconnectedness of all life in our ecosystem is integral in the guiding ethics of social workers and affirming the rights of Nature. To be part of co-creating truly sustainable ways of living, social work must be rooted in eco-centric cosmologies and worldviews that affirm the interdependence and interconnectedness of all life. We explore what social work can look like from eco-centric perspectives and approaches when the principles of Earth Jurisprudence are applied and placed in dialogue with the new policy. Through a case study of a Nature programme offered to women at Danish shelters for victims of partner violence, based a.o. on Shinrin-yoku, we show the healing and transformative powers of Nature and the possibilities for including Nature-based intervention, therapy, or healing in eco-social work.
