Taking Social Work into the New Millennium.

Witkin, Stanley L.

Welcome to the new millennium! I hope the fact that you are reading this editorial (by electric light?) means that Y2K doomsday predictions did not befall you. Of personal significance for me is that with this issue I pass the halfway point of my editorship. If the next two years pass by as quickly as the first two, it won't be long before I will be reflecting on my past experience as editor-in-chief. With that in mind, I want to use this editorial to reiterate and expand on my aims for Social Work and most important, to continue to encourage you, the readers, to participate in our profession's most important and widely distributed publication.

In my first editorial (March 1998) I stated that Social Work, as the membership journal of NASW, should focus on topics of broad relevance that are central to our professional mission. Many of you have responded to this invitation. As a result, Social Work has published articles on such fundamental topics as poverty, advocacy, ethics, diversity, professional identity, health care, and vulnerable groups. I continue to encourage such submissions.

Social Work is a journal of the profession-- the whole profession. I remain committed to seeking ways of strengthening connections between members and the journal. During the past two years, I have tried to put a "human face" on the journal by giving presentations about Social Work at conferences. Your presence, questions, and comments at these meetings have been useful and demonstrate your interest in keeping Social Work a quality publication.

Although practitioners constitute the vast majority of Social Work's readers, most articles are written by academics. This is not surprising since writing and publishing are job requirements for most academics, whereas most practitioners write on their own time. Journals are central to academic life in other ways: as a source of information, a primary publication outlet, and a medium to demonstrate professional competence. Therefore, academics have a vested interest in maintaining journal policies and conceptions of privileged knowledge that favor them.

I want academics to continue writing for Social Work. They have a lot to offer and besides, I am one! But I also think it is important to increase the number of practitioner-authors, not only because they represent the majority of readers, but because they have important things to say. Their experiences, insights, and knowledge are valuable information resources for the profession, but like other resources they must be tapped to be realized. To do so requires that the manuscript review process be made less mysterious and intimidating (see below) and that alternatives to the standard journal article be emphasized. Four existing alternatives--Practice Updates, Commentaries, Points & Viewpoints, and Letters--are highlighted below.

* Practice Updates inform readers about new or innovative practices or adaptations of existing approaches to new populations. Their primary aim is to share information about noteworthy practices important to the profession. "Practice in this context is not limited to specific methods or areas, but is broadly defined to include a wide range of professional activities.

* Commentaries provide thoughtful analyses of current issues of significance to the profession. Such analyses often are provocative and include proposals for addressing the issues raised.

* Points & Viewpoints present alternative interpretations or constructive critiques of articles published in the journal. Its purpose is to stimulate fruitful discussion of important issues.

* Letters enable readers to comment on articles or editorials published in the journal. Although sometimes overlooked, letter writing has a distinguished history: Many of our most revered scholars and scientists expressed their important ideas in the form of letters. Letters also are the first section of the journal to which many readers turn.

The different aims and formats of these columns provide potential authors with multiple arenas for expressing their ideas. Their flexible formats and relative brevity may make them more suitable to nonacademics. I consider each important and encourage you to consider contributing to them.

Some Functions of Professional Journals

Professional journals are important to social work. They influence practice, education and knowledge development. Journals expose us to multiple perspectives on various topics, enriching or altering our thinking. Practitioners read journals to learn about potentially useful interventions, policies, and programs. Social work educators depend heavily on journals for course materials and for keeping up-to-date in their interest areas. Researchers use journal articles to support their own work. Publishing a research study gives it credibility and makes its findings available to others.

A basic function of professional journals is to disseminate information to their intended audiences. For Social Work this means first the members of NASW and then other professionals in social work and related fields. This belief undergirds my assertion that Social Work should address topics of broad professional relevance. Although readers commonly suggest that Social Work should include more articles about their particular interest areas, such as a practice method or specific problem, one journal cannot accommodate the diverse interests in the profession. Such a strategy, in my opinion, would lead to a fragmented publication in which a small proportion of readers would be pleased a small proportion of the time.

Practitioners and academic readers may also view the journal differently: the former believing that Social Work is too academic, the latter that it is not sufficiently scholarly. Interestingly, there is little clamor to include the interests or perspectives of the people we serve. In a previous issue I offered some suggestions for including client voices in the journal, for example, cowriting with clients or writing from the dual perspective of client-social worker. I want to reiterate this call.

Distinguishing and prioritizing academic (often meaning scientific) practice and lay forms of knowledge has historical roots and is supported by institutionalized social practices. I am not sure they serve the profession well, and I would like to find ways for Social Work to overcome them. The challenge is finding ways to be inclusive and of recognizing the value in multiple voices and forms of expression. I see no contradiction between this position and the production of a high-quality professional journal.

Gatekeeping is a second important function of journals. Social Work's wide circulation, high visibility, and prominence make it the preferred publication outlet for many authors. This is a great situation for Social Work, but it means that only a small percentage of the manuscripts submitted get published. Like most journals, Social Work uses an anonymous, peer review process to determine which submissions best meet the standards of the journal: relevance to the profession, importance, soundness of analysis, clarity of writing, originality, and interestingness.

In addition to these more or less typical criteria, I think we should also consider qualities such as generativity, challenging the commonplace, assumed, or taken-for-granted; heuristic capacity, stimulating new questions, ideas, or perspectives; transformative potential, proposing basic changes in beliefs and practices; and value expression, articulating, clarifying, or expanding the central professional values of human dignity and social justice.

Evaluating manuscripts involves complicated judgments. Although reviewers do not know the identities of authors, they differ on what they notice, emphasize, and critique. No manuscript is perfect, and reviewers must weigh their critiques against their assessments of worth. Despite its limitations, should this manuscript be published? Is the topic of sufficient importance and relevance to encourage the authors to revise and resubmit? The possibility of differing assessments makes the review process inherently controversial.

Responsibility for these complex judgments falls to the Social Work editorial board, the consulting editors, expert reviewers, and the editor-in-chief. Because reviewers are key players in the manuscript decision process, their qualifications are important. According to NASW policy, consulting editors must be NASW members, be established scholars, have current experience, publish in peer-reviewed journals, and possess expertise relevant to the journal. Editorial board members must meet similar requirements. Unfortunately, these criteria exclude most practitioners, a situation that concerns me. First, without representation, prospective practitioner--authors might legitimately wonder about the meaning of "peer review." Second, for manuscripts addressing practice issues, the assessment of knowledgeable and experienced practitioners is important. Third, although published authors often make wonderful reviewers, this is not always the case. Just as the best athletes are not necessarily the best coaches, writers of informed, constructive reviews are found throughout the profession. For these reasons, I have appointed a group of "expert reviewers"--social workers who may not meet the publication requirements for consulting editors but have considerable practice experience in areas that would be useful in the review process. Expert reviewers augment the range of reviewers' expertise and add an experienced-based practice perspective to reviews of manuscripts addressing practice issues. My initial experience with the expert reviewers suggests that they are a valuable resource for the journal.

Most submissions are sent to three reviewers. Their reviews and recommendations are sent to the editor-in-chief for a decision. The editor-in-chief assesses the reviewers' comments and adds his or her own assessment, which may include other factors such as similarity of the manuscript to others already in the publication pipeline. The outcome of this review is a rating of one to four indicating a decision to (1) accept, (2) reject, but encourage resubmission with minor revisions, (3) reject, but encourage resubmission with major revisions, and (4) reject. Currently, the acceptance rate, including manuscripts resubmitted after revision, is about 20 percent.

Social Work's influence and importance place it in a leadership role. Beyond serving as an outlet for submitted manuscripts, Social Work, through its editor-in-chief and editorial board, influences the content of the journal. Editorials present the editor-in-chiefs views on issues he or she thinks are important for the profession to consider. Occasionally, special issues are developed that focus on particular themes. For example, the two centennial issues published in November 1998 and July 1999 contained articles, commentaries, and letters submitted in response to a call for papers addressing social work's unique and important contributions over the past century. In some cases, specific authors are invited to address issues of importance. Changes in policies or in the operation of the journal create new opportunities for potential authors. The addition of the international advisory panel (September 1999) and the appointment of expert reviewers are two examples. Creating new formats like the interview on soc ial work with older people (November 1999) helps draw attention to particular issues. Encouraging topics of broad relevance, controversial issues that encourage exchanges of ideas (March 1998), and clients' perspectives (January 1999), may influence submissions.

During the next two years we hope to use the NASW Web page (www.socialworkers.org) to make Social Work more accessible, timely, and interactive. Ideas for new columns, designed to be appealing, informative, and expressive of our diverse perspectives, are in the works. But this partnership depends too on your willingness to share ideas--as colleagues, readers, and authors. Together, we can make Social Work in the new millennium an even more meaningful, inclusive, and relevant professional publication.