Relational pedagogy in social care education: a model for relational justice

Driven by a statutory obligation to protect the public, within the context of historical failings and institutional abuse, a process of professional regulation is transforming the profession of Social Care Work [SCW] in Ireland. Statutory registration requires Social Care Workers [SCWs] to demonstrate threshold-level proficiency standards, a challenge that has enlivened debates about theory, pedagogy, and practice. Although proficiency requirements are primarily instrumental and technical, focussing on case and risk-management, social justice is now central to the definition of SCW. However, there has been very little debate about what this entails for theory and practice and critical perspectives are marginal. In response, the value-based model of Relational Pedagogy, based on an ethic of care and relational justice, is proposed as a counterweight to the proficiency perspective by nurturing four inter-related sets of practices within social care education: (i) caring practices; (ii) critical practices; (iii); creative practices, and (iv) emancipatory practices.