Advocating for Social Justice
Advocating for Social Justice
Advocating for Social Justice
This course has presented the various roles of the public and community health nurse. The media presenters and the course textbook have covered this in depth. As you prepare for this final Discussion, consider what you have read and heard about the future of public health. Reflect on the readings, Web resources, and media presentations presented throughout this course about the role of the nurse in a community/public health setting and vulnerable populations. Then, respond to the following: (WRITE 1 PAGE DISCUSSION PAPER)
What is the community health nurse’s role in advocating for social justice for vulnerable populations and in eliminating health disparities?
How do you see community health care and the role of the community health nurse changing in the future?
Support your response with references from the professional nursing literature.
RESOURCES
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- Student paper example
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Video: Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Family, community and population-based care: Vulnerable populations. Baltimore: Author
Course Text: Stanhope, M., & Lancaster, J. (2014). Public health nursing: Population-centered health care in the community. (REv. 8th ed.)Philadelphia: Mosby Elsevier.
- Course Text: Public Health Nursing: Population–Centered Health Care in the Community
- Chapter 32, “Compromised Populations”
- Chapter 34, “Migrant Health Issues”
- Chapter 35, “Teen Pregnancy”
- Chapter 38, “Violence and Human Abuse”
Social justice advocacy has been defined as organized efforts aimed at influencing public attitudes, policies, and laws to create a more
socially just society guided by the vision of human rights that may include awareness of socio-economic inequities, protection of social rights as well as racial identity, experiences of oppression, and spirituality. Social justice advocacy has been relatively uncommon in the United States in the last three decades. In comparison, in the 1960s and 1970s, students were often at the front line of social movements (e.g., the civil rights, women rights, and anti-war movements) and such activism is believed to have been one of the most powerful mechanisms for creating social change.
As a public land-grant institution, premier research university, and global leader in education, Penn State will support our community of students, faculty, and staff who advocate for social change and human rights consistent with Penn State’s Statement on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
We understand social justice advocacy to be planned, organised and sustained actions. Its purpose is to influence public policy outcomes, with and/ on behalf of a vulnerable group or community or indeed the wider public good.
Social justice advocacy is informed by experiences of poverty and exclusion by:
Providing individual/personal advocacy supports aimed at realising right and entitlements.
Delivering direct services and meeting social and economic needs.
Empowering and involving those experiencing the issues in the decisions that impact their lives.
Producing research and analysis that illustrates the realities of poverty and social exclusion.
It is targeted at a broad range of stakeholders including: policy-makers, civil and public servants, social partners, relevant international organisations, broader public opinion, and other relevant actors.
Who is civil society?
Civil society is the space between the household and the state. It fulfils many roles including providing alternatives, vision and acting as a counterweight to the influence of commercial interests and unfettered state power. It represents two of the fundamental freedoms in a democracy – the right to free speech and the right to freedom of association.
Civil society organisations that are involved in social justice advocacy can include: non-governmental and non-profit organisations, the community and voluntary sector, trade unions, professional associations, community-based organisations, faith-based organisations, social movements and networks, the media and academia.
Community and voluntary sector social justice advocacy
Early on we decided to focus on the advocacy work of the community and voluntary sector. While it does not have a monopoly on social justice advocacy, the organisations who established The Advocacy Initiative believed they played a critical role in addressing the causes of inequality and exclusion in our society and in ensuring the voices of the excluded and marginalised are heard.