This wooden statue (right) was bought by Herman de Mönnink from an Senegalese artist. The painting of this statue (left) was made by a Dutch artist, Huib van der Stelt.
Maybe this image could function as the uniqu international symbol of social empowerment of social work? In Holland social workers are very enthousiastic because the statue symbolizes the social work quote:'In
life you have to manage it yourself, but not alone.' This statue symbolizes
the Ubuntu philosophy about human autonomy and positive social dependency : 'I
am because we are' but also 'we are because I am'.
So the statue goes beyond individualizing and pathologizing social problems and underlines the power of the social context, of social support, so important in social work clientsituations. Why do we not introduce this as the international and nation symbol for social work profession, like doctors have their esculape etc?
© H.J. de Mönnink, 2014 - Multi Method Social Work,