A Family Therapist Consulting in Complex Settings Part 2: Innovative Family-Based Practice Models more

I MARCH 2006 PAGE 3 ~ Family Therapy In Action ~ Part II: A Family Therapist Consulting in Complex Settings: Innovative Family-Based Practice Models by Gonzalo Bacigalupe, EdD I Being called as a consultant is a privilege that is i granted in what is often a very brief but intense period | of time that carries a tremendous responsibility. Ap- j proximating a social justice agenda into the practice of a j relational consultant is complex but unavoidable if the practitioner is working with social contexts in which ine- quality and disparity is present. The participatory ap- proaches, with its social justice sensitivity, emphasize j emancipation and how people through communicative action can sort out the right way to reach a just world via consciousness and organizing. The collaborative ap- proaches are, on the other part, skeptical of modern nar- ratives or a particular form of truth. Their minimalist attempt at not interfering with people's choices have em- phasized the value of the conversation per se as having the potential to move the involved parties into genera- tive resolutions. Recent developments offer appealing applications for consulting practitioners committed to an emancipatory agenda but that are also inviting of par- ticipants' voices: positive deviance in community health programs, appreciative inquiry in organizational devel- opment, family group conferencing in community social work, and the public conversations project. Positive Deviance involves a careful inquiry of practices that already exist in the community. This model is the result of international public health efforts in the areas of malnutrition and famine in which re- searchers and health workers noticed that communities facing serious problems have some individuals and fami- lies whose behaviors enable them to find better solutions to problems than the rest of their community even though they may have access to similar resources. Shar- ing this knowledge with the rest of the participants counters or shifts the way people organize to resolve problematic issues. Countering the usual imposition of assistance models in which the professional knowledge prevails, positive deviance practitioners collaborate with the community to locate the individuals and practices that can later on be shared with others. Similar to the collaborative approaches in family therapy, the profes- sionals do not presume to know the answers and encour- age the systematic inquiry of the local practices that are minority but result in positive outcomes. Positive devi- ant practices work if the solutions are repeatable in a specific community and its defining features are cultur- ally consonant with the community in which the investi- gation occurred. Thus, getting to know the prevalent cultural values of the community and finding an inter- cultural fit is central to ensure success. And like other effective consulting models, this approach fosters a mini- malist form of intervention that prevents dependent relationships with professionals or institutions. Appreciative Inquiry (AI) emphasizes a dia- logical activity in which the consultant main assump- tion is that whatever you want more of already exists in the organization. The recurrent guiding question is: What is working well around here?. AI was devised to counter the professional socialization which leads to assess events as problems to solve. Similar to as- sumptions in some brief family therapy approaches, the AI is based on the premise that when people (i.e., professionals) try to solve a problem, they may actu- ally generate more of them. The result of not con- structing solutions based on what does not need to be changed or needs further support is a demoralizing, vicious, and negative circle. The past is also con- structed in a positive form to help reorganize the pre- sent and future experiences. The consultant asks par- ticipants about positive memories of the organization at issue. This remembering of a silenced element of the institutional culture foments a sensation of pride with relation to the group. In this way, AI conversa- tions identify the elements that allow constructing a different future. The negative aspects are not ignored but they are put in a different perspective. AI has three stages that aim at the discovery of excellence, forces, abilities, etc.: the sharing of hopes for an or- ganization or ideal community, the design of new structures and processes, and the implementation of the hopes or dream. Like effective systemic consulta- tion, a core aspect of AI is the formulation of ques- tions that fortifies the capacity of a system to appre- hend, to anticipate, and to enhance its positive poten- tial Family Group Conferencing (FGC) is the meeting of all family members, agency representa- tives, organizations, advocates, and other persons in- volved with the family with the goal of planning the care and protection of children at risk. Originated in New Zealand as a result of the indigenous communi- ties' struggle with the impact of destructive state in- terventions on their families, the FGC was designed as a collaborative and participatory approach in which families have an active voice in all matters af- fecting them including the safety of their members. Child protective services and restorative justice pro- grams in several countries have embraced this modal- ity of work in which strengthening the relationships between people is central to foster responsibility and safety. [Continued on Next Page] Part II: A Family Therapist Consulting in Complex Settings: Innovative Family-Based Practice Models by Gonzalo Bacigalupe, EdD [Continued from Page 3j FGC emphasizes collaboration over control by the professionals, insists on the family and its com- munity leadership, defines outcomes consensually rather than in a predetermined way, and it adheres to a strength rather than a pathological perspective. FGC embraces a social justice and cultural competent approach in which culture is defined in its complexity and refuses to adopt techniques that appropriate or abuse indigenous cultural processes. Because of the same characteristics that make this approach so at- tuned to a collaborative and emancipatory practice, efforts at mainstreaming FGC have often been re- sisted by those who have become skeptic of making families the leading element of the intervention. The Public Conversations Project (PCP), a Greater Boston based initiative, works towards pre- venting the re-enactment of polarizing discussions and the careful preparation of a conversational set- ting in which participants can enter into a new con- versation. The project is popularly known for organiz- ing conversations about highly divisive issues (i.e., abortion, religious beliefs). Through careful prepara- tion and delineation of structured rules for dialogue, the PCP facilitators create a safe space in which indi- viduals are encouraged to speak and listen fully to each other preventing the emergence of simplified views of the other. Core questions include asking what matters most to participants and the sharing of stories about the ways in which their opinions have been shaped by their personal experiences. Like the approaches described earlier, the coordinator of the conversation approaches participants from a not- pathological perspective. Like the group conferencing facilitators, the PCP approach emphasizes the pre- meeting planning within a collaborative framework. These promising practices can be integrated in the tool box of the relational artisan as practices that are informed by careful and attentive listening, affirmation, curious questioning, transparent and careful preparation, and humble explanations. Rather than a logarithmic application of these princi- ples, the relational consultant situates these practices considering not only the "identified problem" but its located circumstances and how the consultant's own position construe it together with the community that participates in its definition.