In this paper we discuss the links between emancipatory social work education and community empowerment. Based on Freirian-Gramscian-Althusserian theoretical analyses and praxis, we argue that the development of critical consciousness has the potential to contribute to radical and empowering social action. In doing so, we draw on the voices of students who have had the benefit of emancipatory social work education, and on our experiences in working in communities.
Emancipatory social work education, rooted in critical and radical theories, highlights the iterative relationship between the personal and political dimensions of life, thus rendering the micro-macro dichotomy a false one. It thus brings into sharp focus the complex inter-relationship between agency and structure. Emancipatory social work is directed at heightening awareness of external sources of oppression and/or privilege that hold the possibility of increasing self-esteem and courage to confront structural sources of marginalization, oppression and exclusion.