When Duty Calls: The Implications of Social Justice Work for Policy, Education, and Practice in the Mental Health Professions

In reaction to the pioneering model of social justice education in counseling psychology described by Goodman, Liang, Helms, Latta, Sparks, and Weintraub, several implications of social justice work for policy, education, and practice in the mental health professions are suggested. Specifically, it is recommended that mental health scientists and practitioners (a) lobby for policies that compensate practitioners for social justice work and primary prevention, (b) serve communities by participating in interdisciplinary social justice programs, (c) advocate for promotion and tenure policies that recognize and reward high-quality scholarship whose purpose it to serve communities, (d) identify the trade-offs that occur when social justice work becomes an emphasis in a curriculum, (e) be models of vulnerability to students and colleagues, (f) advocate for clients who are too overwhelmed to advocate for themselves, (g) embrace traditional and nontraditional approaches to helping, and (h) balance confrontation with engagement when challenging unjust systems and practices.