SOCIAL-WORK - PROFESSION WITHOUT QUALITIES ATTEMPT TO LINK SOCIAL-WORK AND CYBERNETICS

From the perspective of the practitioner social work is considered as a crypto-cybernetic performance, i.e. the observations formulated by H einz von Foerster on second-order cybernetics are translated into acti on patterns for social workers: the observation of the observer is ins titutionalized in the form of 'supervision'; a 'cultivated sense of po ssibilities' corresponds to a reality that is seen as constructed, rat her than objectively given; the contingency of moral expectations lead s to a 'practised ethic of responsibility'; the black-box idea corresp onds to the proclaimed 'right of the client for self-determination'. T oday, due to Heinz von Foerster, social work can unashamedly celebrate its cybernetic' coming out'.