SOCIAL WORK AND LABOR: CURRENT CONTRADICTIONS AND CHALLENGES

Abstract

This article analyzes the impacts of transformations in the world of work on the professional practice of social workers. It assumes that such changes have expanded the socio-occupational spaces of the profession, but also intensified processes of precariousness, overload, and devaluation. Historical-dialectical materialism, based on Marxist authors, is adopted as a method to understand the contradictions that permeate the working class and social work. The research, of a bibliographic and documentary nature, considers the regulatory frameworks of the profession and discusses the sociability of work as a central category. The discussion shows that the sociability of work under capitalism determines a relative autonomy of social workers, which is constantly challenged by the demands of the State and the interests of the working class. It concludes that, despite ethical-political and theoretical-methodological advances, challenges persist in daily professional practice, especially when working in interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary teams.