Professor Jim Ife

Professor of Social Work,
Social Work and Community Welfare

Biography
Contact
Publications
Projects
Teaching

Biography

Jim Ife has been active in social work education since the 1970s. He has held positions at the Tasmnaina College of Advanced Education (now part of The University of Tasmania), Curtin University, The University of Werstern Australia. He was Professor of Social Work and Social Policy at The University of Western Australia, and also at Curtin University, prior to his appointment in 2003 as the inaugural Handa Professor of Human Rights education and Head of the Centre for Human Rights Education at Curtin. He 'retired' in 2006, but remained active in writing and in sessional teaching at sevetral universities, before coming out of 'retirement' to take up his current position at Western in 2017.

This information has been contributed by Professor Ife.

Qualifications

PhD University of Tasmania
MSW McGill University (Canada)

Organisational Unit (School / Division)

Social Work and Community Welfare

Contact

Email:	J.Ife@westernsydney.edu.au
Phone:	(02) 9685 9774
Mobile:
Location:	EJD.G.48 Parramatta

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Teaching

Previous Teaching Areas

102306 Contextualising Community Development Within Indigenous Australia, 2019
102395 Critical Social Work Practice, 2019
102743 Theories and Knowledges for Social Work, 2019

Publications

Books

Ife, J., Mehta, R. and Tusasiirwe, S. (2024), 'Re-imagining Social Work: Towards Creative Practice', : Cambridge University Press 9781108436885.
Ife, J., Soldatic, K. and Briskman, L. (2022), 'Human Rights and Social Work', : Cambridge University Press 9781108829700.
Tascon, S. and Ife, J. (2020), 'Disrupting Whiteness in Social Work', : Routledge 9780367247508.
Ife, J. (2016), 'Community Development in an Uncertain World: Vision, Analysis and Practice', : Cambridge University Press 9781107543362.
Ife, J. (2012), 'Human Rights and Social Work: Towards Rights-Based Practice', : Cambridge University Press 9781107693876.
Ife, J. (2009), 'Human Rights From Below: Achieving Rights Through Community Development', : Cambridge University Press 9780521711081.

Chapters in Books

Ife, J. (2020), 'Whiteness from within', Disrupting Whiteness in Social Work, Routledge 9780367247508.
Tascon, S. and Ife, J. (2020), 'Decolonising social work vocabulary', Disrupting Whiteness in Social Work, Routledge 9780367247508.
Ife, J. (2020), 'Donna Haraway : cyborgs, making kin and the Chthulucene in a posthuman world', The Routledge Handbook of Critical Pedagogies for Social Work, Routledge 9781138545748.
Kickett-Tucker, C. and Ife, J. (2018), 'Identity in Australian Aboriginal communities : Koodoormitj is the essence of life', Routledge Handbook of Community Development: Perspectives from Around the Globe, Routledge 9781138940765.
Briskman, L. and Ife, J. (2018), 'Extending beyond the legal : social work and human rights', Social Work in the Shadow of the Law, The Federation Press 9781760021610.
Ife, J. (2018), 'Social work and human rights : the 'human', the 'social' and the collapse of modernity', Menschenrechte und Soziale Arbeit: Konzeptionelle Grundlagen, Gestaltungsfelder und Umsetzung einer Realutopie, Barbara Budrich 9783847421764.
Ife, J. (2017), 'Social work, science and green politics', Radicals in Australian Social Work: Stories of Lifelong Activism, Connor Court Publishing 9781925501711.
Ife, J. (2017), 'An afterword : from personal retrospectives to future activism', Radicals in Australian Social Work: Stories of Lifelong Activism, Connor Court Publishing 9781925501711.
Reisch, M., Ife, J. and Weil, M. (2013), 'Social justice, human rights, values, and community practice', The Handbook of Community Practice, SAGE 9781412987851.
Ife, J. (2010), 'Capacity building and community development', Challenging Capacity Building: Comparative Perspectives, Palgrave 9781349313303.
Ife, J. (2010), 'Human rights and social justice', Ethics and Value Perspectives in Social Work, Palgrave Macmillan 9780230221451.

Journal Articles

Panagiotaros, C., Boddy, J., Gray, T. and Ife, J. (2022), '(Re-)Imagining social work in the anthropocene', British Journal of Social Work, vol 52, no 8 , pp 4778 - 4794.
Bennett, B., Ravulo, J., Ife, J. and Gates, T. (2021), 'Making #blacklivesmatter in universities : a viewpoint on social policy education', International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, vol 41, no 11-12 , pp 1257 - 1263.
Ife, J. (2018), 'Right-wing populism and social work : contrasting ambivalences about modernity', Journal of Human Rights and Social Work, vol 3, no 3 , pp 121 - 127.
Voss, T., Bailey, J., Ife, J. and Kottig, M. (2018), 'The threatening troika of populism, nationalism, and neoliberalism', Journal of Human Rights and Social Work, vol 3, no 3 , pp 109 - 111.
Ife, J. (2017), 'Rethinking human rights in the 21st century', New Community Quarterly, vol 15, no 57-58 , pp 29 - 35.
Ife, J. (2016), 'Human rights and social work : beyond conservative law', Journal of Human Rights and Social Work, vol 1, no 1 , pp 3 - 8.
Ife, J. and Tascon, S. (2016), 'Human rights and critical social work : competing epistemologies for practice', Social Alternatives, vol 35, no 4 , pp 27 - 31.
Roby, J. and Ife, J. (2009), 'Human rights, politics and intercountry adoption : an examination of two sending countries', International Social Work, vol 52, no 5 , pp 661 - 671.
Ife, J. (2009), 'Needs, rights and democratic renewal', Nouvelles Pratiques Sociales, vol 22, no 1 , pp 38 - 51.
Tascon, S. and Ife, J. (2008), 'Human rights and critical whiteness : whose humanity?', International Journal of Human Rights, vol 12, no 3 , pp 307 - 327.

Jim Ife's major areas of research have been in community development and human rights, where he has published extensively. His most recent research interets are in the social work and community development practice in the Antrhopocene - a time of crisis, change and potential ctastrophe.