A virada crítica da formação profissional em serviço social no Brasil: o protagonismo da ABESS e os marcos históricos, teóricos e políticos

Abstract

The thesis aimed to analyze the critical turning point of professional training during the Renewal of Brazilian Social Work from 1964 to 1985, seeking to identify its historical, theoretical, and political landmarks and the role played by ABESS in this process. We started from two central hypotheses: 1) the political organization of ABESS and its protagonists was decisive for the critical turning point of professional training in Social Work; 2) the 21st National Convention of ABESS held in 1979 in Natal (RN) was the theoretical, methodological, and political vector that supported this process. The construction of the thesis aimed to understand the Critical Renewal of Social Work in Brazil during the period of the military business dictatorship (1964 to 1985) and its links with the Latin American Reconceitualization Movement; to contextualize the conservative foundation of professional training; to identify the historical, theoretical, and political milestones that were decisive for the critical turn in professional training; to analyze the importance of the political organization of ABESS and the protagonists connected to the entity in the critical turn of professional training; to research the ABESS conventions held between the years 1964 and 1985; and to study the professional curricula of the period. We conducted a qualitative exploratory research, based on a materialist, historical, and dialectical perspective, grounded in the critical social theory of Karl Marx. The methodological procedures used were: bibliographic research, documentary research, and semistructured interviews with open-ended questions. The thesis demonstrated that the critical turning point in professional training in Social Work in Brazil was constituted through a long process, especially during the period from 1973 to 1982, with the data collected revealing how this processing occurred, its individual and collective protagonists, the central milestones, and the importance of ABESS, partially proving the initial hypotheses. The study proved to be relevant by recovering processes that contributed to the emergence of the critical perspective of Social Work in Brazil, highlighting elements that had not been thoroughly explored until then, as well as assisting in the discovery and organization of data related to the study object.