Is There Room for Social Justice in Clinical Supervision? A Systematic Literature Review

Soc Work. 2026 May 12:swag021. doi: 10.1093/sw/swag021. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Clinical supervision is essential in promoting novice mental health providers’ awareness of systemic and individual-level social injustices. Yet frameworks used by clinical supervisors often fall short of providing the needed skills to promote social justice. This is particularly problematic for the social work profession as it is set apart from sister professions by its primary commitment to promoting social change and empowering vulnerable populations. This integrative systematic review explores the extent to which social justice is addressed in clinical supervision and maps the approaches supervisors use to promote a social justice-informed practice paradigm across disciplines. The project included peer-reviewed cross-disciplinary literature published between 2010 and 2024 and followed the PRISMA guide. A SPIDER framework was used to determine the eligibility criteria of papers (N = 26) identified across four databases. Results indicate a scarcity of publications, particularly in social work-specific journals (N = 5), despite encouraging scholarship growth across disciplines. This review also shows that clinical supervision can provide the ideal space for the development of justice-informed praxis and identifies four main themes to guide supervisory approaches: (1) multicultural frames, (2) relational approaches, (3) structural oppression and injustices, and (4) critical/postmodern epistemologies. Recommendations for practice, research, and education are provided.

PMID:42118965 | DOI:10.1093/sw/swag021