Vera, E: Social Justice and Culturally Relevant Prevention

Social justice and cultural relevance have become increasingly popular topics in the prevention literature. Scholarship on these topics is also becoming more commonplace throughout the gamut of mental health professions, suggesting that an agenda which includes social justice and cultural relevance may be a significant trend in the 21st century. This trend is long overdue. Many prevention scholars have argued that cultural relevance is a hallmark of all effective prevention programs (Hage, Romano, Conyne, Kenny, Matthews, Schwartz, &BAD:amp; Waldo, 2007; Vera, 2000). Engaging in democratic, collaborative processes of identifying and responding to community needs is one prerequisite of culturally relevant prevention efforts aimed at promoting social justice.To enhance the readers' ability to understand, design, and implement social justice-driven, culturally relevant prevention efforts, we have reviewed the relevant literature, both theoretical and empirical, on social justice and cultural relevance within the field of prevention. Additionally, we have described concrete examples of programs that attempt to address issues of social injustice and cultural relevance. These examples are based on the authors' real world experiences engaging in culturally responsive prevention guided by a social justice agenda. Next, we aspired to provide opportunities for conversation about some of the more challenging aspects of infusing social justice and cultural relevance into oneÆs prevention efforts. We have provided a series of learning exercises to promote these conversations. Our overall goal is to provide the reader with practical information and discussion of real world challenges and opportunities, all intended to help the reader to discover and dialogue about the complexities inherent in engaging in culturally-relevant, social justice- oriented prevention practice and science.