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The focus for change must shift to altering client systems rather than individual clients.

WHAT IS CULTURAL COMPETENCE?

      Consistent with the definition of MCT, it becomes clear that culturally responsive healers are working toward several primary goals (American Psychological Association, 2017; Ratts et al., 2015; Sue et al., 1998). First, culturally competent helping professionals are ones who are actively in the process of becoming aware of their own values, biases, assumptions about human behavior, preconceived notions, personal limitations, and so forth. Second, culturally competent helping professionals are ones who actively attempt to understand the worldview of their culturally diverse clients and the sociohistorical context in which that worldview develops. In other words, what are the client's values and assumptions about human behavior, biases, and so on? Third, culturally competent helping professionals are ones who are in the process of actively developing and practicing appropriate, relevant, and sensitive intervention strategies and skills in working with their culturally diverse clients. These three attributes make it clear that cultural competence is an active, developmental, and ongoing process and that it is aspirational rather than achieved. Specifically, we define cultural competence in the following manner.

       Cultural competence is a lifelong process in which one works to develop the ability to engage in actions or create conditions that maximize the optimal development of client and client systems. Multicultural counseling competence is aspirational and consists of counselors acquiring awareness, knowledge, and skills needed to function effectively in a pluralistic democratic society (ability to communicate, interact, negotiate, and intervene on behalf of clients from diverse backgrounds), and on an organizational/societal level, advocating effectively to develop new theories, practices, policies, and organizational structures that are more responsive to all groups. (Sue & Torino, 2005)

This definition of cultural competence in the helping professions makes it clear that the conventional one‐to‐one, in‐the‐office, objective form of treatment aimed at remediation of existing problems may be at odds with the sociopolitical and cultural experiences of clients. Like the complementary definition of MCT, it addresses not only clients (individuals, families, and groups) but also client systems (institutions, policies, and practices that may be unhealthy or problematic for healthy development). Addressing client systems is especially important if problems reside outside rather than inside the client. For example, prejudice and discrimination such as racism, sexism, and homophobia may impede the healthy functioning of individuals and groups in our society.

       BOX 2.1 MULTICULTURAL COUNSELING COMPETENCIES

      1 AwarenessMoved from being culturally unaware to being aware and sensitive to their own cultural heritage and to valuing and respecting differences.Aware of their own values and biases and of how they may affect diverse clients.Comfortable with differences that exist between themselves and their clients in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, and other social identity variables. Differences are not seen as deviant.Sensitive to circumstances (personal biases; stage of racial, gender, and sexual orientation identity; sociopolitical influences; etc.) that may dictate referral of clients to members of their own social identity group(s) or to different therapists in general.Aware of their own racist, sexist, heterosexist, or other detrimental attitudes, beliefs, and feelings.

      2 KnowledgeKnowledgeable and informed on a number of culturally diverse groups, especially groups with whom therapists work.Knowledgeable about the sociopolitical system's operation in the United States with respect to its treatment of marginalized groups in society.Possessing specific knowledge and understanding of the generic characteristics of counseling and therapy.Knowledgeable about the institutional barriers that prevent some diverse clients from using mental health services.

      3 SkillsAble to generate a wide variety of verbal and nonverbal helping responses.Able to communicate (send and receive both verbal and nonverbal messages) accurately and appropriately.Able to exercise institutional intervention skills on behalf of clients, when appropriate.Able to anticipate the impact of one's helping styles and of their limitations on culturally diverse clients.Able to play helping roles characterized by an active systemic focus, which leads to environmental interventions. Not restricted by the conventional counselor/therapist mode of operation.

       Sources: Sue et al. (1992, 1998). Readers are encouraged to review the original 34 multicultural competencies, which are fully elaborated in both publications.

Second, cultural competence can be seen as residing in three major domains: (a) attitudes/beliefs component—an understanding of one's own cultural conditioning and how this conditioning affects the personal beliefs, values, and attitudes of a culturally diverse population; (b) knowledge component—understanding and knowledge of the worldviews and cultural contexts of culturally diverse individuals and groups; and (c) skills component—an ability to determine and use culturally appropriate intervention strategies when working with different groups in our society. Cultural humility is a key component of cultural competence, as it serves as the conduit in which awareness, knowledge, and skills are expressed. Box 2.1 provides an outline of cultural competencies related to the three major domains.

Third, in a broad sense, this definition is directed toward two levels of cultural competence: the personal/individual and the organizational/system levels. The work on cultural competence has generally focused on the micro level: the individual. In the education and training of psychologists, for example, the goals have been to increase the level of self‐awareness of trainees (potential biases, values, and assumptions about human behavior); to impart knowledge of the history, culture, and life experiences of various minority groups; and to aid in developing culturally appropriate and adaptive interpersonal skills (clinical work, management, conflict resolution, etc.). Less emphasis is placed on the macro level: the profession of psychology, organizations, and the society in general (Desai et al., 2021). We suggest that it does little good to train culturally competent helping professionals when the very organizations that employ them are monocultural and discourage or even punish psychologists for using their culturally competent knowledge and skills. If our profession is interested in the development of cultural competence, then it must become involved in impacting systemic and societal levels as well.

      Fourth, our definition of cultural competence speaks strongly to the development of alternative helping roles. Much of this comes from recasting healing as involving more than one‐to‐one therapy. If part of cultural competence involves systemic intervention, then such roles as consultant, change agent, teacher, and advocate supplement the conventional role of therapy. In contrast to this role, alternatives are characterized by the following:

       Having a more active helping style

       Working outside the office (home, institution, or community)

       Being focused on changing environmental conditions, as opposed to changing the client

       Viewing the client as encountering problems rather than as having a problem

       Being oriented toward prevention rather than remediation

       Shouldering increased responsibility for determining the course and the outcome of the helping process

      It is clear that these alternative roles and their underlying assumptions and practices have not been historically perceived as activities consistent with counseling and psychotherapy.

      DID YOU KNOW?

      Some studies seem to suggest that White female trainees are more attuned to their biases, and score higher than their male counterparts on measures of multicultural counseling competence. If true, what might account for these findings?

       Source: Spanierman, Poteat, and Wang (2008).

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