Social work currently faces some of its biggest challenges as a profession. With constant public scrutiny over how it deals with child protection and with the implementation of the community care reforms, the wide range of methods of intervention which social workers use now demands greater explanation and understanding than ever before. In its practical approach, Practising Social Work provides a systematic exploration of the whole range of methods and approaches, taking in client groups from young offenders to elderly people. The editors and contributors place each approach in its historical context, giving examples drawn from practice, while offering a critique. Three chapters are especially devoted to anti-racist work, a feminist approach, and working with service users; while other chapters explore crisis intervention, alternatives to custody, family therapy, case work and welfare rights. Practising Social Work is very much about assisting the acquisition of professional knowledge, and helping practitioners to fulfill their prescribed roles so that they are sensitive to their limitations but appropriately active in the service of the client.
At a time when social work is redefining itself in the face of the Children Act, the NHS and Community Care Act, and the Criminal Justice Act the acquisition of this knowledge is essential.