Weiss, Gal, Dixon, and their contributors provide the first large-scale cross-national and cross-cultural examination of the views and the perceptions of social workers through this analysis of graduating social worker students on the threshold of their careers in social work. They identify and analyze the graduating social work students' attitudes towards the sources of social distress, the preferred ways to deal with social problems, the goals of social work, and their professional preferences with regard to client groups, types of professional activity, and place of work. Since first being practiced more than a century ago, social work has become an international profession and is today an integral part of the social services in many different countries. However, as Weiss, Gal, Dixon, and their contributors make clear, there is a distinct lack of ideological consensus over the goals, tasks, desired technologies, major client groups, the preferred sector in which to operate, and a variety of other issues. Throughout its history, social work has undergone a constant process of change; nonetheless, despite the existence of a common professional core, social work is quite clearly socially constructed and takes very different forms in the various national settings throughout the world. This book provides the first large-scale cross-national and cross-cultural examination of the views and perceptions of social workers through an analysis of graduating social worker students at the threshold of their careers in social work. The country chapters identify and analyze the graduating social work students' attitudes towards the sources of social distress, the preferred ways to deal with social problems, the goals of social work, and their professional preferences with regard to client groups, types of professional activity, and place of work. Experts on social work provide analyses on Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Zimbabawe.

Improve your organization’s performance for the well-being of your clients! Organizational and Structural Dilemmas in Nonprofit Human Service Organizations explores the common pitfalls that plague nonprofit human service organizations and cause them to fail in their missions. In this book, leading scholars analyze and evaluate the inherent difficulties that impede effectiveness in these organizations. With this wide-ranging body of knowledge, research findings, and information, you will be able to identify key areas in your organization that may become troublesome at a later date and prevent them from deteriorating. This valuable tool also includes advice and suggestions for repairing detrimental situations that have already occurred or are taking place. The book supplies solutions for repairing or preventing any permanent damage to your organization’s structure, value, or reputation. Organizational and Structural Dilemmas in Nonprofit Human Service Organizations will help you set successful long-term strategies for your organization, despite changes in laws, programs, and public sentiment. With this book, you will learn more about: the changing identity of federated community service organizations the role of congregations as social service providers volunteer and paid staff relations the implications of welfare-to-work programs the cycles of public sentiment as expressed through the media the issue of nonprofit executive misbehavior the preferences of social work graduates for employment in various sectors of the welfare economy such as for-profit as opposed to nonprofit the differences between for-profit and nonprofit organizations

Social workers play a crucial part in contemporary society by ensuring that individuals are able to address, overcome, and manage obstacles in their daily lives. In an effort to better serve their clients, many practitioners have turned to evidence-based practice. Evidence Discovery and Assessment in Social Work Practice provides practitioners with the tools necessary to locate, analyze, and apply the latest empirical research findings in the field to their individual practice. This premier reference work provides insights and support to professionals and researchers working in the fields of social work, counseling, psychotherapy, case management, and psychology.

This Handbook provides an authoritative overview of current issues and debates in the field of health care management. It contains over twenty chapters from well-known and eminent academic authors, who were carefully selected for their expertise and asked to provide a broad and critical overview of developments in their particular topic area. The development of an international perspective and body of knowledge is a key feature of the book. The Handbook secondly makes a case for bringing back a social science perspective into the study of the field of health care management. It therefore contains a number of contrasting and theoretically orientated chapters (e.g. on institutionalism; critical management studies). This social science based approach is a refreshing alternative to much existing work in this domain and offers a good way into current academic debates in this field. The Handbook thirdly explores a variety of important policy and organizational developments apparent within the current health care field (e.g. new organizational forms; growth of management consulting in health care organizations). It therefore explores and comments on major contemporary trends apparent in the practice field.

This ebook is a selective guide designed to help scholars and students of social work find reliable sources of information by directing them to the best available scholarly materials in whatever form or format they appear from books, chapters, and journal articles to online archives, electronic data sets, and blogs. Written by a leading international authority on the subject, the ebook provides bibliographic information supported by direct recommendations about which sources to consult and editorial commentary to make it clear how the cited sources are interrelated related. A reader will discover, for instance, the most reliable introductions and overviews to the topic, and the most important publications on various areas of scholarly interest within this topic. In social work, as in other disciplines, researchers at all levels are drowning in potentially useful scholarly information, and this guide has been created as a tool for cutting through that material to find the exact source you need. This ebook is a static version of an article from Oxford Bibliographies Online: Social Work, a dynamic, continuously updated, online resource designed to provide authoritative guidance through scholarship and other materials relevant to the study and practice of social work. Oxford Bibliographies Online covers most subject disciplines within the social science and humanities, for more information visit www.aboutobo.com.

More than half of children either in foster care, or adopted from care in the developed world, have a measurable need for mental health services, while up to one quarter present with complex and severe trauma- and attachment-related psychological disorders. This book outlines how services can effectively detect, prevent, and treat mental health difficulties in this vulnerable population. Responding to increasing evidence that standard child and adolescent mental health services are poorly matched to the mental health service needs of children and young people who have been in foster care, this book provides expert guidance on the design of specialised services. The first part provides an overview of these children’s mental health needs, their use of mental health services and what is known about the effectiveness of mental health interventions provided to them. The second part presents some recent innovations in mental health service delivery, concentrating on advances in clinical and developmental assessment and treatment. The final part confronts the challenges for delivering effective mental health services in this area. This is the definitive international reference for the design of specialised mental health services for children and young people in care and those adopted from care. It is invaluable reading for health and social care professionals working with this population and academics with an interest in child and adolescent mental health from a range of disciplines, including social work, nursing and psychology.

"Forensic social work is a unique practice field that interfaces with criminal justice or legal systems at the micro, mezzo, and macro levels of practice. This Handbook provides important reference content while exploring the multiple facets of the justice system, the differential nature of people, families, and communities navigating it, and the various ways social workers interface with the criminal justice system and associated client populations. The Handbook is an accessible resource for social workers that synthesizes current research and practice in forensic areas"--

Bringing together international case studies, this book offers theoretical and empirical insights into the interaction between social work and social policy. Moving beyond existing studies on policy practice, the book employs the policy cycle as a core analytical frame and focuses on the influence of social work(ers) in the problem definition, agenda setting, policy formulation and implementation of social policy. Twenty-three contributors offer examples of policy making from seven different countries and demonstrate how social work practitioners can become political actors, while also encouraging policy makers to become aware of the potential of social work for the social policy-making process.

This book is a practical beginner′s guide to both conducting and using research within the context of social work practice. A clear and accessible introduction to applied research methods for social work students and practitioners, this text covers the key themes, debates and approaches, including: - The ethics of social work research - Conducting interviews and questionnaires - Focus groups - Observation and narrative - The involvement of service users - Analyzing data With practical exercises and reflective questions, this is an essential text for undergraduate and postgraduate qualifying social work students.