This encyclopedia provides readers with basic information about the history of social welfare in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. The intent of the encyclopedia is to provide readers with information about how these three nations have dealt with social welfare issues, some similar across borders, others unique, as well as to describe important events, developments, and the lives and work of some key contributors to social welfare developments.

Contains over 230 alphabetically arranged entries that provide information about the men and women, institutions, and events that characterized the American Settlement Movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, focusing on the main currents of the movement.