Social Work

Global knowledge is increasingly essential for all aspects of social work. Today's professionals respond to concerns including permeable borders, the upheavals of war, displaced workers, natural disasters, international adoption, and human trafficking. Everywhere, social workers work with service users and colleagues from diverse cultures and countries. Globally relevant concepts such as human rights, development, and inclusion offer new perspectives to enhance policy and practice and facilitate the international exchange of ideas. This collection of seventy-three chapters confirms the integral and necessary nature of international social work knowledge to all areas of practice, policy, and research. Chapters systematically map the key issues, organizations, competencies, training and research needs, and ethical guidelines central to international social work practice today, emphasizing the linkages among social work, development, and human rights practice. In-depth country case studies and policy examples encourage readers to understand how their practice in social work touches on international issues, regardless of whether the work is done at home or abroad.

In the late 20th and early 21st century United States, the production and misuse of methamphetamine was a growing and urgent public health, criminal justice, and child welfare problem affecting whole families and communities, particularly in rural areas. Yet, child welfare professionals, social workers, educators, and others working within rural areas had little systematic, descriptive data on which to build effective interventions for the growing numbers of children affected by methamphetamine misuse. This book describes a program of mixed methods research combining strategies from developmental and child clinical psychology, psychiatry, and ethnography to examine the psychological functioning of rural children from methamphetamine-involved families. Participants were twenty-nine children in foster care because of parental methamphetamine misuse, four mothers recovering from methamphetamine addiction, seven foster parents of children from methamphetamine-involved families, and twenty-eight knowledgeable rural professionals (child welfare and law enforcement professionals, substance abuse and mental health providers and educators). Children whose parents abuse methamphetamine are often exposed to toxic chemicals, violence, criminal behavior, and neglect as well as physical, sexual, and emotional abuse. Many school-aged children in foster care because of parental methamphetamine misuse have high levels of trauma symptoms and behavior problems. Descriptive information on the contexts in which children are reared, participant observation, psychological testing, and in-depth interviews with children, in conjunction with existing research were used to develop and pilot test an intervention — Life Story Intervention — for rural children in foster care because of parent substance misuse.

Immigration occurs in the wealthy nations of the global north and the not-so-rich countries of the global south; it involves individuals who arrive with substantial human capital and those with limited human capital. Immigration has far-reaching implications for a nation's economy, public policy, social and health services and culture. While human migration is as old as humankind itself, factors such as ease of transportation, globalization of the world market, changing political borders and international immigration policies, growing forced migration populations, and the challenge of undocumented immigrants, suggest that immigration worldwide is a phenomenon toward which the social sciences across the globe must pay close attention. This book explores current patterns and policies of immigration in 25 countries across the globe and the European and African Unions, with analyses of implications for the countries, immigrant populations, and global perspectives. It presents a theoretical model for the study of immigration and is an in-depth study of the phases, stages, and processes involved in immigration and integration. This comprehensive and rigorous analysis of a global phenomenon is derived from existing empirical research and theories undergirding the research. The volume is designed to explore how country conditions, policies, values, politics, and attitudes influence the process of immigration and subsequently affect immigrants, migration, and the country itself. Trends and comparative concepts are highlighted in the analysis, which also discusses policy responses in different countries. Thus, this book is at once a source book and an applied model of immigration studies.

Managerial supervisors are those persons who supervise direct service staff, who oversee human service programs, and who perform macro practice tasks in their agencies on a daily basis. They are not clinical supervisors who oversee the treatment aspects of direct practice; nor are they administrators at the executive level. This book addresses the challenges facing the often under-appreciated managerial supervisors who oversee and provide a crucial organizational structure for work that occurs in human service across the country. The successful managerial supervisor must be able to create and develop the organizational culture in which client-centered practice can occur, balance the demands of administrative leadership with those of workers who see clients, keep a client-centered focus amid the paradoxes that arise in the process, and maintain a healthy professional presence.

This book describes an approach to developing and testing effective community-based programs for at-risk children and youth. Elements of risk and resilience, positive youth development, and organizational collaboration are used to develop a comprehensive intervention framework called the Integrated Prevention and Early Intervention (IPEI) Model. The IPEI is applied to a community-based after-school program called the Bridge Project to illustrate how an integrated intervention framework can be used to prevent childhood and adolescent problems and improve academic achievement. Findings from an evaluation of Bridge Project intervention components are presented. Recommendations for advancing policy and practice for high-risk youth in community-based programs are described.

Restorative justice and social work share principles and goals, including the goal of addressing pain and conflict. Many of the processes used by restorative justice practitioners are based on indigenous practices that facilitate peacemaking, victim healing, and reengagement of offenders. As a method for transforming conflict, restorative justice can be viewed as a theory, a principle, and a practice. Each aspect of restorative justice has the ability to inform and strengthen social work practice and restorative practices can be enhanced by the knowledge, evidenced based initiatives, practice modes, and commitment to social justice pioneered by social work. This book examines the intersection of the two disciplines by exploring restorative justice practices in traditional social work environments. The book provides case studies in settings such as school settings, communities, domestic violence, homicide, prisons, child welfare, and gerontology. Social workers and restorative justice practitioners collaborate on each chapter, outlining theoretical orientations, specific intervention approaches and practice principles that integrate the strengths of each approach in ranging from the commonplace contradiction of punishing public school students for behavioral problems by depriving them of the opportunity to learn from their mistakes to the role that both social work and restorative processes have played in the rebuilding of Liberia.

Developmental social work, which is also known as the social development approach to social work, emphasizes the role of social investment in professional practice. These investments meet the material needs of social work’s clients and facilitate their full integration into the social and economic life of the community. Developmental social workers believe that client strengths and capabilities need to be augmented with public resources and services if those served by the profession are to live productive and fulfilling lives. Although developmental social work is inspired by international innovations, particularly in the developing countries, the book shows that it also has relevance to the United States and other Western nations. It also contends that developmental social work practice is not confined to community organization or other macro-practice interventions, and that developmental ideas can be implemented in mainstream fields of social work practice such as child welfare, mental health, aging, social assistance and correctional social work. The editors and contributors to this book (most of whom are associated with the School of Social Welfare at the University of California, Berkeley) offer a highly original exposition of developmental social work theory and practice. They draw widely on innovative examples from the United States and other countries to show how developmental ideas can be implemented in everyday social work practice.

In an era of diminishing resources, communities that have historically been served by professionals in established social service settings can no longer rely on outside resources and assistance to meet their needs. This book focuses on the importance of developing models that are specific to urban areas, models which help facilitate and promote conversation and advice and reduce the stigma for those seeking assistance. The book suggests that communities can best be served through their own, already-established recreational, social, and cultural centers. It describes how these non-traditional settings can be used — beauty shops, bars, and grocery stores — to reach out to the communities that need help. This allows social work service to be based on the community's own strengths, while developing the community's capacity to help itself with assistance from professionals. These institutions play influential and very active roles in providing assistance to community residents in need, offering social workers the unique opportunity to identify, engage, and plan services with communities. Often these centers are staffed by people that have a similar ethnic, socio-economic, and racial background to the rest of the community, thereby maximizing their psychological, geographical, and cultural accessibility to the community. The book offers a paradigm shift for social workers, showing that service delivery can take place in any setting, formal or informal. It integrates a multicultural perspective which highlights and identifies a variety of innovative methods, stressing that there is no one way of providing assistance to a community in need.

African American males have never fared as poorly as they do currently on a number of social indicators. They are less likely to complete high school than their white male and female or African American female peers, are more likely to exhibit depressive symptoms, and they have fewer sanctioned coping-strategies. Arguably, no other group in American society has been more maligned, regularly faced with tremendous odds that uniquely threaten their existence. When they do receive education, mental health, and physical health services, it is often in correctional settings. They are marginalized in public policies on secondary and higher education attainment, marriage and parental expectations, public welfare, health, housing, and community development. Yet they remain overlooked in health and social science research and are stereotyped in the popular media. Taking a step back from the traditionally myopic view of African American males as criminals and hustlers, this book provides a more nuanced and realistic portrait of their experiences in the world. The chapters offer a comprehensive overview of the social and economic data on black males to date and the significant issues that affect them from adolescence to adulthood. Via in-depth qualitative interviews as well as comprehensive surveys and data sets, their physical, mental, and spiritual health and emerging family roles are considered within both individual and communal contexts. Chapters cover health issues such as HIV and depression; fatherhood and family roles; suicide; violence; academic achievement; and incarceration.

Despite evidence showing Latinos to be among the fastest growing populations in the US, very little attention has been given to practice with Latino individuals, families, and communities. Beginning with a comprehensive definition and demographic map of Latinos, Latino culture, and a cultural asset paradigm, this book identifies strategies for designing culturally relevant programs and services. Chapters highlight health and social concerns including issues surrounding gender, religion, language, immigration, substance abuse, and health conditions. More importantly, the chapters also outline a practice framework that places cultural assets at the center. The book provides a rich paradigm for understanding perspectives on culture, access, assets, and how they intersect to inform best practices. The step-by-step framework guides through six stages: pre-contact assessment, initial contact and asset identification, resource mapping, relationship building, intervention, and evaluation. Each stage is heavily grounded in theoretical and socio-political considerations with particular attention to thinking critically about selecting best practices and how to sustain an evidence-based practice.