This expertly written book provides an accessible framework for culturally competent practice with children and families in child maltreatment cases. Numerous workable strategies and concrete examples are presented to help readers address cultural concerns at each stage of the assessment and intervention process. Professionals and students learn new ways of thinking about their own cultural viewpoints as they gain critical skills for maximizing the accuracy of assessments for physical and sexual abuse; overcoming language barriers in parent and child interviews; respecting families' values and beliefs while ensuring children's safety; creating a welcoming agency environment; and more.
Child Protection and Child Welfare draws on the knowledge of child protection experts and social care professionals to provide an authoritative international overview of child protection strategy and policy. Devoting particular attention to the role played by culture in determining child welfare issues and child protection responses, this book illustrates the impact of both long-term influences, such as the legacy of the caste system in India, and more recent global events, such as the development of international trade in Ghana and shrinking budgets in Italy on national approaches to supporting families and children. The international perspective aims to enhance our understanding of the range of possible approaches, encouraging researchers, policymakers and practitioners to think critically about current models, and providing insights for developing practice. This important book will be essential reading for social workers, policy makers, child protection service workers, commissioners and managers across child and family welfare services, as well as researchers and academics in the field.
In recent years child protection issues have dominated media and public discourse in the UK. This book offers a unique perspective by giving voice to those social workers working within a profession which has become increasingly embedded in a culture of blame. Exploring how statutory child protection agencies function, Leigh also reveals how ‘organisational culture’ can significantly affect the way in which social work is practised. Providing a comparative analysis between the UK and Belgium, Leigh uses ethnography to illuminate the differences between the settings by examining how interactions and affected atmospheres impact on their identities. This book reveals how practitioners perceive themselves differently in such environments and explores the impact this has on their identity as well as the work they carry out with children and families. Leigh’s enquiry and compelling critique into social work, identity and organisations calls for mutual understanding and respect, rather than a culture of blame.
This work is a concise exploration of the close links between social service practices and cultural values which offers a culturally sensitive model of child protection. It proposes effective strategies to assist social workers in responding to diverse needs and circumstances.
"The timing of the publication with the revised Working Together guidelines could not be more advantageous. This book is a unique and important contribution to child care literature. No agency should be without." - Child Abuse Review Professionals concerned with the protection of children face many challenges. This work demands knowledge from several disciplines, a wide variety of skills, and interdisciplinary collaboration. The editors, Howard Dubowitz, a pediatrician, and Diane DePanfilis, a social worker, together with over 70 experts in this field offer what is known about how best to work with maltreated children and their families, in a very practical, concise, and user-friendly way. Structured to follow the life of a case from the time a report of child maltreatment is made through the various pathways in the child protection system, this edited volume synthesizes the best practice principles for responding to reports of child abuse and neglect; engaging children and other family members in intervention; developing cross-cultural practice competencies; assessing risk, evaluating safety, and conducting family assessments; defining outcomes and planning intervention; evaluating risk reduction; and making permanency decisions; and discusses the unique legal, medical, ethical, and other practice issues that work in the child protection field involves. Professionals facing tough dilemmas in practice should find valuable guidance in these pages.
Racial, ethnic and religious diversity requires social workers to safeguard children and support families from many different minority backgrounds. This innovative book is based on an analysis of Serious Case Reviews (Child Safeguarding Practice Reviews) involving issues of race, ethnicity and faith. The authors examine face-to-face social work practice with children, parents, their partners and other family members from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. Throughout, they identify common mistakes in practice, and detail culturally competent responses to often challenging child protection situations. Students and practitioners are supported in the development of their own knowledge and skills through a series of reflective exercises and worked case examples.
"Each chapter contains recommendations for legislators, policy makers, researchers, and families. This book should be on the desk, and minds, of legislators, attorneys, social workers and other mental health professionals who encounter and wish to ameliorate the effects of violence in the lives of their young constituents, clients, and patients." -JOURNAL OF CHILD AND FAMILY STUDIESQuestions relating to violence and children surround us in the media: should V-chips be placed in every television set? How can we prevent another Columbine school shooting from occurring? How should pornography on the internet be regulated? The Handbook of Children, Culture and Violence addresses these questions and more, providing a comprehensive, interdisciplinary examination of childhood violence that considers children as both consumers and perpetrators of violence, as well as victims of it. The Handbook offers much-needed empirical evidence that will help inform debate about these important policy decisions. Moreover, it is the first single volume to consider situations when children are responsible for violence, rather than focusing exclusively on occasions when they are victimized. Providing the first comprehensive overview of current research in the field, the editors have brought together the work of a group of prominent scholars whose work is united by a common concern for the impact of violence on the lives of children. The Handbook of Children, Culture and Violence is poised to become the ultimate resource and reference work on children and violence for researchers, teachers, and students of psychology, human development and family studies, law, communications, education, sociology, and political science/ public policy. It will also appeal to policymakers, media professionals, and special interest groups concerned with reducing violence in children's lives. Law firms specializing in family law, as well as think tanks, will also be interested in the Handbook.
Sexual Abuse in Nine North American Cultures is essential reading for advanced students and all who deal with child abuse, including those involved in therapy, child protection, and the medical, legal, and educational systems.
This book challenges the current child protection culture and calls for family-minded humane practice where children are understood as relational beings, parents are recognized as people with needs and hopes and families as carrying extraordinary capacities for care and protection.
Multiculturalism in Western countries continues to grow, but responsiveness to it with culturally sensitive research, policy and practice has been slower to develop. This lag could be accused of enabling institutional racism – that is, culturally insensitive practices and policies can cause or perpetuate harm to non-mainstream children and families, the very thing that child protection systems are set up to address. Thus, it is critical that the field has a resource that clearly and comprehensively outlines the characteristics of cultural competency in the child protection system when working with ethnic minorities and across both mainstream and non-mainstream cultures, so as to equally protect the safety of all children. Unlike previous research, this book addresses discrete and relevant practice issues - how to work effectively with interpreters, whether or not to match caseworkers and clients based on ethnic background and what to consider when making plans for children in the out-of-home-care (OOHC) system - with best practice guidelines. This book will be required reading for all social work students, academics and practitioners whose work engages with issues of cultural competency.
