Harry Specht – författare

In this provocative examination of the fall of the profession of social work from its original mission to aid and serve the underprivileged, Harry Specht and Mark Courtney show how America's excessive trust in individualistic solutions to social problems have led to the abandonment of the poor in this country.A large proportion of all certified social workers today have left the social services to enter private practice, thereby turning to the middle class -- those who can afford psychotherapy -- and away from the poor. As Specht and Courtney persuasively demonstrate, if social work continues to drift in this direction there is good reason to expect that the profession will be entirely engulfed by psychotherapy within the next twenty years, leaving a huge gap in the provision of social services traditionally filled by social workers. The authors examine the waste of public funds this trend occasions, as social workers educated with public money abandon community service in increasing numbers.

This book discusses how individuals, groups, and organizations develop the means to deal with problems in their interaction with institutions, exploring what methods and practices should be implemented to address various issues.

Throughout its history, social work has been seeking a means to state its purposes and methodology as a unity that transcends the purposes and methodology applicable in particular fields of practice, or sanctioned by particular legislation, or practised by a particular kind of worker. Recent changes in society, developments in social work practice, new additions to the knowledge base of social work and current reorganisation of the social services had led to an intensified interest in this ‘integrated’ approach.Originally published in 1977, Integrating Social Work Methods introduces the reader to the main developments in the conceptualisation of a unitary method. It clarifies what it is that is being unified, identifies issues involved in the attempt to unify, and discusses their implications for social work practice and training. As such it represented the first substantial British text in the field, and was widely welcomed by social work practitioners, administrators and educators at the time.