Mary Langan – författare

Many of the gains of the women's movement over the past 20 years now seem threatened by the combined effects of prolonged economic insecurity, reductions in the scope of welfare provision and a general shift in the climate of public opinion to the right. Social workers are faced with the growing damands of a more inpoverished and more unstable society, with less resources to meet these demands. In response to these pressures, feminist social work has begun to move beyond some of the limitations of both the traditional and radical social work models of the past. The emerging anti-discriminatory model recognizes the diversity of oppresions according to race, gender and class as well as those of age, disability and sexual orientation. Women, Oppression and Social Work offers a new perspective on feminist social work which takes account of the complexity of the manifold oppressions that affect the lives of most women and most social work clients.

Welfare: Needs, Rights and Risks addresses the question of how people get access to social welfare in the UK today. It explores the public, political and professional definitions, constructions and conflicts about who should receive social welfare and under what conditions. In a period during which the rationing, targeting and selective provision of welfare have become more significant, more visible and more disputed, this book examines how individuals and groups come to be defined as in need, at risk or deserving of welfare.

`Provide[s] a good overview of current family theory and research.... well written and worth having' - British Journal of Medical Psychology

`Altogether an excellent collection for students of social policy, social care or social work, covering as it does both subjective and objective features of family life and the logics of inequality within which they are embedded' - Child and Family Social Work

This revised and updated introductory text presents an accessible, interdisciplinary account of how 'the family' is constituted in the 'public' and 'private' spheres.

Drawing in a wide range of theoretical perspectives from sociology, social policy, psychology and psychoanalysis, this book critically examines assumptions about 'the family' that are embedded in social policy, law and political discourse. The text outlines the tensions that exist between such assumptions and the lived realities and everyday experiences of family life. Understanding the Family shows how dominant understanding of the family have failed to recognize a marked diversity of family forms in contemporary society, and also ignore the complex and myriad ways in which family life comes to be experienced.