Social Work's Focus of Concern

Wernes Boehm, 1958

Social Work seeks to enhance the social functioning of individuals, singularly or in groups, by activities focused upon their social relationships which constitute interaction between individuals and their environments. These activities can be grouped in three functions: restoration of impaired capacity, provision of individual and social resources, and prevention of social dysfunction. 

William Schwartz, 1961

The general assignment of social work profession is to mediate the process through which the individual and the society reach out to each other through a mutual need for self-fulfillment. This presupposes a relationship between people and their nurturing group which we would describe as "symbiotic" - each needing the other for its own life and growth, and each reaching out to the other with all the strength it can command at a given moment. the social worker's intervention lies at the point where two forces meet: the individual's impetus toward health, growth and belonging, the organized efforts of society to integrate its parts into a productive and dynamic whole. 

William Gordon, 1969

The central focus of social work traditionally seems to have been on the person-in-his-life-situation complex - a simultaneous dual focus on man and his environment. this focus has been concentrated at some times on the side of the organism as interpreted by psychological theory and at other times on the side of environment as interpreted by sociological and economic theory. The mainstream of social work, however, has become neither applied psychology nor applied sociology. 

Harriet Bartlett, 1970

Social functioning is the relation between the coping activity of people and the demand from the environment. This dual focus ties them together. Thus, person and situation, people and environment, are encompassed in a single concept, which requires that they be constantly reviewed together. 

Louise C. Johnson, 1989

Social workers become involved when individuals are having difficulty in relationship with other people; in growing so as to maximize their potential; and in meeting the demands of the environment. Harriet Bartlett has described this situation as "people coping" and "environmental demands". The bringing together of these two aspects of living in society can be termed social functioning. The core of social work endeavor is to find the client and the worker interacting in relation to problems in social functioning which problems are reasons for worker-client interaction. Thus, the ultimate goal of social work practice is the enhancement of the social functioning of individuals.