Women, Oppression and Social Work: Issues in Anti-Discriminatory Practice

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 demands of a more impoverished and more unstable society, with less resources to meet these demands. In response, feminist social work has begun to move beyond some of the limitations of both the traditional and radical social work models of the past.Women, Oppression and Social Workoffers a new perspective on feminist social work which shows how the emerging anti-discriminatory model recognizes the complex oppressions affecting women today, taking into account race, gender and class as well as age, disability and sexual orientation.