Child Abuse and the Sociology of Social Problems

Abstract

My main concern in Part One is to demonstrate and explain why the problem of child abuse has emerged as such a crucial one for welfare practitioners, what the nature of that problem is, how it has changed, and what have been the implications for policy and practice. The analysis will draw upon perspectives and concepts that have been developed in the sociology of deviance and social problems. It is perhaps ironic that an area of sociology that has been subject to so much rapid development, theoretical argument and heated discussion should have made such little impact on our thinking and analysis of child abuse.2 Even more ironic when it is often argued that sociology in general3 and the sociology of deviance in particular has played such a central role in the radicalisation and increasing disillusionment of social workers.4