The Domain and Expertise of Social Work: A Conceptualization

Abstract

present a coherent view of the domain of social work and of the core of expertise relating to it. The failure of past efforts to achieve such a view has made many professionals scepti cal of efforts in this area, yet much is to be gained from refusing to close the subject. The profession's pursuits can only be enhanced by increased clarity about the domain of social work and the expertise required to address this domain. Additional clarity would help demystify the profession and make it more comprehensible. It would, moreover, help provide a framework within which the richness of social work experience, writing, and re search could be organized, because goals for training within the profes sion could be posited more easily within an atmosphere of clear under standing. Finally, agreement on fun damental expertise—on what is common to the profession—would counteract the tendency to turn the inherent differences in the political, social, and economic contexts within which social workers operate into grounds for claiming that each tem poral or societal context demands a