414 reviews

it, this well-researched and well-structured book will be of interest to researchers, policy makers
and students seeking to build a multi-disciplinary scholarship on the subject.

References
Malhotra, R. (2015), ‘Delivering development and good governance: making human rights count’, World
Bank Legal Review, 6 (forthcoming, January 2015).
Sen, A. (1983), ‘Poor, relatively speaking’, Oxford Economic Papers, 35: 153–69.
Sen, A. (2001), Development as Freedom, New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Taylor, D. (2011), ‘Wellbeing and welfare: a psychosocial analysis of being well and doing well enough’,
Journal of Social Policy, 40: 4, 777–94.
rajeev malhotra
O.P. Jindal Global University
rmalhotra@jgu.edu.in

Sven Hessle (ed.) (2014), Human Rights and Social Equality: Challenges for Social
Work,Social Work-Social Development Volume I. Surrey: Ashgate. £60.00, pp. 216, hbk.
Sven Hessle (ed.) (2014), Environmental Change and Sustainable Social Development, Social
Work-Social Development Volume II. Surrey: Ashgate. £60.00, pp. 196, hbk.
Sven Hessle (ed.) (2014), Global Social Transformation and Social Action: The Role of Social
Workers, Social Work-Social Development Volume III. Surrey: Ashgate, £60.00, pp. 264,
hbk.
doi:10.1017/S0047279414001019

These three volumes present selected papers from the July 2012 ‘Social Work and Social
Development 2012: Action and Impact’ conference jointly hosted by the International
Associations of Schools of Social Work, International Council on Social Welfare and
International Federation of Social Workers in Stockholm.
Volume I highlights human rights and social equality as key agendas for social work today.
This general theme is emphasized by Swedish human rights activist Thomas Hammarberg who
argues that more equal and cohesive societies are most conducive to protecting the principles
and norms of human rights. However, South African social work academic Vishanthie Sewpaul
cautions that in order to be effective human rights advocates, social workers need to move
beyond micro practice with individuals and small groups to engage in macro political activism
that challenges unfair economic structures.
Further chapters apply these human rights criteria to specific practice areas. Some of the
issues covered include partnering with people with a disability to facilitate inclusion, progressing
active and dignified ageing and the prevention of abuse of older people, promoting a systemic
and holistic approach incorporating community development ideas to protecting children
at risk, dealing with aggressive parents in child protection work, assisting vulnerable young
people, combating violence against women, supporting equal rights for lesbian gay bisexual
and transgender (LGBT) people and opposing discrimination, facilitating access to health care
for minority groups such as asylum seekers and proposing harm reduction policies for illicit
drug use.
Volume II extends the discussion to environmental change and sustainable social
development. A number of contributors urge social workers to add a concern for environmental
justice to the existing person in the environment paradigm. Fred Besthorn argues that
environmental issues were neglected historically in social work, but adds that there has
encouragingly been a flowering of interest in recent years. Lena Dominelli proposes a form
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of green social work that highlights action to address environmental degradation, and promote
sustainable forms of social and economic development. Surprisingly, neither of these authors
refers to broader Green perspectives on the welfare state by key researchers such as British
academic Tony Fitzpatrick.
The authors target the connection between social work and the management of natural
disasters such as floods, earthquakes and tsunamis. Citing case studies from Thailand, China
and Sri Lanka, they suggest that social work’s systems approach can play a key role in assisting
individuals, families and communities to recover from these traumas. Reference is also made
to social workers potentially playing a key role in facilitating access to clean and safe drinking
water. Further practice areas addressed in this volume include social work participation in
social enterprises, global social work education models and action to address discrimination
(via inequitable government funding in areas such as education and health) against indigenous
children in Canada and other English-speaking countries.
Volume III addresses the role of social workers in global social transformation and social
action. British academic Malcolm Payne argues for global solidarity to achieve equality and
justice for human beings everywhere. Two authors from Morocco and Tunisia analyse the
positive social policy consequences of the Arab Spring in terms of promoting greater freedom
of speech and expression, and respect for gender and cultural equality. Other contributors
refer specifically to the social activism of social workers in the USA, Brazil and South Africa,
whilst British academic Sarah Cemlyn analyses the value challenges faced by immigration
social workers attempting to balance the rights of young asylum seekers and the demands of
immigration law. Walter Lorenz warns that social workers must defend the rights of users to
welfare support in the face of government policies that attempt to privatize the welfare state.
Another British academic Michael Lavalette argues that professional social work has always
been an ideologically contested project divided between a conservative minority who engage in
social control of service users, the majority who at least advocate some form of social reform, and
a progressive minority who favour radical change via an alliance with wider social movements.
He charts the history of what he calls ‘popular’ social work based on recognising and addressing
the public causes of private pain, including Jane Adams and the settlement movement in the
USA, and the activities of the Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee in Britain.
He then turns his attention controversially to the Palestinian West Bank where he
documents a number of effective individual and community-based interventions with young
people traumatized by the conflict with Israel. However, some of his rhetoric unfortunately slips
into unqualified endorsement of extreme Palestinian nationalist agendas, such as the so-called
Right of Return which sits light years away from internationalist social justice values. In contrast,
Kay Hoffman’s chapter on social sustainability praises the UK Children of Peace group, which
includes both Israeli and Palestinian children suffering from the violence associated with the
conflict.
Two other contributors provide useful guides for social workers seeking to promote change
at the micro and macro levels. Sarah Banks and Kirsten Nohr offer a number of case studies of
conflicts between social work values and rigid organisational rules or unfair laws that block the
fulfilment of service user rights. They suggest that ethical practice requires social workers not to
act as robots, but rather to be creative in breaking or bending rules to progress social justice. Idit
Weiss-Gal and John Gal argue the case for all social workers not just policy experts to be involved
in social policy activism or what they call ‘policy practice’. Based on a recent comparative study
of policy practice in eight countries, they note that social workers can influence policy by a
number of means, including involvement in professional social work associations, civil society
organisations, academic research and via submissions to parliamentary committees.
Overall, the volumes are rather uneven in both quality and length. Some read as academic
journal-type papers, whilst others are very superficial and seem to be little more than conference
416 reviews

presentation notes. I personally think Volume III works best as most of the contributions
explicitly address the theme of social work and social action. In contrast, many of the papers in
Volume I seem merely to target a number of random practice areas. It may perhaps have been
better either to publish all conference papers via general proceedings, or alternatively to include
a smaller number of peer reviewed papers that considered the key conference themes in depth.
The editor Sven Hessle states an aspiration to appeal to policy makers, practitioners,
researchers and academics, but I think given the above limitations the major audience is likely
to be students and practitioners. However, these caveats aside, the three volumes confirm
that whilst social work as an international profession incorporates a diverse range of practice
methods and values, it nevertheless retains a core universal commitment to social justice and
human rights.
philip mendes
Monash University
philip.mendes@monash.edu

Mitchell Duneier, Philip Kasinitz and Alexandra Murphy (eds.) (2014), The Urban
Ethnography Reader. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. £29.99, pp. 992, pbk.
doi:10.1017/S0047279414001020

Much like ‘best of’ compilations in music, well-conceived academic readers should offer
something to seasoned hands as well as the uninitiated. The neophyte student should gain
a broad overview of a topic, whilst the experienced scholar might find within its pages some
gems previously unknown to them. This book succeeds in providing exactly this, together with
generous commentary between sections and indeed at the beginning of each extract. After all,
what is a ‘best of’ compilation without extensive liner-notes?
Given the high standing of its editors within the world of urban ethnography, it is not
particularly surprising that both the choice of extracts here and the explanatory material
interspersing them are of an excellent standard. The book is logically organised, beginning with
an introduction that provides an ‘invitation’ to the methods that have become the identifying
feature of this body of scholarship. The first substantive section on community uses a series of
well-chosen extracts to illustrate the links between the ethnographic craft and the nature of the
findings it tends to produce.
Each of the following sections, respectively covering: social interaction, family, education,
employment and subsistence, leisure activities, policy applications and reflexivity, all make their
substantive points clearly. In each section, there is much to offer the social policy student and
scholar on the specific topic considered. The original commentary forms the scaffold within
which the extracts provide the kind of detailed, nuanced evidence that makes this genre of
scholarship so compelling. Communities and behaviours that are often dismissed as ‘wanton’,
‘deviant’ or ‘problematic’ (on which more later) are located within broad and oppressive social
structures. As the editors note, social structures and policies can be very usefully understood
through their manifestations in everyday life: their impacts on the ways in which people earn,
learn or simply interact. Obviously, the reader format lends itself to the inclusion of ‘classics’
and this book is no exception, hence the selection of extracts from seminal texts, such as Paul
Willis’ ‘Learning to Labour’, and W.E. Du Bois’ ‘The Philadelphia Negro’. It does, however,
also include some more contemporary pieces that are perhaps likely to become better known
as time passes, such as the contributions from Randol Contreras and Amy Best.
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