ABSTRACT
The representation of the social work labour process which follows depicts it as stratified on a number of different levels, each of which is relatively autonomous. At one extremity of these levels is central government, producing the personal social services' legislative mandate. Legislation in the form of the Local Authority Social Services Act both established Social Services Departments and, reinforced by other pieces of legislation, imposed statutory duties upon them. The establishment of Social Services Departments in 1971 occurred in the wider context of the adoption of 'corporate management' in local government and the organisational structures erected for the implementation of the Seebohm Report were caught up in the discourse of corporatism. In the 1970s and early 1980s, local authorities interpreted central government legislation, mediating between it and service users. When local authorities implemented the Seebohm Report, they were not required to straightforwardly apply one detailed model of the structure of the social work labour process.
