ABSTRACT
The demand by minority ethnic populations within national societies for equity and non-discrimination in all spheres of social and political life is a global phenomenon. Social work, like the other mental health professions, has been a target of ethnic grievance against the cultural bias perceived to suffuse its theoretical frameworks and models of practice. Some efforts are being made in ethnic minority communities to establish more culturally sensitive programs. For example, some American Indian groups in the United States (French, 1997) and Afro-Caribbean people in Britain (Wilson, 1993; Sassoon and Lindow, 1995) have developed their own culture-based mental health treatment models. However, the preponderance of ethnic minority persons with mental health problems must receive services from mainstream mental health providers. Even in "developing" nations where indigenous healers are utilized more frequently than trained professionals, the development of mental health services has meant increased access to mental health service delivery systems patterned after European and North American models.
