ABSTRACT

This chapter examines the response of the social-work services to the ethnic dimension in society and reviews the key issues confronting policy makers, administrators and practitioners. The issues and dilemmas facing social workers and social service departments in the area of ethnicity cannot be divorced from wider social policy considerations. Transcultural social work goes well beyond the face-to-face interaction between social workers and people who do not share the same cultural background. It involves getting the policies right and developing organisational structures that are sensitive to cultural diversity and provide for separate development in specific areas of need. However, short of providing for separate development in all areas of the minorities' lives, a viable alternative organisational set-up might be one that combines the adaptation of existing services with separate development. The separate development of services for ethnic minorities could come about through the application of positive discrimination policies and the separate delivery of some Universalist services.