ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book deals with the question of how to bring the community into the thinking and practice of the human services. It advocates the all involve empowering citizens by changing the relation between professionals and people who use their services. The book shows the users of those services are very disproportionately the victims of a market economy that creates poverty and inequality among families and communities and of market-oriented social policies that work against efforts to improve matters. It illustrates, public sector workers find themselves reduced to buying a given number of hours of therapy from a private provider who has an incentive to provide those hours of service whether all of them are needed or not. The book describes the most creative, innovative, and empowering practice, like that associated with family preservation services.
