ABSTRACT
The eco-systems perspective is unlike the other treatment approaches discussed in this book. It is not a model, with prescriptions for addressing cases; it does not draw from a particular theory of personality; it does not specify outcomes. It is often misunderstood as being a treatment model, however. When it fails to live up to people’s false expectations, it is denigrated as being “too abstract for practitioners to use,” “too nonspecific for the case at hand,” and “nonclinical in its orientation.” The most common misuse of the eco-systems idea occurs when it is confused with theories of social systems (Parsons, 1969), a substantive (nonclinical) theory of the way social systems function. This confusion probably has to do with the similarity in language, as does the confusion of the eco-systems perspective with the ecological Life Model of Practice (Germain & Gitterman, 1980), which is a practice model.
