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Abstract

This paper discusses the 'caring' and 'controlling' aspects of social workers' roles and some ways in which role conflict and ambiguity are dealt with in client-social worker interaction. The ways in which individuals interpret each other's behaviour and reveal their motives and the meanings of their communications are considered and some studies of client-social worker relationships are reviewed. Practitioners' perspectives on social work are examined with reference to certain aspects of the relationship between probation officers and their clients. A study of the views of one hundred probationers and their officers is reported: it was found that a large number of probationers saw 'care' and 'control' as complementary. For probation officers the dual function was regarded as problematic: their ways of dealing with this role conflict and dissonance are described and discussed. The care and control debate is regarded as continuing and it is argued that attempting to separate these functions of social work is questionable both in principle and in practice because of possible failure of attempts to meet clients' needs and to protect their interests and those of other citizens. Further, in carrying out these functions it is suggested that social workers should continue to adopt and articulate a critical stance so that they can resist pressures to exercise control when this can be shown to be undesirable.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

Perspectives and Multiple Realities in Social Work and Social Control

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