This introductory textbook distinguishes itself from others, because it takes a discipline approach rather than a social problems approach to framing the foundations of social work knowledge, values, and skills.

This is a revision of the very first text to fully incorporate the strengths or empowerment perspective. The text takes a strong generalist eco-systems approach, while integrating material from the CSWE education core: values and ethics, cultural diversity, social justice, social work practice, human behavior, populations at risk, and policy and services.

The text details the roles of the social worker in the functions of consultation, resource management, and education, and presents an easy-to-understand paradigm that shows students how the partnership between practitioners and consumers takes place at all systems levels.