Seeking Social Good A Life Worth Living Working in Australia Volume 3 Working in Australia

Seeking Social Good: A Life Worth Living: Working in Australia Volume 3 : Working in Australia
ISBN: 9780995394827
Publication Date: 22 March 2017

Seeking Social Good is a wide-ranging autobiography of the career, life and times of Australia's first professor of social work, and pioneer social policy scholar. It is well-organised, carefully referenced, and enlivened by the author's photographs. The work is organised into 6 volumes - 'Getting Educated', 'A Career Under Way', 'Working in Australia', 'Living and Working Overseas', 'Working with International Organisations', and 'Disengaging from Work and Later Life'.

Each is substantial and is worth reading in its own right, as well as being integral to the whole story. 'Later Life' in the final volume is told largely through the author's photos. This autobiographical volume covers John Lawrence's main professional activities within Australia after taking up Australia's first chair of social work at the University of New South Wales in late 1968. In the initial period to the mid-1970s, social institutions were being challenged to justify their existence. It was a turbulent time - especially for those heading university schools and professional bodies avowing social concerns. Cutbacks, pessimism and disillusion followed the frenetic Whitlam years.

In addition to developing a social work school in this environment, the author was engaged professionally in a variety of community activities, such as the Australian Council of Social Service, the Benevolent Society of New South Wales (whose name he unsuccessfully tried to change), the Aboriginal Legal Service, the Australian Council of Rehabilitation of Disabled, the International Year of the Child, and Australia's first child abuse inquiry in 1982. Key papers reflect the author's thinking and work on professions, on social work and social welfare generally and in particular field...