People acting as a strong, cohesive community can achieve more than individuals. When people work together in community, strategies for change that are sustainable are possible. When people identify with their community, they want to see it survive, which encourages a long-term perspective. The alternative, when instead of seeking community, people engage in individualistic, self-seeking behavior, forms a vicious circle that leads to greed, violence, and crime. The stubborn persistence of violence in the United States and throughout the world is related to a loss of community. This is the case whether we are talking about the United States, Bosnia, Rwanda, Palestine, or anywhere else where violence is endemic. When violence is an expression of powerlessness, isolation, and exclusion, participatory community development from the bottom up has the potential to counter it. Community development at the grassroots level taps into and builds the integrity and leadership of members of the community and has the potential to break the cycle of violence. Social workers must become involved with communities at this level by learning from them and allowing themselves to be influenced and changed by them. The National Association of Social Workers is committed to bringing a deeper analysis and more lasting solutions to the crisis of violence facing many U.S. communities. We are committed to exploring new paradigms and models in community building and violence prevention. The Global Crisis of Violence: Common Problems, Universal Causes, Shared Solutions is a valuable contribution to this commitment. It expands the context within which the social work profession addresses violence and its attendant problems. It reflects NASW's investment in training social workers to be better informed and more sensitive 'global professionals' so that they might develop more effective strategies for reducing violence through promoting development. It highlights homegrown strategies to address violence so that social workers can learn about what works and why. Finally, it makes clear social work's and NASW's appreciation for the increasingly cross-border nature of the systemic problems that give rise to violence by expanding the search for solutions to our social problems beyond U.S. borders. It is anticipated that faculty, students, and practitioners who read this book will be stimulated to stretch their understanding about violence and its relationship to development, renew their commitment to community practice, and expand their global consciousness. Josephine Nieves, MSW, PhD Executive Director National Association of Social Workers
Also available:
Youth Violence: Current Research and Recent Practice Innovations - ISBN 0871013118 Lessons From Abroad: Adapting International Social Welfare Innovations - ISBN 0871013606
NASW Press
 NASW Press, a division of National Association of Social Workers (NASW), is a leading scholarly press in the social sciences. We serve faculty, practitioners, agencies, libraries, clinicians, and researchers throughout the United States and abroad. 
Known for attracting expert authors, the NASW Press delivers professional information to hundreds of thousands of readers through its scholarly journals, books, and reference works.
Some of the areas we publish in include:
-Social work in the field of aging -Models of social work -Social work with children and adolescents -Ethics in social work -Community organization -Professional development

Global Crisis of Violence: Common Problems, Universal Causes, Shared Solutions

Politics & Social Sciences

Dorothy Van Soest

Social Sciences

NASW Press

A commitment to promoting social justice for diverse individuals and populations is the foundation for culturally competent social work practice. This book aims to help prepare professional social workers to transform oppressive and unjust systems into nonoppressive and just alternatives. Intended for both undergraduate and graduate courses as a student guide, Social Work Practice for Social Justice is a companion to Garcia and Van Soests earlier work, Diversity Education for Social Justice: Mastering Teaching Skills. The authors engage students and stimulate their learning by presenting fundamental concepts that define and elaborate on racism and institutional qualities, oppression, classism, social justice, and social inequities.
Council on Social Work Education 
 We are a nonprofit national association representing individual members and graduate and undergraduate programs of professional social work education. Founded in 1952, this partnership of educational and professional institutions, social welfare agencies, and private citizens is recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation as the sole accrediting agency for social work education in this country. 
 CSWE Press is a niche publisher that addresses the needs of social work educators. Some of our areas of publishing specialty are
 -The philosophy, theory, and practice of teaching -The process and evaluation of learning -The organization and structure of social work education -Diversity in all forms in social work practice and education -Social work in multiple contexts

Social Work Practice for Social Justice: Cultural Competence in Action

Betty Garcia

Council on Social Work Education

The second edition of this valuable reference gives readers a critical examination of the educational processes inherent in the diversity-for-social-justice curriculum. This updated text discusses social justice in classroom instruction, student development, social change, transformative learning, and contemporary social work practice. Numerous teaching paradigms and methodologies are presented, including a chapter on using critical events in the classroom for the development of cultural competence among social work students.
Council on Social Work Education 
 We are a nonprofit national association representing individual members and graduate and undergraduate programs of professional social work education. Founded in 1952, this partnership of educational and professional institutions, social welfare agencies, and private citizens is recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation as the sole accrediting agency for social work education in this country. 
 CSWE Press is a niche publisher that addresses the needs of social work educators. Some of our areas of publishing specialty are
 -The philosophy, theory, and practice of teaching -The process and evaluation of learning -The organization and structure of social work education -Diversity in all forms in social work practice and education -Social work in multiple contexts

Diversity Education for Social Justice: Mastering Teaching Skills

An invitation and challenge to students and practitioners to tackle the personal and institutional obstacles preventing the social work profession from realizing its mandate to promote social justice. Systemic racism is centered as the foundation oppression of our country to provide the gateway for understanding and dismantling all other systems of oppression. Garcia and Van Soest probe essential questions about how social justice theories, institutional practices, and deep-seated personal and societal belief systems function to rationalize and support oppression, and they provide numerous exercises as a guide to increased awareness, understanding, and anti-oppression action. This book replaces the earlier edition, Social Work Practice for Social Justice: Cultural Competence in Action.

Social Work Practice for Social Justice: From Cultural Competence to Anti-Oppression

CSWE Press

Just Mercy

Apprentice House