Author Description

Unfinished Business is the first Irish social policy textbook written for students of social care. It covers a range of issues of importance to social care students within the economic and political context of the implosion of 'Celtic Tiger' Ireland. Chapters focus on such varied topics as poverty, child protection, youth, homelessness, disability, alcohol and drugs, immigrants, Travellers, and suicide and mental health. The author also examines social care in a social policy context, with an analysis of the move towards social care regulation in Ireland and its potential implications for social care practice and education.Firmly located on the critical side of social policy, Unfinished Business poses important questions about policy failings and approaches in Irish social policy. While social and community services are under enormous pressure as austerity continues, an ongoing theme of this book is that these failings are not new and that there is historically a poor level of achievement in the field of Irish social policy. Unfinished Business is written in a clear and accessible style and laid out in a user-friendly manner. It also includes extensive recommendations for further reading. This book will prove useful not just to social care students, but also to students of social work, youth work, community work, early childhood studies, nursing, addiction studies, child protection studies, social science, social studies and public administration.