Editorial

We open this editorial with the sad news of the passing of our long-serving journal board member, Nigel Elliott. Nigel is prominent in our thoughts, as are Nigel’s wife and family, and throughout his involvement with this journal he was held in the highest regard by all. Nigel made an enormous contribution over many years to the success of this journal, including in his roles as a board member and long-serving Book Reviews Editor. The financial side of the journal also benefitted from his stewardship in his role as Treasurer of GAPS. He will be remembered for all his contributions, but particularly Nigel will be remembered as a great colleague no matter what role or task he undertook. Always positive, encouraging and supportive to others, the success of this journal was influenced by his ideas, insights, practical input and good judgement. He was one of those rare people who radiate a contagious enthusiasm, and he brought his gentle wisdom and positivity into every meeting and activity. We will start this issue with Nigel’s obituary written by Professor Stephen Briggs, longstanding editor, colleague and friend. Nigel will be greatly missed by us all.

This general issue brings to publication contributions from practitioners and researchers who critically address a range of topics. The first article in this issue from Martin Stuart Smith is titled ‘Beautifully masked’: hidden tragedies at the heart of Mental Health Act assessments in England’. In this article, Smith addresses the complexities surrounding assessments by social workers under the Mental Health Act 1983, highlighting the many dimensions of information gathering and its appraisal, the serious issues that can arise within or surrounding these assessments and the complexities that social workers encounter in this work. Drawing on a range of theoretical perspectives, Smith invites consideration of the interactional dynamics of information sharing and information processing that arise within this form of social work assessment. He highlights the importance of understanding interpersonal exchanges, the performativity of information communication, and the experiential aspects of assessment work such as the importance of empathy.

‘Social workers’ assessment of a child’s need for services as ‘craftwork’ practice’ by Tuuli Lamponen and Noora Aarnio continues with the theme of social work assessment albeit in relation to a different focus and context. Based on research with data from 28 group interviews, this paper highlights the contextual dimension of assessment, and the role of professional discretion. Similar to Smith, this article conveys the complexity of the assessment task and sheds light on how social workers engage with the issues they encounter.

Staying with the theme of assessment and also considering the issue of risk management, Anna-Karin L. Larsson, Helén Olsson and Susanne J. M. Strand consider issues in collaborative practices involving social workers and police officers in cases concerning intimate partner violence. Writing with reference to the Swedish context, their article is titled, ‘Challenges and opportunities in collaborative approaches to responding to intimate partner violence: insights from social workers and police in Sweden’ and they share insights from their research regarding the elements or building blocks of successful collaboration, including the importance of role and task clarity when working across disciplinary or agency boundaries.

Louise O’Connor’s article engages in a multi-level (individual, organisational) exposition of emotion in social work, its importance in relationship-based practice, and its pervasive influence in many different ways on how social workers experience their work, their organisational experiences and their ability to carry out their role. Drawing on an ethnographic study with practitioners working in children and family services, this paper reveals the many ways in which social work practice incorporates emotional content, sometimes visible, sometimes hidden or unacknowledged. Through a detailed consideration of the influence of emotion in professional practice, this paper considers, among other issues, the management of emotion and how emotional containment is sometimes synonymised with ideas of professionalism.

Titled, ‘“I was detecting a kind of, a from the heart kind of dialogue”: understanding the role of reflective spaces for transitional safeguarding innovation’, the article by Gillian Ruch, Jeri Damman, Nathalie Huegler and Susannah Bowyer advances knowledge on how practitioners experience the work of introducing innovation into practice. Through their facilitation of reflective discussion groups with practitioners involved in the introduction of Transitional Safeguarding into UK welfare settings, the emotional impact on professionals involved in the rollout of innovative initiatives is highlighted and revealed as a factor that deserves and needs acknowledgement and support.

The article by Patricia R. Turner highlights the many issues that arise when working with people who experience serious mental health symptoms such as psychosis. The article is titled, ‘Sandplay therapy for people coping with negative symptoms of psychosis: a theoretically promising option’ and it illustrates in detail the therapeutic skills and practices that can be usefully employed within this form of treatment. This article provides an insightful example of the integration of theory and practice that social work can achieve and successfully deliver in helping people with complex needs.

The importance of understanding organisational factors in workforce wellbeing and retention is further examined in the article titled, ‘What do child protection social workers consider to be the systemic factors driving workforce instability within the English child protection system, and what are the implications for the UK Government’s reform strategy?’ by Ciarán Murphy, Jennifer Turay, Nicole Parry and Nicola Birch. This article amplifies the voice of social workers in terms of the factors or reforms they see as important in supporting their ability to carry out their work safely and productively in fluid and sometimes challenging contexts.

The article titled, ‘“Unaccompanied social workers, unaccompanied families”: qualitative research on Italian professionals’ feelings and emotions on working with African refugee families’ by Francesca Tessitore, Francesca Del Vecchio, Mauro Cozzolino and Giorgia Margherita conveys examples of the challenging contexts in which social work is practised. This paper recounts the work of social workers based at a reception centre for migrant families who may have many needs. The emotional dimensions of this social work role are again prominent in this article, along with consideration of the many efforts by social workers to meet complex need in a context of limited resources.

While these articles feature social work in many different contexts, the papers in this issue provide windows into the increasing complexity of practice and the challenges social workers encounter across many different settings. The benefits of reflective practice, identifying our emotional experiences and recognising the influences on our responses emerge as core themes across this issue.