Democratic Social Practice and the Emergence of Social Work in China

Abstract

The paper contrasts the conference focus on the democratic renewal of social practices, an internal process particular to the European and North-American contexts, with the development of social practices in China, where both external and internal forces influence social workers’ dealings with democratization and indigenization of well-established Western concepts. The goals of the authors are to problematize the questions of democratic renewal and to promote international communication among social practitioners.