Abstract

The belief that the profession gets unusually poor news media treatment is entrenched among social workers. As a result, the social work press regularly prints articles discussing the issue and suggesting solutions. This paper outlines the main sociological approaches to theorizing about the media and locates the majority of the profession's own accounts of its coverage within an idealist/pluralist model. Examples of positive presentation of social work are then considered, but it is argued that many of these come from local media. Approving items in the national press have been linked mainly with disasters and with the work of voluntary agencies. Given the search for profit in a consumption-led society, it is unlikely that national news media, particularly the press, will fully endorse social work as it delivers state welfare. Attempts by social work agencies and professional institutions to re-educate the media can have only limited success and should be more carefully targeted.

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