About Ashgate's Social Work and Social Policy List
Ashgate has been publishing in social work since 1977,
under various imprints including Arena, Dartmouth, Gower, Wildwood,
Avebury and Ashgate. Our first book was Paul Willis’s Learning to
Labour, which is regarded as a classic in its field and is
still in print after 30 years. We developed the social policy list
and began to publish in Social Work during the 1980s, and this
programme was accelerated by our acquisition of Heinemann
Education. Books from this period still in print include Gibson
Burrell and Gareth Morgan’s Sociological
Paradigms and Organizational Analysis, first published by
Heinemann in 1979 and reprinted almost annually by Ashgate ever
since, and the UK paperback edition of Donald A. Schön’s 1983 book
The
Reflective Practitioner, which we have reprinted most
years since 1991. In the 1990s we commissioned a highly regarded
list of books in social work and policy, education and health under
the Arena imprint, aimed at helping professionals put theory into
practice. At the same time we continued to develop our academic
monograph publishing under the Ashgate imprint.
Our present list, now gathered under the Ashgate imprint,
continues to draw on this strong publishing history. We have
developed an international reputation for academic excellence,
practical relevance and comprehensive coverage and we are proud of
the quality of the research we have assisted in disseminating and
of the list of highly respected authors from both the academic and
professional worlds who have chosen to publish with Ashgate. We are
one of the few publishers committed to the publication of
specialized research monographs in social policy and social work
(as part of the series Contemporary Social Work
Studies) and we also publish a range
of textbooks, geared both to practitioners and students. We ensure
the quality of our publishing by insisting that all books are
peer-reviewed by authorities in the field.
Our social work list is strong in the fields of social work
education, reflective practice, law and social work, and
international social work. Recent textbook highlights include:
2012 saw the publication of Malcolm Carey’s Qualitative Research
Skills for Social Work and Peter Westoby and Linda Shevellar’s
Learning and
Mobilising for Community Development.
2013 sees the publication of a fully revised and expanded
edition of Janet Batsleer’s Youth Working with
Girls and Women in Community Settings and an exciting new book
from Malcolm Carey and Lorraine Green Practical Social Work
Ethics – the first text of its kind to deal exclusively with
applied social work ethics.