Effective Child Protection

`Eileen Munro′s Effective Child Protection is a `must read′ for anyone concerned with enhancing child protection practice. It directly addresses a core issue-the relationship between intuition and formal analytic thinking in decision-making and practice. Effective child protection practice requires both, and Munro provides a framework that facilitates clear thinking in the complex real world of child protection practice. It is very well written, stimulating and accessible′ - Professor Ian O′Connor, University of Queensland

`The definition of ′good child care social work′ has been a contested one for several centuries. Enduring political and moral pressures have often obscured our understanding of what is helpful for children and their families; and have constrained the development of sound professional practice. Eileen Munro ′s book performs a very valuable service in examining the context, purposes and operational requirements of effective child protection. Her analysis transcends short term panic-led responses and restores a welcome sense of proportion to the challenges involved in promoting and safeguarding the welfare of children. Social workers will find in this book, a range of reasoned, research based, and realistic pointers to good professional practice, set in a wide-ranging social and historical context. If they act on them, then children and families, with whom they work, might well get a much′ - Professor Jane Tunstill Department of Science and Political Science Royal Holloway London University

`This book makes some interesting points... useful... for experienced and qualified social workers′ - Peter Jenkins, Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal

`It will be helpful for anyone with responsibility for deciding the child′s best interests who wishes to re-appraise their approach to decision-making and to develop their capacity for critical thinking′ - Community Care

`This book makes a vital contribution to better decision-making in child care and will be essential reading for social workers and others in child protection′ - Simon Bass, Caring Magazine

′Overall, the book is compelling reading for practitioners, administrators, and policy analysts in the field of child welfare′- Envision: The Manitoba Journal of Child Welfare

′The book makes the fully justified claim it will be essential reading for professionals undergoing qualifying and post-qualifying training. It is to be hoped that it will enjoy an even wider readership′ - Child Abuse Review

This book is written for anyone involved in child protection and child welfare work who is interested in how to make better childcare decisions. The author provides a clear framework on decision-making, risk assessment and reasoning in addition to helping explain and justify decisions and judgements and the sources of any disagreements. Effective Child Protection analytic and intuitive methods of reasoning and proposes a model in which each method has strengths at different points in the process.

Using detailed case studies and graphics to provide memorable illustrations of key points, this book is an invaluable practical and theoretical addition to the complexities of making predictions about children′s best interests and is written for social workers, nurses, police officers and health workers as well as those taking or teaching qualifying and post-qualifying courses in child protection and child care.

Eileen Munro is Professor Emeritus of Social Policy at the London School of Economics.  She worked as a social worker for many years before turning to an academic career. Professor Munro has written extensively on how best to combine intuitive and analytic reasoning in child protection risk assessment and decision-making and also on the importance of understanding how systems’ factors influence workers’ actions. In 2011, she completed the Munro Review of the English Child Protection System conducting a systems analysis of the problems. She is currently working with philosophy colleagues on research methods for complex systems.