A Slight Digression: Casework with Involuntary Clients

Abstract

Despite the recognition in at least some of the social work practice literature (for example, Pincus and Minahan, 1973; Compton and Galaway, 1984) that relationships between workers and clients need not always be harmonious to be constructive, social work continues to train its students almost exclusively in interviewing skills that are more appropriate to voluntary (and often white middle-class) clients. A great deal of effort is devoted to achieving a proper ‘helping relationship’ in which clients are encouraged to explore the problem and come to a resolution in their own way and in their own time. Keith-Lucas (1972), for example, considers that the helping relationship can be defined as ‘the medium which is offered to people in trouble through which they are given the opportunity to make choices, both about taking help and the use they will make of it’ (p. 47). He goes on to proclaim that concern for the client dictates that the worker should be willing ‘to let the helped person decide to what extent and under what conditions he [sic] is willing to be helped’. Concern for the client, according to Keith-Lucas,

does not mean necessarily agreeing to help under these circumstances, or even refraining from pointing out that help is not possible under them. Nor does it mean refraining from offering what help is available, or even, if the need is desperate, intervening in an attempt to get help started. But it does mean, ever and always, treating the helped person as the subject of the sentence, serving his interest, allowing him all possible freedom to be what he wants to be. (p. 103)