The Development of Community Care in the Social Services

Abstract

Any understanding of the policy context of community care work must be, partly, historical. The pattern of a new service always derives from what has gone before, and the thinking which creates an innovation is a reaction against aspects of past provision, and must embrace favoured or necessary elements of former arrangements. Moreover, it must fit with other services which have not necessarily been changed and reflect political or management ideologies of the time. To act, we must know why we are here: this may cause us to rebel or seek to reconstruct what we do, or to acquiesce in or advance the flow of events.