It is hard to think of a more timely and topical major contribution than Drs. Naparstek, Biegel, Spiro, and collaborators have provided in this volume. Their penetrating, comprehensive study and field tests give us mapping toward the goal of reifying the concept of "community" as applied to human services. The book will prove invaluable to those at the policy level-legislators, planners, and administrators. It will serve as an essential reference for community workers-professional provid ers, natural helpers, and citizens as a whole. A salient ideal of New Federalism-placing governance as close to the people as practicable-seems a prophetic match with the model of Neighborhood Empowerment. As the authors point out, conventional wisdom has seemed to offer government regulation, control, and pro gram evaluation as a panacea package for improving human services. This work suggests a radically different approach; specifically, a shift to greater instrumental involvement of the richly variegated mosaic of American neighborhoods, combined with a system of excellent, high technology service agencies. Certainly, genuine efforts have been made before toward a true linkage of the community with human services. The Great Society pro grams, with their emphasis on citizen involvement and "maximum fea sible participation" established the foundation for legitimate citizen/ consumer linkage with the program process. Yet, in so many instances, the results fell far short of expectations.

Innovations in Practice and Service Delivery Across the Lifespan is the first book in Oxford's new social work series Innovations in Practice and Service Delivery with Vulnerable Populations. This book will introduce practitioners and students to new strategies and innovations to effectively deal with a range of problems across the lifespan such as homelessness, alcohol and drug abuse, teen violence, and mental illness. The book is divided into four parts: a conceptual overview, children and adolescents, adults and the elderly. It offers an interdisciplinary approach to practice and service delivery with these populations and the contributors are leading scholars in social work and mental health services. It is an ideal text for students in clinical practice courses or for practitioners interestd in the latest practice and service delivery innovations.

Published in cooperation with the Center for Practice Innovations, Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences, Case Western Reserve University Increased life expectancy, the deinstitutionalization of persons with mental illness, the rise of home health care, and advances in medical technology have resulted in greater numbers of dependent people requiring care by family members. The frail elderly, the chronically mentally ill, and the physically disabled are examples of such groups who now receive their daily care in the community. How do families accept the burden of this care? What are the physical and emotional demands of such caregiving? Are the families prepared to assume this role? Family Caregiving Across the Lifespan considers the broad spectrum of chronic illnesses that necessitate family caregiving throughout the lifespan and expands the caregiving paradigm by including in its focus both members of the caregiving dyad and significant non-family caregivers. It also explores the social context in which care is provided--an entire section of the volume is devoted to discussions of the interface between informal and formal caregivers and society at large. Among the other subjects this volume addresses are the negative consequences of family caregiving, the value of providing support to caregivers, and caregivers of persons living with AIDS. Family Caregiving Across the Lifespan is important reading for those in social work, nursing, family medicine, and clinical psychology. "Family Caregiving Across the Lifespan represents a significant milestone in the continuing maturation of this vital area of long-term care. The title is an understatement of the authors' accomplishments. . . .Rather than offering narrow boxes or labels, the book invites the reader to join in a broadened perspective on caregiving so that it can more fully reflect the richness of the lives of all involved. . . .For those who encounter Family Caregiving Across the Lifespan as part of their continuing study of caregiving, the book provides the integrating milestone of caregiving literature." --Journal of Case Management "This volume is a useful compendium of articles on family caregiving. The fourteen chapters in this volume address many important topics in family caregiving. One of the book's major contributions is its clarification that family caregiving to frail or chronically ill people has no age limitation, although there are unique issues at different points in the development of individuals and families. The book has exceptional merit. It expands our understanding of family caregiving, provides important ideas for future research, offers research findings that enhance our understanding of family care, and presents a very useful review of the literature. This book would be a beneficial addition to the library of all researchers in the area of caregiving. They will discover worthwhile conceptualizations and gain new insights that can inform their research. Practitioners should also benefit from this collection. The chapters addressing interaction between forma land informal caregivers should give practitioners a deeper understanding of how to be more effective in dealing with informal caregivers and care recipients." -Ageing & Society "One paper [in this volume] deserves particular notice because it attempts to do what many of the authors feel is most critical in caregiving research but also most difficult, namely, to analyze the effectiveness of caregiving, the effect of provision of care on elder health outcomes. This is an important and original conceptualization of the problem..." -Steven M. Albert, Contemporary Gerontology "This book is both unique and valuable because it embraces Brody's observation that family caregiving is not limited to a specific segment of the life span. Moreover, the book is not limited to filial caregiving, but entertains an impressive variety of contexts of family caregiving. . . . This book will be a valuable text in graduate-level courses." --Journal of Marriage and the Family

Among the significant trends in human services during the 1980s has been the emergence of emphasis on social networks and social supports in research, prevention, and treatment efforts. Today's human service professionals and planners routinely incorporate information about social networks and social supports into assessments and interventions for a wide range of individual and community problems. Social Support Networks is the most comprehensive, up-to-date bibliography yet published on the theory, research, and practical application of social support networks. Containing approximately 2,700 references, it offers detailed listings for journal articles, books, book chapters, and published reports which appeared from 1983 to 1987. In recent years, social support networks have become a focus for research and scholarship in anthropology, epidemiology, nursing, psychiatry, psychology, public health, social work, and sociology. The literature represented in this bibliography includes a focus on theory, research, practice, and policy drawn from these as well as other disciplines. As such, the volume lends itself to the transfer of ideas and practice across various branches of the social support intervention field, particularly addressing the requirements of practitioners who may feel they have become limited in their response to social problems by relying on their agencies' traditional ways of meeting client needs. The bibliography is divided into five major headings: Overview and Theory, Research-Physical Health, Research-Mental Health, Intervention, and Professional Roles and Policy, and all entries are consecutively numbered to aid cross-referencing by the Author and Subject Indexes. To further facilitate cross-referencing, many Subject Index terms also have sub-indices. This important reference tool will be welcomed by service providers and planners in gerontology, nursing, psychiatry, psychology, public health, social work, sociology, anthropology, and urban affairs.