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17 Int'l Soc. Work 1 (1974)

handle is hein.journals/intsocwk17 and id is 1 raw text is: 
















EDITORIAL


   N  this first issue of 1974 we  are  glad
   to  be  able  to include three articles in
   French. We   should like to be able to keep
this up, and so attract more Franch  readers,
but first we must have  more regular support
from  French  writers. Two  of these  articles
are, in fact, reprinted from  other journals,
and  only one  appears  with us  for the first
time; we  should be  glad of many   more un-
published articles in French.

   Nevertheless, we  are  honoured  to, have
been  allowed  to republish the distinguished
article by Etienne  Berthet, Director-General
of  the International Children's Centre, with
its striking combination of idealism and rea-
lism. It will indeed require great efforts and
great  sacrifices by more fortunate countries
before the poorer  countries of the world can
even  approach  a  balance  between  expend-
ing  resources  and   expanding    population
which   would   provide  the  conditions  for
healthy  child development   as  outlined by
Dr. Berthet -   and as  he reminds us, popu-
lation is at present fast outrunning resources
of professional man-power,  as  well as more
basic  resources. We   must  also  hope  that
programmes of population control, about
which   we  have  published  several  articles
lately, will develop  sufficiently to have a
serious impact on  the problem.

   Mile. Valentin's study of the situation of
the young  child in Senegal  reminds  us how
many   problems  there  are to  solve, at all
levels: the age-old problems  of poverty and
ignorance, compounded   by  population m-igra-
tions, the breakdown   of traditional familial


and   social structures, the growth  of  vast
semi-urban  shanty-towns  with no  clarity of
role or social responsibility. Even the spon-
taneous  movement  by  mothers to set up cre-
ches  for the safe custody  of their children
during  working  hours provides only  a  kind
of care which  can  properly be called custo-
dial, and  is too often repressive, owing  to
the lack of real understanding  of the needs
of  young  children. Mile. Valentin's recom-
mendations  for the rehabilitation of the ma-
terial role and  the  promotion  of free  ex-
pression for young   children call for a pro-
gramme   of  public education which  requires
the participation of all available social work-
ers, professional and  voluntary, as well  as
of  public health nurses  and  other relevant
professional groups.

   As  Dr. Berthet has  shown,  the  effective
application of such insights as MIle. Valentin's
into the needs  of children requires an ade-
quate  infra-structure of economic and social
organization. It is fortunate that Miss Brooks
has  contributed at this juncture an  account
of  the machinery  which is being built up in
Zambia   in  the  hope  of  involving  village
populations in creating and  developing local
resources. Miss  Brooks argues  cogently that
this pro-gramme  is not only one about  which
students of social work should learn, but one
in which  they should  be prepared  by  prac-
tice to participate.

   Our  third contribution in French,  by  M.
Caimo  of Louvain, reports a study of medical
social work in Belgium and  discusses its find-
ings, in on  attempt  to clarify the essential

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