Date: 29.10.2012
Dr Wendy Fitzgibbon‘s new book “Probation and Social Work on Trial: Violent Offenders and Child Abusers” recently received several positive reviews within the academic and Criminal Justice Press. In one review in the Probation Journal, Mike Guilfoyle describes the book as a welcome, sobering and timely addition to recent works on the shape and direction of the probation service.
He continues: “In this work Dr Fitzgibbon is to be applauded for the way that she has directed her academic research and former practitioner rigour to critically examine and analyse recent historical shifts in the way that the probation service and social work have been pilloried, harried and scandalized. The author directs her unrelenting gaze on to a hyped up media furore, when high profile supervisory ‘failures’ result in tragedy, and how both agencies have been at times held hostage to some of the more hostile political reactions that have reshaped and distorted the practice landscape for front line staff.”
Other reviews are on Howard Journal of Criminal Justice , The Police Journal and Professional Social Work. The book was first published in 2011 by Palgrave Macmillan in the US.
Dr Fitzgibbon is the course leader for the Masters of Criminology at London Met.
