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Journal of Social Work

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Forensic Social Work: ! The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/1468017316635491

Social Work Education jsw.sagepub.com

Rosemary Sheehan
Department of Social Work, Monash University, Melbourne,
Victoria, Australia

Abstract
This article reports on a case study of specialist social work education in Australia.
In particular, the views of specialist forensic social workers are explored both about
their needs for social work education to support them for practice in forensic social
work and also about their experiences of a particular program. Whilst social work
education focuses in varying degrees on mental health practice, social workers not
only in mental health and corrections but also in child protection, disability, and drug
and alcohol services are increasingly expected to understand linkages between offending
behavior, psychological disorder and family systems, and balance community and
individual needs. The social workers reported that their experience of postqualifying
education led to adaptations in the nature of their practice, the development of generic
skills, which enabled them to incorporate an awareness of the effects of the justice
system on mental health and to balance what are often opposing needs and consider-
ations when working in this contested area. The experiences of the study group of
forensic social work practitioners can be used to inform the development of similar
specialist programs elsewhere not only in forensic social work but more widely as part
of debates about the nature of specialist social work practice.

Keywords
Social work, forensic postqualifying social work education, mental health, corrections

Introduction
An increasing number of the people who seek mental health services in Australia
are also involved in the legal system, whether it is because the nature of their illness
invokes involuntary care or because their mental health and offending behavior are
interrelated (Ogloff, 2009). Fragile families and high-risk communities challenged

Corresponding author:
Rosemary Sheehan, Department of Social Work, Monash University, Caulfield, Victoria 3145, Australia.
Email: [email protected]

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2 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

by poverty, substance abuse, high unemployment, and rising incarceration rates

can also propel individuals into the mental health system. The shift from mental
health care in institutions into the community has increased the need for profes-
sionals such as social workers who understand the nexus between individual and
community. This need is increased also by changing views about criminality,
moving from seeing it in terms of ‘‘inherited disposition or bad conduct’’ to an
‘‘increasing interest in environmental or psychological explanations for law break-
ing’’ (Rogers & Pilgrim, 2005, p. 8). Thus, there is a growth in demand for social
work assistance from the range of systems and services responding to mental health
and criminal offending matters (Brownell & Roberts, 2002), and forensic social
work has developed as a practice specialty where client problems involve the legal
and justice systems (Robbins, Vaughan, & Eden, 2014).
The origins of forensic social work in Australia reflect the profession’s identifi-
cation with attending to the needs of the poor and disadvantaged, people on the
margins, and have also been strongly associated, in the United States, with work in
prisons and with juvenile delinquency (Brownell & Roberts, 2002, p. 3). Social
work practice in this context also attended to psychosocial assessment with juvenile
offenders, to secure better treatment for them, and to advocacy for vulnerable
women to secure the same. In Australia, forensic social work has been strongly
centered on mental health and corrections systems, although it can be understood
as the application of social work in any nonvoluntary system, including child
protection services. Certainly, contemporary social work practice in mental
health and child protection is as legally intensive a practice as that in the criminal
justice and corrections systems, given the range of legislation that regulates pro-
fessional interventions with clients and their families (Green, Thorpe, &
Traupmann, 2005, p. 145). This Australian approach is consistent with the U.S.
National Organisation of Forensic Social Work’s view of forensic social work as
‘‘practice related to legal issues and litigation, both criminal and civil’’ (National
Organisation of Forensic Social Work, 2010). What is particular to social work in
this context is its focus on information gathering, assessment, and diagnosis, as it
affects legal parameters and the prediction of, for example, risk or offending behav-
iors, and motivation and capacity for rehabilitation or recovery. Social workers are
called on, in this context, to provide assessments for courts about necessary
treatment responses and an individual’s potential for rehabilitation (http://nofs-
w.org/).
However, preoccupation with risk and its assessment, Taylor and Swain (2009,
p. 321) remind, places undue emphasis on control and protection and can distort
the role of social work and its attention to self-determination and empowerment.
Balancing the rights of the individual and the community is regularly debated by
public fora, fixed on concern for community safety and a view that mental disorder
and criminality are connected. Social workers regularly challenge such generaliza-
tions and see it as their remit to persuade community agencies and individuals to
understand risk and precautions in a more nuanced way (Meadows, Singh, &
Grigg, 2007).

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Sheehan 3

Whilst social work education in Australia focuses, in varying degrees, on mental

health practice, social workers not only in mental health and corrections but also in
child protection, disability, and drug and alcohol services are increasingly expected
to understand linkages between offending behavior, psychological disorder and
family systems, and balance community and individual needs (Maschi & Killian,
2011). It is practice, Taylor and Swain (2009) remind, that ‘‘frequently involves
bridging the gap between the lives of offenders, and their families on one hand and
the community on the other’’ (p. 319). In all social work practice settings, social
workers hold to their regard for the person in their environment, attention to what
factors influence individual and family behavior, and to systemic explanations
as much as pathologized explanations, often at times proposing different
interpretations from those offered by law and psychiatry. Taylor and Swain
(2009, p. 321) argue that the acknowledgment by social workers of wider
community factors that impact on offending and on mental health (factors such
as low education and skill levels, lack of employment and poverty, and troubled
family backgrounds) provides a broader scope for both understanding and
intervention.
Yet, Brownell and Roberts (2002, p. 9) note the growth in demand for social
work assistance from community corrections, juvenile justice and child protection,
comes at a time when the social work role in mental health is challenged by a
remedicalization of mental health problems and seeking ‘‘biological explanations
for human behaviour’’ (Stinson, Sales, & Becker, 2008, p. 8) with less attention
given to environmental and interpersonal influences. The adversarial and proced-
ural character of the Australian legal system is in stark contrast to the breadth of
understanding social workers call on and the holistic and informal methods for
problem-solving that social workers are trained to use (Faller, Grabarek, &
Vandervort, 2009, p. 973). It is a legal system more attuned to seeking technical
and concrete ‘‘explanations for human behaviour’’ (Stinson et al., 2008, p. 8) than
accommodating the ambiguity and uncertainty that underlies much of human
behavior. The U.S. Council on Social Work Education’s 2015 Educational
Policy (Council on Social Work Education, 2015) suggests forensic issues and
content need to be better addressed in social work courses and curricula. They
note social workers are expected to understand how laws and regulations affect all
levels of practice, most particularly those groups ‘‘likely to be victimized and
criminalised’’ and whose disadvantage maintains ‘‘ongoing social exclusion and
discrimination, particularly in areas such as housing and employment’’ (Robbins
et al., 2014, p. 174). Further, Robbins et al. (2014) believe it is ‘‘imperative that the
social work curriculum prepare students to work within the reality of the ever-
increasing forensic world in which we all live’’ (p. 174). However, Young (2014)
comments that whilst these ‘‘new opportunities for social work influence emerge,
social work students may not be adequately prepared for work within these settings
during their educational programs’’ (p. 107).
Howe (1994) describes care, control, and cure as the three traditional corner-
stones of social work; forensic work, with its focus on care and control, ‘‘is good at

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4 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

regulating society’s marginal and undisciplined members’’ (p. 526). Howe (1994)
is concerned about the interrelation of law and social work, and a shift
from understanding individual concerns to ‘‘a socio-legal problem, where legal
expertise takes pre-eminence’’ (p. 529). His concern is that social work situated
in a legal context is valued less for its social experience and concern for the human
condition and more as a task-orientated practice that is regulated by procedures
and lists of competences. It is a concern shared by Braye and Preston-Shoot (2002)
who remind that this emphasis on legalism is problematic because it conflates
good practice with ‘‘procedurally correct’’ practice, ‘‘emphasising apparent
certainties rather than acknowledging the imprecision and choice points inherent
in social work tasks’’ (p. 67). Howe (1994, p. 524) reminds also that legislation
and polices can fragment social work’s underpinnings by shaping different kinds
of practice to suit fields such as mental health, child welfare, and working with
adult offenders.
Social work education, in whatever county, should be charged with a require-
ment to prepare graduates to be ‘‘a strong voice in hostile environments[. . .]to
influence the legal system in order to improve its decisions for clients and practi-
tioners’’ (Madden, 2000, p. 4) and to preserve the inherent dignity of the individual
and their right to self-determination, albeit in the forensic context often in
restricted circumstances. What Bland, Renouf, and Tullgren (2009) describe as
‘‘supporting personal responsibility, unpacking discovery and moving from a
sense of alienation to discovery and meaning’’ (p. 45). Social workers must be
confident in their knowledge about best practice and the ways in which the
law can at times inadvertently divert practice from what is in the individual’s
best interests. They need to be able to articulate best practice in the context
of multidisciplinary discussions and collaborations. The provision of a forensic
social work course enhances the training and development of graduate-level
social workers, providing not only postqualifying knowledge but also specific
expertise key to the provision of forensic social work. Cole (2012) suggests social
workers in the forensic setting gain particular skills in negotiating and advocating
for clients and draw from a strengths-based perspective as part of such negotiation
and advocacy.
Social workers have to strike a balance when working with a diverse range of
influencing factors, including legal systems (Braye & Preston-Shoot, 2002). Cole
(2012) describes, in her study of law students and practice in forensic settings, how
social workers are able to engage lawyers in considering how legal and offence
circumstances might impact on their client, introducing knowledge of environment
and interpersonal factors that influence individual behavior. Whatever the practice
context, however, social work education fosters the development of knowledge and
the centrality of social work values and ethics to preserve the inherent dignity of the
individual and their right to self-determination, albeit in the forensic context often
in restricted circumstances.

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Sheehan 5

The Master of Social Work (Forensic Studies): A New

Degree Program
This article reports findings from a case study of specialist forensic social workers
in Victoria about what they need from social work education to support them for
practice in their dedicated service setting. The social workers in the sample were
employed by the Victorian Institute of Forensic Mental Health, known as
Forensicare, which provides treatment and care services to mentally ill offenders
in prison, to inpatients in the secure psychiatric hospital and after their release into
the community and provides assessments and psychiatric reports for court. This
group of social workers is selected for the study, as they are the only designated
forensic social workers in Victoria, and it is suggested, given the nature of their
practice, have a unique understanding of the knowledge and skill set needed to
work in a forensic context.

The Study Aims and Context

The article is drawn from a larger study that explores the extent to which social
workers employed by Forensicare identify their practice as specialist, with distinct
and distinctive skills and knowledge, their role differentiated from other fields of
social work, including mental health, and the implications of this for the social
work profession. It set out also to ask social workers to comment on the introduc-
tion of the new Master of Social Work (Forensic Studies) in particular the ability to
meet their needs for postqualifying education about forensic social work.
A cooperative enquiry approach, using interview and focus groups, gathered
information about how the social workers defined and described forensic social
work, the nature of their practice—and the knowledge and skills needed for this
practice, and how social workers could be prepared for work in this practice
domain. This approach draws also from collaborative participatory strategies
(Israel, Eng, and Schulz, 2005, p. 8), as the study invited social workers to work
with the researcher to identify what factors are key to education for forensic prac-
tice and to what extent the new degree successfully contributes to the development
of forensic social work practice. An earlier study by Green et al. (2005) explored
Australian social workers’ understandings of forensic social work; it did not extend
to examine what postqualifying education was needed for this specialist practice
domain.
The study participants were the cohort of social workers working in designated
forensic social work roles in the Victorian Institute of Forensic Mental Health
(Forensicare). All social workers (n ¼ 15) employed by Forensicare—located
solely in metropolitan Melbourne—participated in the study. The social workers
were interviewed either as small groups of two or three, or as a larger focus group,
with one individual interview. The social workers organized the groupings for

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6 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

interview, according to their work roles, whether they were hospital based (at the
Thomas Embling Hospital), either in acute or continuing care units or community
rehabilitation units or members of the community integration teams, or providing
a service to individuals in prison or about to be released from prison (including the
Melbourne Assessment Prison and the Women’s prison). Both the hospital- and
community-based programs are located in the inner-North area of metropolitan
Melbourne, Victoria.
The six individual interviews and four focus groups were audio-recorded and
transcribed; the data were analyzed using content analysis, canvassing key themes
that were salient to the research aims (Grbich, 2007). Data gathered were predom-
inantly qualitative with some quantitative data sought to provide demographic
information about the study participants and their position in the organization.
The study was able to gather important data about the social workers’ under-
standings of their roles and their needs from professional education, together
with their evaluation of the utility of the new degree for their practice. A limitation
to the study is that Victoria’s designated forensic social workers are all based in
metropolitan Melbourne.
Notwithstanding this study limitation, the remit and nature of the organization
is comparable to other Australian forensic services, although there are varying
emphases in the balance of secure hospital, rehabilitation, and community-
based work.

Study Findings: The Participants and the Work Context

Of the study participants (n ¼ 15), 11 were female (mean age of 36), with 4 male
study participants (mean age of 51, but 3 participants were over 56 years, 1 par-
ticipant was 27 years). Fourteen study participants had social work qualifications,
one had social welfare qualification; six participants had additional postqualifying
education in family therapy, management, science, and social work. All study
participants worked in multidisciplinary teams (psychiatry, psychology, occupa-
tional therapy, and nursing). The study participants had previously worked in a
range of other services: adult mental health, prison welfare, government social
services, child protection, child and family welfare, the justice system, and working
with homelessness. Their current areas of work matched the areas of responsibility
of Forensicare: Six social workers were variously attached to acute, continuing
care, and community rehabilitation units at the Thomas Embling Hospital (the
secure mental hospital) in which both sentenced and unsentenced individuals are
placed when grounds of mental impairment are connected to their offending.
Another five of the social workers worked in the community integration teams,
and with individuals on community orders, or had completed their sentence (about
half the clients form each cohort).
A number of this group will be clients who, whilst they have committed an
offence, have been found not guilty by reason of mental impairment but can be
supervised in the community by the forensic service. Clients of Forensicare come

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Sheehan 7

from all age brackets: from their 20s to their 70s, although there is a concentration
of drug and alcohol issues driving offending behaviors and mental health problems
with younger offenders. Four social workers also provided a key service to the
Melbourne Assessment Prison, the Melbourne Remand Centre, and the
Women’s Prison, with an intensive support service for 6 weeks prior to and after
release—for men leaving the Assessment and Remand prisons—to assess mental
health needs and coping strategies, connect them to community and area mental
health supports, and link them to financial support and accommodation services.

Study Findings: Is Forensic Social Work a Specialist Practice?

The majority (n ¼ 12) of the study participants believed forensic social work was a
specialist practice domain because of the distinctive nature of their work context
and role. Whilst two of the respondents believed their work was based on the same
knowledge and skill set of social work: ‘‘No it’s the skills you’ve bought in from
every other job and basic social work training, drug and alcohol training, child
protection . . . but not specialist’’ (SW01).
Other respondents believed what distinguished this work from mainstream
mental health was the interface between social work and the legal system and
the extent to which social workers have to observe statutory guidelines.
Individuals who come into the forensic system do so because they are charged
with a criminal offence and have associated mental illness concerns.
The central role of the criminal justice system and the need to understand
offending issues and mental health and sentencing legislation was referred to by
all respondents: ‘‘Because the legal framework has a high profile that surrounds the
forensic setting, the patients and their vulnerabilities’’ (SW11). The complexity of
clients’ needs made this practice domain ‘‘more specialist than mental health social
work’’ (SW07) because the respondents described forensic clients as particularly
marginalized even within the mental health service network:

There’s that additional layer of stigma[. . .]because of the sort of offending issues[. . .]
which people are fearful of and it’s really important to our role as social workers, we
have to be exceptionally good advocates and exceptionally good at developing rela-
tionships with outside agencies because without them we can’t do our work, I think
it’s important just to say how marginalized this group is. I know everyone in mental
health is but this is particularly so. (SW08)

Whilst client advocacy is a feature of all social work practice, respondents believed
it characterized their work in the forensic domain:

I think it’s working with a very specific population of clients[. . .]as a forensic social
worker we have specialist knowledge, we really understand the justice . . . system and
the mental health system and how they work and work both together and completely
separately and how that affects your client and their life. (SW11)

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8 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

The nature of their work and its particular focus did mean, respondents believed,
that they were viewed as having specialist knowledge by virtue of having an under-
standing of legal issues and their interface with mental health issues.
What was also described as a specialist focus in forensic social work is the
emphasis on risk assessment, and social workers must be familiar both with under-
standings of risk and how to assess these and translate these into appropriate plans
for clients, as well as formally representing them in reports for Court:

A lot of the work that we do and the team together is looking at the risk of the person
reoffending[. . .]looking at addressing the issues that need to be addressed in order for
them to not reoffend or be less likely for them to reoffend[. . .]to define their symptoms
and how to kind of manage them[. . .]so we can get them ready for discharge and are
less likely to relapse or if they’re going to relapse then they’re prepared. (SW03)

What all respondents emphasized was that it was the role of social work to ensure
that within these assessments clients’ individuality is respected and their wishes—
even if unrealistic—are heard. It was also important that risk assessment and man-
agement were broader than attention to offending: ‘‘looking at all the different
demands, the offending issues, substance abuse, their family relationships or not
just family but everything that impacts on that person’’ (SW03).

Study Findings: Knowledge and Skills for Forensic Practice

The knowledge and skills social workers draw on in the forensic role are both
specialist, as outlined earlier, and generic. Their responses revealed self-assessment
of how effective is their practice and how well they believed they were prepared by
social work training for forensic social work. All respondents spoke about the core
knowledge of social work: psychosocial assessment; crisis, family, and systems
frameworks; advocacy, brokerage, and interagency liaison; the provision of prac-
tical supports; social values about justice and individual dignity. These core areas
took on a particular identity in the forensic context and had to accommodate
mental health and legal system knowledge. Building relationships with individuals
and working with families was challenging:

When a person is arrested especially for a major crime . . . the person is removed from
the situation there and then. They’ve left everything behind even their clothes and
whatever so they come to us with absolutely not only nothing on you know just the
prison clothes on but their belongings are left. (SW12)

Relationships with families were often ‘‘broken because the offences have been
created against the immediate family’’ (SW05), and trying to repair relationships,
especially when the client had children, was challenging not only in terms of indi-
vidual work but also in reminding other professionals that the individual had a life
context that needed to be considered.

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Sheehan 9

Social workers spoke about needing enhanced knowledge in the core areas
identified earlier for forensic practice. For example, they identified that not only
did they need to know about mental health and mental health systems, but how
these intersected with substance abuse and trauma, as well as with offending. The
study participants identified advocacy as more complex than in other services, in
part because of community anxiety about forensic clients and prisoners, and
because community agencies—including mental health—do not automatically
identify forensic clients as part of their services. The study participants commented
they needed to be persistent about developing strong links with other agencies to
support forensic clients being released into, or already placed in, the community, as
clients endure particular stressors that can easily lead to breakdowns in their com-
munity context. Combined with this is the skill in being able to manage a client’s
agitation and help them, and others working with them, de-escalate problems.
Participants—especially those working in the community—noted that they
needed to negotiate practical supports as much as mental health services, as their
client group was often quite alone in the community and needed assistance to
maintain basic needs such as accommodation, food, clothing, and income. They
emphasized that it was the social work assessment that turned its mind to this
stronger focus on planning, to ensuring the care plans in place made sure whether
the client was in custody or in the community, the services they needed were
covered and covered well. This attention to life context meant social workers
had to ‘‘be able to stand up to psychiatrists’’ (SW01), to challenge clinical and
risk focused approaches to have a social emphasis, not solely a problem focus, and
that what individuals need, and what they have, is taken into account:

(The) Medical model and legal model, it feels like we’ve got two dictators over
us[. . .]it’s all about risk and social workers don’t necessarily operate from that risk
perspective, we come from a strength base rather than deficit based practice, it feels
like we’re fighting against it sometimes because we have those two masters. (SW05)

Study participants all noted that medical and legal frameworks do not readily fit
with social work theory and practice. Moreover, the legal frameworks with which
forensic clients need to engage do not primarily focus on or provide for what
individuals need. The significant amount of social control that features in both
these frameworks challenges both social worker core practices and principles
(respect for clients, individual agency) and a realistic understanding of what clients
are able to do.

Study Findings: Preparation for Forensic Practice

All study participants commented that whilst theirs is a specialist practice in the
forensic setting, there is a forensic element to range of social work practice
domains, which may or may not be recognized. They noted that aged care, dis-
ability, drug and alcohol, homelessness, child welfare—as well as mental

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10 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

health—services all contain forensic elements because of the vulnerability of their

client groups, which might involve the legal system or offending behavior. Other
service systems with a forensic dimension included, for example, Family Court
work, where cases might involve dealing with domestic violence and risk to children
and other family members. Study participants believed that attention to assess-
ment, early intervention, and case planning was as much an important focus in the
services as in the forensic setting. What one participant referred to as: ‘‘It’s a
generic within specialist functioning’’ (SW05).
The study participants commented that the majority of social work degrees are
very broad in content and design. The specialized knowledge that is needed for
forensic work, they believed, would not be well enough accommodated in under-
graduate social work programs, and they welcomed opportunities for this in post-
qualifying social work programs, noting that there was little on offer to meet these
needs. Forensic clients are complex needs clients, and the level of mental health
knowledge needed to work with them was beyond the remit of undergraduate
training. Not only do social workers in the forensic context need to know about
the mental health system itself, the medical language of mental illness, and the
clinical models which predominate and shape services in this system, but they
also need to be able to offer a social work perspective and the contributors to,
and impacts, on mental health status. When asked what students needed to know
about, one participant said:

[. . .]Drugs and alcohol, they are vulnerable people, homelessness is an issue, family
work is significant. The legal context is important. You need to know about assess-
ment and counselling[. . .]. The specific issues that create conflict with family members,
they are very isolated people. You need to understand forensic friendly services in the
community and how they work. We need to be able to speak our own language and
the language of other professionals. (SW10).

Integrating social work approaches into clinical models was considered important;
attention to the ecological context, to recovery, to family work, to strengths-based
approaches characterized their work:

When people have been in hospital for a long time they pathologise themselves and
they put everything in a mental illness basket as well, because that’s part of the
dominant framework, and I’ll say to them but hang on it sounds like were you like
that before you got sick, yeah, sounds like that’s just who you are you know every-
thing is not about the illness. Your illness is an aspect of you it’s not, you are not a
schizophrenic you have schizophrenia. There’s a real difference in the way we view
people I think. (SW05)

What participants reported was that it was important to convey to social

workers undertaking postqualifying education for forensic work that ‘‘social

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Sheehan 11

workers cannot be singular thinking people because of the issues and the complex-
ity they have to acknowledge and the complexities of human beings’’ (SW11).
Moreover,

Social workers need to take people outside of this kind of band wagon (a psychology
model) because risk assessment is given all[. . .]and they have not considered in some
ways any other, that it is not the only option – and what this entails for education.
This (a psychology model) has got advantages in making people feel safe but we
shouldn’t be kind of taking it for granted. (SW11)

Working as a member of a team, making use of reflective practice, and super-

vision were noted as important content for graduate social work in mental
health education. Even though whilst working as a team member, social
work had to hold onto social work values about the integrity of the individual,
which might mean challenging agreed positions. One respondent noted it is
important to ‘‘keep people human: if they’re here and they haven’t been sentenced,
as soon as the staff talk about them raping somebody I say ‘yes, allegedly’ and
by that you keep them human’’ (SW12). There was an expressed concern that in
the forensic setting:

It looks as if everybody who’s here is guilty and when they’re interviewed by the
clinicians, they are interviewed as guilty people. When you work with them as a
social worker you need to work with them as not guilty people and abide by the
social justice system. (SW11)

In forensic social work, further education needed to convey the unique nature of
this practice domain:

A realistic understanding of the field, knowing how they work and what other con-
straints, being able to assess the complex histories of clients, regular supervision is
essential, finding someone to talk to about complex cases and know systems. Be able
to deal with multi-factorial issues and families and carers especially when an offence is
committed on the family. There’s a high level of supervision of the social workers in
this setting. You need to work with people who have committed gross offences. How
to work with patients in a non-discriminatory way; often working with the victims and
the perpetrator at the same time, supporting both the client and the family member.
Family sensitive practice is essential. There is grief and loss, which continues. Patient
wants contact with family and the family does not. Need to understand media influ-
ence and cultural perspective and cultural issues and different perspectives on mental
illness. You have to share information in the community, their stigma, their isolation
because the individual can’t communicate. The social workers need to have knowledge
about children and how to work with Child Protection, how to facilitate visits between
the children and the patient. (SW05)

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12 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

Study Findings: The Utility of the Monash University Social

Work Forensic Studies Course for Practice
Monash University in Australia introduced in 2010 a postqualifying Master of
Social Work (Forensic Studies)1 to meet a demand both nationally and overseas
for a degree in advanced practice in forensic studies for social workers.
Importantly, this degree program also meets the need for postqualifying courses
in mental health practice called for by the Australian Social Work Education and
Accreditation Standards (2008), as part of the Australian National Practice
Standards for the Mental Health Workforce (2002). This degree is an innovation
in the Australian tertiary education landscape; whilst there are specialist postgradu-
ate programs in mental health, none exist in forensic social work.
Study participants were asked to look at the Monash University Master of
Social Work (Forensic Studies) course outline and comment on its construction,
its utility for practice, and what additional material should be provided. All
respondents commented that the course added ‘‘value’’ to postgraduate social
work education, which ‘‘helps you explore specific domains’’ (SW01). Its coverage
of mental health practice and psychological disorder was good, and it offered the
specialist attention needed to risk assessment. The subject Mental Health in the
Correction System was noted as offering attention to both mental health practice
and the management of problem behavior as well as essential attention to working
within a legal framework. One respondent noted that what distinguished this
course from others was not only its clear focus on research and knowledge
about forensic systems but also its attention to practice and enhancing practi-
tioners’ readiness for this domain. Another respondent commented favorably on
the mix of forensic subjects and social work subjects, and what was seen as broad
access to subject selection that offered a range of pathways to match individual
practitioners’ education needs.
Each of the study participants offered a range of options for how the course
might be extended. One respondent suggested.

More material on for example acquired brain injury, on personality disorder. How do
you deal with this? What’s the priority? Risk assessment and risk management. Social
work in the forensic setting is very client centred (understanding) the culture of the
setting and its impact on the individual, the way people behave is influenced by the
institution environment. For example, clients giving information might be reluctant
because they are awkward, which nurses might see as being uncooperative. You are
dealing with the here and now which may not take into account previous work. How
to work with people who work for years with services who’ve let them down? (SW04)

Another participant believed it would be useful to have more ‘‘knowledge about

legal impairment, custody versus non-custodial orders[. . .]community development
work[. . .]barriers for clients with forensic issues, stigma, the different languages
used by other professionals’’ (SW08), and this includes being ‘‘aware of our own

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Sheehan 13

personal values, being challenged by what we see in corrections and human rights’’
(SW05). Working with courts and lawyers was included in subject material, but
participants emphasized how important this is to their work, particularly in rela-
tion to developing appropriate treatment plans. Several respondents commented on
the need to give attention to intellectual disability, given issues of marginalization
and vulnerability and intersection with mental health and corrections systems.
Mindfulness of cross-cultural factors and influences was also important and how
to work effectively with differing views about mental illness and offending whilst
ensuring these are connected to the reality of the individual’s current context.
The study participants all commented that the strength of the new Master of
Social Work (Forensic Studies) degree is that it adapts generic skills to an aware-
ness of the justice system in mental health and how to balance what are often
opposing needs and considerations when working in this area.

Discussion
Just as Brownell and Roberts (2002) found there has been a growth in demand for
social work assistance with mental health and criminal offending matters, so too is
there a demand for recognition of forensic social work as a practice specialty. The
participants in this study all said that forensic clients are complex needs clients, and
social workers need both mental health knowledge and knowledge of the criminal
justice and corrections systems to practice in this domain. It was ‘‘not enough to
just be able to do acute mental illness. . .there is the element of risk and criminality
and justice system contact’’ (SW07). The study participants commented that the
level of knowledge they needed to work in the forensic setting was beyond the remit
of undergraduate training, so welcomed a postqualifying course that not only tar-
geted their practice specialty but also recognized the need for understanding the
forensic lens in a range of social work practice domains. This was evident in par-
ticipants identifying a forensic dimension in a range of services: drug and alcohol,
housing, family welfare, for example, as well as nonvoluntary services such as child
protection and family violence agencies.
The study participants believed the introduction of a degree such as the Master
of Social Work (Forensic Studies) recognized that social work in forensic settings is
both distinct from, and not directly connected to, other external social work
groups. What is also distinct is the need for knowledge of the legal system and
processes, and study participants spoke about social work’s role in ensuring the
individual and their best interests was the primary focus of attention rather than
regulations and procedures. This reflected the concerns raised by both Howe (1994)
and Madden (2000) that the legal system can divert attention away from valuing
social work priorities in favor of legal solutions. It was Madden (2000) who empha-
sized that social work education had a responsibility to prepare graduates for work
in what was described as ‘‘hostile environments’’ (p. 4), which the criminal justice
system and corrections could be in terms of social work priorities for their clients.
Yet, the study participants believed they could carry both ways of working with

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14 Journal of Social Work 0(0)

individuals—the clinical and the social—and needed to do so if they were to be

effective. ‘‘When you are in forensic, we do work under the law strictly, and mental
health sentencing; you have to know not only about it but have good working
knowledge of this be able to work with our patients’’ (SW06). Negotiating with
lawyers on behalf of clients could be challenging not only in terms of having suf-
ficient knowledge about legal matters but also being aware that lawyers ‘‘like to use
forensic social workers to make their clients look better,’’ whether such options are
in a client’s best interests. Braye and Preston-Shoot (2002) reflect this in their
observation that the law is an ineffective remedy for the often long-term and com-
plex problems of individuals and families.
Brownell and Roberts (2002) proposed that what is particular to social work in
the forensic context is the focus on psychosocial assessment, on risk assessment and
making decisions about an individual’s capacity for rehabilitation. These foci were
certainly evident in how study participants described their practice. However, they
consistently emphasized that these foci were embedded in forming relationships
with individuals and that their assessments had a broader purpose, which was to
understand the individual and their world and how they viewed what was happen-
ing to them. Their interest was less in the task of achieving assessment and more
about how to connect with the client to be able to advocate for them. This was not
without its challenges: ‘‘You might be advocating for something and they just
throw everything back at you and it’s a hard one to argue because nobody
wants to be responsible for that risk’’ (SW05).
It is social work practice in a highly scrutinized context, where external obser-
vers—especially the media—are ambivalent about forensic clients and community
investment in their care. Such observers are also ambivalent about recovery and
rehabilitation and about the professionals who invest attention and advocacy in
this client group. The study participants paid particular attention to keeping in
mind social work values about justice and human dignity in their work and that
this needed to feature in the MSW (Forensic Studies) course. They emphasized, as
did Madden (2000), that social work education needs to prepare graduates to
ensure the social work voice is heard in the organization, often in the face of
agency and interprofessional criticism. Central to this is ensuring social work pro-
grams are regularly assessing how they educate students and what training is
needed to prepare students for new and emerging modalities of practice.

Concluding Comment
The extent to which social work activity is increasingly defined by bureaucratic
structures and legislative frameworks remains an ongoing dilemma for the profes-
sion (Sheehan, 2010). Social workers in this study described how law and mental
health regulated their activity and that this challenged social work core values and
practice. They believed, however, the new Monash University Master of Social
Work (Forensic Studies) degree program adapts the generic skills of social work
to the awareness needed to work within the mental health justice system and

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Sheehan 15

encourages debate about working in this contested area. It offers opportunities for
graduate social workers to explore specific practice domains for forensic work and
recognizes the specialist competency of forensic social work.

Acknowledgments
This study has been made possible by the generous support of Lisa Wright, Acting Chief Social
Worker Forensicare, Victorian Institute of Forensic Mental Health, and social work and social
welfare staff at Forensicare. I would like to thank them for their generous participation in this
study, providing a unique perspective on people within the mental health and criminal justice
system, and giving attention to an important social policy and human rights issue.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, author-
ship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication
of this article.

Note
1. Graduates entering the program have obtained the standard (in Australia) 4-year under-
graduate Social Work degree or its equivalent. The degree draws on knowledge of foren-
sic practice in the human services developed by the Centre for Forensic Behavioral
Science, which provides training for staff employed in the Victorian Institute of Mental
health (known as Forensicare). Monash University supported the development of this
degree to extend educational opportunities for graduates who have leadership and
advanced clinician roles in mental health and allied fields of practice.

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