Amazing Grace

I think the most important thing I gained from this book was the connection so visibly made between government budget cuts/public policy decisions and the populations that they directly impact. A lot of times we don't make that critical connection when we read a story in the newspaper about the latest fiscal policy or tax cuts.

The book helped me remember to focus on the all-important necessity of combating poverty, and never settling or accepting its existence anywhere. To remember that part of our essential humanity is broken when we allow poverty to exist.

Poverty is an over arching social issue that affect people in many ways. Stress has often been associated with poverty. This relationship is explored through Kozol (1995) and his experiences with children in an impoverished neighborhood. The children he describes have bio-psycho-social risk & resilience factors in regards to stress and poverty. Stress and poverty can be put into an ecological perspective utilizing functionalist theory. Functionalist theory is limited in implementing a planed change process with a client. Utilizing empowerment theory works to both help the client understand there issue and they aren't the only one with the issue (much like functionalism). It goes further to help create a planned change process for the client and to continue that process at the macro level.

You can read the entire article in my resources section of my website, The Stress of Poverty: A Case Study Using Amazing Grace or you can read more reviews.