This book has focused on the development of CCETSW's anti-racist initiatives, as outlined in the Rules and requirements for the Diploma in Social Work (Paper 30) (1989). The aim has been to explore how CCETSW's anti-racist initiative came about, how it fared in practice, what reaction it generated, and what political response it produced. In doing so, it has been possible to offer an assessment of the successes and limitations inherent in ‘progressive’ top-down policy developments. This is important for, as Solomos and Back (1996) stated:

Paper 30 was a top-down policy initiative that attempted to deal with the manifestation of racism in social work agencies by imposing legitimate modes of practice onto social work students and practitioners. It did this by regulating training and assuming this would filter through to practice. One of the major concerns of the report has been to look at the successes and failures of this policy, and the barriers that prevented its constructive implementation and operationalisation. In doing so, it became evident that while anti-racist initiatives are clearly relevant to social work education and training in a society structured by inequality, policy initiatives by themselves do not necessarily invoke change in institutions such as social work agencies. It also became apparent that such policies are always vulnerable to counter-policies from political opponents hostile to anti-racist perspectives. By themselves then, topdown policy initiatives are relatively limited in the extent to which they alone can develop anti-racist practice within welfare agencies which themselves operate in ways that reflect and embody institutional racism.

An analysis of CCETSW's anti-racist initiative and the commitment to, and ability of, social workers to address racism and implement antiracist social work practice also needs to be undertaken in the context of historical ‘race-related’ political developments. An analysis of such developments reveals that social work education, training and practice has tended to be dominated by individualistic and cultural theories of racism which do not focus on structural and institutional racism.