History alumnus inspires future social workers in new textbook edition

As the political and social landscape continues to change, so do the needs of society’s most vulnerable people. In the fourth edition of Tackling Poverty and Social Exclusion: Promoting Social Justice in Social Work, author John Pierson ’66 gives an in-depth explanation of the impacts of social exclusion—the process by which people are blocked from rights, opportunities, and resources. Within a framework of social justice, the book tracks major changes and developments in social work policy in the United Kingdom and prepares social workers to engage directly with the social and personal circumstances facing excluded individuals and their families through real-world case studies, activities, and exercises.

Wooster’s liberal arts curriculum and the reputation of the history department drew Pierson to Wooster. As a student he came to understand the ways in which that knowledge could be used and credits his Independent Study advisor, Jim Hodges, professor emeritus of history, with teaching him how to write without embellishment. “In our first year, we read Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty, and Plato’s Republic, among other sources,” he said. “What an introduction to the Wooster curriculum: natural sciences, theology, economics, sociology, literature, and, of course, history. Embedded within it was the invocation to try to make a better world.”

After graduating from the College with a degree in history, Pierson received a master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and returned to Wooster to teach in the history department in 1968. “For two years, I was a colleague of those professors I so admired,” he said. Pierson then moved to England, working for 14 years in social services before taking up an academic career at University of Staffordshire, where he taught for 30 years. In each step in his career, Pierson was driven by the desire to create a fairer society, and Tackling Poverty and Social Exclusion works to inspire that same desire in its readers.

Pierson hopes that his book will help social work practitioners in the United Kingdom think through difficult decisions they must make while in the field and ultimately understand their role in a constantly developing world. “Poverty and inequality continue to afflict Britain, as various measures of material deprivation make clear,” Pierson explained. “The book aims to help social workers understand how government policies intersect with duties that they ultimately have to carry out and the dilemmas they face.”

This feature originally appeared in the Spring 2025 issue of Wooster magazine.

Photo provided by Pierson.

Posted in Alumni, Magazine on March 13, 2025.