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This article proposes the concept of a child-centered social worker committed to minimizing the potential for system-induced trauma by assisting the sexually abused child through the judicial process and providing clinical treatments as well. The prosecution of child sexual abuse cases continues to be an area in which there is a strain between the judicial system and the social work profession. The former is predominantly interested in the conviction of the accused and the later is primarily interested in the protection of the child's emotional well-being. Social workers have played an important part in the legal process and are attuned to developmental needs of children and their concerns. Social workers are recognized as experts in the area of child sexual abuse because they work with abused children more regularly than other professional groups. Increasingly, social workers are being called on by the legal system to provide information about the nature of sexual abuse and its impact on children. Social workers have become more involved in efforts to educate the child about and facilitate their ability to participate in the courtroom processes. There is a need to re-conceptualize the traditional role played by the clinical social worker.

This article analyzes the development and use of systematic risk assessment models by child protective services agencies. The proliferation of child protection risk assessment models in more than 40 states can be seen in part as a response to the crisis engendered in child protection services (CPS) agencies by the growing number of intakes and a resource-depleted environment. Risk assessment also reflects a legislative trend that views CPS intervention as justified "only when a child has suffered specific types of maltreatment" and that has defined maltreatment "more carefully in terms of particular physical harms or injuries, sexual conduct, or severe emotional damage." Two authors have described three procedures as risk assessment: 1) categorization of cases on the basis of severity of risk; 2) "needs assessment," although the factors in this term are not necessarily those associated with the prediction of future abuse; and 3) a "process for assessing the likelihood that a given person will harm a child in the future."