Social Work and the ‘Social Doctor’: Bowlby, Social Reproduction and ‘Common Sense’

Abstract This article furnishes a critical commentary on the work of John Bowlby. It is argued that social work’s engagement with his contributions demands ideas are historised. An exploration rarely examined early articles reveals figure preoccupied wider world and not simply dyadic relationship involving mother her child. Viewing himself as ‘social doctor’, Bowlby was also relentlessly intent shaping public professional perceptions within framework ‘Fordist’ economic settlement after Second World War. maintained ‘Bowlbyism’ might be more fully understood if through lens Marxist feminist reproduction theory alongside Gramscian about ‘common sense’.