With ever-increasing globalization, the challenges that social support will face in the future can no longer be addressed solely within national contexts. As a variety of studies implicitly shows, transnationalism is associated with specific and manifold forms of social support. Yet research that systematically locates transnational social support at the center of analysis is just at its beginning.

This publication addresses transnational social support from both a theoretical and an empirical research perspective. Its overall aim is to contribute to the introduction of a transnational perspective in the academic discipline and professional field of social work. Transnational approaches can extend and transform the conventional nationally-bounded approaches to both knowledge and practice. The aim is to incorporate a transnational dimension in the very knowledge structure of social work. Gathering together authors from around the world, this text offers perspectives for social work theory and practice that transcend nation states.

Adrienne Chambon is a Professor in the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work at the University of Toronto.

Wolfgang Schröer is a Professor in the Institute for Socialpedagogic and Organisation Studies at the University of Hildesheim.

Cornelia Schweppe is a Professor in the Department of Social Work at Johannes Gutenberg-University of Mainz.

1. Introduction Adrienne Chambon, Wolfgang Schröer and Cornelia Schweppe Part 1: Transnational Social Policy 2. Transnational Social Policy and Migration Ernie Lightman 3. Social Policy in a Transnational World: The Capability Approach, Neediness, and Social Work Lothar Böhnisch and Wolfgang Schröer Part 2: Transnational Social Support and Transnational Organizations 4. Development Cooperation as a Field of Transnational Learning Kay E. Ehlers and Stephan Wolff 5. New Religious Movements as Transnational Providers of Social Support: The Case of Sukyo Mahikari Wendy Smith Part 3: Transnational Family Care 6. Negotiating Double Binds of In-Between: A Gendered Perspective of Formal and Informal Social Supports in Transnationality Luann Good Gingrich 7. Sisters in Struggle? Wars Between Daughter-in-Law and Migrant Worker Frank T.Y. Wang Part 4: Transnational Social Support and Biography 8. Migration Biographies and Transnational Social Support: Transnational Family Care and the Search for "Homelandmen" Désirée Bender, Tina Hollstein, Lena Huber and Cornelia Schweppe 9. Transnational Biographies: The Delimitation of Motherhood Elisabeth Tuider Part 5: Transnational Social Support: Unintended Consequences and Future Challenges 10. The Missing Presence of Aboriginal Peoples from the Transnational Debate Adrienne Chambon and Arielle Dylan 11. Paradoxes of Transnational Knowledge Production in Social Work Stefan Köngeter