'Social work has lost one of its kindest hearts and most brilliant minds’

Published by Professional Social Work magazine, 9 October, 2023

Professor Andrew Cooper has always been known as a ‘social worker’s social worker’. His commitment to relational approaches in the face of oppressive, process-driven practice has been a lifeline to social workers holding belief in relational connection for deeper understanding and meaningful support. His writing has brought clarity, meaning and comfort to social workers across four decades. His intellect and kindness has offered sense and containment in the midst of the heightened emotion in which we often work.

Andrew came to social work via a philosophy degree and a Master’s in philosphy at Warwick University. He worked as a hospital porter and then a residential social worker before being seconded to train as a social worker at South Bank University. He became a senior social worker and then trained as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist at The Tavistock Clinic. But he never lost faith in social work and proudly maintained his social work identity.

Andrew taught at the West London Institute of Higher Education before becoming Professor of social work at the Tavistock and Portman and the University of East London in 1996. He was head of discipline as well as Professor of social work at The Tavistock and was elected dean of post graduate studies and director of research and development in 2000. 

He went on to become involved in high-profile child protection enquiries, including the national enquiry into the circumstances surrounding Victoria Climbié’s death. Throughout his career, he continued to assert the need for reflective, relational approaches and to actively encourage social workers to take time away from practice to think and reflect upon the relationships that were provoking most anxiety and to seek meaning in the emotions that arose out of the relational connections experienced.

I knew of Andrew through his prolific and beautiful writing about relational practice. I was thrilled to meet him when I joined the Tavistock as a lecturer and then as a candidate on the social work doctoral programme he’d created. Andrew was kind and interested and his intellect was phenomenal. He told me he’d never had any trouble in remembering things that he’d read and he supposed this must make him sound pretty clever. But it was his ability to find helpful meaning in any situation by exploring his own emotional reaction and then dipping into his extensive internal literature database that made every conversation with him so valuable. Andrew supervised my doctorate and then mentored me when I returned to practice as a principal social worker. Even as our relationship morphed into a very precious friendship, I found myself wanting to reach for a pen to take notes whenever he spoke.

Andrew created the highly successful social work doctorate at The Tavistock and Portman where, to date, 38 successful research works have been produced. It was a source of pride for Andrew that the doctorate had created a space in which Black social workers could find sufficient safety to develop academic and reflexive ability. The result is a strong body of work with important exploration by Black social work academics of the psycho-social experiences of diverse groups of people.

But it was through Covid-19 that I came to understand more about Andrew’s generosity, compassion and humility. I was working as the adult’s principal social worker in a local authority and as our teams were hit by the daily devastation of multiple deaths among the people known to our services, as well as personal experiences of the pandemic, Andrew agreed to step in to support the social work team managers. And so began our weekly teams meetings with hospital and community team managers in which colleagues were given space to explore and reflect upon their experiences. Andrew’s thoughtful responses underpinned by a profound respect for the work of the teams became a lifeline for colleagues facing unprecedented levels of grief and fatigue. His personal availability to social workers throughout the pandemic was a direct and very practical contribution to his profession and emphasises the authenticity that is apparent in his writing.

Andrew was a talented artist a keen gardener, and a Conventry City supporter. His innate empathy and understanding of vulnerability may have come from his own very difficult experience of cancer as a young man. He wrote about this early brush with death in his paper A Good Death:

‘I think the existential reality is that we each die alone. No one can do it for us, and no one can accompany us in death itself, only on our passage towards it, or if we are the survivor, following it. But this is not the same as dying in a state of loneliness. In a secular way of thinking, our salvation, our after life if you prefer, resides in the possibility of being remembered and held in the minds of others long after death.’

Andrew will long be held in the minds of his friends, students and the social work profession. Most importantly to him, he will be held in the minds of his family including his wife Heather and their two children Daniel and Rachael. Andrew often spoke in his lectures and anecdotes of his love for them. Social work has lost one of its kindest hearts and most brilliant minds. His family have lost a devoted husband and father. 

Tanya Moore is principal social worker for adults at Essex County Council

A tribute from Dr Wurola Bolaji, senior lecturer in social work at the University of Hertfordshire and former doctoral candidate of Andrew

What a privilege to know, be supervised and mentored by such a great person and such great mind! One of Andrew’s last words to me was that his mind was strong but his body not so. I did not know that would be our last meeting. Andrew planted seeds of great minds to carry on where he left. He led me to me and brought out the best in me. The pain of his demise is deep but the consolation of his legacy lives on in our hearts and minds.