There has been considerable interest in recent years in comparing the operation of social work services for children and families internationally, particularly between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Reviewing the respective policy environments and drawing on recent research experience in these three nations, the author speculates as to how such services may be placed to respond to a converging agenda to tackle the high social and economic costs of social exclusion. It is argued that a conspiracy of circumstances have led child and family social work away from its more general child welfare objectives of the past and have created consolidation of functions in relation to child-protection work. This has left services ill-prepared to play a central role within a new and resurgent child welfare agenda. If child-protection systems are to successfully metamorphose to encompass child welfare ideals, they will need to reconfigure to help shape their own future. This future will be concerned with the identification of, and service provision to, marginalised populations predicted to create high lifetime social and economic costs for society--the alternative being a default to the reductionist position of child-protection agencies largely concerned with the management of "child abuse".