Abstract: Social work, as a vital tool for the Party and the government to achieve social governance, is particularly significant in the development of county-level regions. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct research and interpretation on the development of social work in county regions. This study examines the development of social work within the context of county-level governance. From a leadership attention perspective, this research constructs an analytical framework centered on the interaction between the subjects and objects of leadership attention. Through an exhaustive analysis of the development of social work in City T spanning over a decade, this research discovers that the concentration of leadership attention can expedite the transformation of social worker cohorts from instrumental associations founded on rational calculation to communal affiliations based on professional emotional recognition. At the theoretical stratum, this research advocates the incorporation of the perspectives of leadership attention and professional communities when dissecting the development of social work and the exploration of the interactive shaping mechanism between them. At the practical tier, this research proffers that the development of social work ought to heed the distribution of leadership attention by county governments and, via the apportionment of policy support and financial resources, construct professional communities within the county to foster the in-depth advancement of social work.

Key words: county-level area, country-level social work, leadership attention, social work community