Since the introduction of social work into China in the early Republic of China,social work and civil affairs have been inextricably linked.During the era,civil affairs,as a kind of internal affairs work,was transformed and modernized with the attention of all previous national governments.During the Period of Nanjing National Government,social work was incorporated into the government’s social welfare system,was different in its organization and was complementary in its function.After the failure of the Great Revolution,Communist Party of China developed the tradition of civil affairs in the construction of political power in the Central Soviet-style Area and Shanxi-Gansu-Ningsia border area,and inherited and continued it in the cities after the founding of new China,which became an important working situation for the professionalization and specialization of social work after its restoration and reconstruction.Therefore,the construction of social work system with Chinese characteristics must take the tradition of civil affairs work and its historical relationship with social work into special consideration.