Give me your tired, your poor,Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.I lift my lamp beside the golden door!(Emma Lazarus, New Colossus, 1883; embossed on the plaque mounted inside the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty)One of the massive trends affecting a myriad of families that has accelerated around the world in the past three and a half decades is immigration - with scores of people leaving their homelands to move to countries they hope will be safer and provide a less turbulent environment in which to reside and raise their families. Such families often encounter enormous problems in their new and sometimes ethnocentric, uninviting, even to the point of hostile environments. In this article, some of the problems and issues encountered and ways therapists can enhance client families understanding of their situation, their feelings about it, and how better to cope and problem solve will be explored from an integrative problem-centered and family systems perspective. The discussion has been purposely kept broad and general in order to be applicable across national borders in the many lands in which family researchers, academicians, and clinicians conduct studies, teach, and practice.The introductory portion (Part I) of the article establishes the background of the kinds of often multi-problem families now being seen in many countries. They are indeed challenging and diverse, exhibit many idiosyncratic behaviors and may be needy and demanding or almost non-communicative. They are part of the rapidly changing population influx and mixture in many regions across the globe.Part II lists and briefly discusses common factors in many of the manifold theories that can be subsumed under an integrative systems umbrella. It highlights the importance of selecting the theoretical approaches that will best illuminate the situation, issues and people involved and the accompanying strategies that should be selected to be utilized.The article concludes in Part III with 2 case vignettes illustrating the clinical applicability of this type of theoretical orientation and clinical problem solving intervention perspective. It also emphasizes the importance of the ability to form a solid therapeutic alliance with the client(s). to the extent they can risk trusting enough to enter into it. © Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

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