Child Welfare Systems and Migrant Children


Book Description

The book examines where, why and to what extent immigrant children are represented in the child welfare system in 11 high-income countries. By comparing policies and practices in child welfare systems (and welfare states), especially in terms of how they conceptualize and deal with immigrant children and their families, we address an immensely important and pressing issue in modern societies.




Migrant Youth, Transnational Families, and the State


Book Description

Each year, more than half a million migrant children journey from countries around the globe and enter the United States with no lawful immigration status; many of them have no parent or legal guardian to provide care and custody. Yet little is known about their experiences in a nation that may simultaneously shelter children while initiating proceedings to deport them, nor about their safety or well-being if repatriated. Migrant Youth, Transnational Families, and the State examines the draconian immigration policies that detain unaccompanied migrant children and draws on U.S. historical, political, legal, and institutional practices to contextualize the lives of children and youth as they move through federal detention facilities, immigration and family courts, federal foster care programs, and their communities across the United States and Central America. Through interviews with children and their families, attorneys, social workers, policy-makers, law enforcement, and diplomats, anthropologist Lauren Heidbrink foregrounds the voices of migrant children and youth who must navigate the legal and emotional terrain of U.S. immigration policy. Cast as victims by humanitarian organizations and delinquents by law enforcement, these unauthorized minors challenge Western constructions of child dependence and family structure. Heidbrink illuminates the enduring effects of immigration enforcement on its young charges, their families, and the state, ultimately questioning whose interests drive decisions about the care and custody of migrant youth.




Racial Disproportionality and Disparities in the Child Welfare System


Book Description

This volume examines existing research documenting racial disproportionality and disparities in child welfare systems, the underlying factors that contribute to these phenomena and the harms that result at both the individual and community levels. It reviews multiple forms of interventions designed to prevent and reduce disproportionality, particularly in states and jurisdictions that have seen meaningful change. With contributions from authorities and leaders in the field, this volume serves as the authoritative volume on the complex issue of child maltreatment and child welfare. It offers a central source of information for students and practitioners who are seeking understanding on how structural and institutional racism can be addressed in public systems.




Dreams and Nightmares


Book Description

Dreams and Nightmares takes a critical look at the challenges and dilemmas of immigration policy and practice in the absence of comprehensive immigration reform. The experiences of children and youth provide a prism through which the interwoven dynamics and consequences of immigration policy become apparent. Using a unique sociolegal perspective, authors Zatz and Rodriguez examine the mechanisms by which immigration policies and practices mitigate or exacerbate harm to vulnerable youth. They pay particular attention to prosecutorial discretion, assessing its potential and limitations for resolving issues involving parental detention and deportation, unaccompanied minors, and Dreamers who came to the United States as young children. The book demonstrates how these policies and practices offer a means of prioritizing immigration enforcement in ways that alleviate harm to children, and why they remain controversial and vulnerable to political challenges.




Children on the Move


Book Description

Millions of children are on the move, both within and between countries, with or without their parents. The conditions under which movement takes place are often treacherous, putting migrant children, especially unaccompanied and separated children, at an increased risk of economic or sexual exploitation, abuse, neglect and violence. Policy responses to protect and support these migrant children are often fragmented and inconsistent and while children on the move have become a recognised part of today's global and mixed migration flows they are still largely invisible in debates on both child protection and migration.




Ident/Iafis


Book Description

IDENT/IAFIS : the Batres case and the status of the integration project




Oxford Handbook of Child Protection Systems


Book Description

"cross the spectrum of political ideologies there is, in principle, widespread agreement that the state has a legitimate role in protecting children from harm. Even the Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman (1962), among the most ardent liberal supporters of the laissez faire philosophy, recognized this "paternalistic" function of government. At the same time, the traditional view of children, that they are the property of the father (pater) or the parents, is under pressure (Zelizer, 1994; James & Prout, 1997; Archard 2004). Societies are at an intersection when it comes to how children are treated and how their rights are respected, which creates tensions in the traditional relationship between the family and the state. Children are a focus of government responsibility under certain state-defined norms relating to harm and need. And parents are sometimes constrained by the state from exercising their (familial or property) rights under state-defined criteria of harm and need"--




Child Welfare Practice with Immigrant Children and Families


Book Description

Children in immigrant families represent nearly one-fourth of all children living in the United States. As this population of children has increased, so has their representation among children involved in child welfare and related systems. Once immigrant families come to the attention of these systems, they often have multiple and complex needs that must be addressed to ensure children’s safety and well-being. Culturally competent practice with Latino, Asian, and African immigrants requires that professionals understand the impact of immigration and acculturation on immigrant families to conduct adequate assessments and provide interventions that respond appropriately to their needs. Professionals also need to be familiar with federal and state policies that affect immigrant families and how those policies may affect service delivery. At the system level, child welfare agencies need to educate and train a culturally competent workforce that responds appropriately to children and families from diverse cultures. This book addresses these critical issues and provides recommendations for the development of culturally competent assessment, intervention, and prevention activities in child welfare agencies. This information can be used as a resource by child welfare administrators, practitioners, and students to improve the child welfare system’s response to immigrant children and families and promote culturally competent practice. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of Public Child Welfare.




Child Welfare for the Twenty-first Century


Book Description

This up-to-date and comprehensive resource by leaders in child welfare is the first book to reflect the impact of the Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA) of 1997. The text serves as a single-source reference for a wide array of professionals who work in children, youth, and family services in the United States-policymakers, social workers, psychologists, educators, attorneys, guardians ad litem, and family court judges& mdash;and as a text for students of child welfare practice and policy. Features include: * Organized around ASFA's guiding principles of well-being, safety, and permanency * Focus on evidence-based "best practices" * Case examples integrated throughout * First book to include data from the first round of National Child and Family Service Reviews Topics discussed include the latest on prevention of child abuse and neglect and child protective services; risk and resilience in child development; engaging families; connecting families with public and community resources; health and mental health care needs of children and adolescents; domestic violence; substance abuse in the family; family preservation services; family support services and the integration of family-centered practices in child welfare; gay and lesbian adolescents and their families; children with disabilities; and runaway and homeless youth. The contributors also explore issues pertaining to foster care and adoption, including a focus on permanency planning for children and youth and the need to provide services that are individualized and culturally and spiritually responsive to clients. A review of salient systemic issues in the field of children, youth, and family services completes this collection.




Child Welfare Removals by the State


Book Description

Child Welfare Removals by the State addresses a most important (but little-researched) legal proceeding: when the State intervenes in the private family sphere to remove children at risk to a place of safety, adoption, or in other forms of out-of-home care. It is an intervention into the private family sphere that is intrusive, contested, and a last resort. States' interventions in the family are decided within legal and political orders and traditions that constitute a country's policies, welfare state model, child protection system, and children s position in a society. However, we lack a cross-country analysis of the different models of decision-making in a European context. This text aims to present new research at the intersection of social work, law, and social policy concerning child protection proceedings for children in need of alternative care. It explores the role of court-based and voluntary decision-making systems in child protection proceedings, its effects, dynamics, and meanings in seven European countries and the United States, and analyses the tensions and dilemmas between children, parents, and socio-legal professionals. The book consists of eight country chapters, plus an introduction and conclusion chapters. The range of countries of countries represented in the book covers the social democratic Nordic countries (Finland, Norway, and Sweden), the conservative corporatist regimes (Germany and Switzerland), the neo-liberal (England, Ireland, and the United States), and related child welfare systems.