Permanence in Child Care

Abstract

Since the mid-1970s discussion about child care policy has been dominated by the concept of `permanence' - the belief that if children in care cannot return to natural parents they should be placed, preferably for adoption, with permanent new families. Before then it was considered difficult, if not impossible, to find adoptive parents for physically or mentally handicapped children, for black children or children of mixed parentage, and for older children. Over the past ten years adoption and fostering agencies have challenged this view. Impressed by their success in finding new families for wide range of children with special needs, some local authorities enthusiastically adopted `permanence policies'. This is the first book to describe and evaluate independently British attempts to find new families for children with a range of special needs. `Permanence in Child Care' locates such work in its historical and social policy context before going on to examine in depth the first three years of a specialist placement agency. The rewards, difficulties and costs involved in the enterprise of moulding a new family are illustrated by the experiences and opinions of the children, their new families and their social workers, and form the basis of a discussion of permanence policies and of their place in British child care policy and practice.

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