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Learning briefs are short resources that share more about how Changing the Way We Care undertakes a certain aspect of the care reform work and what some of the main lessons are. This learning brief was developed as part of the initiative's 2022 annual report and shares learning on family-based alternative care from Guatemala, Moldova, India and Kenya and links the reader to additional CTWWC resources on the topic.
Changing The Way We CareSM (CTWWC) is a global initiative designed to promote safe, nurturing family care for children. This includes reforming national…
The National Adoption System and Child Protection in Guatemala: Looking Back and Examining the Today
This article discusses the evolution of adoption policy and practices in Guatemala from the 1990s to 2021. The authors synthesized their own research and analyzed adoption scholarship and reports and organized that history into three distinct periods:
(1) conflict years (1966–1996) when mostly Guatemalan military families and associates adopted stolen children,
(2) post-conflict and millennium adoption years (1997-2007) when the commercialization of children and illicit adoptions surged, and
(3) reform years (2008 to date) when new adoption regulations and institutions were…
PRESENTACIÓN
La adopción ha existido a lo largo de la historia, ha cambiado en sus formalidades y en su finalidad, adaptándose a los derechos de la niñez; en Grecia los padres abandonaban al bebé dentro de una vasija para que otra persona lo tomara y se hiciera cargo de él; en la antigua Roma la adopción era considerada un privilegio que tenía por objeto principal preservar la vida.
La adopción tiene sus raíces muy remotas. Para el caso de Guatemala, esta se realiza mediante procedimientos ágiles y técnicos en los que se prioriza el interés superior del niño, niña y adolescente -NNA-…
Abstract
Evidence of child abduction for intercountry adoption challenges our notions of altruism. The history of illicit adoptions and child abduction is presented with specific emphasis on Guatemala as a case example. Drawing on data produced in an ethnographic research, the analysis searches to elucidate how those involved in intercountry adoption in Spain (mainly adoptive and prospective adoptive parents) deal with signs of fraud and corruption. The results point out how these discourses usually dismiss the failures of the system and revolve around the idea of rescue. The rights of…
From Intercountry Adoption to Global Surrogacy: A Human Rights History and New Fertility Frontiers tackles the constantly changing landscape of intercountry adoption. Extracting on chronologic data, this book discusses the politics and practice of intercountry adoption starting with the state of international adoption to in the 1950s continuing to present-day adoption practice and protections. Chapters include: 1) Rescue, refugees, orphans and restitution; 2) The politics of adoption from Romania to Russia and what we know about children languishing in residential care…
Following increased international attention and criticism since 2000 of the dramatic escalation in the numbers of Guatemalan children being unethically placed into intercountry adoptions, the country passed a new adoption law in 2007 and imposed an intercountry adoption moratorium until a stronger child protection system could be operationalized to ensure the safety and rights of children and their families. Despite some efforts at gatekeeping, children, however, continued to be admitted into child-care institutions without a systematic determination of their best…
The Infant Mental Health Journal has published an important Special Issue on Global Research, Practice, and Policy Issues in the Care of Infants and Young Children at Risk.
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), The Hague Convention on the Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption (The Hague Permanent Bureau, 1993), and the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children (2009) have provided a comprehensive, rights-based framework and guidance for developing domestic adoption and alternative, family based…
Since 1986, American parents have adopted over 17,300 children from Guatemala. This study assessed the health, growth, and developmental status of 103 Guatemalan adopted children (48 girls; 55 boys) after arrival in the United States. Physical evidence suggestive of prenatal alcohol exposure and adequacy of vaccinations administered were also reviewed.
Retrospective chart review was conducted of 103 children who were evaluated after arrival in the United States in an international adoption specialty clinic, and a case-matched study was conducted of a subgroup of 50 children who…
From the 80s until the early 2000s, thousands of Guatemalan children were robbed and sold for thousands of dollars, separated from their mothers in the hospitals where they were born or taken from their homes. Today, those children have grown up and had the opportunity to look for their biological parents and their abductors. This documentary from Noticias Telemundo shares the stories of these families and the "business" of adoption in Guatemala during that time.