Displaying 1 - 10 of 14
This study addresses children’s right to family life when placed in public care and questions how the Child Welfare Service and the Child Welfare Tribunal understand and facilitate this right within a Norwegian context.
Based on a thematic analysis of 18 interviews, factors that have the potential to contribute to and challenge the strengthening and development of ties are presented.
The implications of these factors for practice are discussed in light of the value of family life, the double role of foster parents, and the use of discretion when balancing children’s right to family life…
Abstract
Care leavers need support in the transition to adulthood. Care leavers in Norway benefit from the universalistic and somewhat generous Nordic welfare model. However, this model is constructed to meet general needs identified in the whole population. More specific needs in smaller groups may not be so well planned for. The article discusses this dilemma in the light of two previously published articles by the author and two co‐authors, where the topics are the history of leaving care support in Norway and how the Nordic welfare model may represent a problematic frame for leaving…
Abstract
This paper explores how young people who have been in out‐of‐home care develop a positive agentic capacity. The analyses are based on longitudinal biographical interviews with 24 care experienced young people (age 16–32 years) living in Norway. At the time of the interviews, they were in the education system or working and described themselves as ‘doing well’. Through the application of a relational understanding of agency, this paper provides in‐depth insights into how relations shape the biography, identity and decisions of young people with care backgrounds, scaffold…
Abstract
How is care arranged for unaccompanied refugee minors at residential care institutions, and what kind of conditions do these arrangements constitute for young persons' well‐being and development? Informed by developmental perspectives that consider young people's development through participation across contexts in everyday life and by research into how parents in ‘ordinary’ families organize care, we developed a study based on interviews with 15 unaccompanied refugee minors and their professional caregivers at residential care institutions. The interviews were analysed…
Abstract
This paper addresses the conceptualization of ‘outcomes’ for care experienced people through an in-depth longitudinal study of 75 young adults in Denmark, England and Norway. ‘Outcome’ studies have played a crucial role in raising awareness of the risk of disadvantage that care experienced people face, across a variety of domains including education and employment. These studies may have an unintended consequence, however, if care experienced people are predominantly viewed, and studied, through a problem-focused lens. The danger is that policy and research neglects other –…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to address how young unaccompanied refugees in Norway actively engage in interpersonal relationships. It explores the significance of these relationships in doing well following adversity, according to the young people’s own perspectives.
Design/methodology/approach
This study is based on a qualitative research design. Data were derived through a combination of participant observation, interviews and research workshops inspired by participatory methods. In total, 12 young unaccompanied refugees, aged 15–20, residing in Norway,…
Abstract
The aim of this article [from the Child & Family Social Work special issue on teenagers in foster care] is to account for and discuss support to young care leavers within the comparable welfare regimes of Norway and Sweden and to explore key differences between these 2 countries. This model implies that children and young people are included and entitled to support through being family members, not as independent actors in their…
Abstract
Without access to their own families, how do young, unaccompanied refugee minors re-establish their social lives in ways that facilitate a sense of togetherness in their everyday lives during resettlement? This question was approached by exploring the young persons’ creation of relational practices and the kinds of sociomaterial conditions that seemed to facilitate the evolvement of these practices, including the professional caregivers’ contributions. Interviews with 11 boys and 4 girls (aged 13–16) from Afghanistan, Somalia, Angola and Sri Lanka, as well as their professional…
Abstract
This article is written as part of the FORUM project (FOR Unaccompanied Minors: transfer of knowledge for professionals to increase foster care), an EU funded project which sought to enhance the capacity of professionals to provide quality foster care for unaccompanied migrant children, primarily through the transfer of knowledge. The article aims to contribute to this transfer of knowledge by bringing together literature which is of relevance to professionals developing or enhancing foster care services for unaccompanied migrant children (such as social workers), other…
Abstract:
This working paper has reviewed cross-national datasets for the general population and available national data and other relevant (grey and academic) literature concerned with young people in care and care leavers in the three study countries. The aim is not evaluative; i.e. not to determine which country does ‘best’. Rather, the paper seeks to provide a situated understanding of the multi-dimensional complexity of transitions out of ‘care’ and of ‘outcomes’ for children and young people with experience of care, and hence to enable a contextualised understanding of the diver-sity…