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Introduction
The European Commission Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO) commissioned SOS Children’s Villages International to undertake case studies of arrangements for ‘alternative child care’ in six non-European countries across three continents to help inform the EU’s future strategy for provision of support for children in countries outside Europe. This report is a case study of one of the six countries, Ecuador. A companion report provides a summary of alternative child care across Central and South America. The results of the regional reports…
Abstract Many children are cared for on a full-time basis by relatives or adult friends, rather than their biological parents, and often in response to family crises. These kinship care arrangements have received increasing attention from the social science academy and social care professions. However, more information is needed on informal kinship care that is undertaken without official ratification by welfare agencies and often unsupported by the state. This article presents a comprehensive, narrative review of international, research literature on informal, kinship care to address this…
ABSTRACT
With the orphan population escalating, communities continue to rely on relatives to provide care to orphans. Therefore, there is a need to explore the role of caregivers with regard to the well‐being of orphans, the challenges they face, as well as how they could be empowered to be more responsive to children's needs. The paper acknowledges that informal caregivers play an important role in the lives of orphans. The paper also concedes that, in the process, caregivers are faced with challenges which make it difficult for them to fulfil their responsibilities and roles. As a result…
This presentation was given by Pat Dolan - Professor and Carmel Devaney, Lecturer and Researcher at the UNESCO Child and Family Research Centre at NUI Galway - at Innocenti’s Expert Consultation on Family and Parenting Support on 26-27 May 2014. The presentation focuses on informal supports for families and on incorporating research into practice.
This discussion paper is part of the first explorations of the worldwide phenomenon of children living in informal alternative care. As defined under the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children (hereinafter the Guidelines), these children are without parental care and live with relatives or family friends without State involvement in selecting or monitoring those arrangements. They, like all children, are entitled to protection and care, but little is known about them.
In Section 1, this paper provides a conceptual placement of informal alternative care within the larger framework…
Federal and state policies in the United States give preference to relatives as foster parents to care for children taken into state custody. Increasingly, however, states are using relatives to care for abused and neglected children to avoid having to take children into custody, according to a new Child Trends study, State Kinship Care Policies for Children that Come to the Attention of Child Welfare Agencies: Findings from the 2007 Casey Kinship Foster Care Policy Survey. When children are not taken into state custody, child welfare agencies offer significantly less financial…