Research Catalog

Title

Shattered bonds : the color of child welfare / Dorothy Roberts.

Author

Roberts, Dorothy E., 1956-

Publication

New York : Basic Books, c2002.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

x, 341 p.; 24 cm.

Summary

"The first book in 30 years to consider the devastating social consequences of the overwhelming numbers of black children in the child-welfare system." "The story of foster care in the United States is the story of the failure of the social safety net to aid poor, largely black, parents in their attempt to make a home for their children. Shattered Bonds tells this story as no other book has before - from the perspective of a prominent black, female legal theoretician." "The current state of the child-welfare system in America is a well-known tragedy. Thousands of children every year are removed from their parents' homes, often for little reason other than the endemic poverty that afflicts women and children more than any other group in the U.S. Dorothy Roberts, an acclaimed legal scholar and social critic, reveals the racial politics of child welfare in America through extensive legal research and original interviews with Chicago families in the foster care system. She describes the racial imbalance in foster care, the concentration of state intervention in certain neighborhoods, the alarming percentages of children in substitute care, the difficulty that poor and black families have in meeting state's standards for regaining custody of children placed in foster care, and the relationship between state supervision of families and continuing racial inequality."--Jacket.

Subject

• Child welfare > United States
• Racism in social services > United States
• Social work with African American children
• African American families > Government policy
• Foster children > United States

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 277-315) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

Introduction: Facing the racial reality of child welfare -- Pt.1: Destroying Black families in the name of child protection. The color of America's child welfare system. The system's inferior treatment of Black children. Tracing the disparity to Black child poverty. Is racism the cause? The system's fundamental flaw. A racist institution? -- Pt.2: The new politics of child welfare. The assault on family preservation. Why family preservation fails. Is adoption the answer? Welfare reform: Ending aid to poor children. Locking up parents and children -- Pt.3: The system's racial harm. Protection of family rights. A Theory of group-based harm. Conclusion: Child welfare and social justice.

ISBN

• 0465070582 (alk. paper)
• 0465070590 (pbk. : alk. paper)

LCCN

^^2001043139

OCLC

• 47696562
• SCSB-10254269

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library