Table Of ContentPRACTICAL
SOCIAL WORK
Series Editor: Jo Campling
(BASW)
Social work is at an important stage in its development. All
professions must be responsive to changing social and economic
conditionsiftheyaretomeettheneedsofthosetheyserve.Thisseries
focuses on sound practice and the specific contribution which social
workers can make to the well-beingofoursociety in the 1980s.
TheBritishAssociationofSocialWorkershasalways been conscious
ofits role in setting guidelines for practice and in seeking to raise
professional standards. The conceptionofthe Practical Social Work
seriesarosefrom asurveyofBASWmembers todiscoverwhere they,
the practitioners in social work, felt there was the most need for new
literature.Theresponsewas overwhelmingandenthusiastic,and the
resultisacarefullyplanned,coherentseriesofbooks.Theemphasisis
firmly on practice, set in a theoretical framework. The books will
inform, stimulateand promotediscussion, thusadding to the further
developmentofskills andhighprofessionalstandards.Alltheauthors
are practitioners and teachers ofsocial work, representing a wide
variety ofexperience.
Jo
CAMPLING
PRACTICAL
SOCIAL WORK
Series Editor: Jo Campling
(BASWJ
EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD FORTHCOMING
Terry Bamford, Malcolm
Social Work andChildAbuse
Payne, Peter Riches, Sue
David Ball and David Cooper
Walrond-Skinner
TheManagement andPrevention of
Violence
PUBLISHED
Robert Brown, Stanley Bute
Social Work andMentalHandicap and Peter Ford
David Anderson Welfare RightsWorkintheSocial
Social Work andMentalIllness Services
Alan Butler and Colin GeoffFimister
Pritchard StudentSupervision inSocial Work
Residential Work Kathy Ford and AlanJones
Roger Clough Social Work with Computers
Social Work with OldPeople Bryan Glastonbury
Mary Marshall Working withFamilies
AppliedPsychologyfor Social Gill Gorell Barnes
Workers Social Work withEthnicMinorities
Paula Nicolson and Rowan AlunJackson
Bayne
Crisis Intervention inthe
Social WorkwithDisabledPeople SocialServices
Michael Oliver Kieran O'Hagan
Working in Teams Social Care intheCommunity
Malcolm Payne Malcolm Payne
Adoption andFostering: Whyand Social Work withJuvenileOffenders
How
David Thorpe, Norman Tutt,
Carole R. Smith
David Smith and Christopher
Social Work withtheDyingand Green
Bereaved Working with Offenders
Carole R. Smith Hilary Walker and Bill
Community Work Beaumont (eds)
Alan Twelvetrees
Adoption
and Fostering
Why and How
Carole R. Smith
M
MACMILLAN
© British Association of Social Workers 1984
Softcover reprint of the hardcover I st edition 1984 978-0-333-35230-4
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without permission.
First published 1984 by
Higher and Further Education Division
MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS LTD
London and Basingstoke
Companies and representatives throughout the world
Typeset by
Wessex Typesetters Ltd
Frome, Somerset
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Smith, Carole R.
Adoption and fostering.
l. Adoption
I. Title
362.7'34 HV875
ISBN 978-0-333-35231-1 ISBN 978-1-349-17479-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-17479-9
For Dolores, Bertie and Barry
Any opinions expressed and/or interpretations offered in this book are solely those of
the author and do not necessarily reflect those of any employing authority in the fields
of adoption and fostering.
Contents
1 Adoption in Contextand Social Work Intervention 1
Introduction 1
Which children? 2
Which plan? 4
Social workers and adoption 7
The nature ofdifference 8
What kind ofintervention? 10
Group discussion 14
What do we know about working with adoption
applicants? 15
Conclusion 17
2 Is Blood Thickerthan Water? 18
Introduction 18
Follow-upstudies ofadoption outcome 19
Some observations 23
What's the problem? 24
Adoptive parents: a problem? 25
Adopted children: a problem? 28
Adopted children and child psychiatricservices 30
Conclusion 33
3 MakingPlans and Choosing Resources 36
Introduction 36
The needs ofchildren 37
What happens to children in care? 40
What are the options? 42
Is adoption a choice? 44
The use and abuseofresources 48
Conclusion 50
VI Contents
4 Parentsand Children 52
Introduction 52
Workingwith parents ofchildren in care 52
Working with parents wishing for adoption 60
Before the baby is born 61
When the baby is born 65
Placementwith prospective adopters 66
Some general comments 68
Working with children 69
What should be done? 70
How should we do it? 73
Should we do it? 75
Who should do it? 76
Conclusion 77
5 Workingwith Family Resources 78
Some basic premises 78
The first contact 83
What next? 84
Group meetings: children with special needs 89
Group meetings: comments 99
Group meetings: babies and toddlers 100
Social workers and applicants: interviews 104
Some concluding remarks 109
6 GettingFamiliesand ChildrenTogether 112
Linking children and families 112
Introducingchildren and families 119
The placement 126
Adoption 130
Agency procedure: the adoption panel 133
Conclusion 136
7 Conclusion: Getting It All Together 138
Introduction 138
Permanency and adoption 139
Fosterand adoptive parents: clients or ...? 140
The natureofadoption 142
Concluding remarks 147
A Guide toFurtherReading 149
Bibliography 153
Index 164
1
Adoption in Context and
Social Work Intervention
Geographies, said the geographer, are books which, ofall books, are
most concerned with matters of consequence. They never become
old-fashioned. Itisveryrarelythatarnountainchangesits position. Itis
veryrarelythatan oceanemptiesitselfofits waters. We writeofeternal
things.
Antoinede Saint-Exupery, TheLittlePrince
Introduction
Idoubtthatanyonewould challengetheview thatsocialworkersare
concernedwithmattersofconsequence.Thisassertionisvalidacross
thewholerangeofsocialworkactivities,whetherweinterprettheseas
a means ofexercising more effective social control or as a way of
enhancing the quality oflife for individuals and groups within an
established political,socialand economicstructure. At thisjuncture,
however, we arenotafforded thecontinuityof'eternal things', either
in relationtoproblemswhichsocialworkersarelegitimatelyexpected
to confrontorwith regard toappropriatemeansoftacklingtheseat a
professional and organisational level. Weare still faced with ques
tions concerning the interpretation ofsocial problems, the organisa
tionofresources,developmentofappropriateskills andtheidentifica
tionofpotentiallysuccessful methodsofintervention. Social workers
actwithinthecontextofpoliticalpower,ideologicaldebate,economic
constraints, changing social and demographic conditions, legally
circumscribedchoices, as well as responding to professional issuesof
theory and practice.
Althoughthisbookisaboutsocialworkpracticeitiswithreference
to the points above that we must understand the changing signifi
cance of adoption in the field of child care. Social work practice
essentially involves making decisions and this raises some thorny
questionsaboutplanningfor adoptionandworkingwithparentsand
their children. Such questions concern the conditions under which
2 Adoption andFostering
children should be placed for adoption, which children should be so
placed, whether adoption plans should be made without parental
agreement, whether and when parental contact should be termi
nated, andhow far we canensurethatadoptedchildrengrowup into
competent, happyadults. Anydiscussionofsocialworkpracticeand
adoption must therefore take accountoffactors which have changed
adoptionfrom aminoranduncontentiousactivity toacentralareaof
concern and often passionate debate.
Which children?
Adoption was legally recognised in 1926. The Report ofthe Depart
mental Committee on the Adoption of Children (1972), hereafter
referred to as the Houghton Report, defines it as 'the complete
severanceofthe legal relationshipbetweenparentsandchildand the
establishment of a new one between the child and his adoptive
parents' (p. 4). Although adoption commonly occurred where the
adopters were related to, or already knew the child, literature
concerned with 'non-relative' adoptions illustrates two particular
characteristics of early arrangements. First, children placed for
adoptionwerenormallywhite,healthybabiesor toddlers. Ellison,for
example, commented in 1958 that even a baby with a squint was
sometimeswantedand McWhinnienotedin 1967that'theconceptof
the perfectchildmakes manyadoptionsocietiesview as unadoptable
the child who has the misfortune to have a visible birthmark'
(McWhinnie, 1967, p. 26). Writingin 1947, Lockridge madesimilar
commentsaboutpracticein theUnited States. Secondly,prospective
adopters tended to be viewed as generous public-spirited citizens
whose wish to adopt amply suited them for the job. In 1970
Bowerbankremarkedthatcasepapersofadoptionsocietiesoperating
during and following the last war suggest a concern, not with the
suitability ofadoptive applicants, but with the sex, colouring and
characteristics of the babies which they were prepared to accept.
Emphasiswas commonlyplacedon meetingthesocialandemotional
needs of childless couples. Similar attitudes coloured adoption
practice in the United States. The Florida Adoption Actof1943, for
example, was bitterly fought because of requirements for social
investigation and supervision ofprospective adopters (see Witmeret
at., 1963).
There has, however, been a dramatic change in this picture of
adoption. Arrangements made by voluntary societies and local
authoritiesarenow governed by the AdoptionAgencies Regulations,
Adoption in ContextandSocialWorkIntervention 3
1976. These Regulations were first introduced in 1939in an effort to
improve practice and are, at present, under review by the DHSS.
Socialworkershave becomemoresophisticatedin theirexpectations
of professional competence and this has clearly influenced their
approach to work in adoption. A major change has also occurred in
the diminishing number of babies being relinquished for adoption
and in our knowledge about the kinds ofchildren who may benefit
from this sortofplacement. Manypractitionersand researchershave
noted a declinein adoption placementsofbabiessincethe late 1960s
and evidence suggests that greater availability ofabortion, effective
contraception and more flexible social attitudes to illegitimacy and
single-parentfamilies, have contributed to a change in surrendering
patterns (see Lambert, 1971; Triseliotis and Lobban, 1973; Tizard,
1977). While the above trends were becoming apparent, social
workers were beginning to focus attention on those children with
'special needs' who required permanent substitute families.
Several important factors encouraged this change in emphasis.
First, researchin Britainand the United Statesshowed thatnotonly
couldfamilies befound toadoptolder, blackandmixedracechildren
but thatsuch placementsalso had a verygood chanceofturningout
well. Inthe UnitedStates, Kadushin (1970a) reportedon afollow-up
study ofchildren aged between five and twelve years at placement.
Fanshel (1972), Grow and Shapiro (1974), and in Britain, Gill and
Jackson (1983), have considered the outcome oftransracial adop
tions. Secondly,duringa reviewofresearchClarke (1981) comments
that results 'give us cause for cautious optimism' about the develop
mental progress of children from deprived and disrupted back
grounds who are subsequently placed with adoptive families.
Thirdly, it was becoming apparent that leaving young children in
residential care to see 'how they would develop' or attempting to
assess theirpotential by early psychological and intelligence testing,
failed to provide any guarantees to prospective adopters and
sometimes hindered normal development (see Wittenborn, 1957;
Rutter, 1970). Fourthly, Rowe and Lambert's blockbuster, Children
who Wait (1973), brought social workers face to face with the facts
about many children who were in danger ofgrowing up in care.
Translating their research findings into national terms, Rowe and
Lambert suggested that there were about 7,000 children waitingfor
family placement. Theauthors comment that, 'all thosewho worked
on this project found it a sobering experience ... the findings are
depressing, not so much because there is anything new or startling
aboutthem, butbecausesomanyoftheold problemsarestill withus'
(Rowe and Lambert, 1973, p. 99). Fifthly, some widely publicised
