The 1983 case Racine v Woods is the leading child protection case from the Supreme Court of Canada, distinguishing bonding and/or attachment as a more important determinant of best interest for an Indigenous child than cultural connection. Using this case, courts are upholding the permanent placement of Indigenous children in non-Indigenous homes as opposed to placement within their culture. Racine v Woods reflected knowledge of attachment and family at that time but runs counter to current knowledge. Reconsideration of the factors to decide cross-cultural adoption is needed. The essential point is that attachment assessment draws from a dyadic relational theory and is being applied to communal family systems, such as Indigenous systems. Such a review is consistent with the calls to action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) as well as its predecessor, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP), and recent Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) decisions.

INTRODUCTION: The article challenges the current interpretation of Attachment Theory (AT) which favours placement of Indigenous children in non-Indigenous homes. Historical attempts to assimilate Indigenous populations are examined in relation to ongoing assimilation within child intervention and justice systems. The goal is to stimulate discussion about possible culturally appropriate models to articulate the complex and multiple attachments formed by an Indigenous person who is brought up in an Indigenous community, compared to the popular Western and Eurocentric view of parenting through dyadic attachment derived from AT.METHODS: A review of AT literature examining key questions of cross-cultural applicability validity in relation to Indigenous populations. Consultations were held with Elders from the Blackfoot Confederacy of Alberta as part of the Nistawatsiman project. Data were gathered in a project relating to AT and the Supreme Court of Canada.FINDINGS: Cultural Attachment Theory is emerging as a preferred way to think of Indigenous contexts as opposed to applying traditional AT. The validity of AT with Indigenous families is likely not valid and perpetuates colonial and assimilative understandings of family, parenting and the place of culture.CONCLUSIONS: Pan-Indigenous methods bias child intervention, blinding them to the capacity of Indigenous caring systems’ capacity to raise their children. The use of AT sustains over- representation of Indigenous children in care and continues the colonial practices of fracturing Indigenous caregiving systems which, in turn, creates the patterns for the next generation’s over-representation in care. Indigenous ways of knowing and being are required along with Indigenous-based decision making.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has called upon Canada to engage in a process of reconciliation with the Indigenous peoples of Canada. Child Welfare is a specific focus of their Calls to Action. In this article, we look at the methods in which discontinuing colonization means challenging legal precedents as well as the types of evidence presented. A prime example is the ongoing deference to the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Racine v Woods which imposes Euro-centric understandings of attachment theory, which is further entrenched through the neurobiological view of raising children. There are competing forces observed in the Ontario decision on the Sixties Scoop, Brown v Canada, which has detailed the harm inflicted when colonial focused assimilation is at the heart of child welfare practice. The carillon of change is also heard in a series of decisions from the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal in response to complaints from the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada and the Assembly of First Nations regarding systemic bias in child welfare services for First Nations children living on reserves. Canadian federal legislation Bill C-92, “An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families”, brings in other possible avenues of change. We offer thoughts on manners decolonization might be approached while emphasizing that there is no pan-Indigenous solution. This article has implications for other former colonial countries and their child protection systems.