Child Protection A Journey into History

Child Protection: Paradoxes of Publicity, Policy and Practice

“…New York and London, giving rise to societies dedicated to the protection and rescue of children from parental violence and neglect. Often such societies came into being after widespread publicity about a dramatic case of child abuse as in New York where the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children was founded after the New York Times featured the case of Mary Ellen whose stepmother was found guilty of assault and sentenced to one year at hard labour in the penitentiary (Williams 1983). Such societies were given legal power to investigate cases of alleged cruelty to children, remove children and to prosecute parents.…”

“…Historians have identified periods of dormancy in societal interest in child abuse over the past hundred years (Williams 1983) with the two high points being its initial 'discovery' in the late nineteenth century and its rediscovery in the 1960s and 1970s. The latter period, which could be described as the 'second wave' of the child rescue movement, began when US paediatrician Kempe and his associates (radiologist Silverman, psychiatrist Steele, obstetrician Droegemueller and radiologist Silver) used newly developed radiological survey technology to identify previously undiagnosed fractures in young children.…”

Child abuse reconsidered the urgency of authentic prevention

“…Cohn and Miller (1977), who evaluated the nationwide federally funded treatment programs of the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect, state that treatment is often equated with casework, psychotherapy or medical care, rather than with the wide range of services these difficult families require. Moreover, the vast majority of treated patients are abusive parents, rather than abused children, an expression of the familyfocused philosophy that has guided child protection programs since the 1930s (Williams, 1983b). According to Cohn and Miller (1977), only adult members are receiving treatment in 85 percent of abuse families in federally funded programs.…”

“…Yet in the midst of their failure to protect children from reabuse, agencies continue relentlessly to be guided by policy initiated over 50 years ago: To keep the child with parents except in dire circumstances (Williams, 1983b). One source of resistence to changing this policy is the romanticization of the mother-child relationship.…”

“…In a statement reminiscent of Fay's justification of termination of parental rights in 1893, (quoted in Williams, 1983b), Kempe and Kempe (1978) maintain:…”