If an anthropologist from the future were to study the United States in 2011, she’d likely conclude that our child welfare system was designed to remove children from families of color.
The numbers are stark. In New York, 82% of kids in foster care are children of color. Studies show that black families are 10 times more likely than white families to be reported to Child Protective Services, and 15 times more likely to have a child removed from their home. (This isn’t a footnote/bibliography kind of blog, but US stats can be found here.)
Dorothy Roberts, who wrote Shattered Bonds: The Color of Child Welfare (terrific executive summary here — okay, no more footnotes) says:
The child welfare system is designed to privilege white people like Carrie and me. Doors have flown open; we were certified in record time. We can be confident that everyone we meet will assume we aren’t drug users, won’t neglect our foster children and aren’t in it for the money.
What’s more, because we’re not poor, it’s unlikely that our child will be perceived as suffering from “neglect,” the cause of 75% of all child welfare cases. Neglect — poor health care, poor nutrition, lack of shelter — looks looks an awful lot like poverty.
Carrie and I can’t wait to love, nurture, support and celebrate a child in our home. But our job just begins there. The real work in front of all of us is to organize for institutional change that will address the disproportionalities of our system.
Luckily, we’re not alone. A bunch of groups are organizing the community around these disparities, including the Child Welfare Organizing Project and the Anti-Racist Alliance. We invite our friends to join us not just in caring for Blitzen, but in creating a just, equitable world for her to live in.
[…] Race and Child Welfare (fosterwee.wordpress.com) […]
Thank you for “getting it.” If you guys are on Facebook you have to come join the Progressive Foster Parent communitY! https://www.facebook.com/groups/67237542989/ Seriously, come join us. Lots of folks there who also “get it” and want to make change.
I work for CPS, and I definitely notice the disproportinate numbers of African American families who are involved in the Child Welfare System. It begins with a higher number of referrals, continues with a higher number referrals accepted which leads to a higher number of investigations, a higher number of foster care placements, and ends with a higher number of TPR’s. It is really maddening, and as hard as you may work to be color blind, there is a supervisor or judge who is not, and you fail at enacting change. It is spiraling black hole that will not cease without a proactive approach.
We also see that there are disproportinate numbers of inviduals in poverty vs those who are not. And a disproportinate number of African Americans are impoverished. The family court judges in our county are quick to move on from a case where the parents have “real attorneys”, meaning ones who are not public defenders. Also, the public defenders in our county suck, so if you are poor, and stuck with one, it is more likely that you are going to receive the finding of neglect, that the court is going to confirm that your child requires placement in foster care or with a relative resource, and that you will receive a TPR. I have had multiple clients who have asked me to be their attorney (obviously they are a little confused on the difference between social worker and attorney, but the point being that they feel as though their CPS worker is acting as a better advocate for them than their attorney is) despite the fact that I removed their child! So, I think it goes beyond just having color blindness. There is that level of it, but also the level of poverty, which causes both blacks and whites to not receive a fair shake when CPS becomes a part of their lives.
Thanks for the comment, Kati. It’s neat to have readers/commenters/allies from CPS.
It does indeed seem like a spiraling black hole where poverty and race lead to findings of neglect and Termination of Parent Rights.
For what’s it’s worth (and I think this is what you’re saying too), I think that “color blindness” serves to perpetuate privilege. Any solution to our child welfare system, not to mention our education system, health care system, judicial system, prison system, economic system and foreign policy would seem to require a color conscious anti-racism.
Thanks again for reading and commenting.