The weight of history: child protection and parenting with a disability in 20th Century Iceland

ABSTRACT

This contribution focuses on four periods in Iceland, from the early twentieth century until the time of writing, in order to document and analyse the struggles of people with intellectual disabilities to marry, have a family and maintain custody of their children. Each period is linked to specific pieces of legislation that governed the bodies and lives of disabled people and reflected larger social norms concerning issues of family life and parenthood. An emphasis is placed upon the perspective of contemporary critical disability studies in analysing the historical development of this struggle, and the voices of those who experienced this struggle first-hand, drawn from a number of research projects conducted in Iceland. Our main contention is that the weight of history still comes to bear upon matters of parenting and family life, even in the most recent shift toward a human rights approach to disability. There remains a strong socio-cultural resistance toward parenting with an intellectual disability, rooted in the ideology of early twentieth-century eugenics. Our goal is to document the development of these phases throughout the twentieth century in Iceland in order to illustrate how older ideas and prejudices still inform contemporary child protection practices concerning parents with disabilities.     

Mock-juror reactions to multiple interview presentation and rapport-building

ABSTRACT

In the UK and some US states, video-recorded investigative interviews of child victims/witnesses can be presented in court as the child’s evidence-in-chief. However, there is scarce advice or research on the effect that presenting different sections of the interviews may have on juror perceptions of the child’s testimony. Two aspects of testimony presentation are examined here: first, whether to show the rapport-building phase of the interview, and second, the presentation of multiple interviews (i.e. more than one interview with the same child). Participants (n?=?103) informed they were watching two interviews of the same child separated by a week had more positive perceptions of the child’s testimony than those informed they were watching just one extended interview with a ten-minute break. Also, those watching the rapport-building phase had less positive perceptions of the child’s testimony than those who did not watch this phase. Participants’ perceptions of the interviewer and their case progression decisions were mainly not related to the above presentational differences. Thus, (i) mock-jurors were not inherently biased against multiple interviews and (ii) decisions regarding whether or not to show the rapport-building phase in court may have significant effects on jurors’ perceptions of the child and their testimony.     

嫖宿幼女罪分解归入强奸罪与猥亵儿童罪及立法修订研究

嫖宿幼女罪的客观方面分别与强奸罪和猥亵儿童罪的一部分相重合,可以将该罪归入后两个犯罪中,减少冗余罪名及引发的司法适用中的矛盾和民众的不满。这样处理对幼女的身心健康的法益保护范围不会减少,而定罪界限更加明确。归入两罪后,对强奸罪中嫖宿幼女量刑情节进一步细化,通过刑法修订增设猥亵儿童罪加重的构成要件,能够进一步有效从严打击相关犯罪。     

“Those Are Our People and That's Our Family”: Wabanaki Perspectives on Child Welfare Practice in Their Communities

In collaboration with the Maine Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission Convening Group, this study explored perspectives of Wabanaki community members and tribal child welfare staff on state child welfare involvement in Wabanaki communities. Qualitative analysis of three focus groups found that participants perceived fundamental differences between what guides the work of tribal child welfare staff and state child welfare staff, as well as differences in understanding the profound impact of removing a child from the community. These findings are suggested to be elements of a Wabanaki counter-narrative that contrasts with the historical dominant narrative about Native families and children.     

虐童行为的类型分析及刑法规制

鉴于虐童行为的复杂性，对虐童行为有必要从伤害的类型和侵害主体与被虐儿童的关系的不同视角进行类型分析。在现行刑法的规定面前，对幼师之类非家庭成员虐童但危害结果未达到轻伤害以上的行为，按寻衅滋事罪或侮辱罪定罪处罚都存在解释上难以跨越的障碍，只能按无罪处理。通过立法修改将幼师之类的情节严重的虐童行为入罪化确有必要。针对我国现行刑法对虐童行为规制存在的不足，借鉴域外立法经验，有必要单独增设虐待儿童罪。     

The Role of Supervision in the Retention of Public Child Welfare Workers

Abstract

Contrary to common belief, having a manageable caseload size may not be critical to the retention of child welfare MSW social workers. In this study of the retention of 765 title IV-E MSWs in public child welfare, support from supervisors emerged as a pivotal factor in employee retention. With analyses regressing retention and intent to leave public child welfare agencies, support from supervisors emerged as a predictor, but caseload size did not. The preliminary findings of qualitative interviews corroborated these results. This study corroborates literature indicating that support from supervisors enhances retention of specially trained child welfare workers.     

孤残儿童救助制度的问题及其对策

兰考火灾事件等一系列惨剧的接连发生,凸显了我国孤残儿童救助制度存在的诸多问题.本文从孤残儿童救助制度的历史演进和现状出发,分析目前我国孤残儿童救助制度在救助政策和机构职能等方面存在的诸多问题,并提出了完善我国孤残儿童救助制度的对策和建议.     

试论高觉敷对20世纪中国儿童心理学的贡献

高觉教毛重是我国名的心理学史家，同时他也在儿童心理学领域有着突出的贡献。本就其在译介国外儿童作、撰儿童心理学理论章、从事儿童心理与教育发展的具体研究等方面作一初步介绍一探讨，以肯定一代学术大师对２０世纪中国儿童心理学的巨大贡献。     

Lived citizenship as the locus of political agency in participatory policy

Participatory policies seeking to foster active citizenship continue to be dominated by a territorial imagination. Yet, the world where people identify and perform as citizens is spatially multifarious. This article engages with the tension between territorially grounded perceptions and relational modes of practicing political agency. Studying empirically the Finnish child and youth policies, we address jointly the participatory obligations that municipalities strive to fulfill, and the spatial attachments that children and young people establish in their lived worlds. To this end, we introduce the concept of lived citizenship as an interface where the territorially-bound public administration and the plurality of spatial attachments characteristic to transnational living may meet. We conclude by proposing a re-grounding of lived citizenship in both topological and topographical terms as an improvement in theoretical understanding of mundane political agency and as a step towards more proficient participatory policies.     

Australia's Children ‘Safe and Well’?1 Collaborating with Purpose Across Commonwealth Family Relationship and State Child Protection Systems

So ubiquitous is reference to collaboration in policy documents that it is in danger of being ignored altogether by service deliverers who are not clear about its rationale, how it is built, or its real value. This is evident in the child and family services context where for example the National Framework for Protecting Australia's Children calls for collaboration and a ‘shared responsibility’ across the state, Commonwealth and the non‐government sectors to keep children safe and well. This article describes a project undertaken to analyse and ultimately increase levels of collaboration between state and Commonwealth government family service providers. The research reinforced an important message that levels of collaboration should align with the vulnerability of children and their families: the greater the level of risks to children, the greater the level of collaboration needed within and between systems to keep children safe.