Transcript iriss-cccs-s4-2-mark-creekmore-2008-09

Accountability and practical
change in child welfare:
Beyond professionalism
Mark Creekmore ([email protected])
Getting it Right for Every Child: Childhood, Citizenship and
Children’s Services
Glasgow, Scotland
September 23, 2008
Miss Jane Addams, “The child at
the point of greatest pressure”

“… it is well so far as it goes, but it is not after all sufficient”
to save children from dying or to protect them from harm.
What is “… the next step, the one beyond the mere
negative salvation of human life?”

If we look at children under greatest pressure “… we will
discover the beginnings of new life, something more
positive, much more beautiful, much more all-embracing
than anything we have yet dealt with, because our minds
are fixed only upon preservation.”

“And there is that wonderful life in the children of the most
crowded quarter, living under the most untoward conditions
which will sweep away our little attempts at charity and
correction if we will but give them opportunity to grow and
adapt themselves to the particular point of the city in which
they find themselves at the present moment.”
39th annual session of the Proceedings of the National Conference of Charities and Corrections,1912
Three stresses in child welfare in the US
leading to change
 Formal incorporation of child and
parent perspectives into the CWS:
“Nothing about me without me?”
 Constraints on professional decision
making to correct excesses systemwide
 Separate and parallel systems for
acute and chronic cases
Three (sometimes)
competing goals
 Individual and social (group) rights
 Change (growth, treatment and
recovery)
 Protection
Child and parent perspectives in CWSs:
“Nothing about me without me?”
 About me without me: the sources of
information and the objects of change
 Nonprofessional volunteers as mediators,
advocates and change makers
 Surrogates for recipients of services
 CASA
 FC review boards
 Alumni associations (The Chafee Program)
 Research
 Direct participation. Case management,
permanency plans and self-help movements
Constraints on professional decision
making




Class action lawsuits
Evidence based practice
Structured decision making
Quality assurance methods
Separate and parallel systems for
acute and chronic cases
 Special docket courts, problemsolving courts and therapeutic
jurisprudence.
 Acute conditions and stages:
dependency caused by the acute
condition, regression of one’s
capacities and recovery after getting
assistance from others, typically
professionals
Chronic conditions and coerced
treatment
 Community courts, mental health courts,
domestic violence courts, reentry courts
and substance abuse (drug) courts
 Elements
 Chronic problems that cause (usually minor)
criminal activity
 Voluntary admission based on exchange
 Violation of court orders
 Recovery (relapse) model
System stresses and balance
 Are we any closer to Addams’s
ecological view?
 What roles do professions play in
post-modern organizations?
 How have Scotland and the US
resolved these conflicts differently?