7 - Protecting Children, Creating Citizens

Summary

At the beginning of the journey that became this book, I set out to learn how child protection caseworkers help create the conditions for children's citizenship through their interactions with children, young people and their families. Child protection caseworkers are in a particularly important position to help children and young people who encounter the child protection system achieve citizenship status by promoting their participation. As the ‘street-level bureaucrats’ (Lipsky, 1980) implementing child welfare policy on the frontlines of child protection, the ways in which child protection caseworkers interact with children and young people on a regular basis can promote or stifle children's participation. I have shown here that many of the child protection caseworkers I studied created citizens in their interactions with children and young people while seeking to protect them from harm.

I asked a number of questions. First, given children's growing status, how do the professionals working in child protection agencies empower children by promoting their participation in important decisions when they investigate child maltreatment and provide support services to children and families? A child's genuine participation occurs when children are informed, able to reflect, develop and express their own opinions. Children's opinions and wishes are then considered in the decisions during investigations, removal from home, out-of-home placements, contact with parents, choice of schools, extracurricular activities, and other related decisions. Do professionals give children the opportunity to reflect on what is going on in their lives and develop opinions about what should happen? Do they listen to children's wishes and take them seriously? Which beliefs about children and young people do child protection workers draw on that influence the extent to which they promote children's participation? What are the effects of policy and organizational factors, such as practice guidelines and approaches, on workers’ participatory practices?