Children’s Rights to Participate in Out-Of-Home Care: International Social Work Contexts

For centuries, residential child and youth care systems worldwide have provided homes for vulnerable children and adolescents. The implementation of children’s rights, especially the right of participation, is assessed as an important base for promoting the best interests of the child in an out-of-home care environment.

Featuring contributions from distinguished international authors, this volume offers an in-depth understanding of crucial participation processes and underlying power structures when involving young people in decision-making about their care and everyday life in different out-of-home care institutions. Contributions cover a broad spectrum of current research findings concerning the participation of young people in foster families and residential living groups in Australia, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland as well as cross-nationals perspective on children and young people’s participation in foster and residential care placements in Great Britain and France.

The volume fills major gaps concerning the participation of young people in different out-of-home care and policy settings and will be required reading for policymakers, researchers, practitioners, scholars, and students interested in increasing opportunities for young people’s participation and creating better out-of-home care settings for vulnerable young people.

Claudia Equit, PhD, is a professor of social pedagogy at the Leuphana university Lueneburg, Germany. She is involved in several research projects in the field of alternative care and children´s rights. She is the founder of the International Network ＂Participation of looked after children and adolescents in child welfare＂ associated with EUSARF. She can be reached at claudia.equit@leuphana.de

Jade Purtell is a multidisciplinary researcher and practitioner focused on out-of-home care and transitions from care experiences and youth participation in policy-making processes. Jade is currently managing the Peer Worker models for transitions from care project at Monash University and undertaking her PhD in care leaver early parenting. She can be reached at jade.purtell@monash.edu