Book review of Neil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, Eds. (2011). Child Protection Systems: International Trends and Orientations. New York: Oxford University Press, $55.00 (hardcover)

Noble, Dorinda N.

English

ScholarWorks at WMU

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare Volume 38 Issue 4 December Article 12 2011 Review of Child Protection Systems: International Trends and Orientations. Neil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, (Eds.). Reviewed by Dorinda N. Noble. Dorinda N. Noble Texas State University, San Marco Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/jssw  Part of the Social Work Commons Recommended Citation Noble, Dorinda N. (2011) "Review of Child Protection Systems: International Trends and Orientations. Neil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, (Eds.). Reviewed by Dorinda N. Noble.," The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare: Vol. 38 : Iss. 4 , Article 12. Available at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/jssw/vol38/iss4/12 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Social Work at ScholarWorks at WMU. For more information, please contact maira.bundza@wmich.edu. Journal of Sociology & Social Welfarechapters do comment on the immediate effects of financial col-lapse and recession. What the authors are unable to commenton is the longer-term impacts of these phenomena. The bookprovides an excellent baseline for another study on thosethemes. Now more than ever, researchers and scholars needto work as advocates in social policy; Dr. Goldberg's careerof solid work in this area is an excellent example for youngscholars.Jennifer R. Zelnick, Touro College Graduate School of SocialWorkNeil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, Eds. (2011). ChildProtection Systems: International Trends and Orientations.New York: Oxford University Press, $55.00 (hardcover).Child Protection Systems is a well-written, thought-provok-ing work that updates Combatting Child Abuse: InternationalPerspectives and Trends (1997, N. Gilbert, Ed.). Child ProtectionSystems tracks changes over the last 10-15 years to the child pro-tection systems of the U.S., Canada, England, Sweden, Finland,Denmark, Norway, Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands.All these nations have expanded their child protection systems,both in scope and in cost. Despite each system's unique char-acter, all have been influenced by globalization, capital andlabor mobility, and economic interdependence among nations.Furthermore, all are touched by growing neo-liberal attitudes,which increasingly reject the collective "welfare state" idea infavor of the stance that individuals must be self-reliant, ap-proaching their lives as a "do-it-yourself" project. Almost allten countries have dealt with gripping cases that provokedmedia and public outcry, and generated new or refined childprotection laws. The editors assert that data related to out-of-home placements from the various nations are hard tocompare because of differences in the way they are collectedand assessed, as well as because of differences in how theyvariously define common terms. That said, the trend in out-of-home placements generally appears to be moving up. With theexception of the U.S., all these nations have adopted and areinfluenced by the U.N. Convention of the Rights of the Child.176Gilbert's 1997 edited book identified two primaryorientations of child protection: child protection (exemplifiedin the U.S., Canada, and England), and family service (notablydemonstrated in Denmark and the Netherlands). The child pro-tection attitude views child abuse as deviant acts from whichchildren must be protected; responses tend to be legalistic andadversarial. The family service orientation identifies abuse as aproblem of family dysfunction which is best addressed by helpand support in partnership with the family. In this volume, theeditors added a third pattern to child protection systems: thechild-focused orientation, which sees the child as an individ-ual with a relationship to the state. Hence, the approach maybe opposed to the parents. This orientation is concerned withthe child's total well-being. Child-focused elements are emerg-ing in policies of all the countries studied, such as in Finland,which is creating a "child-friendly" society. Also shaping allthese nations' child policies is the idea that a nation is stra-tegically wise to "invest" in its children so that they will behealthy, educated, and prepared to assume the nation's socialand economic challenges.In each nation's system, social workers are important.Norway, for instance, mandates specific education for child pro-tection workers, many of whom are social workers. Because ofmedia attention on high-profile abuse cases, a child-death casemay expose the child protection employee to professional andsocial problems. Child protection systems in all ten nations arebecoming more bureaucratized and more dependent on stan-dardized tools. All these issues may discourage child protec-tion workers and cause them to leave the field.With the exception of Denmark, foster care is the mostpreferred alternative placement. Because Denmark and otherNordic countries tend to use out-of-home placements for trou-bled teenagers, the use of creative residential placements (suchas those providing transition services for teens approach-ing adulthood) is more accepted than in the U.S. (In fact, thechapter on the U.S. system did not address residential care.)While the U.S. and England encourage adoption as an alterna-tive, adoption is not used often in the other countries, and it isnot allowed in Finland.This book is an excellent tool for graduate students andprofessionals to compare and contrast child protection systems,Book Reviews 177Journal of Sociology & Social Welfarehow those systems reflect a society's history and culturalthinking, and how systems address the world-wide problemof child abuse and neglect.Dorinda N. Noble, School of Social WorkTexas State University-San MarcoTony Judt (2010). Ill Fares the Land. New York: The PenguinPress, $25.95 (hardcover), $15 (paperback).Written as a critique of contemporary Western politics andeconomies as well as a call to revisit the social welfare commit-ments of the post World War II period in Europe and the UnitedStates, Tony Judt wrote the essays in this book as he was para-lyzed and dying of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS); he diedin August, 2010 at the age of 61. Widely acknowledged as theleading historian of 20th century European history, Judt wasalso a social and political critic whose essays were frequentlypublished in The New York Review of Books and other journalsboth in the U.S. and Britain, where he was born, studied andtaught before assuming an endowed position at NYU.The title of the book is taken from a 1770 poem by OliverGoldsmith: "Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,/Wherewealth accumulates, and men decay." Judt details the severalways in which contemporary Western societies have experi-enced a decline in economic and social well-being as a conse-quence of having abandoned the vigorous economic and polit-ical commitments to the welfare state at mid-20th century. Theerosion of good jobs, beginning in the 1970s, combined withchanges in tax policies that favor the wealthy, has had dire con-sequences for sustaining welfare state programs that, amongother things, reduced inequality and strengthened the socialcontract among the citizenry. Growing inequality is singledout as the most serious contemporary problem (p. 184). Thesedevelopments are most acute in the U.S. and Britain and esca-lated under and following the Reagan and Thatcher regimes,but the populace in continental Europe, he suggested (clair-voyantly, considering the current economic difficulties there),was not well served by the advent of the European Union.Judt begins each essay with a quote, many taken from178

Review of \u3cem\u3eChild Protection Systems: International Trends and Orientations.\u3c/em\u3e Neil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, (Eds.). Reviewed by Dorinda N. Noble.

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Review of \u3cem\u3eChild Protection Systems: International Trends and Orientations.\u3c/em\u3e Neil Gilbert, Nigel Parton, & Marit Skivenes, (Eds.). Reviewed by Dorinda N. Noble.

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