| Abstract: | This paper locates the adoption services in England and Wales within the wider context of children's services, and examines the reasons why adoption, during the 1970s and 1980s, achieved a position at the pinnacle of the available child placement options. The central claim is that adoption survives today as an artifact of a philosophy of permanence that the new Children Act of 1989 sought to abandon, so that it is now divorced, practically and ideologically, from other child welfare services. As a result there is a pressing need, it is argued, for adoption to be integrated into a range of children's services that are founded on collaborative working and partnership. The current review of adoption law in England and Wales seems poised, however, to preserve adoption as a placement system that is fundamentally out of step with other initiatives for consumer-led child welfare services. In conclusion, the paper considers the implications that this twin-track approach holds for services to children and their families. |
