The Beginnings of Child Protection Systems
To understand just how far we have come in our approach to child safety, it is helpful to look back at the foundation of our current system.
Our national child protection system emerged from the 1960s, the same decade that Casey Family Programs was founded, based largely in response to the work of Dr. C. Henry Kempe, a physician who coined the term “battered child syndrome” in 1962 to describe injuries caused by child abuse and neglect. His work influenced policymakers and led to all states creating mandatory reporting laws and child protection systems.
But these systems were all built to respond after a child was harmed, and they frequently relied on removing children from their families and placing them in foster care. Over time, the number of children under 18 in foster care ballooned, reaching a peak in 1999 of 543,000 — roughly the population of Fresno, California, or more than the number of students in the entire Los Angeles Unified School District today.
Removing children from their families has remained the primary response to suspected abuse and neglect across this country, in part due to the belief that children couldn’t be safe in an environment where they had been maltreated before. And historically, removal was tied to federal funding — the federal government generally provided the most significant level of funding support to states after children were removed from their homes.
Has this approach improved safety for children? This is a critically important question to answer as we continue efforts to ensure all children grow up safe and strong.
In general, safety can be defined as freedom from abuse or neglect. But across the country, individual states have varying definitions of what constitutes neglect. Safety also can be described as feeling safe, having a permanent family and a connection to one’s community and culture.