Child welfare policy, aside from its heavy regulation and bureaucratic nature, has been significantly influenced by progressive revisions that prioritize “luxury beliefs" benefiting the privileged few while imposing costs on those directly affected by these policies. Sadly, it's often the children who bear the brunt of such policies.
The children who wind up suffering under particular policies are paying the real price.
Two prominent liberal foundations Casey Family Programs and the Edna McConnel Clark Foundation have played pivotal roles in shaping and disseminating these policies.
These policies practiced today include “intensive family preservation services” and “differential response” which are discretionary treatment methods for child maltreatment and neglect.
James G. Dwyer, himself a liberal academic, has stated that the “sole measure of success, has been ensuring as many children as possible are in the custody of their biological parents.”
However, the skewed incentives embedded within these policies serve to otherwise reward neglectful behavior, as evidenced by the array of benefits bestowed upon errant parents such as professional therapy, food, and shelter.
The beneficiaries are not the children languishing under neglect, but rather a coterie of licensed therapists, bureaucrats, and advocacy groups who profit handsomely from the continued perpetuation of these programs.
Take, for example, Dr. William C. Bell, the President and CEO of Casey Family Programs.
A decorated and revered advocate for child welfare programs amongst the black elite, who promotes pathways for philanthropy towards the disproportional lot of black children in the foster care system.
This is a man, who amongst his peers, is a leader for preventing the destruction of the black family when CPS workers are “too quick” to remove children from parental care.
A 990 filing for FY 2022 reports that Dr. William C. Bell was compensated $1,202,688 from Casey Family Programs on top of an additional $55,600 reported as other compensation.
Dr. Bell’s noble endeavors are juxtaposed against a compensation package exceeding $1 million. Such figures beg the question: Where does the line blur between altruism and vested interests?
Sociologist Richard Gelles, in his work “The Book of David: How Preserving Families Can Cost Children's Lives” traced the origin of family preservation policies back to the 1990s. Here he notes that again Casey Family Programs, along with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Children’s Defense Fund, and the Edna McConnel Clark Foundation all pushed for these policies as a “cost-effective way” to keep children out of foster care.
No mention at all was made that these policies would actually improve child well-being.
To quote Gelles, “State and local agency heads, legislators and legislative aides, governors and presidential administrations were told about the unqualified successes of family preservation and the tremendous cost savings. The skeptics and other critics were either unknown or cast as merely academic gadflies.”
Luxury beliefs, as described by Rob Henderson, are entrenched status symbols that people are reluctant to relinquish.
I would add by saying that when we are able to internalize or experience the costs in our decision making, we are incentivized to either forego or alter our future behavior. Insofar as when that feedback mechanism is absent or distorted, we will otherwise make decisions that in our private lives would never have sought out to begin with.
Elites will otherwise espouse or hold luxury beliefs like “abolishing the police,” or “the legalizing of all drugs,” or that “monogamy and marriage is dated.” But when you peer into their private lives, namely the institutions that emerge in the upper class, the norm is high securitization, two-parent households, and if they indulge at all in drugs their resources for therapy and a stable household typically does not result in their lives having to spiral out of control.
The same is true also for child welfare, that while it is laudable for reducing the quantity of children in the foster care system and to get rid of Child Protective Services all together, the actual parent’s decisions to prioritize their well-being over their neglected child or children is seldom scrutinized or considered.
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