An important new study estimates the chances of children encountering the family police (a more accurate term than “child protective services”) during their childhoods. I first learned about the study when Prof. Robert Latham, Associate Director of the Children & Youth Law Clinic at the University of Miami linked to it on his excellent blog.
The study measures the likelihood of being subjected to a child abuse investigation, the likelihood of being forced into foster care and the likelihood children will have their parents taken from them forever, through termination of parental rights.
The study illustrates the horrifying ubiquity of family policing. We have a full discussion of the findingson this blog here. This is a Harper’s-style index of some of the study findings:
THE NCCPR INDEX OF FAMILY POLICE
OPPRESSION
13 – The percentage of Native American children in Minnesota whose parents will be taken from them forever.
14 – The percentage of Black children in West Virginia whose parents will be taken from them forever.
15 – The percentage of Hispanic children in Maine whose parents will be taken from them forever.
28 – The percentage of Hispanic children in Maine who will be forced into foster care at some point during their childhoods.
32 – The percentage of Black children in West Virginia who will be forced into foster care at some point during their childhoods.
47 – The percentage of Native American children in Minnesota who will be forced into foster care at some point during their childhoods.
54 –
The percentage of white children in Indiana who will be subjected to the
trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
54 – The percentage of Hispanic children in Indiana who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
64 -- The percentage of Native American children in Minnesota who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
67 – The percentage of Black children in Arizona who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
73 – The percentage of Native Alaska children who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
73 – The percentage of Black children in Kentucky who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
74 – The percentage of Black children in Montana who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
79 – The percentage of Black children in Indiana who will be subjected to the trauma of a child abuse investigation at some point during their childhoods.
Source: Youngmin Yi, Frank Edwards et. al., State-level variation in the cumulative prevalence of child welfare system contact, 2015 – 2019 (Children and Youth Services Review 147 (2023)
