Child Welfare Systems and Migrant Children. A Cross Country Study of Policies and Practices / Sistemas de Bienestar Infantil y menores inmigrantes. Un estudio internacional transversal a través de Políticas y Prácticas

Abstract

With the increase of migration, the share of the population that needs some form of assistance has increased. Almost everywhere, the number of children who need protection (within the family, away from the family, and even those without family) has increased. The trouble is that often the systems designed to protect children do not intercept migrant children, not even those who are unaccompanied and without documents, who instead come under the jurisdiction of the agencies that deal with immigration. The migratory phenomena put a strain on the welfare systems, mainly because the principles of protection and assistance present in the Welfare system, which are inspired by human rights and social justice, come into conflict with the laws that regulate immigration, which are generally aimed at restricting it. The book Child Welfare Systems and Migrant Children. A Cross Country Study of Policies and Practices, edit by Marit Skivenes, Ravinder Barn, Katrin Kriz and Tarja Poso, and published by Oxford University Press for the School of Public Policy, University of Maryland, addresses these questions by reviewing the welfare systems of a number of countries in a worldwide perspective. It also offers an overview of the current legislation on welfare and immigration in eleven countries, of how welfare systems deal with the problems of families and migrant children, illustrates the training of social workers and provides criteria for assessing the adequacy of their education with regard to the problems of immigrants.