ANU - Community Capacity Building in Child Protection Projects

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	Community Capacity Building in Child Protection Projects Regulatory Institutions Network

Capacity building is a key goal for child protection services. Child protection workers need to build the capacity of parents to care for their children, the capacity of communities to support families, and the capacity of young people to look after themselves. However, these aims are often undermined by a range of factors. These include:

Child protection intervention often occurs in contexts where there is limited knowledge about the extent of the problem and where what is considered acceptable parenting is contestable.

Interventions are often perceived as threatening by families and sometimes as unjust, which can affect the degree to which trust and cooperation are developed.

Substantial increases in reporting rates mean that services often struggle to identify which cases require the most attention and cope with mounting caseloads.

Intense scrutiny and criticism often means that child protection services need to justify every decision they make, meaning that risk assessment procedures and child protection laws are often relied upon to justify interventions rather than providing frameworks for best practice.

These projects draw on various theories of responsive regulation, empowerment, restorative justice, shame management and defiance, and hope to explore how institutions can overcome these challenges in order to build the capacity of parents, communities and young people.

News & recent Events

Building Capacity in Indigenous Child Protection
Mary Ivec presented "Building Capacity in Indigenous Child Protection" at the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA) Social Policy Research Workshop (December 2008).

Governing Beyond Command and Control: A Responsive and Nodal Approach to Child Protection
Nathan Harris and Jennifer Wood published Governing Beyond Command and Control: A Responsive and Nodal Approach to Child Protection in Mathieu Deflem's book Surveillance and Governanace: Crime Control and Beyond (Emerald Publishing, Bingley, UK: 2008).

Australian Institute of Social Workers Professional Development Seminar
Mary Ivec presented "Restorative Justice, Regulatory Theory and Research and its Relevance to Social Work Practice and Social Welfare Policy" at a seminar series co-sponsored by the Australian Association of Social Workers and the Australian Catholic University (June 2008).

More News and Events