In this article, Ronny Flynn explores the current position on placing white children with black or white carers. She goes on to examine how a skills-based approach can improve the options for both white minority ethnic children and white majority ethnic children. How this approach relates to the debate on ‘same-race’ or ‘transracial’ placements for black children is explicit throughout. The author concludes by discussing some of the anxieties that may be raised by this proposal to consider black carers for white children if the skills of the carers meet the needs of the children.
Association of Black Social Workers and Allied Professions (ABSWAP), Black Children in Care: Evidence to the House of Commons Social Services Committee, London: ABSWAP, 1983a.
2.
ABSWAP, Give the Black Child a Chance, First national conference on black children in care, London, 1983b.
3.
AhmedSCheethamJSmallJ (eds), Social Work with Black Children and their Families, London: BAAF/Batsford, 1986.
4.
BanksN, ‘Direct identity work’, in BarnR (ed), Working with Black Children and Adolescents in Need, London: BAAF, 1999.
5.
BarnR, Black Children in the Public Care System, London: BAAF, 1993.
6.
BarnRSinclairRFerdinandD, Acting on Principle, London: BAAF/CRE, 1997.
7.
BarnR, ‘Race, ethnicity and foster care: meeting the needs of minority ethnic children’, in BAAF (ed), Exchanging Visions: Papers on best practice in Europe for children separated from their birth parents, London: BAAF, 1998.
8.
BarnR (ed), Working with Black Children and Adolescents in Need, London: BAAF, 1999.
9.
BrahAHickmanMMac an GhaillM (eds), Thinking Identities: Ethnicity, racism and culture, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1999.
10.
BrahA, ‘Difference, diversity and differentiation’, in DonaldJRattansiA (eds), ‘Race’, Culture and Difference, London: Sage, 1992.
11.
ButtJMirzaK, Social Care and Black Communities, London: HMSO, 1996.
12.
CharlesMRashidSThoburnJ, ‘The placement of black children with permanent new families’, Adoption & Fostering16:3, pp 13–19, 1992.
13.
CheethamJ (ed), Social Work and Ethnicity, London: George Allen & Unwin, 1982.
CrossW, Shades of Black Diversity in African-American Identity, Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1991.
16.
Department of Health, Quality Protects, London: The Stationery Office, 1998.
17.
DivineD, articles in The Caribbean Times, 18 and 25 March, 1983, references in Rhodes P, below.
18.
GilroyP, ‘The end of anti-racism’, in DonaldJRattansiA (eds), ‘Race’, Culture and Difference, see Brah above, 1992.
19.
GilroyP, ‘The peculiarities of the black English’, in GilroyP (ed), Small Acts, London: Serpents Tail, 1993.
20.
HallS, ‘New ethnicities’, in DonaldJRattansiA (eds), ‘Race’, Culture and Difference, see Brah above, 1992.
21.
HaskeyJ, ‘Population review’, Population Trends, London: Office of National Statistics, Summer 1997.
22.
InceL, Making it Alone: A study of the care experiences of young black people, London: BAAF, 1998.
23.
MaceyM, ‘Same-race placement policies — anti-racism or racism?’, Journal of Social Policy24:4, pp 473–91, 1995.
24.
MacphersonW, The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry, London: The Home Office, 1999.
25.
MaximéJ, ‘The importance of racial identity for the psychological well-being of black children’, ACPP Review and Newsletter15:4, 1993.
26.
National Foster Care Association, Payment for Skills, Making it Work paper, London: NFCA, 1993.
27.
National Foster Care Association/National Extension College, Caring for Children and Young People, Cambridge: NEC, 1999.
28.
National Foster Care Association, National Standards for Foster Care, London: NFCA, 1999.
29.
National Foster Care Association (forthcoming materials on the assessment of foster carers).
30.
PhoenixA, ‘ “Sensitive” to “race” and ethnicity? The intersection of social work, psychology and politics in transracial adoption practice’, in MesserDJonesF, Psychology and Social Care, London: Jessica Kingsley, 1999.
31.
RhodesP, ‘Racial Matching’ in Fostering, Aldershot: Avebury, 1992.
32.
RoweJHundlebyMGarnettL, Child Care Now, London: BAAF, 1989.
