Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to attend the bi-annual Wicked Problems Institute alongside leaders from child welfare agencies, foundations, Children’s Home Society of America member organizations, and other stakeholders from across the country. The two-day convening used the social ecological model framework to explore how states and communities can better ensure clear pathways to support families. There was excellent content throughout, including from Dr. Robert Sege on the Health Outcomes from Positive Experience (HOPE) framework.
The importance of relationships was a consistent theme across sessions, focusing on connection, belonging, and the centrality of family. These same concepts come up in conversations across the political spectrum and programmatic silos, though sometimes different stakeholders use different terms to express similar concepts. Whether individuals spoke about social capital, belonging, relational connection, or sundry other terms, they embrace and elevate the value of relationships. That’s encouraging.
In discussions about the well-being of children and families at risk of entering the child welfare system, we spend a great deal of time on what is needed: meaningful connection and how to foster it; building relational skills; and creating conditions where connection can take root. These what and how conversations are key, but stakeholders spend far less time on who is responsible for doing that work. There’s a need to carefully consider the following:
- Who is best positioned to build and sustain those relationships?
- Who should create the conditions that allow them to flourish?
- Who should fund this work, and who should be accountable for the outcomes?
These questions can feel bureaucratic and impersonal, seemingly at-odds with the deeply personal subject matter. But in the context of policy and public systems, these questions must be answered.
Public agencies play an essential role in the lives of children and families. But their role is not the same as that of family, community, or other trusted relationships, nor should it be. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. put it, “Law cannot make a man love me, but it can restrain him from lynching me.” Systems can create safety and structure, but they cannot generate the kinds of relationships that ultimately sustain people.
Even at its best, the state is not family, and it doesn’t need to be.
Fundamentally, governmental child welfare agencies serve a safety function. Child welfare is designed to intervene when there is risk of harm, not to serve as the primary vehicle for promoting well-being broadly. Well-being more appropriately sits with public health and other community-based systems. Parents and families consistently say they don’t want to seek support from the same agency that has the authority to remove their children. Being clear about the ‘who’ deeply matters to families.
Every stakeholder wants to ensure that children and families have the relationships and supports they need to navigate challenges and thrive. But the shared goal does not imply identical roles.
State agencies, service providers, funders, community leaders, and faith communities each bring distinct capabilities and limitations. The challenge going forward requires clarity about each role: to understand where each stakeholder is best positioned to lead, where they are best positioned to support, and the instances in which they should step back.
Reformers and stakeholders risk talking past one another until they get clearer on the ‘who’: who builds relationships, who enables them, and who sustains them. This leaves critical work undone or misassigned in ways that ultimately harm children and families.