In this interview, Dr. Katherine Wade, Professor. Kirsty Horsey, and Dr. Zaina Mahmoud, collectively the team of the project Children’s Voices in Surrogacy Law, provide insights on the project’s aim and activities. The project took place in a regulated surrogacy context currently undergoing reform.

Adoption is essentially a measure to protect the child deprived of a family. It is based upon the best interest of the child and not on the wishes of adults. It consists of providing a family for a child and not of providing a child for a family…Principles seemingly generally accepted. Nonetheless, politics intervene in several aspects of adoption: attitude of certain receiving countries, regulations of certain countries of origin and individual decisions.

«A family for a child, rather than a child for a family». It is a principle easier said than done. How can one switch from the demand of prospective adopters in search of a supply of children «available for adoption» (the vocabulary used is often very indicative), to the supply of prospective adopters who meet the demand of children in need of adoption (psycho-medico-socially and legally «adoptable» children)? Here are a few ideas to explore.

“Recognizing that the child, for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality, should grow up in a family environment… – Recalling that each State should take, as a matter of priority, appropriate measures to enable the child to remain in the care of his or her family of origin – Recognizing that inter- country adoption may offer the advantage of a permanent family to a child for whom a suitable family cannot be found in his or her State of origin.” Extracts from the preambles to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and The Hague Convention of 1993.

Children are waiting …

Millions of children and young people « with special needs » or “who present particularities” reportedly live in family or institutional placements around the world, both in developing countries or those in transition and in the industrialized countries. Too often, no permanency planning has been drawn up for them. Even if adoption is probably not the solution for the adequate permanent protection for each of them, a certain number are psycho-socially and legally adoptable. Many of them, however, do not find an adoptive family.

After ten years’ existence, the IRC is changing its name. It is in no way a change of mandate but the intensification and a more precise rendering of the terms of its activities.

Making it compulsory for prospective adopters to go through the adoption accredited bodies (AAB) of the receiving countries, although not imposed by The Hague Convention of 1993 (THC-1993), constitutes an absolute guarantee for inter-country adoptions between countries, be they members or not of the Convention. These AAB must be approved by the receiving countries (art. 9-11 of THC-1993), and authorised by the country of origin (art. 12).v

Experience shows that the involvement of the adoption accredited bodies of the receiving States in the inter-country adoption process can make a positive contribution to promoting the rights of the child deprived of family, to respecting the principle of subsidiarity of inter-country adoption, as well as providing multidisciplinary support at various stages for the children, the parents of origin and the adopters. The AAB’ mediation thus increases the chances of a successful adoption and serves as an ethical guarantee (see the Editorial in Bulletin 70). Nonetheless, this safeguard is not automatic. Thus, numerous private adoption accredited bodies, sometimes accredited in their own State, have never given serious consideration to what, in their practice, the ethics of the best interests of the child means. Some have been or are accomplices and sometimes protagonists in exerting pressure, in abusing, in violating the rights of the child, or even in trafficking. Furthermore, determining the number and the profile of adoption accredited bodies authorised to collaborate with a State of origin, often takes no account of children’s needs and from the outset becomes a source of competition and pressuring (see the Editorial in Bulletin 65).

Millions of children throughout the world are currently in, or in need of, out-of-home care because their parents are unavailable or unable to care for them. They live with relatives, in foster care, in residential facilities, in child-headed households or in the street. They reside in their own country or are displaced internationally (children placed abroad, separated child asylum seekers or undocumented migrants …). Sometimes, care is provided under conditions that violate their rights: abuse, lack of efforts towards family reunification and/or permanency planning, deprivation of liberty, etc.

For an adequate protection of children separated from their family during natural disasters

The ban on discrimination is a basic principle of the protection of human rights in general and the rights of the child in particular.

The ISS/IRC study on the age of prospective adoptive parents has been brought up to date. A sizeable number of States impose a minimum age but few of them fix a maximum age.

The spirit of The Hague Convention 1993 invites States of origin to collaborate with the number and type of partners in receiving States that best fit the needs of their children.

This article establishes minimum standards: they can surely be improved by good practices in both receiving countries and countries of origin.

Besides preventing the separation of the child from his/her parents, one of today’s great challenges for many countries resides in the development, for each child placed in institution or in a foster family, of an individualized plan for permanent and preferably family life.

One of the difficulties of the adoption process consists of striking a balance between two apparently contradictory aims: on the one hand, the need to take the time to identify the best permanent solution for the child, and on the other hand, the child’s need not to stay too long in the uncertainty of a provisional solution (institution or foster family).

While some children are certainly “trafficked for the purpose of adoption”, there is no evidence, as far as we know, that children have been “trafficked through adoption for subsequent exploitation.”

A State giving preference to simple adoption or to full adoption is certainly linked to its cultural concept of the family and thus raises ethical questions when it comes to recognising intercountry adoptions.

At the start of a series of three editorials devoted to the post-adoption period, the IRC presents the issue of professional support during the first moments of the adoptee’s life together with his new family.

During the post-adoption period, the child and the adoptive family may need professional support, as explained in our previous editorial. Concurrently, another step of a different nature aims at monitoring the welfare of the internationally adopted child for the information of the State of origin.

This editorial is the third of a series devoted to the post-adoption period. In the previous two editorials, we presented the issue of professional support in the first moments of the adoptee’s life together with his/her new family, and addressed the question of follow-up reports required by the States of origin. Given the complexity of the search for origins, it will be addressed in two parts: the first one presents the theoretical aspects of the issue whilst the last editorial will be dedicated to the implementation of this specific aspect of adoption.

Having presented the different points of view on the right to know one’s origins, we address, in this last editorial on post-adoption, some practical aspects of the implementation of the search for origins.

When people living outside their country of origin adopt a child from this same country, it frequently happens that national regulations are inconsistent with those at the international level, particularly the Hague Convention of 1993 (HC-1993). If the responses vary according to the situation, the best interests of the child, here too, should be the primary consideration.

If full adoption continues to be the most widely followed approach when it comes to placing a child in a new family on a permanent basis, one wonders if this choice is always the one that best safeguards the rights of the various persons involved, and particularly those of the biological parents. Through the few examples presented below, we have intended to open a debate on the place of full adoption in the future.

A decisive step towards the adoption of the United Nations Guidelines for the Protection and Alternative Care of Children without Parental Care.

Developments in intercountry adoption and its implementation in countries of origin may sometimes share similarities with development programmes, thus creating a new dynamic whilst also raising important issues. Although conventional texts highlight the need for genuine cooperation among countries, the meaning and the scope of the latter still remain to be defined in a context which experiences constant change.

In order to better disseminate the ethical principles, which govern intercountry adoption and, thus, to rectify the biased news coverage of adoption in general, and even more so when celebrities are adopting, it would be useful for adoption professionals to appear more in the media.

Stays abroad are often at the root of adoption procedures, which soon become particularly complex, since they fall outside any legal framework. Emotions often obscure the legal principles yet designed to protect children. The following is an overview of adoption on holiday…

Initial statistics for the year 2006 reflect a tendency towards a decrease in the number of intercountry adoptions. This slowdown, however, raises a number of questions, in relation both, to its possible causes and to its possible long–term consequences.

Although countries of origin increasingly take more steps to protect themselves against the pressure from receiving countries, which “lack children”, the latter must now find the means of better managing the flow of their prospective adoptive parents.

As part of a joint UNICEF-ISS project, the Monthly Review will include a series of articles on the protection of the best interests and the rights of unaccompanied children.

Whilst in receiving countries, there is great concern about information relating to the health, psychological state of the child and his/her possible background, the same occurs in countries of origin in relation to the criteria of evaluation of prospective adoptive parents.