IMPROVING ASIAN CHILDREN’S RIGHTS TO LIVE WITHIN THEIR FAMILY OR AN
ALTERNATIVE FAMILY:
FOSTERING & ADOPTION
アジアの子どもが家庭や代替家庭に住む権利の拡大
（養子・里子養育）
IMPROVING
ASIAN CHILDREN’S RIGHTS TO LIVE WITHIN THEIR
FAMILY
OR AN ALTERNATIVE FAMILY: FOSTERING & ADOPTION
パク・ユンソク
韓国里子養育父母協会（韓国里親会）KFCA
創設者・前（初代）会長
在ソウル・オーストラリア大使館外交部長
Founder
of Korean Foster Care Association & Director,
Public
Diplomacy Australian Embassy
1.
Why fostering is important in
The
situation for children looked after by local authorities has changed
significantly in the last three decades in the
The
cultural changes have been enshrined in law, with the biggest watersheds being
the Children Act of 1989 and the Utting Report of
1997 in the
Foster
care provides services for children to improve social worker training. It
is a way of providing a family life for children who cannot live with their own
parents. Foster care is to provide temporary care while parents get help
sorting out problems, or to help children or young people through a difficult
period in their lives. Children will return home once the problems that caused
them to come into foster care have been resolved and it is clear that their
parents are able to look after them safely. Others may stay in long-term foster
care, some may be adopted, and others will move on to live independently. The best interest of
children is to live within their family of origin, an alternative family should
be found which can provide continuous care, stability and life-long commitment.
From Wikipedia,
the definition of foster care is a system by which adults care for
minor children
who are not able to live with their biological parents.
In the
2. Recent changes in policies and numbers of fostering
& adoption
1) In the United States,
fostering is the main care for “looked after” children with more than 600,000
children in foster care. Foster home licensing requirements vary from state to
state but are generally overseen by the state's Department of "Social
Services" or "Human Services". .In many states,
children, unable to function in a foster home, usually due to behavioral
problems stemming from child abuse and neglect, are placed in
Residential Treatment Facilities (RTFs) or other such
group homes meant to treat children with similar backgrounds. The focus of
treatment in such facilities is to prepare the child for a return to a foster
home, to an adoptive home, or to the biological parents when applicable.
However, adoption of children who are considered a special need in foster care
is an ongoing social problem within the United States often due to the lack of
funding that could pay to train foster parents to appropriately care for
children with special needs.
Due to behavioral problems, family suitability, care
availability, and other issues, the majority of foster care children move
multiple times during their stay in state-mandated care. Most foster care
children move between care families seven times during their entire stay in the
system. Foster care children in some states face even more instability. In
California, for example, one in ten foster care children move five or more
times every single year.
Aging-Out" of Foster Care Nearly 20,000 foster care
teens "age-out" of the foster care system each year. Many of these
young adults lack the support and life skills necessary to live on their own.
Foster care studies have shown that in just four years after leaving foster
care, 25 percent of "aged-out" youth have been homeless, 42 percent
have become parents themselves, fewer than 20 percent are able to support
themselves, and only 46 percent have graduated from high school. “Aged-out”
foster care youth are at high risk for substance abuse, domestic violence and
poverty.
Recent United States Foster Care Legislation. On November
19, 1997, President Bill Clinton signed a new foster care law (The
Adoption and Safe Families Act 1997) which dramatically reduced the time
children are allowed to remain in foster care before being available for adoption.
The new law requires state child welfare agencies to identify cases where
"aggravated circumstances" make permanent separation of child from biological
family the best option for the safety and well-being of the child. One of the
main components of The Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA) is the imposition
of time limits on reunification efforts. In the past, it was common for
children to languish in care for years with no permanent living situation
identified. They often were moved from placement to placement with no real plan
for a permanent home. ASFA requires that state identify a permanent plan for
children who enter foster care. [2]
2) In the
Children
in public care in
60,900
children were in the care of local authorities on
1) Gender: 55% (33,700) of children looked after on 31st March 2005 were boys and
45% (27,200) were girls 2) Age: 5% (2,800) of children looked after on
31st March 2005 were under 1 year old; 14% (8,700) were aged between 1 and 4
years old; 20% (12,100) were aged between 5 and 9 years old; 44%
(26,500) were aged between 10 and 15 years old; 18% (10,800) were aged 16 and
over
3) Placements: 68% (41,700) were living with foster careers; 11% (7,000)
of children looked after on 31st March 2005 were living in children's homes; 9%
(5,700) were living with their parents; 5% (3,100) were placed for adoption;
5.5% (3,300) were in other placements such as residential schools, lodgings and
other residential settings 4) Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking
Children:
2,900 unaccompanied asylum seeking children were looked after on 31st March
2005; 70% (2000) were boys and 30% (880) were girls. 5) Adoption Orders:
Figures on adoption orders apply to adoptions by relatives and step-parents as
well as adoptions from care: 5,680 adoption orders were made in
At
New Adoption and Children Act
2002 implemented. The Quality Protects initiative in
The evolution of adoption law is an engrossing topic.
3. Korean fostering situation must be improved financially
1) Majority of “looked after” children is still in institutions in
Local government welfare workers need better training
because they remain restricted by a mindset that prioritizes placing vulnerable
children in institutions over private care, said a leading advocate for foster
homes. Despite amendments made in recent years to the Child Welfare Act that
acknowledged the importance of placing children in family settings, social
workers continue to place them in large institutions. When city social workers
find a child in need of welfare they automatically give these children to orphanages.
The government has to change the thinking of social workers so that children
are placed according to the individual needs of each child.
Over the last five years the number of children going
into foster care has increased. In 2004 there were 10 198 foster children,
compared to 1,722 in 2000. At the same time the number of children in orphanages
has also increased, with 17,675 children in institutional care in 2004,
compared to 17,342 children in 2002. It is hard to overcome the influence of
orphanages in Korean society, which were originally set up to take care of
children displaced after the Korean War. Most people have little knowledge of
The government has seen problems rising from
collective care, but there are difficulties in locating substantial funds for
the care of children in facilities. So the government has been reluctant to
move into more individualized programs for children. In 2005, the Ministry of
Health and Welfare transferred the jurisdiction of child welfare matters to
local governments. The lack of a uniform policy means there is inconsistency in
the degree of attention given to the issue. Local governments must have the
will to pay attention to child welfare. Because of that, the attention given to
child welfare can vary. Some programs may be demolished; some programs provided
may be of poor quality. Moreover, without financial assistance from the central
administration, local governments are struggling to come up with funds to
sustain individualized care programs. Localization requires an assumption that
local governments have financial independence. That can be feasible in
2).
The nation’s
birthrate has fallen to a record low as married couples face mounting childcare
costs and other financial burdens. The South Korean National Statistical Office
announced in May 2006 the total fertility rate tumbled to 1.08, down from the
previous lowest of 1.16 recorded in 2004. This is the lowest birthrate in the
history and the lowest in the world. The number of newborn babies also dropped
nearly 8 percent to 438,000 from a year ago, according to the statistical data.
With no substantial pickup in the birthrate over the short term, demographers
estimate the aged population over 65 will have make up 20 percent of the
population by 2026. In a desperate effort to tackle the nation’s twin problems
of a declining birth rate and an aging population, the government in May 2006
announced a comprehensive policy that includes pouring 10 trillion won ($11
billion) into childcare subsidies. This is the first time
The state plans to
boost the number of after-school classes in an attempt to relieve the burden on
parents of costly private education fees. The cost of childcare and education
is considered the main reason for couples to avoid having babies in
3) Women reject
motherhood in
According to the
office, the average age for women’s first marriage was 27.7 last year, up from
26.5 in 2000 and 24.8 in 1990. As
many couples abandon thoughts of having children because of soaring education
and childcare costs, the government allocated a bigger share of the budget to
fund the welfare measures. As part of efforts to address the population
problem, about 30.5 trillion won ($31 billion) will be spent over the next five
years to strengthen the country’s social safety net. Budget planners expect to
channel the money into the expansion of day care services and preschool
education for infants and improving childcare facilities. Korean women are
abandoning all hope for having children mainly because they find it hard to be
society’s ideal mother who excels at work and at home, the author of the report
said.
In
1 in 3 married women rejects motherhood 2006-03-23
One in three married Korean
women say it is ok to have no children, adding concerns to the nation’s
dwindling birth rate, a state-run think tank said in March 2006. Single men and
women also prefer to have only one child after marriage, according to the
report by the Korea Institute of Health and Society. Half of single women also
answered that it is better not to tie the knot at all, said the report titled
`Investigation on low birth rate and study on its comprehensive measures. ` The
study was based on interviews with 3,800 married women between the ages of 20
and 44 and 2,670 single women and men in 2005. Korea suffers from both a fast
aging population as well as a low birthrate. The report said that couples avoid
having more children because of high education and childcare expenses. There is
such a high demand for private education, that on average, a Korean couple
spends half their income on their children’s education, - the largest
proportion among living expenses.
4) High education
expenses and increase of study abroad
It said parents with one child spend 23.8 percent of their income on education,
59 percent for two children and 63.9 percent for three. The higher the
children’s grades, the more money are spent on private education. For an
elementary school student, education costs 260,000 won, whereas it costs
440,000 for a high school child. The 2005 survey was based on interviews with
3,800 married women and 2,670 single women and men between the ages of 20 and
44. The Korea Institute of Health and Society also said women’s difficulty in
balancing work and family also contributes to the decreasing birth rate. A whopping
61.2 percent of women quit their jobs just before or after marriage and about
half stopped working after delivering their first child.
Overseas studies at early age sharply
increase in May 2006. The number of schoolchildren in Seoul who went abroad for study hit a
record high of 7,001 last year, indicating parents are spending on their
children’s overseas education despite the nation’s sluggish economy. The figure
shows a 15 percent increase from the year before, and an average of 22 students
left Seoul per day between March 2005 and February 2006, said the Seoul
Metropolitan Office of Education on 20 May 2006. Meanwhile, the nation’s
competitiveness in the education sector fell to 42nd place from 40th last year,
according to a report by International Institute for Management and Development
released. The country received poor grades in education mainly due to the lower
expenditure spent on public education compared to other OECD member countries.
Education critics said that the figure represents how parents are distrusting
the nation’s public education.
The total number of students nationwide who went overseas for study reached
16,446 last year, according a recent data released by the Ministry of
Education. According to the Bank of Korea, the overseas education costs for
Korean parents were $3.37 billion last year while domestic media reported the
figure to be around $10 billion per year. The figures have been rising since
2000 when the government allowed high school children to study overseas. Prior
to that, those students had to go through checks with their local education
authority. To prevent Korean children from "illegally" studying in
other countries, the ministry, in 2001, had planned to submit a revised law to
the National Assembly, which would remove all impediments for students. But
public opinion was strongly against it at that time, assuming too many students
would go abroad uncontrollably.
The number of Korean
students studying abroad has shot up more than 10-fold over the past six years
due to an increasing demand for early English education. According to the
recent report, the number of students going overseas swelled from 1,562 in 1998
to 16,446 in 2004. A soaring number of elementary school students have gone
abroad during the six-year period more than 30-fold for the last 6 years.
6). Korea is aging fastest in the world
Korean society is
aging at an alarming speed. As defined by the United Nations, in an aging
society, people over the age of 65 accounts for 7 percent of the population and
in an aged society, they account for 14 percent. Research forecasts that Korea,
currently categorized as an aging society, will take 18 years to become an aged
society, whereas the change took 24 years for Japan and 72 years for the United
States. Aging population. Like many advanced countries, the problem of a
rapidly aging population has emerged as one of Korea’s top national concerns,
with its far-reaching and profound implications in social and economic
situations. In 2005, an average Korean lived to be 77.9 years old, more than a
year longer than the OECD average of 76.2. By 2050, it is expected to reach
83.3 years. The burgeoning ranks of elderly people are becoming a heavy on
burden on the shrinking working-age population. Economists worry about the growing
ratio of children and elders over 65 compared with those of a working age. As
the ratio rises, it becomes harder to maintain living standards for the
dependent population because the workforce is put under strain. Population
aging in a context of stagnant or declining labor supply can affect economic
growth. Higher taxes are needed to fund pension and health systems, to the
detriment of productive investment and work effort.
The expansion of the elderly population will directly raise the question of how
to guarantee the living standards of the elderly who often have insufficient or
almost no source of income. To address that, the ministry and ruling Uri Party
officials last year announced a plan to set up long-term care insurance for
senior citizens in order to address the welfare needs brought on by the growing
elderly population. The new social insurance scheme is designed to cover
age-related healthcare costs, such as dementia and palsy treatments at
recuperation centers, separately from existing health insurance, relieving the
financial burden of the aged from individual families, ministry officials
explained.
Factoring the
growing size of the population aged between 50 and 64 out of the total
working-age population, it is also vital from an economic point of view to
utilize that age group in the labor market. In 2005, eight people in the age
group of 15-64 supported one senior citizen. However, in 2020, four people are
expected to be responsible for one senior, and one person for one senior by 2050,
ministry data shows. The demographic shift will require the people to work a
few more years after the retirement age and even lead to the age-based
retirement concept being discarded, experts predict. This year, the government
will create some 80,000 new jobs, mostly social work, for the elderly. The
government also plans to cultivate industries to care for elderly people, which
include health, treatment and food services, medical equipment, housing and
finance. The market for "silver businesses" is forecast to expand
from the current 6.4 trillion won to 31 trillion won by 2010 and 116 trillion
won by 2020.
4. Fostering promotion is the answer to
population decline in Korea
Although the foster care system in Korea is in
an infant stage, foster care system is widely sought after by local
authorities. Korea still has orphanages where children are housed with
isolation. Children who are underprivileged, or whose parents are divorced,
come to orphanages. The foster care system in Korea is developing with local
authorities finding it difficult to offer sufficient placement choice to looked
after children, so the retention of existing foster carers
is vital, and finding new foster carers are
important. However, most important factors for the Korean foster Care System is
to let Koreans know the services are available, as some parents still take
their children when they kill themselves. Koreans are now aware of Korea being
the lowest birthrate country in the world. That may lead Korea to disappear in
2305. They simply do not know that the government or Foster Care Systems are
available for their children to be looked after while the children cannot be
cared for by their birth families. Koreans have to learn that they have the right
to demand temporary relief from being parents so that the government can look
after the children.
The low birthrate, and aging society could be
mended by the improvement of the foster care system for young parents. They
would have more children if they were aware that their children would be looked
after by the foster care system or the local authorities if something were to
happen to them. They would have a more relaxed attitude towards child bearing.
Therefore, foster care must be included in the Korean government’s efforts to
increase the birthrate.
Currently foster carers’
dissatisfaction with the attitude and support offered by social services has
been linked to their premature departure from fostering. The quality of the
relationship between foster carers and government
authority and how it improves. Foster carers often
feel under-supported and undervalued. They become more assertive with social
workers and feel conflicts with and within the system. However, Korean foster carers are free volunteering at this stage due to monthly
payment of $70 per month, the government’s encouragement of foster carers for their values and self-esteem would be vital to
have more foster carers. Curing the Korean illness,
low birthrate and aging, the Korean government has to promote further foster
care system as the foster carers are true volunteers
who sacrifices their own well-being to look after children, and they are also
warm helpers for underprivileged people in order to increase harmony of modern
society and happiness of Korean people. The government should improve and
promote the foster care system, which could be answers for all the birth rate
problems and aging society.
5. What se should do to promote
children’s rights in Asia? - FANA should be established.
Children have a right to have their needs understood, assessed and
reviewed so that, where it is necessary for them to live away from home, their
placements can be planned and their needs met. Adoption and fostering should
meet the emotional, developmental and spiritual needs of children, including
needs relating to their religious persuasion, racial origin and cultural and
linguistic background and any special needs. We will work in a child-centered,
multidisciplinary and anti-discriminatory framework, with individuals,
statutory agencies and voluntary organizations.
To promote children’s rights, we adults
have to organize a Child Care Network in Asia, and we would like to establish
Fostering & Adoption Network Asia (FANA), initiated from Korean Foster Care
Association. We FANA should make a leading Asia membership organization for all those
concerned with adoption, fostering and childcare social work. We should work
with our members and partners to promote and develop high standards in
adoption, fostering and child placement services; promote public and
professional understanding of adoption, fostering, and the life-long needs of
children separated from their birth families; ensure that the developmental and
identity1 needs
of looked after children are respected and addressed by social work, health,
legal and educational services; inform and influence policy makers and
legislators, and all those responsible for the welfare of children and young
people.
FANA believes
that 1) each child has a right to loving and secure family relationships, a right
to be heard and rights as a citizen; 2) Secure attachments to carers are essential to children’s mental health and
psychological development, 3) Every effort should be made to enable children to
live in their own birth families and kinship network, providing this is
consistent with the child’s welfare. Korea should have a joint cooperative
organization for fostering & adoption in order to provide alternative
families, moving away from institutions.
References
1.
www.cia.gov/nic, Global Mapping, CIA 2020
National Report
2.
www.baaf.org.uk, British Association of
Adoption & Fostering
3.
www.fostering.net, UK Fostering network
4.
www.wikipedia.org, Definition of Foster
Care
5.
www.ngopower.net, Korean Foster Children’s
Statistics
6.
www.nso.org, National Statistics for Children,
Aged, etc
7.
www.kedi.org, Korean Children Overseas Study
Hike
8.
www.kwdi.org, Korean Women Rejects Motherhood
9.
www.korea2050.net, Korean Population
Projections
Table1: Korean population projects from 2006 until 2305 by Prof Chun Kwang-hee, Seoul National University in July 2006
Table 2: Korean population project in the
year 2006, 2050, 2100, 2150, by SNU
자료: 전광희 등(2005), ≪사회적 합의에 의한 적정인구연구≫ 보건복지부 용역보고서 Prof Chun Kwang-hee, Seoul National University for a “Suitable
Population of Korea Research Report” provided
to the UN Future Forum & to the Ministry of Health & Welfare in
July 2006
