Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T10:50:26.161Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Scandals, Lawsuits, and Politics: Child Welfare Policy in the U.S. States

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2021

Juliet F. Gainsborough
Juliet F. Gainsborough*
Affiliation:
Bentley University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In order to understand what factors drive child welfare policymaking, this research analyzes data on spending and legislation from the U.S. states over a three-year period. The key independent variables are scandal, litigation, federal oversight, and local discretion. While states that experience a scandal or a lawsuit do not increase their spending levels over previous years, they do enact more child welfare legislation. This raises the possibility that states engage in symbolic rather than substantive responses to child welfare crises. The administrative structure of the child welfare system also affects state policymaking.

Type
Research Article
Information
State Politics & Policy Quarterly , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , Fall 2009 , pp. 325 - 355
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Achen, Christopher H. 2000. “Why Lagged Dependent Variables Can Suppress the Explanatory Power of Other Dependent Variables.” Paper presented at the annual conference of the Political Methodology Section of the American Political Science Association, Los Angeles, CA.Google Scholar
Arceneaux, Kevin, and Huber, Gregory A.. 2007. “What to Do (and Not Do) with Multicollinearity in State Politics Research.” State Politics and Policy Quarterly 70:81–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bailie, Kathleen A. 1998. “The Other Neglected Parties in Child Protective Proceedings: Parents in Poverty and the Role of the Lawyers Who Represent Them.” Fordham Law Review 66:2298–301.Google Scholar
Berry, William D. 1990. “The Confusing Case of Budgetary Incrementalism: Too Many Meanings for a Single Concept.” The Journal of Politics 52:167–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berry, William D., Ringquist, Evan J., Fording, Richard C., and Hanson, Russell L.. 1998. “Measuring Citizen and Government Ideology in the American States, 1960–93.” American Journal of Political Science 42:327–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bess, Roseana, Leos-Urbel, Jacob, and Geen, Rob. 2001. “The Cost of Protecting Vulnerable Children II: What has changed since 1996?” The Urban Institute. www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=310071 (March 17, 2009).Google Scholar
Bess, Roseana, and Scarcella, Cynthia Andrews. 2004. “Child Welfare Spending During a Time of Fiscal Stress.” The Urban Institute. www.urban.org/url.cfm?ID=411124 (March 17, 2009).Google Scholar
Birkland, Thomas A. 1997. After Disaster: Agenda-Setting, Public Policy, and Focusing Events. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Brooks, Susan L. 2001. “The Case for Adoption Alternatives.” Family Court Review 39:43–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, Ian, and Drakeford, Mark. 2003. Social Policy, Social Welfare and Scandal: How British Public Policy is Made. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Child Welfare League of America. 2005. “Child Welfare Consent Decrees: Analysis of Thirty-Five Court Actions from 1995 to 2005.” www.cwla.org/advocacy/consentdecrees.pdf (March 17, 2009).Google Scholar
Council of State Governments. 2002–04. The Book of the States, Vols. 34–36. Lexington, KY: The Council of State Governments.Google Scholar
Elazar, Daniel J. 1984. American Federalism: A View from the States, 3rd ed. New York, NY: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Erikson, Robert S., Wright, Gerald C., McIver, John P.. 1993. Statehouse Democracy. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Geen, Rob, and Tumlin, Karen C.. 1999. “State Efforts to Remake Child Welfare: Responses to New Challenges and Increased Scrutiny.” Occasional Paper Number 29. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.Google Scholar
Gilens, Martin. 1999. Why Americans Hate Welfare: Race, Media, and the Politics of Anti-poverty Policy. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hero, Rodney E. 1998. Faces of Inequality: Social Diversity in American Politics. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
King, Gary, Tomz, Michael, and Wittenberg, Jason. 2000. “Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation.” American Journal of Political Science 44:347–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kingdon, John W. 2002. Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policy, 2nd ed. New York, NY: Longman.Google Scholar
Mezey, Susan Gluck. 2000. Pitiful Plaintiffs: Child Welfare Legislation and the Federal Courts. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). 2004. State Child Welfare Legislation 2002–2003. www.ncsl.org/programs/cyf/childlegislation.pdf (March 17, 2009).Google Scholar
National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). 2005. State Child Welfare Legislation 2004. www.ncsl.org/print/cyf/cwlegislation04.pdf (March 17, 2009).Google Scholar
Orr, Susan. 1999. Child Protection at the Crossroads: Child Abuse, Child Protection, and Recommendations for Reform. Reason Public Policy Institute. Policy Study No. 262. October. www.reason.org/ps262.html (January 30, 2009).Google Scholar
Roberts, Dorothy E. 1999a. “Poverty, Race, and New Directions on Child Welfare Policy.” Washington University Journal of Law and Policy 63:63–77.Google Scholar
Roberts, Dorothy E. 1999b. “Welfare's Ban on Poor Motherhood.” In Whose Welfare?, ed. Minks, Gwendolyn. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Roberts, Dorothy E. 2002. Shattered Bonds: The Color of Child Welfare. New York, NY: Basic Civitas Books.Google Scholar
Rosenberg, Gerald N. 1991. Hollow Hope: Can Courts Bring About Social Change? Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Scarcella, Cynthia Andrews, Bess, Roseana, Zielewski, Erica Hecht, and Geen, Rob. 2006. “The Cost of Protecting Vulnerable Children V: Understanding State Variation in Child Welfare Financing.” Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schneider, Anne Larason, and Ingram, Helen. 1997. Policy Design for Democracy. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.Google Scholar
Stone, Deborah. 2001. Policy Paradox: The Art of Political Decision-Making, Revised Edition. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company.Google Scholar
Tomz, Michael, Wittenberg, Jason, and King, Gary. 2001. CLARIFY: Software for Interpreting and Presenting Statistical Results. Version 2.0. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University. http://gking.harvard.edu (June 1, 2001).Google Scholar
Wilkinson-Hagen, Amy. 2004. “The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997: A Collision of Parens Patriae and Parents' Constitutional Rights.” Georgetown Journal on Poverty Law & Policy 11:137–68.Google Scholar