Social policy approaches to intercountry adoption

To pick up on the themes of conflict and ambiguity, there is a significant difference between the Hague Convention and the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The Hague Convention states that ICA ‘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’ (emphasis added). The CRC, meanwhile, recognizes that ICA may be appropriate in certain cases, but only if the child cannot be cared for ‘in any suitable manner’ in his/her country of origin (Article 21). This could conceivably include a wide range of alternatives, such as small family-type homes, child-headed households and informal communitybased solutions. Such options may be more suitable than ICA for many children who do not live with their birth families, given that very few separated children are abandoned or orphaned healthy babies (Graff, 2008; Saclier, 2000). 

There is tension between the two approaches and the Hague Convention appears to be in the ascendancy, but there are efforts to gloss over the differences. Ambiguity is the key diplomatic skill. This is apparent in the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)’s Position Statement on ICA. UNICEF looks to the CRC as its touchstone and has an ambivalent position on ICA. It says that it supports the Hague Convention but considers ICA ‘one of a range of care options which may be open to children, and for individual children who cannot be placed in a permanent family setting in their countries of origin, it may indeed be the best solution’ (UNICEF, n.d., emphasis added).