Mothering on the Edge: A Critical Examination of Mothering Within Child Protection Systems

This book brings critical, scholarly attention to the systematic positioning and subjective experiences of mothers involved in child protection processes in "risk"-based child protection. While mothers are typically the primary focus of child protection prevention and investigations, their gendered experiences, challenges, and triumphs are seldom given space in the academic literature, practice, and/or public spaces to be seen or heard. The volume illustrates the structural positioning and/or lived experiences of mothers who come into contact with child protection for a variety of reasons: substance (ab)use, positive HIV status, child injury, fetal alcohol syndrome, colonial assessment methodologies, young age, incarceration, childbirth, and intimate partner violence. Ultimately this anthology calls for a fundamental rethinking of how mothers involved in child protection proceedings are conceptualized in child protection research, policy, and practice. It is recommended that mothers voices must be central to humanely reforming child protection systems.