First Nations Child and Family Caring Society

Available data suggest that First Nations children, youth and families in Canada continue to experience multiple and disproportionate human rights violations stemming from colonialism. First Nations child and family service agencies began developing in the 1970s to affirm community-based systems of...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Cindy Blackstock, Nico Trocmé
Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
Format: Text
Language:English
Subjects:
Online Access:http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.548.3263
http://www.mcgill.ca/files/crcf/2005-Communiy-Based_Welfare_Aboriginals.pdf
Description
Summary:Available data suggest that First Nations children, youth and families in Canada continue to experience multiple and disproportionate human rights violations stemming from colonialism. First Nations child and family service agencies began developing in the 1970s to affirm community-based systems of care and stem the tide of children being placed in non-Aboriginal homes. Although these agencies have demonstrated significant success there are key barriers which limit their efficacy, such as the imposition of Euro-western legislation, inadequate access to financial resources and the continued marginalisation of indigenous knowledge within Euro-western social work. This paper describes the contemporary lived experience of First Nations children, youth and families in Canada. It identifies the conditions that support First Nations child and family service agencies to implement community based responses to child maltreatment that honour the strength, wisdom and resiliency embedded in indigenous ways of knowing and being. Future directions, such as mobilising a movement of reconciliation in child welfare as a means of dislocating Euro-western social work values, policies and practice that aggress indigenous ways of caring for children, will be discussed.