Because of changes in adoption over the last few decades – changes that include
open adoption,
gay adoption,
international adoptions and trans-racial adoptions, and a focus on moving children out of the
foster care system into adoptive families – adoption has had a large impact on the basic unit of society and the family.
Joan Boocock Lee, an
Episcopalian British-American actress married to a Jewish husband, stated that as members of an
interfaith marriage the couple faced difficulty adopting in the mid-twentieth-century United States. Some adoption research scholars have reported seven core issues to consistently be associated with the processes of adoption. Problems with loss, grief, rejection, guilt and shame, identity, intimacy, and control may, in some cases, uniquely affect each member of the adoption triad.
Trans-racial adoption The adoption of children of one race by parents of another race, which began officially in the United States in 1948, has always generated controversy. The argument often comes down to opposing views as to who gets to decide what is the "best interest" of children. Critics of transracial adoption question whether
white American parents can effectively prepare children of color to deal with racism. Others wonder where the children raised by white parents will find social acceptance as adults. Testimony from many transracially adopted adults who grew up in white families illustrates the "in-between" status many adoptees feel, not belonging to or feeling comfortable in communities of color or among white society. Another source of controversy is the history of the widespread removal of children from families and communities of color, which has been shown by historians to have been a tool to regulate families and oppress communities, dating back to slavery times and during the now-discredited
Indian Boarding School movement of the early twentieth century. Given this history of child removal, the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) condemned transracial adoptions in 1972 in their historic Position Statement. In that paper, the NABSW equated the removal of African American children from their families of origin—and their placement in white homes—with "
cultural genocide." Pro-transracial adoption advocates argue that there are more
white families seeking to adopt than there are minority families; conversely, there are more minority children available for adoption. For example, in 2009, 41% of children available for adoption were African American, 40% were white children, and 15% were Hispanic children. This disparity often results in a lower cost to adopt children from ethnic minorities – usually through special adoption grants rather than fee discrimination. Many critics decry the exchange of money for children, whether as "fees for service" or otherwise, arguing that no children of any race should ever be for sale. Proponents point out practicality in the current systems. This situation is morally difficult because the adoptive families see adoption as a great benefit to trans-racially adopted children, while some minorities see it as an assault on their culture. In 2004, 26 percent of African-American children adopted from foster care were adopted trans-racially. Government agencies have varied over time in their willingness to facilitate trans-racial adoptions. "Since 1994, white prospective parents have filed, and largely won, more than two dozen
discrimination lawsuits, according to state and federal court records." scholarly articles, memoirs, blogs, and numerous books on the subject.
Rehoming With the increase in adoption rates over the many decades, the United States has been faced with a new morally questionable practice: rehoming. This is the act of caregivers posting an advertisement when they do not feel the child should be in their care any longer. Investigation of the child's new housing situation is not required in this practice, and this has created an underground market, one where child traffickers can thrive. There is a lack of regulation surrounding this practice and current legislation contradicts each other, making this harder to combat. When a parent adopts a child, they may not have been aware that the child has special needs and thus, are not equipped to help this child. The child may act out or not fit in with the family so the family turns to rehoming. Rehoming is not adoption and because of that, the government does not have to be notified and adoption agencies are not involved. Thus, re-homing is a prime target for child and sex traffickers. There are laws set in place to protect children through adoption processes and against sex trafficking, but there are barely any laws regarding rehoming. The courts authorize this practice because the U.S. state law may allow a parent, legal guardian or relative within the second degree to place out or board out a child. However, while the U.S. federal bill Preventing Sex Trafficking and Strengthening Families Act would require the family to make rational decisions and prioritize the health of the child, the
Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children contradicts this. This states that the family only has to make sure children are placed in adequate care only when the re-homing process is done across state lines. There is no mention of maintaining the children's safety when rehoming within the same state. The laws surrounding rehoming are basically non-existent which puts adopted children at the risk of unequipped parents and all other types of dysfunctional homes. This second-chance adoption, as some parents see it, has led to negative effects that failed adoptions have on children as they go through the process of readapting to a new home environment again. With the statute that allows second-degree legal guardians to put their adopted child in the care of someone else, and the rising of re-homing websites and ads on social media, the rehoming process highly exposes children to underground markets and other trafficking prospects. In that regard, laws and statutes concerning adoption and rehoming should be re-evaluated to ensure the full protection of adopted children. In 2018, the
Uniform Law Commission formed a committee to study the rehoming issue, which is also known more formerly as "unregulated transfer of adopted children". The committee indicated that it will draft a uniform or model law to prohibit the unregulated transfer of all adopted children. == Cost of adoption ==