Birth Family Contact When Children are Adopted From Care: Balancing the Well-being of Adopted Children with the Needs of Birth Family Members

The adoption of children from care involves legally severing children’s birth family connections, often against the wishes of birth parents. When thinking about contact between children and their birth relatives, complex psychological and ethical issues must be considered. How can contact benefit children in situations where they have experienced abuse and neglect in their birth family? How can we address the issues of loss for adoptees and birth family members whilst holding the long-term well-being of the adopted person in mind? Is closed adoption without parental consent ever ethically defensible? This presentation aims to start conversations about these complex issues drawing on research carried out in the United Kingdom that has explored the issue of birth family contact for children adopted from care, contrasting these UK experiences with different approaches to adoption and postadoption contact in other legal jurisdiction