Social networks and the employment of young people leaving care

This chapter illustrates how most young people in Chinese state care become state wards as very young children and have disabilities. When they reach adulthood, many of them remain unemployed. Before the economic transitions in the 1980s, the government provided most of these young people with jobs when they became young adults, or they gained employment in welfare enterprises with tax concessions to employ people with disabilities. After the economic transition, however, many welfare factories reduced their employees or closed down, and state directives for job placement were dismantled. The chapter shows how job placement for young adult orphans has become a challenge for child welfare institutions, and a bottleneck for the support of new children entering state care.

Children in alternative care

This chapter describes how family abuse and neglect are the main reasons that children are in alternative care. In China, due to the absence of an effective child protection system, very few children receive alternative care for these reasons. Most children who are orphaned live with extended family. If they become state wards, the child welfare institution tries to arrange adoption. Otherwise, the most common forms of alternative care are institutional care or foster care. The chapter shows the significance of how alternative care is organized as it affects the childhood experience of the young people and their future opportunities. The qualities of the alternative care that they encounter might contribute to their current and future social inclusion.

Introduction to leaving state care in China

This introductory chapter talks about how the rapid social, economic, and demographic changes in China have affected all aspects of the living environment of children and young people, particularly children in state care. Positive developments are the growth of the mixed welfare state and the relaxation of the family planning requirements, so that all families can now choose to have more than one child and they are more likely to receive free social services. These trends imply that fewer children will be left in state care in the future. On the other hand, whereas the government once arranged jobs for young people leaving care or other young people with disabilities, it now relies on the developing labour market to fulfil this function.

Growing up in institutional family group care

This chapter discusses how, in addition to formal foster care in families, some state child welfare institutions also provide alternative care in family groups with a paid house mother on the site of the institution. This type of alternative care raises questions about whether this grouping is sufficient to simulate the benefits of family based care in relation to outcomes for children when they are growing up, and the impact on their transition to adulthood. The chapter looks at the experiences of seven young people in one city who had lived in this arrangement. It considers the differences for these young people during their childhood and as they prepared for possibilities to leave the family group care in the institution.

Self-identity of young people leaving state care

This chapter analyzes the self-identity, with reference to social inclusion, of the young people in care in their transition to adulthood and the possibility of independent living. It focuses on how the various aspects of social inclusion during childhood and young adult years might affect their identity. In addition to the usual dynamic identity formation of teenagers, young people leaving care also negotiate the shedding of an identity as someone in the care of the state and the acquiring of an identity as an independent young adult. These processes have important policy implications because they imply that transition to independence of children in state care requires a care approach and environment that are supportive to positive identity formation during childhood and adolescence.

Policy implications for young people leaving care in China

This chapter reviews how the Chinese and international communities are sharing understanding about good practice in alternative care while children are growing up, particularly by prioritizing long-term family-based support. They are also changing alternative care practices to support children during their childhood and as they reach young adulthood, so that they are prepared emotionally and practically to live independently as adults in the same ways as their peers, away from state control. The chapter also looks at the policy and practice changes in China for the generation of young people who grew up in state care over the last 20 years, when alternative care was beginning to shift away from institutional care and recognize the rights of children and young people to an inclusive childhood and adulthood.

State support for children in informal care

This chapter focuses on the implications of informal care relationships for children as they become young adults. These issues are important for the larger questions about good types of alternative care that benefit the well being and outcomes for children and young people in care and as they prepare to leave care. The chapter considers the advantages and disadvantages of informal care compared to institutional care, the role of government in supporting or prohibiting informal care, and the implications for social policy change to support these traditional arrangements. It also shows how, in recent years, China has more publicly recognized its policy responsibility to these children, as scandals even resulting in children's deaths have gained a profile in public media.

Economic security of young people leaving care

This chapter talks about the economic security of young people with and without disabilities leaving state care as they reach adulthood. It examines the effect of the scarce policies, including the impact on the economic independence of the young people. Some of these reasons were due to the exclusionary childhood experiences in state care. Other reasons were due to the inadequate responses to their needs and preferences in this transition stage of their young adult lives, which had the effect of continuing to exclude them from the economic and social opportunities expected of other young people. In the worst cases, irrespective of their personal capacity, it would seem unlikely that some of these young people will ever leave state care, suspending them in the status of never becoming independent adults.

Housing pathways of young people leaving care

This chapter utilizes the social exclusion framework to analyse the housing pathways of young people in state care who were trying to leave care at the time of the research. It considers their exclusion from the market, policy, and society, and the interrelationship between these three aspects of exclusion due to their isolated childhood housing experience. It also explores how the state manages their right to independent housing during their transition to adulthood and how their housing status affects other aspects of their adult life. The chapter shows young people's expectations for future social relationships, their place in the community and their contribution to it, can be stymied by their lack of housing options.

Social inclusion impact of a childhood in state care

This chapter examines how the love and care that children receive in their families or alternative care are among the most important factors influencing the quality of the childhood experience. Young people in alternative care in China grow up in institutions, foster care or family group care arranged by state child welfare institutions, and non-governmental organizations or kinship or non-kinship families. The alternative care experiences of these children affect the quality of their childhood and, later, their transition to adulthood. The chapter also introduces young people who related their state care experiences. They spoke of positive experiences about affection and love from families and community members, as well as negative experiences about violence in state care, both physical and emotional.