Mediation in kinship care: another step in the provision of culturally relevant child welfare services

With rising numbers of children entering the child welfare system and declining numbers of available foster homes, the foster care system has increasingly turned to placements with relatives to meet the needs of children removed from parental custody. Nowhere is this situation more evident than in the African American community. But the child welfare system did not invent the concept of kinship care. The foundation of current mediation practice can be traced to several ancient cultures, including African culture, where the kinship network often provided mediation services in the resolution of disputes. As an ethnocentrically designed child welfare system grapples with how to best incorporate kinship care into its array of services, conflicts between kinship caregivers and the foster care system have arisen. It is suggested that the application of mediation to conflicts in agency-kinship family relationships can serve as yet another step in social workers' efforts to provide culturally relevant child welfare services.