Moving from risk to Safety ● 71service practices (Križ and Skivenes 2013). A number of authors have sug-
gested that there are broad differences in emphasis or “flavor” between the
policy direction of different countries, reflecting either a child protection or
a child welfare orientation (Connolly 2004; Fargion 2014; Gilbert, Parton,
and Skivenes 2011). When a child welfare orientation is adopted, practitio-
ners and policy makers consider the best interests of the child to be strongly
related to the interests of the family as a whole, and these mutual interests
are best supported by undertaking a comprehensive exploration of strengths
and difficulties. A child welfare orientation draws on social or psychologi-
cal theories to frame problems and uses more therapeutic or needs-oriented
interventions (Fargion 2014; Gilbert, Parton, and Skivenes 2011). Its focus is
to “create those material and social conditions within which all children are
given sufficient opportunities to reach their full potential” (Fargion 2014, 2,
also quoted in Keddell 2015, 71). Thus, the main purpose of a child welfare
orientation is to develop a prevention policy framework based on a long-
term understanding of causes and patterns of social problems rather than to
reactively respond to risky events or risk factors (Keddell 2015; Spratt 2008).
Thus, when considering risk and safety, a child welfare orientation does not
prioritize risk identification but instead responds to need, viewing risks of
harm as resulting from a lack of universally accessible services and social and
psychological supports.
Gilbert, Parton, and Skivenes (2011) noted that a child protection ori-
entation, by contrast, constructs family problems as moral and individual
rather than social problems. The orientation has a tendency to result in
a forensic investigatory approach on the part of workers, and often this
leads to an adversarial relationship between agents of the state and parents.
Too frequently, the process becomes judicialized and results in involun-
tary out-of-home placement of children (see also Keddell 2015). Fargion
(2014) further commented that child protection orientations appear to
be grounded in a belief that abuse can be understood objectively and can
be quantified via the use of standardized assessment tools. This leads to
children’s best interests being narrowly defined in terms focused almost
exclusively on their protection from abuse events. Fargion (2014, 2) noted
that this approach leads to families’ problems and difficulties being seen as
“signals of risks” and treated accordingly.
Which of these two orientations holds sway in any particular country will
shape the construction of risk and inform the ways families are governed and
regulated in that country. Many countries increasingly draw on a combina-
tion of these two orientations, combined with an emerging new paradigm:
a child focused orientation. This focuses on the child’s long-term overall
development and well-being (Gilbert, Parton, and Skivenes 2011).