Child Welfare: Connecting Research, Policy, and Practice

26. Engaging with Fathers in Child Welfare

26 Engaging with Fathers in Child Welfare Christopher Walmsley Leslie Brown Marilyn Callahan Lena Dominelli Susan Strega Today, men are present in the lives of child welfare-involved children as resident or non-resident fathers, stepfathers, the mothers’partner, the mother’s brother or father, and family friends. Yet the overwhelming focus of child welfare policy, practice, research, and education is mothers. This chapter explores why men and fathers are often not involved in child welfare services, describes how to encourage their involvement, and identifies some of the complexities of increased father involvement in child welfare. The chapter is based on a review of the literature and the authors’ research. Background Isn’t Parenting Really Mothering? In Canada, the majority of first-level child protection social workers are women (see Chapter 4, which indicates that 82% of those participating in the 2003 CIS study were women), and historically child welfare has been viewed as a practice that takes place between women (Davies, 2005; Callahan & Walmsley, 2007; Scourfield, 2006). Until the end of World War II, almost all child welfare practitioners and administrators were women, but with the return of male war veterans , men began to enter the field of child welfare. Men are found today in the field as managers, parenting experts, and child development researchers, but research, education, and practice in child welfare has nevertheless remained focused on mothers.1 385 In our recent analysis of child protection practice, we found that social workers considered fathers irrelevant to both mothers and children 50% of the time (Strega, Brown, Callahan, Dominelli, & Walmsley, 2009). Men’s potential violence may be a reason to avoid them in practice (Buckley, 2003), but clearly, social workers give little importance to involving fathers in planning for a child’s care. In our society, caring work is constructed as feminized activity (Christie, 2006), and with the feminization of the child welfare workplace, men perceive social services as designed for women (Devault, Gaudet, Bolte, & St-Denis, 2005) or mother-centric (Ball & George, 2006). However, processes that exclude, marginalize, or render fathers invisible are not unique to child welfare.A study of popular parenting literature (Fleming & Tobin, 2005) found that although most books were written for the gender-neutral “parent,” the adults portrayed with children were most frequently female (69%) in comparison to male (23%). In parent education materials, fathers are often depicted only in peripheral ways as sideline participants or helpers (Hodgins, 2007). A study of popular parenting materials in Britain and the United States also found fathers portrayed as doing little more than stepping in and helping, whereas mothers are viewed as the full-time parent (Sunderland, 2004). In parent education programs such as those found in Quebec’s community-based health and social service centres,known as“Centres locaux de services communautaires”(CLSCs), only 18% offered self-help groups for future/new fathers, whereas about twothirds offered programs for the gender-neutral parent (Richard et al., 2005). Parenting has traditionally been viewed as mothers’ work, and even today, as fathers are portrayed“helping”at home,co-parenting still means“Mom’s responsible , Dad helps out”(Carter & McGoldrick, 1999, p. 255). The gendering of parenting , which views child care as “mother’s work,”is expressed in child welfare practice by focusing on mothers and largely ignoring or excluding fathers. Involved Fatherhood Today,a growing popular and academic discourse argues the benefits of involved fatherhood. There are websites, research projects, father support programs, and father-specific education booklets available to encourage fathers to actively care for their children (Father Involvement Research Alliance website (n.d.); Fatherhood Institute website (n.d.); Devault et al., 2005; Hoffman, 2008; Nanaimo Men’s Resource Centre, 2007). Since the publication of Michael Lamb’s The role of the father in child development (1976), researchers have been interested in involved fatherhood. Since then, the benefits of increased father involvement have been argued to be: increased cognitive, emotional, relational, and physical WALMSLEY, BROWN, CALLAHAN, DOMINELLI, AND STREGA 386 well-being; higher measures of cognitive functioning; better relationships with peers and siblings; fewer health-related problems; less substance abuse among adolescents; lower rates of delinquency; less incarceration; less likelihood of becoming an unwed mother; and less likelihood of experiencing homelessness, receiving state benefits, or living in subsidized housing (Long, 2008). However, as Featherstone (2004) notes, disentangling whether poor outcomes for children in mother-led families are a result of father absence or the absence of...