Of Note: Guatemala's Adoption Industry

Check into any of the posh hotels in Antigua, Guatemala, and you will likely spot a dozen gringo couples, each with a Guatemalan child or two, lounging poolside or stepping out for a bit of sightseeing. Scores of adoptive parents travel to this desperately poor country every year—in 2006, 5,024 children found new homes overseas, 4,135 in the United States.^1,2 Widespread use of birth control in the United States means that the demand for children to adopt outstrips supply, causing prospective parents to turn to countries where locals are unable to take in all children in need of families.

The large number of Guatemalan children finding new homes in the United States appears to help alleviate a tough situation. Nearly half of rural homes are without electricity or running water,³ and in 2006, per capita income was a mere $2,400,⁴ one of the lowest in the Americas. Adoptive parents reasonably assume that they are rescuing children whose mothers are unwilling or unable to care for them. This is true in some cases, but fraud and exploitation has increased the number of children available for adoption, making Guatemala second only to China in the number of children adopted by American couples.⁵

Guatemala's current popularity as a destination country for adoptive parents is rooted in a sad history closely linked to U.S. actions. Guatemalans are keenly aware of this, even if most people in the United States are not. In 1954, spooked by the elected Guatemalan leader's Communist tendencies, the Eisenhower administration authorized the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to mastermind a coup that installed a right-wing dictatorship. The coup sparked an insurgency, leading to decades of remarkably brutal state-sponsored violence targeting government opposition and their perceived supporters. To prevent anything resembling a leftist revolution, the United States kept its hand in the game by quietly providing military aid, until the Guatemalan army was implicated in the well-publicized murder of a U.S. citizen in 1990.⁶ By the time the United Nations-brokered peace accords were signed in 1996, over 200,000 civilians had been killed or 'disappeared'.⁷ Adoption served a humanitarian purpose by finding homes for children orphaned by war.

The massacres have ended, yet the number of children adopted by foreigners grew 15 fold between 1996 and 2006, as adoption expanded into a lucrative business facilitated by high demand in the US, and poor rule of law and weak state institutions in Guatemala—the remnants of an oppressive regime. There are stories of kidnappings and coercion; of women tricked into giving up their children; of teenage girls paid to have babies; of nurseries filled with infants ready for sale.⁸

And there's plenty of money involved: each U.S. couple shells out roughly $25,000 to adopt a child, the birthmother receives about $3,000, and the middlemen—U.S. adoption agencies and Guatemalan lawyers—keep a sizable chunk of the fee. There is fraud on both sides: the lawyers are notorious for sidestepping laws to line their pockets, and several U.S. adoption agencies have swindled couples out of thousands of dollars.⁹ And there is resentment on both sides: in the U.S., eager adoptive parents fret about needy children without considering that many mothers did not freely give them up for adoption; in Guatemala, the irony of the United States' eagerness to accept Guatemalan babies and deport hard-working Guatemalan adults has not gone unnoticed.

Guatemala has taken steps in recent months to crack down on adoption fraud.¹⁰ But past efforts have done little to curb illegality—rule of law remains weak in Guatemala, due to barren state coffers, corruption in the security forces, a neglected judicial system, and a society scarred by years of military oppression. ¹¹ However, drastic change appears to be imminent. According to a recently ratified convention, specific legislation to protect children and families must be implemented before the end of the year; otherwise, the United States will no longer approve adoptions from Guatemala.¹² This is a harsh—yet necessary—measure toward...