Children’s services and child protection made headlines on several occasions in Autumn 2024. Beyond the judicial aspects (e.g., the Châteauroux trial, which concluded in December, concerning an illegal network engaged in the unauthorized placement of children by the Nord département’s social services and the subsequent abuse of those children), we saw recommendations from France’s Economic, Social and Environmental Council in a notice explicitly entitled “Child Protection is in Danger” published in early October 2024. Naturally, when dealing with difficulties facing children and their families, the situation is almost always an urgent one and, in a suboptimal institutional context (shortfalls in funding, staff numbers and care facilities), the immediate problem captures all the attention of the child welfare and child protection services. But, in response to such human challenges, we also have to be able to look ahead and envisage possible mid- and long-term developments, in order to cope with the specific needs of at-risk children.
This was the objective of a foresight exercise carried out between September 2020 and October 2023 by an inter-association group, supported by Futuribles, that aimed to explore the trends which might affect the child protection sector (with particular reference to the social groups concerned and the modes of intervention), and to draw up scenarios on how it may develop in the years to 2035. Baptiste Cohen, a member of the study’s steering committee, outlines that exercise here. After briefly going over the relevant indicators (applicable law, available budgets, clientele and staff concerned etc.) and the underlying factors in the crisis around child protection, he presents the four scenarios developed as part of this exercise and the public policy lessons to be drawn from them. The aim is to improve the governance of this strand of welfare protection, so as to offer better future prospects for this very neglected section of youth.
The article is downloadable only in French. It is not available in English.
