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Transracial Adoption

Transracial adoption is the placement of adoptable children with parents of another race. With rare exception, transracial adoption involves White parents gaining access to children of color. Debates about transracial adoption have been largely focused on Whites who want to adopt African American children or children from other countries. The debates rage because race is central to the structure of society and identities. Given the significance of race and the color line, transracially adoptive families negotiate challenges beyond those of same-race families, as this entry shows.

White Parents, African American Children, and Social Workers

The adoption of Black children by Whites has been publicly debated since 1972, when the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) gained enough strength to speak out against the practice in a White-controlled child welfare system. Historically, transracial adoption numbers have remained quite low. For instance, 2 years before the NABSW spoke out, only 2,500 transracial adoptions had taken place. Since 1992, no uniform method for tracking adoptions has existed. Unfortunately, the methods employed for gathering statistics are also problematic and reflect a continued misunderstanding of race. For instance, although Black-White multiracial children have been historically viewed and counted as Black, Black male-White female interracial couples as adoptive parents have been statistically counted as White. That is to say, agencies often track the race of the adoptive mother relative to the adopted child.

Despite relatively low numbers of transracial adoptions and the problems with tracking, these adoptions have been subject to a great deal of media attention and political maneuvering. In 1994, the Multiethnic Placement Act (MEPA) was passed and then amended. The Interethnic Placement Act (IEP) followed in 1996. These pieces of legislation attempt to enforce “colorblind” practices in adoption. The goals of these laws are to reduce the amount of time that children wait to be adopted, increase the pool of potential adoptive parents, and make all adoptions “color-blind.” Based on this legislation, agencies can now be penalized (federal funds withheld) if they deny or delay an adoption based solely on race or national origin. The two acts do not extend to American Indian children. The unique history of the U.S. government and Native Americans has meant that Native Americans through the Indian Child Welfare Act are given the right of the “Nation to protect the best interests of Indian children.” In this case, the debates are waged around “who is American Indian?” and “who gets to decide,” but the resolution is not found in the newest pieces of U.S. adoption legislation.

The Debates

Drawing on Western tenets of individual rights regarding group-based rights, advocates of colorblind policy argue that race ought to be ignored in the placement of children. MEPA and IEP codify the “best interest of the child” criteria. They argue that when race is considered in the adoption process, Black children and other children of color are needlessly raised in institutional care rather than in loving families. On the other side of the debate are advocates of a race-matching policy, who argue that because historically grounded inequalities are still pervasive, placing a Black child with a White family is a form of cultural genocide. Drawing on group-based rights criteria, they suggest that the best interests of a child are addressed only when the grievances of the oppressed group to which that child belongs are addressed.

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