| Despite discouraging measures from inter-governmental conventions, more and more people from western countries are adopting foreign children. While most academic research on international adoption focuses on either psychological or pedagogical aspects of adoption, this research project investigates social paradigms informing practices of adoption, thereby including important variables such as ethnicity, multiculturalism, migration, economy, and global politics. To study the interrelation between adoption practices and adoption discourses, it is crucial to study the ways in which international adoption is institutionalized. Central in this process are adoption agencies. Increasingly, they have become the brokers of adoption, mediating between birth parents, orphanages, adoptive parents, and various state agents from sending and receiving countries. As such, they contribute not only to shaping practices of adoption but also to facilitating the idea that international adoption is a viable option. The focus of this study, therefore, is on practices of international adoption through the spectre of these adoption agencies. The aim of the research is to examine how adoption practices are informed by socio-economic, cultural and political discourses and how they in turn contribute to shaping adoption paradigms in society. |
