Trauma-Informed Logics in Foster Care: Shifting Responsibilities and Organizational Impact

• In Event: 40809 - Rewriting the Future: Youth-Driven Policies That Catalyze Change

Abstract

Trauma-informed care has increasingly gained prominence in social welfare policy and practice, particularly as it has been shaped by the study of adverse childhood experiences and victim advocacy movements. Sociologists have begun to explore the broader implications of incorporating trauma-informed approaches into welfare policy. Recent scholarship argues that the concept of trauma has played a pivotal role in bridging welfarist and punitive social policies, contributing to the expansion of state interventions. Other studies suggest that the adoption of trauma-informed practices reflects a political shift in how the state understands and responds to various forms of violence, including psychological harm. Additionally, research has highlighted how trauma-informed approaches influence socialization practices for children and youth within both welfare and carceral settings. This study extends existing scholarship by addressing an under-examined aspect of how child welfare agencies incorporate trauma-informed approaches into their organizational practices. Using an ethnographic approach, this research explores how trauma-informed care functions as an organizational logic within a foster care group home setting. Initial findings suggest that trauma-informed care operates as a strategy for the organization to shift accountability for program outcomes onto the youth themselves, while also justifying minimal intervention and reducing the burdens placed on staff. For sociologists, this case advances our understanding of state power in family life from an organizational perspective, extending our models to include an analysis of direct and extensive state socialization of youth in these programs. Implications for how this may shape our understanding of organizational neglect and the reproduction of surplus populations will be discussed.

Author

• Hannah Elizabeth Curtis, University of Washington