“It’s Not Just About Making Sure They’re Not Sexually Abused Again”: The Emergence of a Biopolitics of Risk in Child Protection Practice

• In Event: Normative National Imaginings: The Biopolitics of Childhood

Abstract

This paper reflects on the findings of a qualitative study with sexually abused teenage girls involved with child protection in Montréal, Québec, Canada. The child protection system – a regulatory state apparatus – is mandated to protect children and youth from the risk of maltreatment. This study, however, revealed an expansion of risk with the infiltration of a neoliberal, postfeminist discourse of autonomous “girl power.” No longer viewed solely in terms of their risk of re-victimization, girls were scrutinized (and controlled) for their risk of failing to become the ideal, functioning citizens necessary to the welfare and progress of the biopolitical nation-state.

Presenter

• Rosemary Rushbrook Carlton, Université de Montréal