Dorothy Roberts, a legal scholar and prominent voice in favor of dismantling the child welfare system, has been named to the 2024 class of MacArthur Fellows. The fellowship comes with a no-strings-attached $800,000 prize, known as a “Genius Grant.”
The University of Pennsylvania law, sociology and Africana Studies professor tackled the destructive nature of foster care removals more than 20 years ago in her book “Shattered Bonds,” an indictment of the field that emanated from her research with a group of parents in Cook County, Illinois.
In 2022, she published “Torn Apart: How the Child Welfare System Destroys Black Families — and How Abolition Can Build a Safer World.” In that book, she argued that rather than replacing the child welfare system with another better-functioning system, it should be abolished altogether.
Roberts’ published work has fueled a growing movement of parent activists. She is credited with helping popularize terms now more widely used in the field that describe the work of child protective services as the “family policing system.”
In its announcement of this year’s Genius Grants, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation summarized its respect for her work as follows:
“Roberts argues that the engrained oppressive features of the current system render it beyond repair. She calls for creating an entirely new approach focused on supporting families rather than punishing them.
Her support for dismantling the current system of child welfare is unsettling to some, but her provocation inspires many to think more critically about its poor track record and harmful design. By uncovering the complex forces underlying social systems and institutions, and uplifting the experiences of people caught up in them, Roberts creates opportunities to imagine and build more equitable and responsive ways to ensure child and family safety.”
The new class of 22 MacArthur Fellows includes a range of professionals from scientists to an alternative cabaret star.
The youth-focused winners include Jason Reynolds, “a writer of children’s and young adult literature whose books reflect the rich inner lives of kids of color and offer profound moments of human connection.” His 2016 novel “Ghost” describes an 11-year-old star sprinter navigating domestic violence at home and an incarcerated father.
Sterlin Harjo, co-creator of the groundbreaking television series “Reservation Dogs,” is another fellowship awardee. Harjo’s moving dramatic comedy show centers on a group of spunky Indigenous teens in the Muscogee Nation, who face challenges from the intergenerational legacy of Indian boarding schools and suicide among Native youth.
Previous award winners in the child welfare and youth justice field in previous years include poet and writer Reginald Dwayne Betts, adolescent brain development researcher Damien Fair, restorative justice expert sujatha baliga and social psychologist Jennifer Eberhardt.
In her work to abolish foster care as it currently operates, Roberts envisions shrinking the current system through legislation that limits the authority of CPS, such as bills barring involuntary drug testing of new and expectant mothers.
She wants parents accused of child maltreatment granted quality legal representation, earlier in the investigative process. Roberts also says anti-poverty efforts must be expanded, through diverting the billions of dollars spent on “regulating and breaking up families” to programs that provide cash assistance, health care, housing and other lifeline benefits.
“Abolishing family policing does not mean ignoring children suffering from deprivation and violence,” Roberts writes. “To the contrary, abolition means imagining ways of meeting families’ needs and preventing family violence that do not inflict the damage caused by tearing families apart.”
Click here to listen to The Imprint Weekly Podcast’s in-depth interview with Roberts, recorded in 2021 as she was working on her most recent book.
