Child protection systems in rural China: interagency responses
Ilan Katz, Yahua Zhang and Xiaoyuan Shang
Social Policy Research Centre, UNSW
Contact Email:   ilan.katzunsw.edu.au

This project is jointly being undertaken by the Social Policy Research Centre at the University of NSW in Sydney, Australia and Save the Children China. Its aims are to examine the current systems and processes which now operate in China, with a view to policy and practice reform. This paper reports on preliminary findings from the first phase of the research carried out in Lixin, a rural county in Anhui Province. The main hypothesis of the research is that child abuse is still a hidden problem in China and the current systems are unable to provide effective protection to maltreated children even in serious cases.

The research involves a detailed analysis of legal and policy documents at the national and provincial levels and fieldwork in three areas of China – a rural county, an urban setting and a metropolitan setting. The fieldwork consists of semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders (judges, senior police officers, policy makers) and focus groups with front line practitioners – police, teachers, welfare workers and doctors. In addition children in each location were interviewed about their views. This paper reports on the preliminary document analysis and the first round of fieldwork
The main finding of the research to date is the remarkable minimilisation of the problem of child abuse by participants, who mainly indicated that they would be unwilling to report even severe cases. Although physical punishment is forbidden in public schools, some parents said physical punishment is an acceptable method for disciplining children. Thus although there is a reasonable legal framework for child protection, the actual systems and the attitudes of those responsible for child protection mitigate against adequate protection for children.

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