Abstract
This chapter provides an overview of the German child protection system. Thereby, it highlights the key terms used in Germany: child protection and child endangerment. The development of those concepts – often used in a narrow and a broad sense – over the last centuries is shown. Based on this, the structures of the German child protection as of today are explained and linked to guiding principles in child protection. These are the intertwining of support and protection, the reliance on professional discretion, and the family service orientation. The German child protection system has many relations to other systems of the welfare state such as the educational and health system. Regulations and challenges in cooperation are highlighted. In the last section, the recent challenges like ensuring accountability of the system and addressing inequality and discrimination are discussed.