This paper looks at how social protection is evolving in developing countries and how it relates to the vulnerabilities of children. It goes on to present the different conceptual models for protection and how they have changed and been influenced by the changing definition of poverty and the growth in transnational knowledge and policymaking.

This paper highlights a number of recurrent issues that help to illuminate and explain the differences that persist between France and Germany in spite of recent reform efforts in child & family policies and evaluates the success of these policies and whether they have achieved their desired effects on mothers' employment patterns, especially those of qualified female workers.

This study used the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being (NSCAW, long term foster care general sample) data set to examine foster child and caregiver characteristics, and the caregiver–child relationship as a predictor of placement stability.

Parental leave and early childhood education and care have gained a high profile in child and family policy fields, and both have been the subject of substantial cross-national mapping, describing and comparing their main features across a range of countries. This article provides overviews on parental leave and early childhood services in affluent countries, and reflections on this mapping.

Knowledge transfer is highlighted in this paper as a conceptual framework to understand mandated referral to Early Intervention (EI) services for young children with open child welfare cases.

This study explores the development of “state of the child” reports between 2000 and 2010 in an effort to not only quantify the development but also to understand the shifts and changes in the field.

The papers collected in this issue provide a contemporary perspective on comparative child and family policy, highlighting new developments and current challenges for research and policy.

This study uses data from the 2005 National Household Education Survey to examine the effects of child care subsidies on the enrollment of low-income children in early childhood education programs.

Child care and early education policies may not only raise average achievement but may also be of special benefit for less advantaged children, in particular if programs are high quality. We test whether high quality child care is equalizing using rich longitudinal data from two comparison countries, Denmark and the United States. 

A comparative analysis of child welfare systems in 10 countries identifies three broad functional orientations – child protection, family service and child development.