ABSTRACT
The successful management of a child’s return home and his or her subsequent adjustment to family, neighbourhood and school should, therefore, be among the indicators of a satisfactory social services’ intervention and the willingness or ability of the family to change. The need to scrutinise the cluster of decisions surrounding a child’s return home from substitute care and to suggest ways in which reunion might be effectively managed should be seen against this background. Mother and child will have become able to manage without each other and when they meet they will have to start from scratch to get to know each other. The widespread unease generated by separation was dismissed with official hindsight as an over-dramatisation from the well publicised behaviour of a few children entering D. Winnicott’s clinic. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
