ABSTRACT

Just over 1 million children have been adopted internationally since the mid-1950s, at least half of them adopted by US citizens, while other countries such as Australia, Canada, Spain, France, Italy, Sweden, and other Western European countries have also been integrally involved in adoptions (Selman, 2013, 2015). Today, the practice has declined by more than 65 percent since the peak of 2004 when 45,000 children were adopted globally (Selman, 2012a, 2012b, 2015). This decline has led some to ask if we are now seeing the beginning of the end of intercountry child adoption as we know it (Selman, 2010, 2012a, 2012b).