ABSTRACT
The worldwide debate and discussion over intercountry adoption can be divided between its outcomes and its process. Those who support intercountry adoption contend that its outcome is to help more children in need to find a family. Those who do not support it have argued that when the knock-on effects are considered it is uncertain that the global numerical impact on the number of children adopted represents a net gain. To some extent, this argument over outcomes has been assuaged by the widely accepted principle that an intercountry adoption should only be made where a domestic placement cannot be found. However, the worldwide debate and discussion over the process of intercountry adoption continues to be divisive. Support for intercountry adoption as helping needy children has been qualified and countered by the charge that private agencies have exploited vulnerable birth mothers and have been profiting excessively by marketing children for adoption abroad who would have been better cared for within their own state. Further, it has been contended that by straddling two countries they have avoided the safeguards and oversight of either. These arguments are reflected in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989, Article 21:
States parties that recognize and/or permit the system of adoption shall ensure that the best interests of the child shall be the paramount consideration and they shall: (a) Ensure that the adoption of the child is authorized only by competent authorities … and that… the persons concerned have given their informed consent to the adoption… (b) Recognize that inter-country adoption may be considered as an alternative means of child’s care, if the child cannot be placed in a foster or adoptive family or cannot in any suitable manner be cared for in the child’s country of origin; (c) Ensure that the child concerned by inter-country adoption enjoys safeguards and standards equivalent to those existing in national adoption; (d) Take all appropriate measures to ensure that, in inter-country adoption, the placement does not result in improper financial gain for those involved in it.
