Remaking collective knowledge: An analysis of the complex and multiple effects of inquiries into historical institutional child abuse

This article provides an overview and critical analysis of inquiries into historical institutional child abuse and examines their multiple functions and complex effects. The article takes a broadly international view but focuses primarily on Australia, the UK and Ireland, jurisdictions in which there have been major national inquiries. Drawing on sociological and other social science literature, it begins by considering the forms, functions, and purposes of inquiries. An overview of emergent concerns with institutional abuse in the 1980s and 1990s is then provided, followed by an examination of the response of many governments since that time in establishing inquiries. Key findings and recommendations are considered. The final sections of the article explore the evaluation of inquiries, both during their operation and in their aftermath. Policy change and legislative reform are discussed but the focus is on aspects often underplayed or overlooked, including an inquiry's credibility, its role in processes of knowledge production, and the part it plays in producing social and cultural shifts. In the context of growing numbers of inquiries across Western democracies, including the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, it is argued that grasping the complexity of the inquiry mechanism, with its inherent tensions and its multiple effects, is crucial to evaluating inquiry outcomes.

Spedali Degli Innocenti, the Foundling Hospital in Florence, Italy

The author reflects on a visit to the Ospedale Degli Innocenti, the former Renaissance foundling hospital in Florence, having escaped from an international clinical conference. He considers the symbolism of the architecture and artwork in relation to its function as a sanctuary for abandoned children.

¿Qué pasa en La Inclusa? The role of press scandals, doctors and public authorities in the evolution of La Inclusa de Madrid, 1890-1935

Traditionally, infants abandoned at foundling hospitals were identified as "bastards" and "children of vice" whose health, to all intents and purposes, reflected the moral sins of their parents and thus, led to unavoidable mortality. By late 19th century, several changes challenged that consideration: a growing emphasis on the importance of fighting infant mortality, the appearance of a new, medicalized, ideal of motherhood, the spread of new medical theories, the appearance of disciplines like Child Health, the construction of pediatric wards, and maternity hospitals. The consequences of these changes had their greatest impact at La Inclusa due to its location in the capital city, close to the decision-making centres and as focus of the interest of the national media. This article examines the role of the press and the medical profession in successively denouncing La Inclusa's excess mortality during the period 1890-1935. By looking at daily press and medical publications, it sheds light on the uneven consequences of the press scandals denouncing foundlings' extreme mortality in the period. The first scandal (1899-1900) faded without acknowledging any excess foundling mortality; the second (1918) was initiated by the doctors in charge but only produced some changes. The third scandal (1927) was instrumental in bringing about the changes that would turn a century-old institution in a state-of-the art medicalized centre and the change from debris of society to healthy children of foundlings. The effects of the press coverage were not restricted locally to foundlings in Madrid, and had a wider impact: by making the public aware of the dire situation of foundlings, they contributed to the development of legislation related to the fight against infant mortality and the control of mercenary breastfeeding.

Releasing mother's burdens: child abandonment and retrieval in Madrid, 1890-1935

In nineteenth-century Europe, the foundling hospital grew beyond its traditional purpose of mitigating the shame of unwed mothers by also permitting widows, widowers, and poor married couples to abandon their children there temporarily. In the Foundling Hospital of Madrid (FHM), this new short-term abandonment could be completely anonymous due to the implementation of a wheel—a device on the outside wall of the institution that could be turned to place a child inside—which remained open until 1929. The use of survival-analysis techniques to disentangle the determinants of retrieval in a discrete framework reveals important differences in the situations of the women who abandoned their children at the FHM, partly depending on whether they accessed it through the Maternity Hospital after giving birth or they accessed it directly. The evidence suggests that those who abandoned their children through the Maternity Hospital retrieved them only when they had attained a certain degree of economic stability, whereas those who abandoned otherwise did so just as soon as the immediate condition prompting the abandonment had improved.

Institutionalization of mentally-impaired children in Scotland, c. 1855-1914

This article examines two institutions which were established in Scotland specifically for the accommodation of mentally-impaired children: Baldovan Asylum near Dundee and the 'Scottish National Institution for the Education of Imbecile Children' in Larbert, Stirlingshire. It surveys the aims and agendas of the institutions in the spheres of residential childcare, mental health, and education and training. It compares the admission regimes of these institutions and considers whether they complemented one another in serving an unsatisfied demand for places, or whether they were in competition for admissions, staff and charitable support. The survey covers the period from the opening of both institutions to the implementation of the Mental Deficiency Act of 1913 which required the (re)certification of all children.

[The history of smallpox vaccination in the Imperial Moscow foster house]

The article deals with the history of vaccination against natural smallpox which is directly connected to the Imperial Moscow foster house which became one of smallpox vaccination centers in Russia of XIX century. In 1801, when variolations were substituted by more safe cowpox vaccinations, in Russia the first vaccination using the method of Jenner was made exactly in in the Imperial Moscow foster house. From 1805, the smallpox vaccination received the status of force of law, the Imperial Moscow foster house began to produce and to distribute the smallpox vaccine all over the country and apply the smallpox vaccination not only to its foster children but to all turned to and, besides that, to train the smallpox vaccination. In 1857, the Imperial Moscow foster house became the first establishment in Russia where the revaccination was applied. In 1980, the WHO proclaimed that the implementation of the global program of smallpox irradiation resulted in the natural smallpox elimination on Earth. The smallpox became the first communicable disease defeated due to mass vaccination. One third of Earth population was vaccinated by the Soviet vaccine, which originated mainly because of the activities of physicians of the Imperial Moscow foster house.

Herlihy's thesis revisited: some notes on investment in children in Medieval Muslim societies

David Herlihy proposed "that we seek to evaluate, and on occasion even to measure, the psychological and economic investment which families and societies in the past were willing to make in their children" and suggested an alternative to both the "theory of discovered childhood [in Europe]," as introduced by Philippe Ariès and the notion of Lloyd DeMause that the historical evolution of child-parent relations in general formed a continuous and irreversible process of progress. This article shows that although we lack some of the archival sources that are essential for reconstructing the real lives of children in the premodern Mediterranean Muslim world, we are still able, with the "investment" criterion in mind, to assess attitudes toward children, at least in some defined periods of time and geographical regions.

The role of the Toronto Girls' Home, 1863-1910

It has been suggested that the role of Ontario children's homes, who had for half a century been helping disadvantaged children, changed significantly and immediately under the 'Children's Protection Act of 1893'. However, the records of the girls admitted to Toronto Girls' Home from 1863 to 1910 suggest that this was not the case, for this home at least. For most of their history, their core clientele was the children of poor respectable parents dealing with a crisis or who could not both work and care for their children. Thus, although prior to 1893 they did also care for a significant number of neglected children, and after 1893 fewer such children were admitted, the Home continued for more than 20 years to help families as they always had, providing a form of family support for which the child protection system was not designed.

Abandoned in Brussels, delivered in Paris: long-distance transports of unwanted children in the eighteenth century

The study uses examinations and other documents produced in the course of a large-scale investigation undertaken by the central authorities of the Austrian Netherlands in the 1760s on the transportation of about thirty children from Brussels to the Parisian foundling house by a Brussels shoemaker and his wife. It combines the rich archival evidence with sparse indications in the literature to demonstrate that long-distance transports of abandoned children were a common but historiographically neglected by-product of the ambiguities of foundling policies in eighteenth-century Europe and provides insight into the functioning of the associated networks and the motives of parents, doctors, midwives, transporters, and local officials involved.

[The Dateus founding home in Milan: questionable date of establishment]

The authors translated from latin to italian the living will of the priest Dateus from Milan, dated 787 a. C., found and published by Ludovico Antonio Muratori in his Antiquitates Italicae Medii Aevi (1740). In the document is specified the request of converting his house into a founding home. Many historians consider this to be the first example of a founding home in the western world. The AA., after review of the history and the literature, noted the lack of any documented activity of the institution, as well as, the unusual model proposed for that time. Therefore, it is the AA. belief that the original document is actually postdated to the 1550 a. C.

The business of relief work: a Victorian Quaker in Constantinople and her circle

This article explores how Victorian notions of charity translated to evangelical mission projects in the Near East. Focusing on Quaker philanthropist Ann Mary Burgess, it traces the trade networks that she established to serve the Armenian community living in the Ottoman Empire. Burgess's vast network of supporters throughout Britain, Europe, and the Near East enabled her to fund relief projects using profits from goods produced by the orphans and widows served by the Friends' Constantinople Mission. The mapping of these networks reveals the evolving relationship between evangelicalism, the humanitarian movement, and the marketplace in imperial Britain.

The role of Protestant children's homes in nineteenth-century Ontario: child rescue or family support?

The Children's Protection Act of 1893 introduced Ontario's first full-fledged child protection scheme. However; for half a century, children's homes had been helping disadvantaged children, and they played a key role in the evolution of an empathetic child-protection system. During the course of the nineteenth century, the provincial government had increasingly accepted responsibility for disadvantaged children and had developed legislative definitions of a child in need of protection and of neglect that were incorporated into the 1893 Act. The work of the children's homes went hand in hand with these developments, as they not only helped needy children but also helped develop these concepts of neglect and provided models for the home placements promoted by J. J. Kelso and mandated by the Act.

[Pediatrics in Arezzo: a millennium]

The analysis of the evolution of Pediatrics in Arezzo, from 1100 until today, has been a very positive contribution to the study of pediatric history. It explains health problems and the true suburban environment allowing to verify the effective and operational applications of the laws issued by the central governments. In particular, it describes the care given to foundlings, the development of hospital facilities and the case of the six children who died of sepsis in 1959.

[Syphilis, brothels, unwanted children and wet nurses. Italy and syphilis infection in the 19th century]

In 1861 in Italy a repressive law was passed against prostitution to reduce syphilis transmission. After the constitution of the Kingdom of Italy there began a debate on this law which was harsh on prostitutes and failed to resolve the health problem in question. In 1880, in Italy, studies were promoted under the aegis of a royal commission to understand the social situation of prostitution and the epidemic spread of syphilis. In 1888 Crispi issued new regulations concerning prostitution, prevention and therapy of infectious diseases: three years later a new regulation was established which partly restored the 1861 law. In this paper we present not only the question of prostitution in Italy in relation to syphilis, but also the serious problem of infection transmission to unweaned babies and to wet nurses in orphanages.

Concepts of childhood: what we know and where we might go

The publication of some forty years ago of the landmark work by Philippe Aries, entitled Centuries of childhood, in its widely-read English translation, unleashed decades of scholarly investigation of that once-neglected target, the child. Since then, historians have uncovered the traces of attitudes toward children- were they neglected, exploited, abused, cherished?- and patterns of child-rearing. They have explored such issues, among others, as the varieties of European household structure; definitions of the stages of life; childbirth, wetnursing, and the role of the midwife; child abandonment and the foundling home; infanticide and its prosecution; apprenticeship, servitude, and fostering; the evolution of schooling; the consequences of religious diversification; and the impact of gender. This essay seeks to identify key features and recent trends amid this abundance of learned inquiry.

‘A future not of riches but of comfort’: The emigration of pauper children from Bristol to Canada, 1870–1915

This article examines the emigration of orphan and deserted children from Bristol to Canada in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This emigration was organised and financed by the local Boards of Guardians and, as such, raises important questions about the way in which state agencies cared for dependent children. The emigration of Poor Law children is explored in relation to debates about childcare, poverty, racial degeneration and imperialism. Of particular interest is the role played by women in promoting child emigration and the article considers the women's contribution to discourse and practice, both locally and nationally. The dynamics of emigration are analysed by using both British and Canadian sources and the tensions associated with pauper emigration are examined in some detail.

[Socialism and social protection - a tautology? Child abandonment in the USSR, 1917-31]

La protection sociale, question centrale de 1'histoire du socialisme, n'a pas suscité une grande attention de la part des chercheurs. Si le socialisme est 1'É at-providence par excellence, il faut s'interroger sur le fonctionnement de la protection sociale ainsi que sur les modalités d'élaboration de la politique sociale. L'hypothèse d'une relation tautologique entre socialisme et État-providence est confirmée par le fait qu'après la chute du communisme et la dissolution de I'URSS, la Douma a exprimé la volonté de développer et renforcer 1'É tat-providence(social ‘noe gosudarstvo)russe et ses « garanties sociales » pendant les réformes économiques. L'utilisation même d'une expression telle quesocial'noe gosudarstvo,inconnue dans les discours soviétiques, n'exprime-t-elle pas le désir politique de nier cette nature intrinseque du socialisme ? II est vrai que ce fut pourtant le gouvernement bolchevique qui pour la premiére fois dans 1'histoire, le 30 octobre 1917, proclama la « protection sociale totale »(pol'noe social'noeobespečenie)non seulement pour les travailleurs mais aussi pour les autres catégories sociales dépourvues de travail (enfants, invalides et indigents).