Child abuse and kinship guardianship: social work and indigenization perspectives in Indonesia

Indigenization was an essential issue in social work; however, it was hardly explored in previous studies on child abuse related to kinship guardianship. This article aimed to describe the assessment of eligibility of the alternative caregiver and examine the intervention for the permanency plan of the abused child. The abused child was removed from Western culture to his grandfather living in the Eastern context. This study employed a qualitative approach with seventeen participants. Data-gathering techniques included document search, in-depth interviews, observation, and drawing analysis. The assessment of the eligibility of the grandfather that applied systems theory and indigenization showed that the grandfather was eligible as the alternative caregiver. At the intervention phase, an emphasis on indigenization led to guardianship -not adoption- as an option for the child's best interest. The implications for social work practice and education were that indigenization should be given more space, especially in multicultural societies; when alternative care is required, Indonesian and African social workers should encourage the kinship form, considering strong community ties as the social capital; future research should focus on indigenization in permanency plan for abused disabled children.