PRACTICE GUIDELINES FOR THE INTEGRATION OF CHILD-HEADED HOUSEHOLDS INTO EXTENDED FAMILY FOLDS

Luzile Florence Nziyane,Assim Hashim Alpaslan

doi:10.15270/47-3-125

Abstract

Foster (2004:2) emphasises that even with the advent of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the “extended family safety net is still by far the most effective response to economic and social crises throughout sub-Saharan Africa.” Webb (in Foster, Levine & Williamson, 2005:241) agrees that the extended family system, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, generally serves as an alternative arrangement to provide care to orphaned children. However, Foster (2004:2-3) states that this system is becoming stressed and its capacity to care for orphans may be weakening as some of the orphaned children do slip from this traditional method of orphan care and end up living by themselves in child-headed households (CHH). Phiri and Tolfree (in Foster et al., 2005:16-17) assert that these families need support to enable them to cope with the strain of shouldering the burden of taking in orphaned children. It is in light of this that the researchers were motivated to conduct the study to explore the suggestions on how barriers that hinder effective integration of these children into extended family folds can be overcome with a view to formulating practice guidelines to support this traditional method of orphan care

Highlights

AND PROBLEM FORMULATIONFoster (2004:2) emphasises that even with the advent of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the “extended family safety net is still by far the most effective response to economic and social crises throughout sub-Saharan Africa.” Webb agrees that the extended family system, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, generally serves as an alternative arrangement to provide care to orphaned children
The findings will be presented according to the major theme with its accompanying sub-themes and categories, which emerged from the processes of data analysis undertaken on the transcribed interviews
The suggestions to overcome hindrances to integrating orphaned children into extended family folds will be presented according to the following sub-themes: Poverty relief; Advocacy by social workers on behalf of orphaned children; Discipline, reprimand and direct orphaned children living with extended families; Suggestions on how to deal with specific challenges hindering the integration of the child-headed households (CHH) into the extended family; Alternatives to family integration; Practice guidelines on integrating CHH into extended family folds

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Foster (2004:2) emphasises that even with the advent of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the “extended family safety net is still by far the most effective response to economic and social crises throughout sub-Saharan Africa.” Webb (in Foster, Levine & Williamson, 2005:241) agrees that the extended family system, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, generally serves as an alternative arrangement to provide care to orphaned children. The research questions posed to focus the study were: What are the suggestions to overcome the barriers against integrating children from CHH into the extended families from the perspectives of the extended family, children heading CHH and social workers rendering services to these client systems?. The goal for the study was set as follows: To explore the suggestions on how to overcome barriers that hinder effective integration of CHH into extended families and to formulate practice guidelines to inform the integration process of the orphaned children into extended families from the perspective of the extended families, children heading the CHH and social workers. The sample was comprised of ten orphaned children heading CHH, eight extended family members related to the children participated in the study, and seven social workers who were rendering social work services to these client systems. Guba’s model for the trustworthiness of qualitative data as outlined by Krefting (1991:215-222) was applied to verify the data

OF FINDINGS

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR