Raising the World: Child Welfare in the American Century

Sara Fieldston

Published by Harvard University Press 2015

Raising the World

Child Welfare in the American Century

Sara Fieldston

https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674425507

Overview
Contents

About this book

Sara Fieldston shows how humanitarian child welfare agencies sponsored by Americans filtered political power through the prism of familial love after World War II. These well-meaning institutions shaped perceptions of the United States as the benevolent parent in a family of nations, and helped to expand American hegemony around the globe.

Reviews

Fieldston should be commended for providing a long overdue synthesis of U.S. voluntary child-saving agencies during the Cold War. Her book is a very successful contextualization of how U.S. charities such as the Christian Children’s Fund, fueled by the desire to care for wartime dependents and participate in the larger narrative of containment through emulation of the U.S., used foster parenting by sponsorship to export U.S. ideas about democracy and the family.
-- M. E. Birk Choice

This remarkable book brings private humanitarianism into the story of American global power during the Cold War. Moved to relieve suffering and express their commitment to love, peace, and international friendship, ordinary Americans and child welfare professionals ran headlong into the controversies of U.S. foreign and military policy. From postwar Europe and Japan to Korea and Vietnam, Fieldston shows us what happened when Americans and their government agreed that saving the world’s children was the foundation of reconstructing nations and remaking the world.
-- Ellen Herman, author of Kinship by Design: A History of Adoption in the Modern United States

Raising the World is a major contribution, showing us the affective side of Cold War–era modernization theory. To inoculate poorer nations from communism, Americans embarked on a host of programs overseas. Sound emotional development and individual happy childhoods, these liberal reformers believed, were essential to world peace. A fascinating, nuanced study, Fieldston’s book is essential reading for those who want a better understanding of how ordinary Americans become invested in the project of American hegemony.
-- Naoko Shibusawa, author of America's Geisha Ally: Reimagining the Japanese Enemy

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Author’s Note Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
Prologue: Tales of Love and Global Power Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Manufacturing the Citizens of the World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	12
2. Reading Dr. Spock in Postwar Eu rope and Japan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	32
3. Building International Friendship in an Orphan Age Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	54
4. Raising Little Cold Warriors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	78
5. Forging the Free Child’s Armor Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	109
6. Training the Natives of the Future Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
7. Challenging the Global Parent Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	179
8. Globalizing a Happy Childhood Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	206
Epilogue: Raising Children, Uplifting the World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	227
Abbreviations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	237
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	241
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	303
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	305

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Pages
- Main content: 328

eBook

Published: March 9, 2015
ISBN: 9780674425507