Résumé :
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Family continuity is a unifying framework for all family and children's services in the 1990s and beyond. It is the contemporary approach to supporting families, protecting children, achieving permanence, and providing for continuance of important relationships across the life span. Starting with the principle that children need to be embedded in family and community networks of continuing caring relationships, we present a framework which integrates an array of family-based services. A brief, historic overview of child welfare services in the 20th century shows how a series of reforms, including permanency planning responded to limitations of the service delivery system by increasing the engagement of formal child welfare services with families. The evolution of permanency planning has culminated in a family focused paradigm which increases for children the possibilities for family connectedness that will endure throughout the life course. The article concludes with a discussion of critical issues for the transformation of practice, program, and policy of family and children's services.
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