What price a child? Commodification and Australian adoption practice 1850–1950

Abstract

The issue of premiums has always proved problematic for advocates of benevolent adoption for whom the involvement of money tainted an exchange that was meant to be grounded in love. This paper argues that the shifting relationship between supply and demand has meant that there has always been a market in children and that adoption was one of the more prominent mechanisms used to regulate that exchange. Drawing on a database of 25000 advertisements placed in Australian newspapers during the so-called century of the child, it analyses the ways in which children were rendered desirable in a competitive market. Analysing the more than 3000 advertisements in which it was made clear that money, known at the time as a premium, was to change hands, it casts new light on the commodification process involved in adoption, identifying a mismatch between the preferences of those seeking and those needing to dispose of children. It identifies a market that was highly responsive to the environment in which it was operating and proved remarkably resilient in the face of the increasing regulation of adoption. By viewing adoption through the lens of the market, it questions the notion that the ‘best interests of the child’ have always necessarily prevailed.

Keywords:

• History of adoption
• adoption advertisements
• commodification of children
• baby farming
• adoption premiums

Notes

1. The statistics relate to the database as it stood at 23 December 2015. Research continues as additional newspapers come online.

2. The earliest cases to be reported were Caroline Jagger (‘Baby Farming’, 1868) and Margaret Waters (‘“Baby Farming” in England’, 1870). See Kociumbas (2001) for a discussion of the impact of this publicity.

3. The preference for girls has been observed both now and in the past across most jurisdictions where altruistic adoption is offered (Goldberg, 2009; Gravois, 2004; Melosh, 2002; Murray, 2004). For a discussion of possible explanations of this phenomenon see Swain (2012, pp. 404–407).

4. National Archives of Australia, Uniform Adoption Legislation – Material prepared by States, A432 1961/2241 Part I. Retrieved from http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/ItemDetail.aspx?Barcode=1172639&isAv=N