An out-of-home care system in crisis: implications for African American children in the child welfare system.

An out-of-home care system that is itself in crisis lacks adequate resources to provide the services needed by families and children in distress. Increasingly, these families are composed of people of color, particularly African Americans. Using current child welfare statistics and a review of the literature, this article examines the nature of the crisis in child welfare, and how poverty and an array of social problems, as well as problems specific to the child welfare system, increase the overrepresentation of African American children and families in the out-of-home care system. Implications for child welfare practice and advocacy are also discussed.