Child abandonment
Legal and social aspects
(Abstract)
The first chapter of this research begins with a reflection on the notion of minor interest in the Italian and international legislation. Being child abandonment the core of this research, the first chapter presents also a short survey on the child rights and on adoption, from the 1865 code to the new 2001 law n. 149. The most relevant issue discussed in the first chapter is nevertheless the notion of abandonment: the abandoned child is deprived of any moral and material assistance, and because of this entitled to specific protections.
The verification of the state of abandonment is the fundamental prerequisite for the child adoptability. The research describes the stages of the process that leads to the adoptability decision, as modified by the 2001 law n. 149.
The second chapter deals with the problem of foreign minors that live in Italy without effective parental figures. In the study of the legal aspects of this phenomenon the relevant laws are not only the mentioned law 149/2001, but also the laws on migrations (laws 40/1998 and 189/2002).
The second chapter aims also at defining the figure of the foreigner unaccompanied minor, and at identifying the legal discipline to be applied in this case, examining the national and international relevant laws.
The third chapter deals mostly with the social services activities. The first part of the chapter describes the legal features of these services, with a particular attention to the recent 328/2000 reform. In its second part the chapter presents some interviews the author made with operators of the social services; with the manager of the Social Security Department of the Florence Council and with other operators of the same office; with the investigating magistrate of the Juvenile Court of Florence; with the chairman and with other magistrates of the same Court, and with the manager of the immigration office of the Florence police force.
Aim of this part of the research is to examine the answers to the problems described above of the social services and of the judiciary officers in Florence.