This week, the Minister of Social Affairs and Housing Sophie Hæstorp Andersen revoked permission for Danes to adopt children from South Africa. Although seemingly irrelevant, the news comes at a time when fertility and parenthood are at the top of conversation subjects around the table. This might then be a good time to take a look at Denmark’s history with adoptions.
Back in the 20th century, the Vietnam War triggered a peak of adoptions by Western parents, including Danes, a trend that extended to the 70s and 80s. During these decades, South Korea, India, and Colombia became major countries from which Danish families adopted children.
In response to the growing numbers of international adoptions, through the years Denmark incorporated harsher regulations around bringing foreign kids into the country.
One of the well-known facts about why processes have been made difficult is that Danish media eventually discovered a dark truth about adoptions: some parents were happily getting kids that were presented as abandoned or orphaned, but in fact had biological families that had been coerced to give their kids away.
Despite the decline, Denmark remains a country with a high percentage of internationally adopted children relative to its population, a trend that probably stems from the fact that very few children are available for domestic adoption in Denmark.
One might wonder where these adoptions are taking place, as Danes remain very homogenous-looking people. This somehow points to a different question to ask: how effective is the integration system for foreign kids in a country like Denmark? As always, we don’t have all the answers, but we hope the questions in this section might inspire reflection that is useful for our readers.
