The Vicissitudes of Foster Care in Interwar Yugoslavia and the Global History of Child Protection
The Vicissitudes of Foster Care in Interwar Yugoslavia and the Global History of Child Protection

Summary/Abstract: This article deals with the possibilities and limits of rooting foster care in interwar Yugoslavia, which was primarily presented through a local project in Savska Banov-ina and reflected in a health film produced by the School of Public Health. The vicissi-tudes of foster care in Yugoslavia are set in the global and Balkan contexts, and in relation to interstate settings for child protection and its initial institutionalization as a strategy for legitimizing the new supra-national institutions of social work and post-1918 nations. The public representation of foster care to the international community and wider audiences in Yugoslavia is explored by examining the reports of Mica Trbo-jević, one of the main proponents of foster care, prepared for the First Balkan Con-gress on Child Protection (1936), and the film Spas male Zorice (1931 by Mladen Širola). Discursive practices aimed at promoting foster care are discussed in compari-son to mainstream visions of families, children and rural communities, disseminated among Yugoslav and international experts.

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