Book Review - Research Handbook on Adoption Law, edited by Nigel Lowe and Claire Fenton-Glynn, Research Handbooks in Family Law Series, Edward Elgar Publishing

This book is the latest edition of the Research Handbooks in Family Law Series, which addresses some of the most important issues in contemporary Family Law, and provides a thorough analysis of adoption law in relation to regulation and practice in the UK as well as in other countries. The impact of adoption on the child, the adoptive parents, the birth parents, and society is explored and discussed from different academic and inter-disciplinary perspectives. The book addresses highly relevant questions regarding the adoption institute from both a UK and international perspective and provides knowledge and insights about the past, present, and future of adoption. The book is divided into six parts: Introduction (Part 1); The Different Faces of Adoption (Part 2); The Adoption Process (Part 3); Post-adoption (Part 4); Comparative Perspectives on Adoption (Part 5); and Intercountry Adoption (Part 6). The aim of the book is to provide the information necessary to start a discussion regarding adoption and the benefits and challenges associated with it. The authors do so by bringing together scholars from across a wide range of disciplines, including law, social work, philosophy, economics, geography, education, and sociology. Among other things, this book deals with the requirements for adoption and the international law instruments protecting human rights, including the Hauge Convention on Intercountry Adoption, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), and the European Convention on the Adoption of Children (Revised). While contributions to the book primarily focus on the UK, as the previously mentioned headings of the different parts reveal, the book also contains comparative elements and insights into both regulation and practice in other countries that are key actors in the area of adoption, including China and the USA, thus providing a broader international perspective.