The purpose of this research is to examine the issue of child abuse as a problem of social deviance. The plan of the research will be to set forth the current social context in which the issue has become relevant and the theoretical foundation on which it can be analyzed and then to discuss approaches to the problem that may forecast possible methods of addressing and solving it.
Child abuse and neglect are phenomena that have been persistently and programmatically tracked in many countries. Yet that seemingly straightforward statement is deceptive, inasmuch as some experienced researchers have advanced the view that perhaps 60% of all deaths actually linked to abuse and neglect are in fact not recorded (Crume, DiGuiseppi, Byers, Sirotnak, Garrett, 2002). What are called "child fatality review teams" in the literature in the United States have concluded that official administrative bureaucracies specifically set up for the purpose of protecting children and bringing into the criminal justice system medical service practitioners and others whose charge includes the protection of children have been woefully inadequate in either reporting or acknowledging the extent to which the deaths of children are correctly attributed to the malfeasance of adults. One meta analysis of child-fatality statistics, based chiefly on an extrapolation from research conducted in the state of Colorado, cites "the inability of any one system of child protection, law enforcement, health, or criminal justice to recognize, track, and assess the circumstances of child maltreatment deaths" (p. 18). That study found that the highest rate of child deaths ascribed to deliberate abuse occurred with children, mainly girls, less than one year old and of black non-Hispanic origin (Crume, et al.). Researchers acknowledged that ascertainment of violent death was made the more difficult according as clear evidence of the cause of death was not apparent; thus deaths involvi...