Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History

INTRODUCTION:

This post reminds readers that certain American universities (individuals directing centers within schools within the universities) + think-tank nonprofits (individuals directing centers within the think-tank nonprofits) + well-to-do, privately controlled and owned tax-exempt foundations (also “nonprofits”) collaborating internationally with their foreign counterparts in all three categories around the theme of marriage and especially fatherhood promotion, with a just a splash of** domestic and/or child abuse-prevention, typically all under the label “family,” really do exist.  

And you’d better be prepared to deal with their influence and, better yet, talk about it.

Talking about it should not take place in borrowed terms which add to the free-publicity.  They’ve already got that.  We need terms which explain where they are, who is involved, and how such networks connect to policymaking at the federal levels.  That information is part of a basic “who’s who and “what’s what” and where and how they connect.

We cannot continue “advocacy” and “family court reform” (etc. ) pretending that these liaisons just never happened, do not exist, aren’t funded, and don’t influence others who may be acting more directly on individual court cases — like judges, family lawyers, custody evaluators, mediators, and others!

**That splash, added for flavor and not integrated substance, typically seems to mean, assuring ongoing father-child contact no matter what (although the same cannot be said for mother-child contact) and coaching or treating as many others as possible per family unit, with a high emphasis on mediation rather than litigation.  That theme prevails in both countries, despite “women’s groups” (who don’t mention this) also in both countries.

By “both countries,”  in the example (situation) that inspired this post, the public/private sponsorship and partnering comes from both US and UK governments.  Some so-called “partners” seem to be more recent, or at least more recently advertised on the respective websites, but the arrangement still only expands upon (or acknowledges an expansion of the reach of) existing networks of influence.

For example, the American university showing its international partnerships focused on families and children.  This same trans-Atlantic partnership as reflected on a UK website (this UK charity was only formed in 2016).  It administers the “Child & Family Blog” described as that partnership (image below).

Windowframe at top displays the url, “FamilyInitiative.org.uk/Research-Hub“. Paragraph 3 describes the project and lists the two universities (actually, the US-university’s “project”) and Swiss foundation involved. The url belongs to a UK charity, original director occupation “church leader” Richard Eric Wightman (images below, as to LGH May 6, 2019 post).

Link to Search the above UK Charity’s Company#10445272 on this blog.

At least two previous (2018) posts contain my previous drill-downs (on which the many images below, and points I’ve made just touch), some in more depth and pulling in more references to the network. For example, I’d say that a director of that charity with South Africa (and possibly South African Reserve Bank) connections is a little odd. … There is some overlap.  That information may help explain the intensity of my comments, and some broad-based claims on THIS post.  The picturesque (?) long titles to the posts in the search results feature (identify) organizations and the specific family-court-connected professions they are promoting.  After reading this post, perhaps check out that link and read the earlier ones!  (Do not search the charity (on this blog) by name, “The Family Initiative,” as the search term is far too broad).

The Family Initiative, Ltd. (UK) Home page, Bottom: Middle Green logo (“Child & Family Blog”) shows a collaboration tying back to USA (Princeton University, Brookings Institution); Righthand logo Voices in the Middle is actually (further clicks show) in part, British gov’ts. response to “Dispute Resolution Council” Final Report with a focus on having children involved in out-of-court, private, mediation or dispute resolution processes.  The gov’t response document references prominently ONE professional, Janet Walker, OBE, who is an AFCC member, and chair (currently) of its “international committee,” as well as on the board of editors (through 2019) on its Family Court Review…

See white-on-black banner (logo at top left) in the nearby image.

Within the last year or so, I [A] researched, that is, looked up a UK fatherhood (under the label “family”) nonprofit and [B] later, separately, checked the USA (Princeton) university center’s website again, uncovering the international link  improperly labeled a “partnership.”

The above images are search results for ‘family initiative’ (a widely-overused phrase) on my blog.  I see these screenprints date to just over a year ago, January, 2018…

Now I feel obligated to not just report, but also feature this expansion, which I see also encompasses a foreign (EU/Swiss) tax-exempt foundation whose wealth is based on a (German) coffee-and-chocolate family dynasty. I’m not questioning the (patriarch’s) ability, but the opportunity was certainly inherited.

Besides and beyond all of the above, a major family law firm (UK based/Mishcon de Reya) also seems to be backing that UK fatherhood nonprofit partnering, etc. (see nearby annotated image).  Mishcon de Reya is also involved as a “digital sponsor” of “Voices in the Middle” website managed also by The Family Initiative, Ltd.

Tavistock Relationships – USA Professionals – More Fatherhood Support – AFCC connection… (This section added post-publication, May 7).

(More info. available from organization websites, and as previously summarized  UK Charity’s Company#10445272 on this blog. )

The “Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships” (later renamed or registering a dba “Tavistock Relationships”) reference (see above annotated image from Mishcon de Reya website) also highlights the common theme of counseling, coaching and if needed therapy for as many people as possible.

The next five images, which I’ve probably also Tweeted (ca. March 22, 2019 per the screenprints), connect the individuals shown, themselves historically connected to “Association of Family and Conciliation Courts” (key concepts from its start also counseling for parents, psycho-educational behavioral modification, “attitude adjustment” classes and of course lots of mediation, including “mandatory”).

These images added here because it references Tavistock, however the two couples featured with UCBerkeley, Yale (and Smith College in Rhode Island) connections have also published in association with Michael E. Lamb, whose name is coming up soon in this post through the UK (Cambridge)/Family Initiative collaboration… I also have in FamilyCourtMatters.org here, a few years back, a post named after Marsha Kline-Pruett and featuring the AFCC conference circuits shown on her c.v. (“Stanley Cohen awardees — Good Grief, Marsha Kline Pruett” or similar name:

(Found it: The post was: Inside AFCC Stanley Cohen Distinguished Awardees’ Conference Circuits, or, “Good GRIEF, Marsha Kline Pruett!” [Written March 4, 2016, publ. about 2 yrs. later] case-sensitive short-link ends -37M, ca. 8,100 words.)

(“Gallery” format: click on any image and cursor to the next or click each individually to enlarge).

…Adding Mishcon de Reya family solicitors (lawyers) and Tavistock Relationships to two famous research universities: Quite the mixture of powerful players in such agenda.

Two more miscellaneous images from my blog media library showing the company the Cowans have been keeping.  (Captions go with original posting on this blog.)

FAMILY INITIATIVE …#10445272 formed Oct 2016) working w|the Cowans (UCBerkeley, focus “Fatherhood”) + Michael Lamb (Yale grad, psychologist at UCambridge, “The Science of Fatherhd|Fatherhood Global).. (same Michael Lamb who publ. alongside R. Warshak??)

This bio blurb (for Carolyn Pape Cowan) identifies that the editor of publication on John Santrock’s (UT-Dalls) resume is the same. Notice Philip Cowan’s involvement with “Institute for Human Development” at UCBerkeley. I may have posted on this in connection with the UCBerkeley Center for Cities and Schools (which might be under it), but cannot recall for sure at the moment.

Coffee and chocolate (cocoa) beans are produced in the EU, though certainly where their major consumption has been advertised and (successfully) promoted. So we are talking, when it’s a family dynasty foundation (as this one is), the historic factor of colonization also as a source of power (wealth).

The section in yellow-highlit background above was originally shorter.  I’d mentioned the centers, but not the international aspect.

As written now, I wish to call attention to the distance between the concept of representative government (where people governed expect to have some enforceable rights under the applicable jurisdiction, and for prosecution of crimes committed against them within those jurisdictions to be taken seriously) and the actuality of policy justification being discussed and embedded in places to which the average person, if he or she was even aware of it, has no regular direct input.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           The “key actors” I had in mind in writing this post seem intent to transform US practice to better resemble UK practices, although there’s also an awareness that those practices have plenty of shortcomings too, which leaves the field open for the David Mandels (Safe & Together) and Evan Starks (Coercive Control) of this world, not to mention the Jeffrey Edlesons ( 1999 “The Greenbook” with Susan Schechter** (published by NCJFCJ), Edleson first from UMinnesota, now UCBerkeley, both times “School of Social Work”) with or without the Oliver Williamses (1993ff IDVAAC at UMN with a dose of father-involvement as protection, now “Ujima”) and others of similar convictions on major system transformations according to their (respective) shared visions.

These, you may have noticed, predominantly men from the USA** and living/working as academics  in major US universities (except perhaps Mandel) have made inroads and are getting the references and cites in other, to put it bluntly, mostly Commonwealth countries, particularly when it comes to how to prevent violence against women, child maltreatment or domestic violence/abuse.

Who Was Susan Schechter, Briefly (see also Footnotes):

**Susan Schechter (Univ. of Iowa, sociologist) co-author with journalist Ann Jones of “When Love Goes Wrong: What to Do When You Can’t Do Anything Right,”*** (1992) died Feb. 3, 2004, only 57, and of endometrial cancer:  “Susan Schechter, 57, Author of Books Exploring Impact of Domestic Violence” Feb. 16, 2004, New York Times, Campbell Robertson (<~references Jeffrey Edleson).

…In 1999, with Jeffrey L. Edleson, a professor at the University of Minnesota, she wrote a set of guidelines for professionals in civil courts, child welfare services and domestic violence programs. || In her writing, Mrs. Schechter explored the ways domestic abuse affected children

{{article correction notes she went by “Ms.” though was married (to Allen Steinberg).

***Correction: post originally called this book “When Love is Not Enough,” but on checking saw I’d remembered it wrong.  NB: I also remember reading this book while in an abusive/battering marriage. It was encouraging in a time of being beaten down psychologically and economically, not just at times also physically.  I do not know where I might have picked it up that quickly after it was published, although I did get to libraries as a mother with children.  The book was psychologically helpful, but in hindsight, given her sponsoring foundations (and federal agencies) while an Iowa professor, I can see why it wouldn’t have also reported on fathers’ rights organizations and funding as “of interest” to women and children getting ready, perhaps, to leave abusive relationships.  That’d be biting the hands that fed….See next link from “SNAC” for more context.//LGH May 7, 2019.

Susan Schechter Biographical Notes at SNACCooperative.org (“SNAC” for Social Networks and Archival Content) gives a more detailed list of her education, activism accomplishments, and early sources of funding support for her books and her work. (viewed May 7, 2019). She is my generation, and could easily have been an (older) sister.  Recommended short read. Of the 1990s, you can see that the position was under a School of Social Work, and “mainly served as a project director for a number of grant projects…” and some of the private (and federal) ones listed.

In 1991, Schechter took a position as clinical professor at the University of Iowa, School of Social Work. While she supervised several graduate students completing independent studies and practicum requirements, and also lectured for various courses taught at the School of Social Work, the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, the College of Law, and the Injury Prevention Center, she mainly served as a project director for a number of grant projects. Many of these grants explored domestic violence service needs and the relationship between domestic violence and child abuse, and had an impact on national public policy and training procedures. Funding sources included private foundations, such as the Ford Foundation, the David and Lucille Packard Foundation, and the Annie E. Casey Foundation, and federal and state agencies, such as the Department of Justice, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Centers for Disease Control, among others.

LinkedIn for Allen Steinberg shows a B.A. in Sociology from Northwestern (Schechter got her Masters in Social work from Univ. of Chicago; Northwestern also being in “Chicagoland.”).  He went on to get his Ph.D. in History at Columbia (NYC, 1973-83), then 6 years teaching at Harvard, one year at (prestigious) Bowdoin College (Maine) and 28+ Years at the University of Iowa, which may also explain why his wife was there too (again from 1991 forward per her biography).  He shows now as “Greater New York” area.

Their son Zachary Schechter-Steinberg, now I gather from his NYT Aug. 2014 wedding announcement in his early 30s, graduated from Wesley and at the time was ” senior economic adviser for the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions in Washington;” his bride Sarah Ayres, a Dartmouth grad, was economic policy analyst at the Center for American Progress.  Sounds progressive to me…  Her Entymologist? Dad at Dartmouth (Matthew P. Ayres)

I’m betting that this Professor Emeritus at University of Iowa is probably the Allen Steinberg in question (notice areas of interest).  Allen Steinberg, Emeritus Associate Professor: American Social, Legal, & Urban History Cultural Conflict in Modern America, History, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, The University of Iowa.  Footer info has an unusually open explanation of how the State University of Iowa Foundation is dba “The University of Iowa Center for Advancement” and where you can find info about it in various states… Well, not quite providing the EIN#, but California Registry (for Solicitation purposes) it linked to did: EIN#420796760, and total assets surpassed the $1B mark in only 2011.

I see also there is a Susan Schechter Lab (“The Susan Schechter Domestic and Sexual Violence Social Justice Laboratory,” established Fall 2015) at the PIRC (Prevention Innovations Research Center, estab. 2006), under the COLA (College of Liberal Arts) at UNH (The University of New Hampshire, Durham campus).  A Lab within a Center within a College within a University. [<~initial caps intentional] As that link says, undergraduate and graduate students earn academic credit for helping the researchers with their white papers, etc.

Just saw this; I am footnoting this..symbolic of what’s NOT said in such centers, especially on their funding.
### For more information, see Footnote: “Susan Schechter Lab” a.k.a. Standard Setup and Funders (but no Funding Trail): A Lab within a Center within a New Hampshire University working Internationally with Trademarked Trainings run Internationally”  (Footnotes are on a separate post which should be published not long after this one.  This post has more footnotes than most, so I pooled and segregated the footnote texts which would otherwise normally be at the bottom of a post).

…So glad we women have found “our” voices again and have such magnanimous men to speak through their megaphones just as if it was actually our own words, determined by popular vote in open elections..locally…

BACK TO THE FAMILY INITIATIVE:  SELF-LABELING / PARTNER CATEGORIZATION, and some PARTNER PERSONNEL:

Let me just one more time review JUST ONE website showing two versions of the website operator’s own partners.  One of them has four logos at the bottom.  The other also has four logos, but lists itself among “Our partners” and submerges “Princeton University” as a partner under “The Future of Children” [though shown as a “partner” under both images] which cannot be anyone’s partner because, unlike “The Family Initiative,” it’s not a corporate (business) entity but a publication.

However, in the second image (with more detail) listing itself among “Our Partners,” The Family Initiative (Company Limited by Guaranty, #10442572, formed October 2016, + Registered Charity No. 1170660) which manages the blog, i.e., website) at least references what part of the University of Cambridge is involved, i.e., the Applied Research Group in Psychology.  Which (further explored) brings us to Michael E. Lamb, who directs that group. Compare both images!

LEFT IMAGE, Left to Right:  “The Future of Children” (USA) University of Cambridge (UK) Princeton University (USA) Jacobs Foundation (Switzerland). Under https://www.childandfamilyblog.com (scroll to bottom, under the big, bold heading “Our Partners.”

RIGHT IMAGE, Left to Right:  University of Cambridge (UK), The Future of Children (USA), Jacobs Foundation (Switzerland), and “Family Initiative” (UK). Under (fine print, from top of the page, under “About Us/Our Partners”) https://www.childandfamilyblog.com/about-us/our-partners/  That image is basically the whole page content.

The first “Our Partners” is at the bottom of a web page; to view the “OUR PARTNERS” Title in association with lower right admission who runs the website is tough; I had to make the font pretty small or it’d be blocked visually.  The second one was found by clicking on the top right under “About Us.”

The immediate link from the more detailed image, under

Applied Developmental Psychology Research Group

goes right to a large group photo with just one (older) man showing and several younger women.  (below left).  Notice, the photo isn’t even labeled or captioned.  It takes some more clicking around (under “Academic Staff” Dept. of Psychology) to locate the man shown, Professor Lamb, with among his credits being president of Division 7 (“Developmental Psychology”) of the AMERICAN Psychological Association, and editor of a journal published by it (headshot image below-right).

Michael E. Lamb on “FatherhoodGlobal” website, viewed 2018Oct22

LinkedIn (partial) for Duncan Fisher OBE (Cambridge U 1980s grad) originally started Voices In The Middle project 2006 til it moved to Family Initiative), listed at”FatherhoodGlobal” website, viewed 2018Oct22

(Please click image to enlarge. See also images from Oct. 2018; this was taken May, 2019) Fatherhood.Global (“About”) Notice the names/sponsors involved.

Professor Lamb (I probably have posted this earlier also) surfaces representing, I gather, the “science” part of “Biology of Fatherhood” for “Fatherhood.global” which “About Us” page notes sponsorship of the (same) Jacobs Foundation, the year 2014 and a nice conference at Marbach Castle.  And Duncan Fisher OBE.

For those familiar with this name, Michael Lamb also frequently associated with and has given testimonial for books by (American) Richard Warshak, i.e., “Divorce Poison” or similarly.  We are not exactly in gender-neutral territory here!).

(Another reference to Duncan Fisher, whose “OBE” (Order of the British Empire) was on behalf of his services to “children and families.”  This quote is from WBG.org.UK (Women’s Budget Group) and shows another, earlier, nonprofit he started in 1999, the “Fatherhood Institute” a  “Think and Do” tank..  Sure…

Duncan Fisher OBE (from Women’s Budget Group LTD. Company? # 04743741)

Duncan Fisher OBE is a founder of The Family Initiative. He co-founded the Fatherhood Institute in 1999 and was the CEO for 10 years. During that time he served on the Board of the Equal Opportunities Commission for several years. His work focuses on fathers and caring. He campaigns for equal parental leave, better community support for fathers and effective engagement with fathers by maternity and early years services. He received an OBE in 2008 “for services to children”. He manages two websites reporting on research: The Child & Family Blog, which is a project of Cambridge and Princeton Universities reporting on child development; and Family Included, which reports on maternal and newborn health.

(Separately, Duncan Fisher quoted in a June 3, 2015 article “Are Divorced Dads really treated fairly by the family courts?” (Telegraph.co.UK, under “Men/Relationships/Fatherhood” and by Glen Poole of “equality4men” (formed 2013 in the UK), quote is about halfway down):

This presumption that women own their children obviously has a biological basis, which has become hardwired in our collective psyche and written into our laws. In 2015 it is still the case that mothers and fathers do not have equal rights. As the former Equal Opportunities Commissioner, Duncan Fisher, explains:

“In UK law, a father can only be a father if the mother approves him. She can do this in two ways – marry him or invite him to sign the birth certificate. If neither of these happens, he is not the father until the family court approves him. A man has to be vetted by the mother or the state before he is allowed to be a father.”

As I’ve just shown, the ‘Child & Family Blog” has a few problems: distinguishing itself from its partners; distinguishing a project (publication) from a partner (entity); and in general with categories and labels. Yet they are dispensing, essentially, child development, parenting, child care and other labels intended to impact how families interact with each other.

That labeling “confusion” (intentional or accidental?) also prevails at the Princeton website too about “The Future of Children” Partners, if you look it more closely. It’s disturbing to see at such a prestigious institution. I considered whether to send a letter, with appropriate cc’s to those supporting such publications and policies.

From above, I’d said:

**That splash, added for flavor and not integrated substance, typically seems to mean, assuring ongoing father-child contact no matter what (although the same cannot be said for mother-child contact) and coaching or treating as many others as possible per family unit, with a high emphasis on mediation rather than litigation.  The theme prevails in both countries, despite “women’s groups” (who don’t mention this) also in both countries.

(The next paragraph continues from near the top of this post, and refers to UK Child and Family, Marriage and Divorce, etc., professionals and their policies, as I recall)

Those (professionals and their policies) handling the “shortcomings” like violations of due process, women getting beaten or killed, or fleeing with children to avoid the same, children being kidnapped FROM their mothers, and in general breaking up many families, but keeping together some of the most violent ones have an unusually friendly/collegial affiliation for USA-based groups (like, AFCC) that have helped standardize and replicate the same “shortcomings” over here. … And in Canada...

Effectively, these “partnerships” of university centers expand book, curricula, consulting, and conferencing (with travel expenses probably written off) for a select and policy-aligned group of academics and historic think-tank leaders; the groups seem closely bonded judging by frequency of co-authorship, shared leadership of university centers, and a marriage or two involved among the involved academics.

I can see why a certain level of enthusiasm comes with the opportunities for the particular class (specific categories) of individuals…. but that doesn’t make it right!  For those who’ve been paying attention to such centers, a tendency of publishing to be now under “Oxford University Press/USA” (or just Oxford University Press), obviously prestigious, has surfaced.  ### For more information, see Footnote:  “Outsourcing USA Policymaking to Overseas?  Despite Commonalities, the UK =/= the USA!”(Footnotes are on a separate post which should be published not long after this one.).

Helpful definition of ‘bearing” from Etymology Online Dictionary, “bearing”(n.): Usage of “bearings” as “direction or point of the compass in which an object is seen or is moving” dates from the 1630s; “to take one’s bearings” from 1711.  It’s 2019: how do we (individual residents/citizens of the USA) get our bearings on key public institutions and who/what’s moving them, or in which direction?

Establishing policy for intended application ONTO the USA (and associated countries) from OUTSIDE the USA (and, respectively, the associated countries) the normal legislative process at the state level**  is odd and inappropriate.

Seeing this is not too difficult. Reporting it and getting “non-player” serious attention to and discussion of has been, and still is:

For me to call attention even to the key actors which produced these circumstances, I have to continually re-peat, promote, re-teach, from my position — understanding their significance — about different perspectives and the concepts driving them. I understand I must do this because I perceive the ongoing cross-currents and trends {in “family court matters” and issues closely related to them} appeal to mass-marketing-conditioned consumer appetites for the more direct, immediate, concrete, and mainstream-media-validated type of information — not things individually checked and understood where they fit into a larger landscape of public policy (government) or commerce (business).

Most people are encouraged NOT to think independently while believing they are. They are educated to follow, but given a pre-selected menu of choices when a menu of pre-labeled issues comes to their attention.  The battle or, if you will, competition, is to dominate individuals’ mental processing of basic, important data and through continual unresolved conflict affect and subliminally steer the decision-making centers of the individuals, the place where we consent or do NOT consent.

In other words, our minds. Plural.

Bypassing INFORMATION which might eliminate much of the CONFUSION on how things work, what’s going on — especially as to matters economic and matters governmental, which ALL PEOPLE are pretty well hooked into at several levels simply by living — shows intent to bypass INFORMED CONSENT in favor of ARTIFICIALLY ENGINEERED CONSENSUS.

The main thing, it seems, we are to consent to (just an opinion) is to being socially engineered from afar and subsidizing it, too.

[[This “**” refers to/comes from the paragraph above “Establishing policy for intended application”) **For  USA’s family  courts’ transformation, a.k.a. “improvements,” whether this happens at the state  v.  federal levels  is  an   issue, in addition to the problem of government transformations or improvements originating from outside any country’s own borders. Citizens of other countries, in this case, of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, would do well to also be aware (or “beware”) of harmful policies from the USA being exported, which they have been and I see will continue to be..]]

###  See Footnote:  “How to Understand Universities, let alone their Centers?  Universities themselves are a complex concept, with embedded interests, historic continuity and a pervasive presence“ (or a better name if I can come up with one!). It’ll be in or near the “Outsourcing” footnote above..

Note: I’m not anti-university (I’ve attended college, have two bachelors’ degrees, worked at and around some…), just concerned when who and what they are cannot be concisely conveyed to a supporting public, in terms any high school graduate might (ideally) be able to understand. I’ve also tried (hard) to penetrate the identity and funding mechanisms of specific centers which keep coming up in my blogging. Not easy!

“Orient (v.), is from “s’orienter” (French, to arrange facing the east) (says this dictionary) i.e., to get one’s bearings, i.e., to know in which direction YOU are facing…

When the vast power of governments, plural, and the vast power of commercial, corporate interests, plural, both international, start lining up and calling it “good” and “for your own good” but doing so “illicit and complicit,” that is, where the financial accountability sun don’t EVER shine, it’s time for any individual, particularly the non-billionaires, non-millionaires and the non-civil servant employees supporting such governments financially to get his or her bearings….  to take a closer look…. to understand exactly WHAT is aligning, and WHOSE interests are foremost, regardless of how it is marketed, spun, sold, or promoted.

To give words to in what direction any “ship of state” is being steered, and to what destination it’s oriented.  To know “what time of day it is” in the journey.  (Etymology “Get one’s bearings” “orient” onesself).

Immediately preceding context of this post:

In merging two of my blogs (“The Family Court Franchise System” from blogger.com is now incorporated into “FamilyCourtMatters.org” here on WordPress, my April 19, 2019 post) and creating a specialized table of contents (index of post and page titles with original publication dates) for the merger, I explained at length “Why bother?” — why I even bothered with that project, i.e., why I believe my unusual, atypical, “uncommon” perspective and habit of reporting from that perspective should become more common practice among concerned individuals, especially parents, thereby leading to more discussions, individually and (ideally) in person/locally.

There’s been ongoing, on-line talk of: family court practices, flawed practices based on unsound psychological theories, lack of oversight for certain programming or certain types of family court-appointed professionals with quasi-judicial immunity.  There have been claims that recent (like, about 2011) more scientific (sic) evidence exists to inform updated practices, and that current practices don’t keep children safe, as though this was ever an original purpose or even function of the family court systems.

What about identifying who’s habitually been generating new fields of practice — like “fatherhood” —  and the practitioners-and-research-networks to go with them? There are actors, and historically, many can be named, identified, and objectively according to specific, non-emotionally-laden, non-values-drenched vocabulary, accurately categorized but somehow, it seems, they rarely are.  Without some better categorization, it’s hard to see function and even harder to conceptualize network functioning (let alone, funding), or to see where, how and by whom the power is being leveraged over time. It’s certainly hard to get a grip on existing strategy or tactics, and based on those what JUST might be an actual agenda versus (in contrast with) the ongoing propaganda, regurgitated in slightly varied forms, year after year.

Why this post  “More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors)“? 

Although

• naming and objectively, accurately categorizing key actors who’ve been generating new fields of practice and the research-and-practitioner-networks to go with them,  and
• Describing and identifying these not just by people’s or one or two group (nonprofits’) legal business names, but also applying specific, non-emotionally-laden, non-values-drenched vocabulary, accurately categorized to describe them, like:

• Entity/non-entity.  Public or Private.  New or Old.  Big or Small (where finances are available).
• Geography (legal domicile), habitual openness or secrecy regarding a legal business name (or legal domicile), size, or claimed age (how long has existed under what names).
• If available, sources of cash flow, and whether this is primarily public, or private — and whether obtained as contributions, from “program service revenues” (as a nonprofit), or otherwise (sale of investments, dividends, interest, etc.  See any (US) Form 990 income tax return form for categories of revenue and expenses). If not, make a not of why not…
• The level (how much of their revenues/gross receipts come from) of “big-bucks-backing” whether U.S. federal government grants/contracts or tax-exempt foundations (the largest ones around) or other (foreign) governments or foreign legal-domiciled tax-exempt foundations (large ones/old ones/new ones/whose etc.), and how many layers does the cash flow through before reaching said “key actors” and their affiliated organization or institution.
• For entities, frequency of legal name changes, compliance with basic (state or IRS-level) registration and reporting requirements; how often the spinoffs/name changes/mergers.  You’d be surprised at some of these, well-known ones.
• Collaborations, who’s “BFF” (Best Friends Forever) with whom organizationally, …(etc.)

Although even looking at, let alone talking about, almost any of these items in considering, analyzing, or promoting fixes for family courts is not common practice and rarely resonates with // barely disturbs the daily deluge of“don’t ask us, around here we don’t tell, if you want our validation and social/moral support just don’t talk about it,“ interpretations coming from sponsored rhetoric (reporting), I’ve determined to identify, and I intend to continue identifying and featuring, operating networks within the family courts landscape and talk about what role each plays within the larger one.  

That is, I intend to continue naming “key players” and the concepts to go with them. This post features some of them who’ve been around, and under-reported among family court concerned parents and programs/advocates.  

While this “non-reporting” has prevailed, I’ve seen, separately but still featuring ONE personality, a center at University of Texas-Austin’s “LBJ School of Public Affairs” in collaboration with a known (at least to this blogger) relevant center with its own website, Twitter account and branding, “Fatherhood” focused of course, at University of Pennsylvania Temple University (a private university) in association with a Colorado nonprofit whose founders (back in 1980) is, without debate, involved that far back in the operations of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts…[FRPN.org]

FRPN.org Website footer; read the fine print which acknowledges federal funding. Notice two logos: Temple University and 1980ff Colorado nonprofit “CPR” (close connection to AFCC origins through Jessica Pearson). I did locate the HHS grants — they went to the larger TEMPLE, not the smaller CPR, making the “dots” much harder to connect. Searchable at TAGGS.hhs.Gov (Recommend use Advanced Search function).//LGH May 7, 2019 for post. Judging by nearby images I was also publicizing this in 2016

(Footer page from FRPN.org in VERY fine print acknowledges HHS backing.  The two logos represent one university and the Colorado nonprofit, “Center for Policy Research.”  This is one to watch…]

Unless you are even halfway-awake to the existence of these individuals, nonprofits, and their habits when operating coordinated, synchronized, and disseminating rhetoric, publications, studies and evaluations among their own kind (i.e., “fatherhood” practitioners and researchers), how can you responsibly and effectively organize resistance, or speak to sources of basic rights violations?  How can you understand governments, plural, we all have to deal with?

These practices undermine local rights under state laws, conceal their felt impact on local communities, and basically “divide and conquer” any population at-will, whether by gender, by ethnicity (race), or by class.   They also undermine the concept of representative government.

Notice the few, the same specific fields keep coming up as involved in the infrastructure.

TEMPLE UNIVERSITY, PHILADELPHIA (and Rome and Tokyo), What, Really, is that FRPN?

(It’s a project. Not a Center, NOT an Institute. The university gets the grant, the faculty member — working alongside an out-of-state nonprofit with multiple (not exactly neutral affiliations) connections to the family courts and gender-based programming within them.  Building a Body of Evidence for the Field…)

Temple University’s interesting background (Wiki link here, and above) shows it’s LARGE (6 campuses across Pennsylvania, and international ones in  Rome and Tokyo), and only became state-affiliated in 1965.  It is not a State university, but a State-RELATED university.  It gets those state funds, but is still independent.  Great place for private (fatherhood) purposes to embed….

Since 1965, Temple has been a Pennsylvania state-related university, meaning the university receives state funds, subject to state appropriations, but is independently operated.^[17]

It’s also known for preparation of large amounts of people for a variety of professions, per the Wiki:

As of 2017, more than 40,000 undergraduate, graduate, and professional students were enrolled in more than 500 academic degree programs offered at sites across the globe, including eight campuses across Pennsylvania, Rome, and Tokyo.^[11] Temple is among the world’s largest providers of professional education (law, medicine, podiatry, pharmacy, dentistry, and architecture), preparing the largest body of professional practitioners in Pennsylvania.^[12][13]

Temple has many centers and institutes, but the FRPN isn’t listed as a Center… It has many “Schools and Colleges” but a click on “School of Social Work programs” leads back to the College of Public Health. Home page at the CPH (“SSW”) lists many issues and problems which might seem related to the “fatherhood” field as it happens to work in the US, but it’s not mentioned.  (See nearby images).  However, on the bottom left corner, under the column “NEWS” there’s some news about FRPN.

(This should become a separate post, so I’m going to stop here… I see it but the effort to show it should happen separately…This is also the second or third time I’ve gone looking for the key connectors (apart from noticing the contents posted on the FRPN.org website and which authors / groups they were citing).  How it fits into Temple seems to be through a single, large  — in fact the largest associated with him — grant to Temple University from the HHS, ℅ Jay Fagan.  There have been some previous grants but nothing close to this size ($4.8M 2013-2019) to build evidence for the field — of fatherhood…. Are you surprised to hear that his undergraduate major was psychology?  Don’t be!//LGH May 7, 2017)

Within the last month, as I was re-vsiting the LBJ School of Public Affairs CFRP website (I’ve also Tweeted on this, with attached media), a single woman’s profile kept surfacing across the various network initiatives or named programs.  CFRP = “Child & Family Research Partnership” which (as in the UK) somehow translates heavily into “Father-focused FIRST”.

Even from the faculty profile page, it seemed obvious — which the C.V. confirmed — she’d been mentored as a more recent doctorate, under the Princeton/Brookings crowd I mentioned below.  Shown shortly below; look for two resume (c.v., curriculum vitae) images and captions (bright-yellow highlit)…

This type of activity has been taking place 1990s and early 2000s (and, as we speak, approaching the end of the second decade of the 21st century…).  So, now firmly rooted and grounded at UTexas-Austin (LBJ School of Public Affairs), and funded, “Fatherhood” is being fast-tracked for university-wide transformations — and at least here, it also seems universities are being transformed to better fast-track fatherhood policies also, typically under the same words:  CHILDREN and FAMILIES.

The link dates to August, 2018….Cynthia Osborne named LBJ School Associate Dean for Academic Strategies Image (orange-bordered) nearby.

Link: LBJ School of Public Affairs appoints Associate Dean of Academic Strategies” (Cynthia Osborne) already entrenched in fatherhood initiatives, some under CFRP at the same school, and (referencing CFRP) “See Also” Pennsylvania’s FRPN.org (and how many “fatherhood” events, policies, links, and trainings you can find under the above)…LGH May 7, 2019

CV Image #1 of 2, Cynthia Osborne at UTexas Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs. California (BA, MA), Harvard 1999, MPP, Princeton, NJ PhD 2003 is significant to her activities now (shortly after obtaining the PhD) in Austin... I sensed this from the summary, but two snapshots of the posted CV show clearly enough: the individual got her Ph.D. from Princeton University’s “Woodrow Wilson School of International Affairs.”  The “Future of Children” is published (with Brookings Institution) from, or at least as anchored to, a Center within that Princeton School, which I’ve posted on before from its Sarah McLanahan (and Ron Haskins) connections, which also ties it in several ways to centers at Columbia University. (shown below near bottom of this post).(LGH May 7, 2019)

CV Image #2 of 2, Cynthia Osborne at UTexas Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs. Notice 2003 PhD, 2003-2005 “postdoctoral fellow” (mentoring): that Center for Research on Child Wellbeing” at Princeton is underneath the Woodrow Wilson School for International Affairs; see “The Future of Children” and Welfare Reform subject matter, Marriage/Fatherhood Policies, etc. 2013ff references her involvement with the (Temple-Univ. based) FRPN.org also. Very little time, it seems, actually teaching youngsters, or adolescents…From CA to NJ (briefly) to TX. Does she have any kids, I wonder...

And we (“commoners” … concerned mothers/ fathers/ taxpayers) want to play ignorant as if this won’t influence family court decision-making, or the relative place domestic violence issues takes in the larger framework?

C’mon now!  Women overall are targeted in this policy because it targets mothers**  — and women are being used, and collaborating, in promoting it nevertheless, case in point the person I referenced above.  Yet, how many women also want to keep playing with people who try the “gender-neutral card” as if there’s anything close to a gender-neutral landscape in the USA (or, the UK…)??

**(how many women eventually become Moms?  This targets independence in women who are moms, it also targets moms who became single by way of separating from or protecting their children from domestic violence, and partner-abuse, whether witnessing it or being a direct target of it…) 

My doing so seems to at least irritate some people, although it certainly doesn’t deter them for long:  good! Wake up, but “don’t shoot the messenger”!

WHY: I report from this perspective on this blog (despite the level of detailed drill-downs that requires, and how long it takes to produce a single post), on Twitter periodically, and I am not hesitant to talk about this in person to friends or strangers.  People sometimes notice my diligence and consistency writing (typically in public, and not just libraries) and curious about it or about me, are surprised to learn I’m neither a professor nor a enrolled student. In other words, I’m doing this because it’s important and because I want to.  Not for grades, and most certainly not for a living.

This is war.  There are casualties.  There is propaganda, there are supply lines, there’s “counter-intelligence” and there are ongoing disruptions to normal work, life and housing relationships that would occur during peacetime.  HOWEVER when it comes to the family courts, these seem to hit specific individual families, sometimes neighborhoods, but discretely and widespread enough to not always be recognized as a war.  But in what other scenario (livestock domestication) would periodic (parental or state or other immediate relative) kidnappings, murders, rapes (incest and other kinds), trafficking, extortion, hostage-taking and demanding impossible ransoms for the return of one’s own children ever occur?  How is that not war!

Now, what is that war really about, and what is it for?  WHY is it being waged?

[Who started it? Who or what perpetuates it?]

In any war, and in this one, there is basic intelligence available.  What kind of war has no source of obtaining and assessing intelligence, and refuses to discuss that information intelligently?

How does refusal to finish even a basic survey of the supply lines, tactics, and probable agenda (based on what already can be seen) in any way move this world (or country) towards better protecting the foot soldiers and innocent civilians, including children?  But  — like me or don’t, like my message, or delivery style, or not — that is taking place in “family court reform.”  Publicity on it has been compromised, and attention diverted from most significant to least significant elements, based on size, macro-economic impact.  Rhetoric is high, but reality-check is not.

Key “basic intelligence” could and should be conveyed to the point any person challenged on it could point to data he or she has personally encountered (drilled-down) — not just “heard about.”  “Heard about” even from credentialed experts is still, essentially, unprocessed hearsay to the hearer.

There’s a difference between being catechized into repeating key phrases, to knowing how to apply basic look-up principles and get to documentation which would support (or might NOT support) those summary phrases and labels.  With zero drill-downs and maximum values-drenched labels (vocabulary), the norm (see my basic bulleted list above for things I routinely fact-check, where I can, and take notes on) is factions according to the various catechisms. Not much better than religious sects…

Unfortunately most information about government institutions (like, the courts) comes to us highly processed and mediated and not very well sorted or labeled, like many other aspects of daily life in the USA, i.e., in a developed country plugged into the internet and organized according to power structures which historically control information production and distribution.

That’s another reason we must look at (and why I still look at/do periodic corporation drill-downs on) money behind the multi-media platforms and who owns them.  There are ongoing media mergers, even in the nonprofit investigative reporting field.  In that context, when it comes to reporting on: family court reform, family court programming, family court professionals, and/or family court fiascoes, the content is often driven by demand, not just advertising, and with a high entertainment factor.

What IS apparently “family court reform” practice:

See substantial post, spun off with images, examples, analysis and drill-downs.  I’ve left a few paragraphs to describe this spin-off and, I hope, inspire reading it! 

Apparently Common Family Court Reform Practice (Why my Uncommon Approach is less “Flawed”)(short-link ends “-9Qq”).   WRITTEN HERE, MOVED THERE AT ABOUT 5,000 WORDS, THIS RELATED POST BRINGS UP SUCH TOPICS AS (see following, red “~~>“s and I’ll repeat the link below them to show end of spinoff post description. Section also marked by this background-color).

In Family Court Reform, casualties (roadkill) meanwhile only better the cause through calling attention to the same.  In a reverse-logic sense, the more and more dramatic they are, the better it is for the reform agenda.

As opposed to what is apparently common practice now, I typically….

I look for the sources of power as measured / deduced by sources of financial support, ebb and flow.

Since January 2011, I’ve pointed out that that source is primarily individual taxpayers who (most) pay up front for long-term promised benefits.  That status is our leverage, but to exercise leverage (balance of powers) requires knowing which “lever” to use, where to place it and where to stand in applying the pressure, then getting at least enough people to put some weight onto that properly positioned lever, and doing so.  Good timing would help.

A decade ago would’ve been better than now, however now at least there’s more infrastructure to show, and a longer track record of behaviors by participants in the infrastructure, such as continually expanding, mentoring “next generation,” barely disguising sexism (bias against mothers, in particular) through strategic and imitated omission of any positive references to “mothers,” and — to me the most basic indicator — setting up systems which facilitate racketeering and money-laundering, needlessly complicated, and setting them up in (typically) NON-entities within  — the point here is — major universities, public and private.

To think that a repeat of the 1960s protests will work, well, we are in the age of Internet and increasingly centralized control of communications media for a few generations now, and some of those (billionaires through such technology) we need to exercise leverage AGAINST for our own safety, grew up with the occupy, boycott, and stage violent incidents for media attention tactics.

It seems obvious to me (because I do look for the sources of financial support, ebb and flow, and the gatekeepers to it) that overall, the population of this country is NOT supposed to understand it.  It’s not taught, that I can tell, in public high schools (or earlier, though it could be), and to teach it in colleges as a required course would in effect, reveal how those colleges operate and account for themselves (including for public funds involved in their operations) also.

My reporting (blogging, sociomedia, etc.) handles basic, key concepts that once recognized, are easy to see and could be discussed.  Once these are understood, other understandings fall quickly into place.  To obtain the basic understandings builds transferable skills — looking up basic sources, fact-checking promotional websites with those sources, including (because it’s a report to government) those obtained from IRS records where available. Those transferable skills quickly compensate for any time spent getting “up to speed” on certain basics.

Consider the alternatives (and what people seem to be doing now: I’m not an “insider” and so refer to social media oriented around these topics, and the blogs I’m aware of.  I’ve been blogging and following / aware of blogs in this area for a decade now and do have a sense of them, generally (especially those focused on US, but of course neither Twitter nor the “blogosphere” are limited to content from only one country…).

That is, you COULD go around memorizing lists of people, professionals, their affiliated business entities and programming (although company names running the programs change, as do the program names from season to season) without even categorizing them (for starters) according to: Is the name given in any report an entity, or a non-entity. If the former, what’s its legal business name and is it using a dba concealing that name, or a fiscal agent concealing that there is no such entity.

These lists would probably be based on either experience, or hearsay through networking. IS THAT THE BEST BASIS?  How many of us really know in collaborating on-line for some of these issues, others’ cases and the people we’re interacting with? Or they might be based on a near-equivalent:  hearsay from a funded advocacy group.  Personal social connections and loyalty to friends organized around the cause….

All this time could be (and by so many, is) invested memorizing “good guy/bad guy” lists according to where they stand on single phrases, or programs, or according to someone’s website soliciting feedback on good or bad judges.

What about organizing around personally or on-line delivered individual lists of good/bad judges out of your own state or area? How do these correspond or differ from the ones you might be or have been dealing with?  What’s the commonality — their beliefs on various psychological theories, or men vs. women? How solid are these assessments over time? Some judges will retire.  Others may be eventually recalled, at great effort, if appropriate — but then what?

At the end of all that investment of time, who has learned ANYTHING about how the US Government distributes funding to push which kinds of programming to influence the courts?

How about how when private interests do the same — who besides those in on it, by memorizing lists of good/bad people and issues as publicized learns ANYTHING about how private interests distribute funding to push which kinds of programming to influence, here we’re talking, the family courts (and their relationships with criminal prosecutions)?

How about when a private interest is powerful enough to set in place systems designed to alter an entire STATE’s court system, with intent to take those alterations both national and international?

The Ford Foundation’s (1968ff) “Fund for the City of New York” + New York State Unified Court System = “Center for Court Innovation” is such an example.  That Center, which I called out several years ago, is starting to look more and more, generically, like “AFCC” roadmaps, who I was calling out even more years ago (of the about a decade this blog has been around). (Not the topic of this post although a Ford funded nonprofit and initiative, I think, does).

How about when multiple billion-dollar tax-exempt privately controlled foundations collaborate (some will be by nature, progressive, others, by nature, the opposite) to tweak NOT just the courts, but also housing (HUD), education (School Districts), Workforce (DOL), provision of legal aid to access the civil courts, and so forth, and when they have the clout, the professionals to come up with specialized technology at all levels, and are doing this to reduce poverty, inequity, improve justice — and doing this all without having to account for their actions to the people whose funds they are utilizing, as referring here to the USA…??

I’ve brought up and at times listed, charted (℅ FoundationCenter.org search and sort by Total Assets) the biggest privately controlled tax-exempt foundations over the years on this blog, and locally-named, but also quite large community foundations, i.e., geographically anchored by name (Silicon Valley Community Foundation in NoCal; the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven (I believe it’s called)) and others.  Each large metropolitan area tends to have its own.

The state of California even has one, though its origins are a little different:  “The California Endowment.” (searchable on this blog).  Named by geography.

BEYOND THOSE PRIVATE INTERESTS ORGANIZED IN BILLION-DOLLAR ASSETS FAMILY/CORPORATE FOUNDATIONS, OR~~> USUALLY SMALLER BUT STILL OFTEN MULTI-MILLION and can be BILLION-DOLLAR ASSETS “COMMUNITY” [tax-exempt] FOUNDATIONS, which are many… and form their own nonprofits to collaborate on significant projects, …..

UNIVERSITIES AND THEIR CENTERS

In recent months and perhaps for a year or two now, I’ve taken again a closer look at centers based in universities, which requires looking at university financials (whether CAFRs for public (and tax returns their usually nearby private foundations named after the university)  or tax returns + if available, audited financial statements, for private universities).  These centers wield influence through publication and a visible presence; they also uplift and support specific professionals to promote specific causes — often for several decades in a row, usually at least two.

Some of these professionals are ABOUT my age, and I am now seeing them mentor next-generation (usually, PhDs) to keep it going.  Typically what they “keep going” has a close connection to the themes of fatherhood, “inter-disciplinarily,” (<~I think I just made up that adverb) as the answer to social problems and something that ought to be continually studied and reported on.

When the projects are overtly public/private at most levels, there cannot, really, be accountability and is not intended to be.  It’s basically promotion – selling the agenda, programming in all kinds of noble-sounding words imply empathy, concern, altruism, and social responsibility.  But the backdrops  I’m seeing through drill-downs and look-ups (not just experientially!) show systemic, inherent, by-design lack of fiscal accountability to the public served, as well as private agendas running through powerful public institutions.## [## See Footnote “Substantial Powers, but Enforcement Discretionary” at bottom of this post. Look for the green italic font and a short, expressive statement.]

That is absolutely the situation we are dealing with here!  So why not invest some personal time — if you don’t like my writing style, go look things up and write them up yourselves — but LOOK AT the economic structures, and the accounting for tax receipts; provide a roadmap yourself for others!  (Remember that a “balance sheet is not a budget” and that a “Project” is not a “person” corporate or flesh-and-blood, i.e., “natural”. The moment a person starts getting serious about those look-ups, the frailty and degradation of accounting trails will show up, as well as (for most) the historic ignorance on the whole subject matter.

When the “schema” has some more useful labels, and what they represent is understood, then people referring to different local situations, or perhaps, providers, professionals, and of course family court judges and lawyers, could communicate with each other.

When the “schema” is NOT labeled, and as a result people don’t have even an awareness of the grid or landscape it operates within (economically) excessive attention is drawn to one sector only –leaving the other sections to grow big, fat, and sometimes quite ugly in nature — and such infrastructures once set and operational, are hard to dislodge.

Bottom line, the issue is governance.  IS it “by consent of the governed” and to what degree is it representative.  We pay for it — where are the accounts, and is the system fair?

If not, then we are not going to be free, independent, and just might be already indentured and enslaved — but on a temporary leash.  As a formerly-battered wife and mother, and now a “senior” by age, I’ll say I much prefer self-discipline and self-control to being on the end of the leash of a condescending, over-entitled despot: individually or systemically.###  [### Footnote “in 2018” is just my current sentiment.  At the bottom of this post. Look for the green italic font and a short, expressive statement.]

Today’s post title is

More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors) (See Also upcoming “A Closer Look At — and Alternate Interpretation of — Who’s Funding Poverty Research..” (started 4/19/2019): (short-link ends “-9MU” and I expect it’ll be about 10,000 words long.)

Two footnotes (asterisks “**” “***”) from my April 19, 2019 post refer to the details here. Links will be provided over there once this post is published. As it happens, when I off-ramp material, I also introduce it, there’s another extended introduction here, too.

WHY THIS POST: For one length.  For another, I am also continuing to research and wanted to feature specific centers with new developments and it seems, personnel, since I last reported them. A separate post or two were in order. This is the first one and its title refers to the second one, already mostly written.

My accounting/operations-based blogging versus the typical cause-based rhetoric takes longer to explain because I talk about how money moves from one place to at least another (figuratively speaking).

Theoretically to give an account, there should always be parallel/matching accounting entries in the FROM and the TO). Accounting-wise, it moves so to speak through networks.  Showing networks means showing more than one place on the networks, which lengthens any description.

All this money (both the legal and the illegal) has an impact, as it is supposed to.

Talking about money moving from one place to another requires references to (in any instance) at least two places: naming them, showing them, defining them, labeling the concepts.  So, it gets long.

Below (section with the most images) after talking about the BASICS we ought to know, I reference the key organizations / centers and concepts (1) regionalization vs. representation within our elected jurisdictions (i.e., at the state level in the US); and (2) the “overseas” factor as it applies to things “family court related.”

Some program names will be familiar, but what concerns me is that the university centers and names associated with them, generally, are not.  They are very well known in their fields, and they have been for years to me == because I began (researching and writing) this blog a decade ago following HHS grants and networked nonprofits running the programs those grants fund; I notice things “Welfare Reform” things “Domestic Violence Networks” and things “Court-Connected” and how they interact; none of the above is a foreign concept to me which just misses my conscious awareness == but the university centers and names associated with them still do not seem to be in the local (county, state) or not local but still CAUSE-BASED (vs. accounting-based) debates — for example, on single programs like “Family Bridges” or concepts like “reunification camps” or even a few key people running such programs.

…Even on Twitter when several of those centers maintain Twitter accounts and put information out regularly….

University “Centers” are harder to track specifically because they are typically submerged within a large, often multi-million-dollar or (one that came up today) billion-dollar reporting entity.  That’s hardly a coincidence.  However, there are websites and named personnel associated with the centers which can be viewed. Their rhetoric and mutual symbiotic citing each other for more credibility (without corresponding fiscal accountability to the public as taxpayers supporting the institutions) can be noticed.  Patterns do emerge!

I have specific ongoing interest in certain university-based centers as they relate to welfare reform (USA) as welfare reform relates to family court practices, which practices impact women with children attempting to exit abuse.

We know that the family courts are a gauntlet which typically must be run if any father challenges the mother for custody or even where they do not — but are pursued for child support, are staying involved or wish to stay involved in the children’s lives, and as a result, expose those mothers to ongoing — sometimes for years — litigation, draining resources, to loss of contact with their children, subjecting the children to disruptions in their housing, education, care-taking and financial support, and typically affecting local communities or business/school/housing/social support relationships such women MUST develop (perhaps continuing, but often, re-establishing ones less conducive to enabling abuse).

We also know that at times there is roadkill associated with such gauntlets, as well as personal injury and loss.  We know the situation introduces problems which would not otherwise be there without the medium of the family courts.  That’s basic knowledge about conditions.  But where’s the basic knowledge about the corporations involved and how they’re funded and organized?

Basic information, by now we should (all) know …..

So, there is definitely Basic information, by now we should (all) know.  BUT WE DON’T!

I doubt most still do, based on sampling of major media reports when family courts (or domestic violence, etc.) comes up, and from my limited –but targeted to these fields — activity on Twitter.  FYI, I stay inactive on Facebook for privacy reasons.  And I just don’t like the platform…

CONTINUING….

The connectivity of state jurisdiction matters (custody, etc.) ties to federal jurisdiction matters (the social services safety net and federal grants to states for that safety net, as well as for child support enforcement, etc.), all of which ties into all taxpayers through the income tax and other contributions made to federal governments, as well as state.

By definition anything tying into taxation also also ties into tax-exempt institutions (i.e., most large private universities operate as tax-exempt entities with plenty of related ones due to their size and real estate ownership, supportive foundations and so forth).  Of course the public universities are also in receipt of public funds for their continuance.

So-called centers housed at schools within universities while often interdisciplinary are also often funded directly (exactly how, I’ve yet to see the paperwork, but possibly through endowed chairs, or grants to directors) through combinations of federal grants (such as from the Department of Health and Human Services) and, as it pleases them, from tax-exempt foundations also.

These centers once established, continue to develop liaisons, partnerships (so-called) networks and friendly collaborations across the country and “Across the Pond” while rooted and funded as tax-exempt private or public (state system) universities in the United States of America.

So the “interconnectivity” is across all levels through economics — funding studies, publications, research, consultants, reports, and dissemination of reports, maintenance of complex websites, and such.  Yet despite all this interconnectivity there’s major dissociation (lack of comprehension) of that connectivity, or who controls which conduits from the interconnected network to direct government actions impacting individuals at the street level, locally:  people who may THINK that their lives are being affected primarily by local government officials — such as individual judges. Or, perhaps a small circle of connected judges, custody evaluators, family lawyers, mediators, possibly court services (administrative) employees etc.

I obtained two (bachelors’ level) degrees before marrying and having children.  Once married, despite battering and ongoing assaults which took place when pregnant with the second child, and continuing to work, I somehow carried to full term and gave birth to both children, delivered healthy (highest “Apgar” scores). Having done this and now see from the inside out the institution (sic) of marriage, I have now experienced and through networking and researching seen from the other side of that institution how divorce — more than domestic violence, kidnapping, terroristic threats (including to kidnap), financial and even physical abandonment of children post-kidnapping — has been all but criminalized in this country… not even that long after women first gained entrance to its top, elite universities (and within less than 100 years after we even secured the right to vote — through a special amendment to the U.S.  Constitution that, while passed in 1924, some states didn’t even ratify until the 1930s and (latest, I believe) 1948.

Single fatherhood has not been “all but criminalized.”   Single motherhood has been, even though we’ve had single-mother (and raised fatherless) Senators, plural, MIT and Harvard grads, and even a recent US President in this country raised fatherless.

The banners under which this idea is promoted include social welfare, the public good, poverty theory, and in particular psychology (theories of child development).

In this climate (whether or not we may be specifically aware of where it’s coming from), the dangers in reporting abuse is not only from that abuser or “estranged” spouse/partner, but also and to me it seems, even moreso, from long-term, retaliatory and sexist handling of individual parents’ affairs.

Attempts to re-frame, relabel and decriminalize prior abuse/violence/felonious behavior after it’s been confronting (with legal intervention) and reported, persist.

Women who follow through, reading from many sources (again, institutional and individuals’ writings, statements upon academic and government websites, descriptions of grant-making from both public and private sources) on where this attitude came from and who continues to perpetuate and propound it, through reading come face to face with yet more disparaging writings about their own demographic.  

These writings are now about as likely to come from women (single or married) who make a career doing this, in association with powerful men in academia, government, consultancies, or nonprofit think-tanks  — or rotating successively through several of the above. 

There are many examples, but in this short post series (this one, and “a closer look,” linked below) I have a specific example from a university center I’d noticed and published on (Twitter) about a year ago (noticed earlier, but Tweeted then).  Checking back again, I saw more clearly just one fatherhood-focused, talking, and policy-pushing/spouting woman who I sensed before even reading her CV (from the center’s own descriptions) had been drinking from a certain known trough (mentioned below here) at Princeton University.

The C.V. which eventually was found, more than validated this.  I must post it too.

The field of psychology is prevalent throughout.  That field HAS to be brought in because if we are equal under the law, and have individual rights under it, only developed fields (now that religion alone isn’t politically acceptable cause) (although it retains major influence) to declare ALL women (especially mothers) a sub-species and ensure they are disenfranchised EXCEPT where they stay married, without reporting abuse.

This basically means TOO MANY face the choice of being tortured, and possibly eventually killed (with or without their children) or simply dying early from chronic stress and/or sleep, peace, safety deprivation (through attrition) — OR make the leap and navigate systems with signposts and eventual destination well-concealed, and face different kinds of torture, possibly a lifetime.  What may not be lost physically is lost emotionally, i.e., parts of the soul, or conscience, IF retaining the physical without resorting to the same types of violence they’ve been subject to themselves.

Although this field (psychology) was built up and established at key institutions (academic I’m talking) BEFORE many of them admitted women undergraduates or went co-ed (mostly in the VERY late 1960s and 1970s, some even a bit later), it has now become a go-to profession (along with education) for women to become powerful mouthpieces against their own gender (when the theme of “mothers” comes up) and passionate “attack dogs” on behalf of men (when it comes to “fathers”) and in association with and/or married to them.

THEREFORE I SAY,

No woman going through the family court systems in the USA (or, due to the partnerships, I say also the UK) should be unaware of or unable to cite names of key players (“actors” in the post title) who’ve carved out their status to govern the many by the few (i.e., in the oligarchy — from the sidelines) while WE are on the front-lines, year after year.

It’s just basic information!

Women should also know what are the key universities in “fatherhood” networks, state-level commissions so-named (typically under the executive branch, i.e., direct control of state Governors) and at least where these centers have been operational for many years, they should be able to name  several of them, as much as naming (can you do this?) all 50 states of the US, or what are the major bodies of water on its North (rivers, Great Lakes), East (Oceans), South (Gulfs) and West Coasts, not to mention finding Alaska and Hawaii on the maps and knowing where and in which bodies of water to find other US territories, and which other countries own parts of those islands or nearby ones.

I only know because I kept looking.

I also note how very many domestic violence/ family court reform organizations and their spokes-professionals rarely mention these centers.

…Perhaps this means they really do not even exist?  If all the important people in any field aren’t bringing up a certain topic, it must not be relevant — right?? (Keep telling yourself that….)

How did that work when it came to people in any immediate social circles not talking about sexual assault of children, or wife-beating in front of them, 21st century style?  Those who were assaulted know that silence on such assaults doesn’t mean no assaults took place, sometimes habitually.  It certainly didn’t for me.***

(### See Footnote “Silence on Assaults didn’t Erase their Reality (My Personal Awareness of Both the Assaults and Who was Silent about them). So, why would collective silence on public AND private sponsored university-based father(hood)-obsessed centers and consortia (networked centers) mean THEY don’t exist?” at Footnotes to “More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors)” (Post in draft Apr/May 2019). (short-link ends “-9Pt”)

So why would not these experts, lawyers, social workers, and fieldworkers directly with battered mothers and children, being tapped into a network of the same, not divulge to intelligent, competent human beings, their equals, and also mothers, what we were up against?  They surely must have known SOMETHING….How could they effectively serve without knowing what the legal and social services climate was in this regard, and why?

AS then, so NOW, still!!…

SIMILARLY,  the entrenched interests not only are now, but also have been and once rooted in place, planning continued expansion and synchronized control, and are getting better at it: promoting “fatherhood” as a research and practice area within government, academia, and private tax-exempt BILLION-dollar assets foundations (Ford, Annie E. Casey, Open Society) …. in addition to religious circles where it’s been entrenched for over a thousand years, AND in addition to smaller membership nonprofits whose members happen to be public officials in authority (governors, judges, etc.) like the AFCC.

Does that this system is not being adequately reported and noted to people in the throes of the family court systems or their aftermaths mean it does not exist?  Or is insignificant?

Read what they say and look who’s funding it, how long have been those career curves for existing professionals, how are the attitudes, mindsets, and vehicles for disseminating this rhetoric being maintained and diversified (i.e., new technologies or new publications shared in expanding internet-connected, conference and webinar-holding “consortia” (networks)?

These not only exist, they also do affect policy and are intended to continue affecting policy which policies affect individuals “en masse.”

They establish the “politically correct” attitude for people in power towards the balance of power between men and women, between fathers and mothers, and they do this basically citing to social science, sociology, psychology and psychiatry, and proclaiming “evidence-based practices.”

The evidence-based practices are  heavily sponsored, showing signs of vertical monopoly (i.e. fewer players, wider applications).** Obtaining the so-called evidence to justify continued programming (and expansion of the same) requires running massive social science “R&D” (research and development) modeled after drug trials, or sometimes called “RCTs” (the acronym sometimes seems to refer to “randomized controlled trials”) upon the lab rats — people.

Obtaining this evidence in large enough quantities also requires availability of people to be run through behavioral modification and psycho-educational classes. A classic extensive set of lab rats comes from the military (Look into Denver University’s (actually it’s “The Colorado Seminary dba Denver U)’s professors involved in Prep, Inc., and “Within My Reach,” classic marriage and relationship programming.  Scott Stanley, Howard Markman (now also Galena Rhoades).  Military families were subject matter for designing the program.

Another “made to order” population to be RCT’d seems to be anyone on welfare. The state of Oklahoma experimented with this (forced consumption of “Within My Reach” classes as part of orientation for receiving welfare).  (Oklahoma Marriage Initiative).

Some of this has morphed into a class called “MotherWise” being run by at least one of the same personnel (Galena Rhoades of University of Denver, i.e., “The Colorado Seminary”) (“University of Denver is its trade name). This seems to have some connection with the local “Family Justice Center” (google “Rose Andom Center” and “Denver Domestic Violence Coordinating Council.”  Despite the name, the agenda seems closely aligned with promotion of fatherhood.  Oh yes, and marriage…

Another “made to order” population is of course the truly captive audience — prisoners.

Another one is the public school systems, of course.  As well as from time to time, university-associated “lab schools” and, it seems, early childhood/child-care centers.

Another one more immediately connected field (along with welfare recipients because of welfare reform’s stated purposes to promote marriage and reduce out-of-wedlock child-bearing (and teen pregnancies) with “Family Court Matters” is parent education.  Parent education classes are ordered by local or presiding judges or set in place through administrative orders of presiding judges.  Such as I blogged about a year ago (in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, over a period of months) and my recently integrated “The Family Court Franchise System” blog reported throughout 2012 (and other posts on similar topics), and taking place in Cuyahoga County, Ohio (near Cleveland), as I posted when looking up Jack Arbuthnot and Don Gordon, authors promoted through the California state (Judicial Council) website using a Canadian charity (“Justice Education Society of British Columbia”), the website being as I recall PAS.FamiliesChange.ca.gov or similar (in early 2018).

And at the time I couldn’t find any “CAFR” for Cuyahoga County where one ought to be and was admitted to exist SOMEwhere….  which I also blogged.

To maintain the practices requires a constant flow of people — certain demographics of populations  — to practice UPON, thus raising up new generations of practitioners.  Then the studies have to be evaluated and written up also, helped by think tanks, … since the 1970s (!!) care of groups like [Ford Foundation + federal government started] Manpower Research Development Corporation (now MRDC) or Princeton’s “Mathematica Policy Research” and other consultants who over time sometimes are swallowed up by larger corporations (Caliber Associates, Abt, etc. are names that come up often when looking through HHS grants and web pages on marriage/fatherhood programming.  I really don’t know where “Maximus” stands now). It’s major business opportunities for government contractors, and for contractors with government-financed think tanks, too.

So, ….

There are basic navigational markers in public policy and who sets it; just as there are major bodies of water (on all four sides of the contiguous US 48 states, major rivers within it, and major mountain ranges too.  How can these NOT be known, at least a general awareness they exist if not all the specifics — sufficient awareness, i.e., like a NAME, to go look them up on a map, dictionary, encyclopedia or in person if you live near ’em??

This post is “about my writing” while providing a sample of it publicizing specific, on-going and consciously paradigm-shifting centers which collectively, and consciously identify themselves as a university-based international network actively pushing fathers’ rights systemwide.

These rights are pushed under the banner (theme, labels) of  “children welfare” and “child and family well-being,” “parenting,” “violence prevention” and even as the antidote for “poverty.”  In preparing this post, I again looked more closely at another member of the network, and was shocked to see how rapidly the entrenched theme expanded once it was first set up.  That other member is located in Texas.

The internationally networked aspect is promoted on the respective websites as a  positive, good and (implied) validating guard against bad or harmful practices.  The concept basically advertises itself as beneficial because it’s wide-spread (more than one university or entity), cross-sector (often within an individual university), and of course the respective university (or schools within universities) being respectable, their subsidiary components or activities also ought to be…. allegedly.

BUT, through commission and omission this policy in large part through these networks continues, intergenerationally (next generation of policy professionals being raised up through specific university schools, and centers (interdisciplinary but usually with a “home department”) minimizing and undermining, linguistically, grammatically, and as to identifiable, over-arching policy purposes, any corresponding legitimacy of mothers’ rights.

“Off the table” the moment “fatherhood” as a public policy (with practitioners and research networks and specialized jargon which skirts openly saying what it’s in effect DOING) is the concept not of “human rights” or “parents rights” but anyone’s rights as a citizen under the law, or equality under the law.

That is, the essential definition of “fatherhood,” per se, in public policy (internationally) has been and continues to seek to remain and entrench in practice, suppression of “motherhood,” per se.  It is about domination based on gender, and being thus arbitrary, it’s also really about state domination from outside the structure of government itself.

To come out straight and say “motherhood only has meaning to the degree it’s subject to “fatherhood” as a generic quality IS, when it comes to application, individually (attempts to ensure on  case-by-case basis through system transformation) to claim that mothers may only mother to the extent they agree to subject themselves at all levels and all times to individual fathers (even when seeking legal or state protection from them after injury, death threats, kidnapping threats of the children, and other injuries and felony behaviors).

Basically this covertly objects to both genders as, in fact, qualifying constitutionally (at the national level) and being classified as human beings, citizens equal under the law.  In saying this, I mean, the law of countries, not individual states, provinces, or other subsidiary designations within the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, or the United Kingdom, i.e., basically Commonwealths.  Or countries within the European Union (with or without Great Britain should it finally “Brexit.”)

As an American (in the sense citizen of “the United States of America”) I am particularly concerned about merging our nation’s administrative policies and practices, covertly (but less and less so) in opposition to declarations of national purpose and citizenship categories and themes:

• government by consent of the governed,
• representative government with both men and women having suffrage (voting rights) in this country and
• no law openly forbidding women to hold public office)
• no national religion…
• no titles of nobility, hereditary or granted on merit by a monarch.

with those of countries historically and still subscribing openly to a national religion which historically (admittedly, like our country used to) disenfranchised women from voting, inheriting land, participating in top universities (Cambridge, Oxford), or being ordained as Anglican priests, given the Anglican (nationalized Catholicism, essentially) national church of the Commonwealth.

It was not that long ago that a handsome young British prince married a beautiful young American divorcee /actress, a woman of color too, in a ceremony held televised in Windsor Castle.  That’s wonderful, romantic, entertaining for (us “commoners”) but where, really, did this concept of “fatherhood” as “in the public interest” and “motherhood” as (nowhere to be found in current rhetoric) come from — and where is it heading?

More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors) (See Also upcoming “A Closer Look At — and Alternate Interpretation of — Who’s Funding Poverty Research..” post) (short-link ending -9MU”).

That they historically haven’t been and still aren’t today in Commonwealth (former British empire) countries which Commonwealth includes monarchy, national religion (the non-Roman Catholic version of Catholicism established by a dangerous monarch running short on male heirs to the throne, centuries ago).  But I am eff-in’ tired of living in a country (USA) which claims to be different, special and exceptional — but in which the desire to return to its own racist, sexist, and particularly classist past while preaching that the REAL motive of (obviously) doing so is repentance for that past and a desire to fix the systems to make them more equitable, just, or somehow sustainable…

Bullshit.

Reading all this sounds, only on a grander scale, just like a batterer caught, about to be held accountable, and featuring some great acting, sincerity, hand-wringing, and offers to do anything but actually change the status quo (when not under direct scrutiny by others in power) or relationship dynamic.

In this post I’m again calling attention to in which fields such internationalization and standardization of the (patriarchal) status quo is taking place — increasingly gradually — and as an all-out campaign, if not war, on individual rights under the law, and (while we’re at it) as a gender, women.  Particularly “women who give birth to next generations” under almost any circumstances.

I had to chop up a long post intro.  The context in merging two of my blogs under “Why bother” was because of the nature of my writing, as opposed to typical current coverage of similar subject matter — that is, cause-based rhetoric vs. accounting/operations-based blogging.

More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors) (See Also upcoming “A Closer Look At — and Alternate Interpretation of — Who’s Funding Poverty Research..” post (4/19/2019 here): (short-link ends “-9MU”)

More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors):

There are not just practices (evolving) there are principles and key players/actors in steering policy and with policy, public and private financing towards specific solutions moving in specific directions.  All this has to be observed over time, and it has to be observed in motion — it is in motion — which type of documentation, explanation, consciousness-raising usually includes a level of detail never intended to make it in sponsored media.

I also frequently call attention to the media (and its sponsorship, historic and current), i.e., when companies sell off and use the profits to set up foundations, or when companies are bought and sold, rebranded, and streamlined for profits (i.e., moving towards business-to-business marketing more than general news).

Another sector that’s increasingly professionalized, networked, streamlined and coordinated for profits is the public sector.  In addition, there’s also the nonprofit / philanthropic (etc.) sector, which works like the public one in networks, and typically regionally, nationally, or internationally.  There’s a constant and probably unresolve-able tension between increased regionalism and blended public/private enterprises and service delivery and the concept of jurisdiction, representative government. ***

~ ~ ~

**”overseas” — I use that term because so much of this influence is coming specifically from and in collaboration with Common-wealth or EU countries/ universities/ foundations, which, from the US perspective is “overseas.”

[fn#] I chose that “Livfully” odd link because it mentions that this name was formerly “David Mandel & Associates” and represents a suite of “e-tools.”  Click (from there) on “EndingViolence.com” to see “Safe & together Institute” banner for more.  I’ve posted on this a number of times, and Tweeted also). The link I provided also shows, it seems, that LundyBancroft and BarryGoldstein approve.  Naturally — it’s continuing to promote batterers intervention programming and says nothing about the US DHHS responsible fatherhood/healthy marriage programming and doesn’t inform customers (US or overseas) of the existence ALSO of access and visitation funding grants in this country since at least 1988 (law, 1984), and now engrained into the Social Security Act (1996ff) with $10M a year funding for this type of programming, and related…

Looking for a link confirming the marital relationship (Garfinkel/McLanahan) I found it at Columbia University, where Garfinkel is interim Dean of the School of Social Work. Part of his bio blurb says that he and his wife started the well-known, longitudinal “Fragile Families” study, which I hadn’t realized before:  {{Faculty Profile, “SocialWork.Columbia.edu” for Irwin Garfinkel}}

… Dr. Garfinkel is also co-founding director of the Center on Poverty and Social Policy (2014-present). Previously, Dr. Garfinkel served as the director of the Institute for Research on Poverty from 1975-1980,** and the School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin from 1982-1984. From 1980-1990, he was the principal investigator of the Wisconsin Child Support Study. His research on child support and welfare influenced legislation in Wisconsin, other American states, the U.S. Congress, Great Britain, Australia, and Sweden.

In 1998, in conjunction with his wife, Dr. Sara McLanahan of Princeton University, Dr. Garfinkel initiated the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. Nearly 5,000 children in 20 large American cities were enrolled in the study at birth and are now adolescents…

** the “IRP” at UWisconsin has come up on this blog before, through the small nonprofit and odd-Form 990 history (to separate EIN#s show up, it was booted out of Illinois and re-surfaced in Wisconsin) “CFFPP” which historically in name, and after a name-change, continuing in policy, focused on low-income, African-American and Latino fathers.  (David Pate, (CFFP founder and Operations Manager) Jacquelyn Boggess, J.D.  (CFFP Executive Director) (UWisconsin-Madison School of Law)).  CFFPP’s self-descriptions acknowledged itself to be the strategic arm of the Ford Foundation’s policy. Other board of directors are clearly father-centric (and I’ve posted on this before so won’t re-view here).

The connection, still current with IRP is via David Pate (See bio  and research interests at University of Wisconsin-Madison Institute for Research on Poverty), where you can quickly find more: HHS sponsorship and fatherhood/marriage promotion… but little encouragement to follow either the funding of these centers, their sponsors, or HHS itself.

~ ~ READ MORE AT (in draft Apr 17, 2019/active and accurate only when published) ~ ~

Footnotes to “More about those perspectives and key concepts (and actors)” published May  6, 2019). (short-link ends “-9Pt”  I estimate about 5,000 words)  Link is active now, but accurate only when I publish those Footnotes)