ANW History

Until 2009, all adoptions from the United States concerned partial mediation adoption procedures. This meant that the Prospective Adoptive Parents (PAPs), after receiving permission from a Dutch adoption license holder, started the adoption procedure themselves through a self-established contact in America and took care of everything themselves. In 2009, the Dutch government decided against partial mediation in American adoption procedures. The main reason for this decision was the lack of insight into the details of an American adoption procedure. Partly for this reason, there was a sense that ‘things might not be completely right’ with adoptions from the USA For a long time, it remained uncertain what the future of the American adoption procedures might be. Especially when at a certain moment the American adoption contacts Michael Goldstein and Adoption ARC – both with long-term experience in intercountry adoption mediation to the Netherlands – stated that it would not be possible for them to work with the existing Dutch adoption license holders. This would have meant the end of adoptions from the United States.

Meanwhile, the Dutch Central Authority for Intercountry Adoption (CA) took over the complete adoption mediation responsibilities for these American contacts, although this should not have been the role of the CA in an adoption procedure, because the CA should monitor the adoption license holders and all the individual adoption procedures. However, this concerned a temporary situation, which also meant that the mediations from the United States would come to an end.

Some of the adoptive parents felt strongly about this, and in their free time and of their own free will they founded a new adoption license holder, applied for the license, asked permission to provide mediation services in the United States and in the Netherlands, and held meetings with Adoption ARC and Goldstein to establish new partnerships with them.

After putting a lot of time and energy into it, their efforts did not go unrewarded. The founding of this new adoption license holder, Adoption Foundation A New Way (Adoptiestichting A New Way) made it possible to continue with the adoptions from the United States, and to place these children with safe and loving families in the Netherlands: with hetero couple’s, individual applicants, and same-sex couples!