Alternative Care for Children:Family Realities versus Institutional Imaginaries

Abstract

This article critically analyzes alternative care for children and adolescents in Ecuador, juxtaposing family-based care with the protection imaginary that still legitimizes institutionalization as the quasi-automatic response. Using an interdisciplinary approach (law, sociology, psychology) and drawing on international standards, domestic legislation, doctrine, interviews with system actors and data, it examines how the proclaimed priority of family-based care is diluted in State practice. The study reveals a structural gap between the legal recognition of the family and an entrenched institutional imaginary that equates protection with separation, control and distrust of vulnerable families. This inertia produces procedural delays, limited judicial specialization and psychological harm for institutionalized children and adolescents, kept in a limbo that contradicts the principle of temporariness of protection measures. In response, the article propo-ses strict-scrutiny criteria for any decision to institutionalize, together with regulatory and public-policy reforms aimed at progressive deinstitutionalization, consolidation of family-based care as the preferred measure, and a redefinition of the State’s role toward active support for family and community networks, rather than institutional substitution of care.