Among the hundreds of thousands of displaced persons in Germany at the end of World War II, approximately 40,000 were unaccompanied children. These children, of every age and nationality, were without parents or legal guardians and many were without clear identities. This situation posed serious practical, legal, ethical, and political problems for the agencies responsible for their care.

In the Children’s Best Interests, by Lynne Taylor, is the first work to delve deeply into the records of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) and the International Refugee Organization (IRO) and reveal the heated battles that erupted amongst the various entities (military, governments, and NGOs) responsible for their care and disposition. The bitter debates focused on such issues as whether a child could be adopted, what to do with illegitimate and abandoned children, and who could assume the role of guardian. The inconclusive nationality of these children meant they became pawns in the battle between East and West during the Cold War. Taylor’s exploration and insight into the debates around national identity and the privilege of citizenship challenges our understanding of nationality in the postwar period.

Lynne Taylor is an associate professor in the Department of History at the University of Waterloo.

Lynne Taylor's profile page

"This is less a history of unaccompanied children and more so an investigation of the shifting ground of child welfare policies. In ten fine-grained chapters, readers follow the relief efforts of the United Nation Relief and Rehabilitation Administration and International Refugee Organization in the immediate postwar period, when various national governments laid claim to displaced children and youth."

The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth, vol 12 no 2, Spring 2019

"Taylor is able to build upon the considerable existing literature on refugees and the American Occupation of Germany. However, her study is most welcome since child refugees are understudied in both…Taylor also breaks important new ground by describing the child search activities in Germany of UNRAA and the IRO, and her well chosen case studies are among the most interesting and gripping parts of her book."

European History Quarterly, Vol. 48 no 4, 2018