This book captures a unique moment in time, relatively early into the COVID-19 pandemic, when the implications and consequences of the pandemic remained unclear and largely unpredictable. The contributors to this volume contemplate the impact of the pandemic on our relationships with children and youth, child and youth serving systems, and broader issues in society that directly relate to childhood and youth.

The essays collected in this volume cover a variety of perspectives that range from systemic racism in child-serving institutions to the politics of childhood during a pandemic, and the psychological and even neurological impacts of lockdowns, public restrictions and social isolation. Beyond capturing the moment in time, the contributors also focused on the long-term; they contemplated how the evolving situation might affect the way we think about child and youth services and our relationships to children, their families and their communities.

From the very theoretical to the concrete and the practical, this volume provides current thinking and practice in relation to pandemic-impacted residential care settings, education and schools, hospital settings, communities, practitioners, and more. This book was originally published as a special issue of the journal Child & Youth Services.

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