Keywords

Introduction

The Barnahus model may be understood as a hybrid organisation in the tension field of the criminal justice and child welfare systems (Johansson & Stefansen, 2020). As an institutional idea, the aim of the model is to improve society’s handling of violence and abuse against children in a holistic manner. The Barnahus idea has been based on a strong victim orientation from the start, with the fundamental aim of avoiding “secondary victimisation” of children in the handling of violence and/or sexual abuse cases. This avoidance is ideally enabled through inter-agency and multi-professional collaboration and coordination in a child-friendly atmosphere (Johansson et al., 2017; Stefansen, 2017).

Today, the initial victim orientation of the Barnahus model is sometimes challenged through the inclusion of new groups of children who are not always (or primarily) categorised as crime victims, together with a general expansion of the Barnahus group in many countries. The PROMISE European quality standards for Barnahus also define a broad, inclusive target group of both victims and witnesses of all forms of violence (Haldorsson, 2019). Policies and national legislations, as well as guidelines and standards, commonly define the target group in terms of what types of violence and abuse qualify for referral to a Barnahus. Definitions might depend on what various national criminal codes consider to be a violation of a child, for example (Andersson & Kaldal, 2024). Discrepancies also exist between the formal (on paper) and actual (in practice) target groups of Barnahus, which is a topic that we aim to explore in this chapter. Such discrepancies warrant a focus not only on formal regulations and definitions but also on what services different groups of children are offered—or not—within a Barnahus’s general practice and case processing. Through such analyses, we will identify processes of the inclusion and exclusion of different groups of children from Barnahus across jurisdictions. The aim of this chapter is hence to analyse both the scope of the Barnahus model (i.e. who it is for) and its foundational rationales (what it is for) as these factors are negotiated over time, in relation to both the formal (on paper) and actual (in practice) target groups. Ultimately, these negotiations lead to various including and excluding effects for different groups of children; we argue that monitoring these effects at both the national and more overarching levels is crucial.

We use a case study approach to focus on how Barnahus’s target group has manifested on paper and in practice in two well-established Barnahus models, in Sweden and Norway. Drawing on this analysis and by focusing on both similarities and differences compared to these two Nordic models, we also discuss the target group construction in policy tools developed at the European level in order to support countries that are considering or developing national Barnahus models.

Theoretical Framework and Empirical Input

The Barnahus model is commonly described as encompassing two institutional logics: the criminal law-oriented or “penal logic,” which views children as victims of crime and as the aggrieved parties in criminal investigations, and the “welfare logic,” which positions children as vulnerable and in need of protection, support, and recovery services of different kinds (Johansson, 2011, 2017). Within the latter logic, services may be rendered primarily to the child, or they may also encompass family interventions, thus recognising the family trauma that violence or abuse against a child represents, as well as the role of the family in a child’s recovery process.

The concept of institutional logics (Friedland & Alford, 1991; Reay & Hinings, 2009), which is central to our analysis, refers to the belief systems and interpretative schemas that shape organisations and their members’ ways of thinking and operating, and that subsequently can vary between organisations within a field. Previous research has described Barnahus as a “hybrid” organisation, since it combines the penal and welfare logics (Johansson & Stefansen, 2020). In some Barnahus models, the child welfare investigation is a more central part of the welfare logic of the system, while in other Barnahus models, the focus is primarily on the criminal investigation, based in both the justice and welfare aspects.

Our analysis goes further than previous research in understanding how the penal and welfare logics come into play in Barnahus, since our focus is on how these logics can work to grant or restrict access to Barnahus and its various services for different groups of children. We look particularly at how the underlying positionings of children within these institutional logics and in relation to Barnahus—aggrieved party, vulnerable individual, and family member—are activated in discussions and decisions about the Barnahus target group and the types of services offered in Barnahus, and to whom.

While we treat the penal and welfare logics as representing different institutional belief systems related to the criminal justice and child welfare sectors (respectively), our analysis is also sensitive to how these logics overlap in practice and thus can be difficult to separate. One example is the Nordic model for children’s testimonies (Myklebust, 2017). Reflecting a welfare logic, this model exempts children from providing witness statements in open court and accepts video-recorded statements as “evidence-in-chief” because of children’s status as particularly vulnerable. At the same time, the use of Barnahus for out-of-court witness statements is generally thought to ensure that children will be able to freely recount what happened to them, which is important from a penal logic standpoint. We also build from previous research that has described how the hybridity of the Barnahus model can create tensions that can lead to imbalances, for instance in the form of “juridification,” or the prioritisation of tasks related to criminal cases over tasks related to protection, support, and recovery (Johansson, 2011).

Our analysis focuses on the Swedish and Norwegian Barnahus models, both of which have been in operation since the mid-2000s and have become more regulated and standardised over time. They are thus suitable cases for an analysis of how the target group of Barnahus is negotiated and manifests differently in different phases of adoption. While these models are similar, they also represent somewhat different approaches to the coordination of the criminal and child welfare investigations; they also differ in other dimensions that can affect how children are positioned and thus are included in or excluded from Barnahus’s services. Charting the development in both jurisdictions can add depth and nuance to the analysis of the model’s scope and rationale.

The empirical input for the analysis consists of policy documents, standards, regulations, and evaluation reports from each country, all examined under a comparative lens. While reading these texts, we focused on three themes: formal target group constructions, discrepancies between the formal and actual target groups, and service delivery to different groups of children. Across these themes, we looked at how the penal and welfare logics—and related positionings of children in relation to Barnahus—manifest and lead to differences between groups of children in terms of inclusion and exclusion.

The Swedish Case

The Swedish Barnahus model was introduced in 2006 as a pilot at six locations; by 2019, the model had spread to 32 locations nationwide, covering most of Sweden’s 290 municipalities (Barnafrid, 2019). The model is most often affiliated with the municipal child welfare services and focuses on the coordination of parallel investigations: the child welfare services’ investigation of the child’s need for protection and support, and the police and prosecutor’s criminal investigation of the suspected crime (Johansson et al., 2017). Through consultation meetings, the Barnahus coordinator, the child welfare services, police and prosecutors, and health care professionals all exchange information, planning, and the coordination of which investigations and services are to take place. The different professionals also “co-hear” (i.e. listen and observe from another room) the forensic investigative interview with the child in order to both assist the police and prosecutor with the professional’s expertise and to use the information as part of their own assessments—for example, the child welfare services’ initial assessment of a child’s potential need for immediate protection.

Target Group Regulations

In the Swedish government’s 2005 decision to initiate a national Barnahus pilot, the object of such a collaboration was described from both the penal and welfare logics, even though primarily focusing on the initial investigatory phase and coordination of investigative interviews to make the criminal proceedings more effective (Swedish Ministry of Justice, 2005). The definition of the target group for Barnahus also followed from the Swedish Criminal Code, later supplemented by national guidelines and criteria for Barnahus (Swedish National Police Agency, 2009). The 2005 government directive for piloting the Barnahus model in Sweden stated that the target group should be children under the age of 18 (in accordance with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child [UN-CRC]) who were suspected of being victims of a serious crime directed at the child’s life, health, freedom, or peace (our emphasis). These topics are covered in Chapters 3 (physical violence and other violent crimes), 4 (crimes against freedom and peace), and 6 (sexual crimes) in the Swedish Criminal Code, respectively (Swedish Ministry of Justice, 2005). The target group was later expanded to include a wider range of offences. In 2009, the restriction to serious offences no longer applied as the national guidelines referred to all crimes within the relevant chapters in the criminal code. The target group also included children suspected of being victims of female genital mutilation, those who were victims of honour-motivated crimes, and those who had witnessed violence within the family. The guidelines also stated that the Barnahus collaboration should include children who were suspected offenders of sexual crimes “when considered appropriate” (Swedish National Police Agency, 2009, our translation).

At the same time, the national guidelines from 2009 also reflected a potential restriction of the target group, since they also stated that children who had experienced violent crimes, according to Chapters 3 and 4 in the Swedish Criminal Code, were included in the target group (only) in cases where investigations by the child welfare services and the police and prosecutors were initiated in parallel (Swedish National Police Agency, 2009), which does not happen in all cases. In situations where parallel investigations are not initiated, these children thus risk being excluded from the Barnahus practice. But the restriction related to parallel investigations does not apply to the sexual crimes included in Chapter 6 of the Swedish Criminal Code, according to the national guidelines, thus illustrating how regulations can produce different potential thresholds for access to Barnahus for different groups of victimised children.

In the Swedish context, the Act on Special Representatives for Children (2000) is also important to discuss in relation to the target group of Barnahus, since its purpose was to strengthen children’s rights during the criminal investigation and thereby their access to justice as aggrieved parties in cases when a custodian, or someone close to the child’s custodian, is suspected of a crime against the child. But not until 2021 did allowing a child to witness domestic violence become a crime against the child under certain circumstances in terms of a “violation of a child’s integrity” (barnfridsbrott) in the Swedish Criminal Code. Until that time, this group was not positioned as an aggrieved party in accordance with the penal logic in Sweden and therefore was not assigned a special representative during criminal investigations. At the same time, they were positioned as being vulnerable from the welfare logic (and were defined as crime victims in the Swedish Social Services Act). As such, these children were also part of the target group defined in the national guidelines for Barnahus issued in 2009 (Swedish National Police Agency, 2009) yet were difficult to include in practice due to a lack of consent from custodians. At that time they were not positioned as aggrieved parties from the penal logic and were not granted a special representative.

This example illustrates the importance of the existence of varying positionings in different regulations, as Andersson and Kaldal (2024) show in more detail in Chapter 2 of the present book. But access to Barnahus might still be granted to those children who are excluded from the penal logic if alternative rationales and other positionings (such as being vulnerable individuals or family members from a welfare logic) are activated in regulatory documents and the Barnahus’ case-processing practices.

Formal and Actual Target Groups

The latest national evaluation concluded that most Barnahus in Sweden formally define a target group that is in line with the national guidelines (Barnafrid, 2019). Researchers have shown discrepancies between how the target group is defined formally (on paper) and which children are included in practice, going back to the early years of implementation (Åström & Rejmer, 2008; Kaldal et al., 2010; Johansson, 2011; Landberg & Svedin, 2013; Barnafrid, 2019, 2022). Deficiencies are also visible in the latest national evaluation study, especially concerning the inclusion of children who have witnessed violence in their family, those who have been exposed to internet-related sexual crimes, and in some instances those who have suffered honour-related violence (Barnafrid, 2019).

In practice, most Swedish Barnahus have focused on cases of physical violence against children in close relations and on sexual abuse in both close relations and by unknown offenders or offenders outside the family. In addition, different Barnahus have implemented specific inclusions and exclusions, for example related to children who have exhibited harmful sexual behaviour (“young offenders”). Some Barnahus have a clear family-support orientation and offer support and treatment to parents as well (either including or excluding offending caregivers), while other Barnahus are focused only on the child and on multi-professional case coordination. These variations in support and treatment measures could be partly related to the lack of consent from custodians, since these services most often are related to the child welfare investigation and not the criminal investigation, and thus in most situations depend on voluntariness and consent (Heimer & Pettersson, 2022).

These variations also relate to how a child is positioned according to the penal and welfare logics. Some variations have to do with how Barnahus construct the child–family relation and how they position children as either vulnerable individuals or as family members, reflected in whether they offer support and treatment for “only” the children, the children and their “non-offending” caregivers, or to the family as a unit, which can include adult offenders in cases of physical violence against the child (Johansson, 2011; Landberg & Svedin, 2013; Barnafrid, 2019). In cases of physical violence against the child, for example, Swedish Barnahus commonly offer a treatment called “combined parent–child cognitive behavioural therapy,” or CPC-CBT (KIBB in Swedish), which is a treatment method that is directed towards the family as a whole. The development and use of this treatment in Swedish Barnahus may be understood as reflecting a family-support orientation in accordance with the welfare logic. The aim is to improve children’s well-being in the long term, not least since many children still live with (or are in regular contact with) their parents after the Barnahus referral, including offending parents in cases of physical violence. Importantly, this orientation is only visible within physical violence cases, not sexual abuse cases. The routines differ in family sexual abuse cases, and support is usually focused on the child and non-offending caregivers in order to facilitate the child’s protection and support.

According to the Swedish national guidelines, the “young offenders” group should be included in Barnahus when considered appropriate (Swedish National Police Agency, 2009). In practice, different Barnahus treat this group differently, varying both within Sweden and between the other Nordic countries. Iceland, for example, does not include this group, based on the victim-oriented idea that Barnahus should be a safe environment, free from offenders, an idea that has also been expressed by Barnahus staff in Swedish contexts (Johansson, 2011) and discussed in relation to the localisation of Barnahus. Some Barnahus in Sweden do include this group, however. The inclusion of this group makes sense from a welfare logic where children are emphasised as vulnerable individuals, irrespective of the victim/offender position.

In terms of age, the Swedish Barnahus include children up to the age of 18 (in accordance with the UN-CRC), but in practice, very young children and children above 14 have often fallen outside the Barnahus practice since the early implementation phase (Åström & Rejmer, 2008; Kaldal et al., 2010). The latest national evaluation study emphasised that 15–18-year-olds often have difficulty gaining access to Barnahus. Some Barnahus exclude them and refer them to other units within the police organisation (Barnafrid, 2019). This exclusion mirrors tensions between the penal and welfare logics: young children may be excluded because of difficulties with conducting reliable interviews (in accordance with the penal logic) and because investigative interviews are generally seen as particularly distressing from the welfare logic. Older children (above 14) are typically understood as being less in need of a child-friendly environment, since forensic investigative interviews are not legally required to be video-recorded for that age group, in contrast to the vulnerable-victim paradigm that applies to younger children.

As noted above, children who have witnessed family violence have been difficult to include in the Barnahus practice in Sweden (Landberg & Svedin, 2013; Barnafrid, 2019). In 2021, the Swedish Criminal Code included a new type of criminal offence for cases where children have witnessed domestic violence. This legal amendment contributed to a changed legal status for this group of children, who are now included as aggrieved parties in the criminal investigation, in accordance with a penal logic. Despite these children’s changing status, a survey conducted in 2022 showed how, in practice, some Barnahus still positioned this group of children differently than those who had experienced direct violence from their parents or other caregivers. Children who had witnessed family violence were not interviewed or given access to coordinated support at some local Barnahus to the same extent as other groups of children, even though variations and improvements have been noted (Barnafrid, 2022). Hence this group is formally included in Barnahus through their position as aggrieved parties, but in practice, they are only partially included as vulnerable individuals and as family members, depending on their access to various support measures.

The latest national evaluation study (Barnafrid, 2019) also showed that sexual offence cases may be excluded from the actual target group of some Barnahus in situations where they have not also been reported to the child welfare services. This situation typically occurs even though the national guidelines formally exempt sexual crimes from the requirement of parallel investigations, in order to allow room for cases with unknown offenders and offenders outside the family. Yet with internet-related sexual offences, for example, these cases are sometimes excluded from Barnahus, because they fall outside Barnahus’s typical focus on violations that occur within close relations. In these situations, the need for protection and the coordination of parallel investigations is generally deemed to be less relevant, since the child’s parents or caregivers are not suspected offenders. Such scenarios also exemplify the discrepancies between formal (on paper) and actual (in practice) target groups in Barnahus, with both including and excluding effects for different groups of children.

Shifting Positionings During Different Phases of Case Processing

Using as an example the family treatment CPC-CBT, which is often employed in cases of physical violence against children in close relations, we can also see how the positioning of a child can shift according to the different phases of Barnahus case processing. During the initial phase, child victims of physical violence are positioned as aggrieved parties according to the penal logic, which focuses primarily on the forensic investigative interview and the criminal investigation, and then as vulnerable individuals, focused primarily on the acute crisis support around the children and the interventions related to the child welfare investigation. Later on, such children are treated as family members, with a primary focus on treatment for the family as a whole, including any offending caregiver/s, according to the welfare logic. An important consideration is that, depending on the specific group of children the case processing is concerned with, as well as variations between local Barnahus, these shifts in positioning might manifest differently.

A shift in focus has also been notable in Swedish policy documents and reports on Barnahus over time. While a key aim of Sweden’s first national evaluation was to assess the effectiveness of criminal proceedings (Swedish Ministry of Justice, 2005), the key goal of the most recent national evaluation reported in 2019 was to identify suitable examples in order to improve quality in the treatment of victimised children (Swedish Ministry of Social Affairs, 2018). Method development projects such as “After the Child Investigative Interview” (Efter barnförhöret) and “The Fourth Room”Footnote 1 (Det fjärde rummet) have been reported by the Children’s Welfare Foundation Sweden (Stiftelsen Allmänna Barnhuset) in 2017 and 2019 (respectively). These projects also mirror how the welfare logic related to Swedish Barnahus now includes a longer time perspective on case processing; which also focuses on the need for recovery services after the initial acute phase of coordinating the investigative interviews has ended. This shift in focus thus manifests in an increased emphasis on developing psycho-social support and treatment for children and families, while physical health care needs have received less attention so far.

In some respects, this situation may be interpreted as a shift towards a stronger welfare logic, in contrast to the penal logic and the tendency for juridification that have dominated the Barnahus collaboration since the early implementation phase (Johansson, 2011, 2017). Children who have been referred to Barnahus are increasingly given shifting positions during the different phases of case processing, since the existence of treatment and support services implies positions as vulnerable individuals or family members, depending on the type of service. In the report “The Fourth Room” a model is suggested whereby Barnahus could allow children who are not included in the formal target group (which is based on the criminal code) access through other “entrances” in order to offer a wider group of victimised children psycho-social support and treatment. More specifically, the report suggests opening up the “fourth room” to include cases that have not been reported to the police, children who are currently not under investigation, and children who have previously been under investigation but need more support, as well as adults and peers who support victimised children (Stiftelsen Allmänna Barnhuset, 2019). If this broadened entrance to the “fourth room” is implemented in practice, it would imply different positionings of children according to the penal and welfare logics. In cases that have not been reported to the police but where the child has been offered psycho-social support, for example, the child would not be positioned as an aggrieved party but rather as a vulnerable individual. In some cases, the child would also be considered a family member (or even community member), depending on what services are offered, and to whom. We should note that these are suggested target group extensions. How the practice at Swedish Barnahus develops thus remains to be seen and researched.

The Norwegian Case

The Barnahus model was implemented in Norway in 2007 as a trial project and then expanded to a national service in the following years. As of 2023, Norway had 11 local Barnahus throughout the country, covering all regions. Norway’s Barnahus are affiliated with the justice sector and are organisationally placed within the police districts. Because all Barnahus cases are referred by the police after a report on suspected violence or abuse, the inclusion criteria are drawn from Norway’s criminal code. The Barnahus staff (social workers and psychologists) are responsible for coordinating the case processing within the penal track and for ensuring the welfare of the child, both during and after the criminal investigation. Their follow-up mandate is restricted to crisis intervention and short-term support and treatment, similarly to the Swedish model, but is not related to the child welfare investigation as such. In contrast to the Swedish model, the Norwegian model is not structured for parallel investigations, but the child welfare services are increasingly part of the collaborative work that is done in Barnahus, and their role in Barnahus has become more regulated over time (Bakketeig et al., 2021). When the child welfare services are involved in a case, they can now observe the investigative interview and participate in consultation meetings, both before and after the interview. The national guidelines for Barnahus (Norwegian Directorates of the Police, Family and Health, 2016, section 2.4) also explicitly state that the Barnahus has a coordinating responsibility before, during, and after the interview, including the facilitation of information exchange and discussions. Such discussions can give the child welfare services a better foundation to assess the child’s safety, and to plan further follow-up and the division of tasks (Bakketeig et al., 2021).

Target Group Regulations

Both the initial suggestion to Norway’s Parliament in 2004 (Document 8:86: 2003–2004Footnote 2) and the working group report that followed (Norwegian Ministry of Justice and the Police, 2006), which outlined the model pilot starting in 2007, viewed the Norwegian Barnahus model as a way both to strengthen the position of victimised children as aggrieved parties and to contribute to a recognition of their status as being vulnerable and in need of support during the penal case and beyond. Both sources underlined the importance of offering support to the family when a child is victimised, thus positioning the child as a family member as well.

The target group for Barnahus was regulated in 2016 by the introduction of a set of guidelines from the Norwegian Directorates of the Police, Family and Health (2016). Those guidelines, in turn, were built on a legal amendment to the Criminal Procedure Act, implemented in 2015 (Criminal Procedure Act §239–§239f; FOR-2015-09-24-1098), which made the use of Barnahus mandatory for forensic investigative interviews with children under the age of 16 (as well as cognitively impaired adults) who had been exposed to a wide range of offences, either directly or as witnesses. Such abuse includes sexual abuse, physical violence, genital mutilation, homicide, and abuse in close relations. Since 2021, Sweden has criminalised situations where children witness violence against their parents; Norwegian criminal law has criminalised the same offense since 2010. Over time, the Swedish and Norwegian Barnahus models have begun to converge in terms of the types of offences that are included.

However, in contrast to Sweden, the formal target group for Norway’s Barnahus does not include children in the 16–18 age range, although according to Norwegian law (Criminal Procedure Act 22, May 1981, no. 25, section 239), the prosecutor can decide to use Barnahus for interviews with this age group in cases of family sexual abuse. For this age group, the position of the child as vulnerable thus is activated only for specified cases involving family sexual abuse cases, and not for other offences. According to this regulation, those who experience peer sexual violence or other forms of family violence are thus considered to be less vulnerable within the penal logic and therefor are also excluded from the follow-up services offered at Barnahus. In the latest evaluation study of Norway’s Barnahus model, Barnahus leaders argued for an expansion of the target group to include all victims and witnesses under 18, since “children are children” (Bakketeig et al., 2021, p. 60), thus echoing the definition of the child according to the UN-CRC. Such a step would give a broader group of children access to follow-up services in Barnahus than is presently the case.

Norway also differs from Sweden in that children who display harmful sexual behaviour are not included in the formal target group, according to the national Barnahus guidelines from 2016. A new set of guidelines issued in 2023, however, on investigative police interviews with children and other vulnerable persons suspected of a crime, states that such interviews now can be conducted in Barnahus (Norwegian Attorney General, 2023). As the Swedish case also illustrates, regulations other than specific Barnahus guidelines must be included in any analysis of Barnahus’s formal target group.

Formal and Actual Target Groups

In terms of types of violence and abuse, the actual target group of Norwegian Barnahus is broader than the formal target group. As shown in the latest national evaluation study (Bakketeig et al., 2021), the police now use Barnahus for investigative interviews with children who sexually offend their peers or younger children. In some cases, the inclusion of this group in Barnahus happened before their access was formally regulated by the attorney general, thus also illustrating how regulations may confirm already established practices to include or exclude groups of children in Barnahus. Most Barnahus also offer follow-up services to this group of children. Aside from their age, the inclusion of this group in Barnahus may be seen as an affirmation of these children’s status as vulnerable individuals, since their behaviour is often seen as being linked to either earlier traumatisation or cognitive impairments (Hellevik et al., 2023). In Denmark, a similar practice has been developed in specialised treatment centres for children who exhibit harmful sexual behaviour that have been placed under Denmark’s five Barnahus (Danish Authority of Social Services and Housing, 2023).Footnote 3

While discussions in Norway have largely been related to children who display harmful sexual behaviour, the inclusion of this group opens the bigger question of the needs of children who are suspected of other types of violent offences, for instance physical violence against other children. Barnahus leaders have argued that these children also “belong” in Barnahus (Bakketeig et al., 2021). The recent guidelines issued by the attorney general, regarding police interviews with children (and vulnerable adults) as suspects in criminal cases, point in the same direction, since they pertain to all cases where children (under 18) and vulnerable adults are interviewed by police and have the procedural status of suspects (Norwegian Attorney General, 2023). Still, children who harm other children occupy an ambivalent position in Norwegian Barnahus, since they can be included according to legal guidelines, but they are not part of the target group, according to the Barnahus guidelines.

As in Sweden, caregivers are part of the target group of Norwegian Barnahus, in the welfare track of the model. Norway’s national Barnahus guidelines state that both children and caregivers should receive follow-up measures catered to their needs (section 2.3) and be invited to participate in follow-up work involving other services (section 2.4); the guidelines specifically mention family therapy as one form of treatment that can be offered at Barnahus (section 5.3.2).

The family orientation of Norwegian Barnahus may also be seen in practice. In the first evaluation study of the Norwegian Barnahus model from 2012 (Stefansen et al., 2012), some Barnahus had implemented routines for supporting parents while their children were being interviewed, a practice that is also used in Sweden (Åström & Rejmer, 2008; Landberg & Svedin, 2013). Such routines may be seen as a form of indirect support to the child and as indicative of a positioning of the child as a family member, which also accords with the guidelines: “The Barnahus should make sure that the vulnerable aggrieved party or witness and the person accompanying them are supported [during their stay at Barnahus]” (section 5.2.11, our emphasis). In the latest evaluation study, the Barnahus staff did not talk about this practice as part of their responsibility (Bakketeig et al., 2021), which could be a result of a generally higher case load that does not leave room for having two social workers assigned to the case (one following the investigative interview, the other focusing on the parents’ well-being during the interview) and the routinisation of the staff’s work during the investigative interview. This scenario illustrates how positionings are vulnerable to both external and internal pressures.

Shifting Positionings During Different Phases of Case Processing

As seen in Sweden as well, in preparing for the investigative interview and during the interview process, staff members at Norwegian Barnahus engage in practices that position children as vulnerable individuals in need of care, which can be interpreted as an overlap between the penal and welfare logics. According to the Barnahus guidelines, investigative interviews should take place in a child-friendly environment. Research has shown (Bakketeig et al., 2021; Stefansen, 2017) that the material surroundings make a difference for children, who appreciate that the waiting rooms are nicely decorated and that the general atmosphere of the place is pleasant. The Barnahus have also established routines for welcoming children, providing information to prepare them for what will happen at the Barnahus, and for having food and drinks available. The staff members also advise the investigative interviewers (i.e. the police) before and during the interview about the child’s level of maturity and functioning; they also use the interview as an opportunity to learn about the child’s needs for support and follow-up. In the initial processing of Barnahus cases, the child is thus simultaneously positioned as an aggrieved party and as a vulnerable individual in need of support, which illustrates how the underlying institutional logics of Barnahus are blurred in practice and may reinforce each other. While the supporting environment and relational support are generally thought to have a positive impact on children’s ability to disclose violence or abuse in the investigative interview, the support and “clinical gaze” activated in the investigative phase are also vital for the child’s well-being in the investigative phase, as well as laying the groundwork for the further processing of the case in the welfare track. The same blurring occurs with the child welfare services. In cases where such services are involved, they will provide information about the child and family that is relevant for the planning of the investigative interview while also using the information from the consultative meeting and investigative interview when assessing the child’s need for protection after the interview (Bakketeig et al., 2021).

Practice related to medical examinations also illustrates how the positioning of children leads to differences between groups of children in Barnahus. As detailed in Chapter 4 of this book (Stefansen et al., 2024), in Norwegian Barnahus, medical examinations are offered almost exclusively when the prosecutor deems them relevant for penal cases, thus following from the positioning of the child as an aggrieved party, although the Barnahus guidelines explicitly state that medical examinations should be a more universal offer, because children who are summoned to Barnahus are considered vulnerable and in need of a health assessment.

The second consultation meeting accentuates the blurring of the penal and welfare dynamics. As Bakketeig et al. (2021) have described, the meeting is “owned” by the prosecutor and is part of the penal track, but it is also the key collaborative arena for discussing further follow-up measures, both with the child welfare services and the Barnahus staff after the investigative interview and medical examination have been conducted. Bakketeig et al. (2021) describe that cases follow two trajectories after this meeting: some only involve the child welfare services (which positions the child as both a vulnerable individual and a family member), while others continue at the Barnahus. When the Barnahus is part of or solely responsible for the follow-up, children may be positioned differently. According to the guidelines, the Barnahus staff members are to assess the needs of children and follow up when necessary, thus allowing for discretion as well as different types of approaches. Barnahus’s follow-up mandate is generally less regulated than the penal mandate, which also contributes to differences between the Barnahus in the share of cases that include follow-up (Bakketeig et al., 2021).

During this phase of the case processing, the Barnahus staff may focus on the individual child or offer counselling or treatment to the family as well, in addition to engaging in collaboration with related services, depending on the case. In practice, the positioning of the child depends on what the Barnahus staff sees as necessary and possible, which is related both to resources (Bakketeig et al., 2021) and staff experience. As shown in Chapter 6 of this volume (Andersen, 2024), experienced Barnahus staff take a more proactive role in the follow-up phase compared to those who are less experienced, which sometimes means that the staff members stretch their mandate and do work that other agencies should do. One example is to offer more long-term psychological treatment, which formally is the responsibility of child-psychiatry units.

The positioning of the child as a family member in the follow-up phase is less apparent. One Barnahus has tried out a “family meeting” model for informing and supporting families in acute cases where one or both parents are suspected of violence against the child and thus have not been informed about the interview of the child at the Barnahus prior to the interview (Bakketeig et al., 2021). Standardised interventions to support families in cases of less severe parental violence have been suggested but so far have not been implemented. Similarly to the case in Sweden, interventions such as these seem to be restricted to cases involving physical violence. One area that has yet to be studied is how the Barnahus model works in the follow-up phase (and thus positions the child) in other types of cases, for instance in cases involving more severe violence, violence in close relations, family sexual abuse, and in cases of children who sexually offend.

Discussion

As shown in the case analysis of Sweden and Norway, we have identified successive expansions of either the formal or actual target groups. We have also identified the inclusion of groups of children at the border of (or beyond) the Barnahus model’s formal target group and initial victim orientation, such as with children who exhibit sexually harmful behaviour. At the same time, various gaps between formal and actual target groups have developed, thus excluding groups of children from access to Barnahus entirely or to specific Barnahus services, such as support and treatment.

Both the Swedish and Norwegian Barnahus models are primarily based on the positioning of children as aggrieved parties in accordance with the penal logic. In both countries, several types of violence and abuse qualify for access to Barnahus, and the models therefore have a wide scope. But the Swedish case illustrates how the scope of a Barnahus model that is anchored in children’s status as aggrieved parties can be narrowed or expanded over time by adding or removing additional criteria such as “serious” offences, as well as by legal reforms, for example by including new offences. The Norwegian case illustrates how formal inclusiveness in terms of offences does not preclude exclusion of some children in practice, for instance those who are too old to be seen as vulnerable in legal proceedings, if they have been exposed to forms of violence other than family sexual abuse.

The inclusion of children who exhibit harmful sexual behaviour in either the formal or actual target group is a particularly interesting case, since such inclusion both extends the scope of the Barnahus model and challenges the model’s initial victim orientation. The inclusion of this group may be seen as partly flowing from their status of being vulnerable due to their age (in accordance with the penal logic) and partly from a welfare rationale: their harmful behaviour towards others may be linked to prior victimisation or trauma, and they may require follow-up to prevent new incidents. One question that arises is how this expansion affects the original Barnahus idea, since the model is closely linked to a victim orientation. Does the expansion signify a move from a narrow focus on ensuring victimised children’s access to justice and recovery to a broader focus on at-risk children who can benefit from the expertise and methods developed within Barnahus?

Parallel to the positioning of the child as an aggrieved party, Barnahus also position children as vulnerable individuals who need protection and support during the investigative interview phase and follow-up. Such follow-up predominantly pertains to various social and psychological issues—sometimes focused on the individual child, in other cases with a more family-oriented approach—thus simultaneously acknowledging both the child and family as needing support. The family perspective, and positioning of children as family members, is less explicated in regulatory documents both in Sweden and Norway, and the practices between and within Barnahus vary, which suggests that the family-member position has a more ambivalent status in the Barnahus model, especially concerning the inclusion of offending parents in family-support measures. Similarly to the inclusion of children who exhibit harmful sexual behaviour, the family-member positioning challenges the initial victim orientation of the Barnahus model, but such positioning may also be understood as a manifestation of the idea of Barnahus as a holistic approach to victimised or at-risk children’s needs.

In summary, our comparative analysis has shown that both the scope of the Barnahus model (who it is for) and its foundational rationales (what it is for) are negotiated over time, both in relation to the formal (on paper) and the actual (in practice) target group, with varying consequences for different groups of children. Considering this analysis, an important question is how Barnahus’s target group is likely to manifest in the European context and in the ongoing European Barnahus policy diffusion and translation. According to the quality standards for European Barnahus, developed by the PROMISE network, “The Barnahus target group includes all children who are victims and/or witnesses of crime involving all forms of violence” and also includes “non-offending family/care-givers (…) as a secondary target group” (Haldorsson, 2019, p. 54, our emphasis). Violence is also defined in accordance with UN-CRC article 19, which includes all forms of physical or mental violence, injury and abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, and maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse (Haldorsson, 2019).

The formal target group definition in the European standards is interesting compared to the target group definitions for the Swedish and Norwegian Barnahus models in at least two ways. First, the European standards are more inclusive, since they also encompass neglect and negligent treatment in accordance with article 19 of the UN-CRC, and not only violence and abuse, which reflects a broader welfare logic. The Barnahus models in Sweden and Norway, in contrast, exclude from Barnahus those children who have experienced parental neglect. The responsibility for these cases instead lies within the child welfare services in both Sweden and Norway, both of which conduct their investigations of such cases outside Barnahus. Second, the European standards are more delimited compared to at least those Nordic Barnahus models that offer family treatment for the whole family, including offending parents, since the standards specifically include only non-offending family/caregivers as a secondary target group. This approach positions children as vulnerable individuals, in accordance with the welfare logic. The definition of a secondary non-offending target group indirectly excludes offending family members, an approach that reflects a victim orientation based primarily on the penal logic. Both logics are thus present in the European quality standards for Barnahus, but to a different degree and partly in tension with each other.

What does the European Barnahus diffusion imply for the formal and actual target groups of Barnahus? Will the diffusion lead to a standardisation of which children are included in Barnahus, or rather will it lead to increased variance or actual target group exclusions? Many of the European countries take inspiration from, or adopt, the European quality standards when they establish Barnahus, yet various types of Barnahus implementation are currently occurring in the present European adoption phase (Johansson et al., 2024). Several countries define a narrower target group compared to the standards, for example by focusing solely on cases of sexual abuse. Scotland, in contrast, has followed the standards and has set up a Barnahus for a wide target group that includes violence, sexual abuse, and neglect (Devaney et al., 2024). The development of potential gaps between formal and actual target groups is important to acknowledge, however, as clearly shown in our analysis of the Swedish and Norwegian cases. Developments in the Nordic countries, as well as in the similar Child Advocacy Center (CAC) model, which is used in both the USA and Australia, suggest that successive changes are likely in the post-adoption phase. To illustrate, while Sweden, Norway, and Denmark have included cases of sexual abuse and physical violence from the start, for several years the target group in Iceland was restricted to sexual abuse cases (similarly to the US CAC model) before being extended in 2015 to include cases of physical and domestic violence as well. Similarly, CACs have started to include cases of domestic violence (St.-Amand et al., 2023).

These examples show how target group constructions can develop successively within different policy contexts. The policy diffusion of the Barnahus idea, and the European quality standards more specifically, thus implies reconstruction and translation processes between varied policy contexts (Czarniawska & Sevón, 1996; Djelic & Sahlin-Andersson, 2006). Since the Barnahus model may be understood as an institutional field that is undergoing constant exchange and change, feedback loops will likely occur between Nordic and broader European Barnahus contexts, thus leading to further adaptions of the formal and actual target group for Barnahus (both in the Nordic and the broader European contexts), and thus new patterns of inclusion and exclusion.

The diffusion of the Barnahus model is an important area for further research. In understanding the inclusion and exclusion dynamics that follow from the penal and welfare logics and their positionings of children referred to Barnahus, the use of formal (on paper) target group regulations and recommendations is a starting point. But we also need to look more closely both at the actual (in practice) target groups and at what happens in the different phases of case processing in Barnahus.