Roots and routes: navigating family identities and relationships in non-kinship care

• Adopts a multi-stakeholder approach to amplify underrepresented voices, including children of foster parents and parents. • Uses Relational Dialectics Theory to identify five core tensions in family dynamics within non-kinship care. • Challenges the binary distinction between family and non-family in foster care narratives. • Questions the scope of the “best interest of the child” principle in addressing family dynamics. • Advocates for inclusive foster care policies addressing all stakeholders’ needs. The placement of a child into a foster family alters and redefines existing family structures, having profound implications on the sense of family belonging of various stakeholders. However, studies on family perspectives in foster care often focus on only one or two specific groups, frequently overlooking the insights of children of foster parents and parents. Addressing this gap, our study takes a holistic approach by exploring how (former) foster children ( n = 5); parents ( n = 4); foster parents ( n = 10); children of (former) foster parents ( n = 4) and foster care workers ( n = 4) in Flanders (Belgium) understand family and how they articulate family relationships and the tensions and complexities that may arise in navigating these relationships in non-kinship care. All were involved in a placement for at least two years. Focus groups and semi-structured interviews were conducted and analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis and relational dialectics theory. Five dialectics were identified in the narratives of participants: family members and non-family members; family belonging and family ambiguity; equal treatment and differential parenting; in the best interest of the child and in the best interest of all children; and imposing and nurturing bonds. The study concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for research and practice, highlighting in particular the urgent need for a more inclusive and equitable foster care system that pays attention to the often marginalized voices of parents and children of foster parents.