April 2019

• Author: Barbara A. Babb,Marsha Kline Pruett
• Date: 01 April 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fcre.12402
• Published date: 01 April 2019

EDITORIAL NOTE

APRIL 2019

Happy Spring! We hope 2019 is off to a wonderful start for our Family Court Review readers. In

this April issue, we offer you two “special”sections, along with three articles and three student

Notes. We are particularly proud to highlight some of the important work of AFCC.

Our first “special”includes Special Articles on the Hague Convention. We are very grateful to

Judge Judith Kreeger, herself an expert in all things Hague, who has arranged an excellent trio of

articles from other Hague experts. As Judge Kreeger explains in her “Introduction,”“[t]he 1980

Hague Convention on Parental Child Abduction became effective in the United States upon ratifica-

tion in 1998……The international network includes 135 judges from all over the world who engage

in permissible direct judicial communications about family law cases.”These difficult cases, where

one parent has removed a child to a foreign jurisdiction, are emotionally-charged for the parents

and child and challenging to all of the profession als involved. The three articles provide valuable

insight into the complexity of Hague Convention cases. In “Intersecting Issues Involving Asylum in

the United States and Cases Arising Under the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of

International Child Abduction,”California Superior Court Judge and former Hague Liaison Judge

James Garbolino reveals how recent United States immigration policies and asylum have resulted in

uncertainty for courts handling Hague Convention issues. Missouri Court of Appeals Judge and

Hague Network Judge Mary Sheffield and co-author Matthew Rowland contribute the second arti-

cle, “International Hague Network of Judges: Significance in Implementation of the 1980 and 1996

Hague Conventions on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.”They discuss how the

International Hague Network of Judges has developed, the roles of these judges, and their relevance

to the implementation of the Convention. The final article is “The Special Commissions Concerning

the 1980 Abduction Conventions”by Sir Matthew Thorpe, retired English Lord Justice of Appeal

and the idea behind the International Hague Network of Judges. Sir Thorpe explains the operation

of several Special Commissions to identify difficulties with the implementation of the Hague Con-

vention and to propose remedies. We are certain that these articles provide readers with a compre-

hensive overview of the complexities surrounding the Hague Convention.

Our second “special”is the Special Feature on AFCC’s“Guidelines for the Use of Social Sci-

ence Research in Family Law.”Afifteen-person AFCC-appointed Task Force, including Judge

William Fee as Chair and Stacey Platt as Reporter, has worked for several years to articulate issues

and concerns in the use of social science data and to offer suggestions for best practices. In the

“Introduction,”Marsha Kline Pruett, Stacey Platt, and William Fee describe how family law educa-

tion, intervention, and policy decisions across various family law areas use social science research.

Their piece offers a thumbnail sketch of the Guidelines’purpose and focus, with the aim to encour-

age the FCR audience to read the document. “Guidelines for the Use of Social Science Research in

Family Law”is intended “to promote the effective, responsible, and ethical use of social science

research in family law-related practices, programs, and policies. The Guidelines seek to encourage

the use of research by all family justice professionals and self-represented litigants in a manner that

is valid, useful, and applicable in family proceedings.”The document is aspirational, inclusive, and

FAMILY COURT REVIEW, Vol. 57 No. 2, April 2019 155–157

© 2019 Association of Family and Conciliation Courts