A New Class of Persons: Intercountry Adoptees and Postcolonial Theories of Cultural Hybridity

The recent earthquake in Haiti thrust the debate over intercountry adoption into the mainstream media. The Associated Press reported that before the earthquake devastated Haiti on January 12, 2010, there were 380,000 parentless Haitian children. Estimates reported in the New York Times suggest that the earthquake orphaned hundreds of thousands of additional Haitian children who are now in need of adoptive families. The fact that vast numbers of children lost their families during the earthquake in Haiti has reinvigorated debate over the merits and dangers associated with intercountry adoption. Further, the actions of the Baptist missionaries, whom the Haitian government charged with human trafficking after they seized thirty-three Haitian children and attempted to bus them to the Dominican Republic, have intensified the bitter debate over western political, economic, and cultural influence in developing countries. This Article explores the cultural and political narratives that underlie the frequently fraught debate over intercountry adoption. It argues that despite the vast economic disparities manifested in the intercountry adoption process, intercountry adoption does not constitute a contemporary form of western cultural imperialism. Using the postcolonial theory of cultural hybridity as a critical framework, this Article claims that the practice of intercountry adoption exemplifies the process of linguistic, technical, material, and artistic exchange that has traditionally shaped world cultures and facilitated their advancement. This Article situates “culture” as a series of multifaceted relationships—relationships that cannot be reduced to core elements or rooted in a specific physical location—to suggest that cultural identity is neither lost nor found, but rather is modified and developed through cultural interaction. Intercountry adoption exemplifies the process of cultural and intellectual exchange that has traditionally led to growth and prosperity and resists the conventional notion that individuals belong to a single cultural community. This Article maintains that attempts to restrict intercountry adoption to insulate developing nations from western cultural influences perpetuate imperial notions of cultural identity as these notions assume cultures exist within a specific geographical and social context. Specifically, attempts to curb intercountry adoption out of fear that the practice devalues and depletes poorer countries’ cultural resources operate within the same intellectual and social paradigms that perpetuated European notions of racial and cultural superiority throughout the