CONDUCTING COMMISSIONED RESEARCH

In 2013, the Finnish Ministry of Social Affairs and Health commissioned a testimony-driven inquiry into failings in child welfare in 1937–1983. An academic research team was appointed to produce data on maltreatment (knowledge production), to identify and recognize injustice (moral objective), and to recommend improvents in child welfare services (developmental objective). This article discusses the Inquiry and scrutinizes the strengths and weaknesses of the model applied. Two aspects emerged to suggest that commissioned research is susceptible. First, among care-leavers, the Inquiry raised a variety of expectations, which the report and subsequent apology ceremony were able to meet only partially. Second, as ad hoc teams were commissioned to draft recommendations with no political mandate, it is unclear who monitors whether recommendations are acted upon or not. However, the commissioned research had strengths in its knowledge production as well as in its political neutrality.