Skip to main content
The Childhood, Law & Policy Network (CLPN)

Professor Alan Dettlaff

Alan

Professor, University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, United States

Email: ajdettlaff@uh.edu

Profile

Alan Dettlaff is a professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, where he also served as Dean from 2015 to 2022. Alan began his career as a social worker in the family policing system, where he worked as an investigative caseworker and administrator. Today his work focuses on ending the harm that results from this system. In 2020, he helped to create and launch the upEND movement, a collaborative effort dedicated to abolishing the family policing system and building alternatives that focus on healing and liberation. He is author of Confronting the Racist Legacy of the American Child Welfare System: The Case for Abolition, published by Oxford University Press in September 2023.

Research

Publications

Confronting the Racist Legacy of the American Child Welfare System: The Case for Abolition

Expertise

Abolition praxis, child welfare systems, racial disparities
Back to top