One key goal of the book is to identify the various interacting components that explain why an individual child is vulnerable. The author urges his readers to go beyond stereotypes and view vulnerable children not as “bundles of risk factors or as victims or victimizers” but as complex and dynamic individuals with differing yet similar needs. This more complete understanding of children and childhood vulnerability can explain how any individual child interacts at different stages of development. In part 1 the issue of poverty is considered and the argument is put forth that although poverty and living in disadvantaged neighborhoods presents challenges to children, poverty in and of itself does not create vulnerable children, nor does it cause violence and crime. The book also challenges the popular notion that most vulnerable children in the United States are African-American; while statistics show that African-American children are more likely to be poor than other races or ethnicities, one study in Atlanta showed that Blacks and Whites who lived in overcrowded housing conditions had the same rates of domestic violence. In order to understand vulnerable children, it is important to look beyond race and beyond class to the basic home conditions that these children live within. After focusing on the challenges of vulnerable children and why these children are vulnerable in part 1, part 2 presents strategies for helping these children progress successfully through developmental stages. Strategies involve the cooperation of police, child protective services, schools, and city infrastructure. Programs that work are highlighted and continuous care for vulnerable children is underscored as essential to their healthy development. Notes, bibliography, index