Abstract
The welfare state represents an important arena for the expression of women’s citizenship both as a status and a practice. It stands as the focus of many of women’s citizenship struggles and this chapter begins by sketching out women’s role as actors on the welfare stage, both historically and today. It then considers the ambivalent nature of women’s relationship to welfare states which, simultaneously, offer a route to independence for some women, yet all too often construct, sometimes the very same, women as the economic dependants of men. The nature of this relationship varies both according to the type of welfare state or regime and as between different groups of women.
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Notes and References
Koven and Michel (1993). See also Lewis (1980, 1994); Dale (1986); Dale and Foster (1986); Gordon (1990); Sarvasy (1992); Misra and Akins (1998); Siim (2000); Sainsbury (2001). A more negative assessment of their impact is provided by Pederson (1989, 1990).
Hobson et al. (1995); see also Dahlerup (1986); Randall (1987); Fox-Piven (1990); Lovenduski and Randall (1993); Doyal (1995); Mahon (1997); Hobson (1999); Siim (2000); Gould (2001); Peng (2001). Mink (1998), though, is critical of feminists’ failure in the US to defend poor mothers’ rights against punitive welfare reforms.
See David (1985); Balbo (1987). According to a British Government Minister, 91 per cent of women with school-age children say they normally take them to the doctor and 61 per cent to school (House of Commons Hansard, 2001). The point is not, however, necessarily true for all societies. Joseph, for instance, notes how in Lebanon ‘patriarchy privileged the initiatives of males and seniors in such a way that women and juniors often had to have the involvement of males and seniors on their behalf in negotiations with public officials and agencies’ (1994, p. 283).
See Hernes (1987); Fox-Piven (1990); Orloff (1993); O’Connor (1993, 1996); Naples (1998a, b); Hobson (1999); Pope (1999).
See Croft and Beresford (1989, 1992); Fraser (1989); Beresford and Croft (1993); Yeatman (1994); Barnes (1997, 1999a); Higgins (1999); Commission on Poverty, Participation and Power (2000).
Lewis (1994, p. 50); see also Dale and Foster (1986); Riley (1988).
See Lewis (1980, 1994); Mink (1990); Bellingham and Mathis (1994); Misra and Akins (1998).
Leira (1992, p. 126). Examples of alternative health projects are discussed by Doyal (1983, 1995); Lovenduski and Randall (1993); Cockburn (1998). Examples of women as alternative welfare providers can be found in Hyatt (1992a); Basu (1995); Behrend (1995). The dangers are also discussed by Silliman (1999) and Schild (2000).
Recent studies include Sainsbury (1996, 1999); O’Connor et al. (1999); Daly (2000).
See Hernes (1987); Sassoon (1987); Fox-Piven (1990); Kohlberg (1991); Lewis (1994); Meyer (1994).
See Bryan et al. (1985); Mama (1992); Foster (1996).
Pateman (1989, p. 195); see also Daly (1994); Kornbluh (1996); O’Connor (1996); Christopher (2001b).
Orloff (1997). Evidence of the domestic violence experienced by lone mothers can be found in, for instance, Bradshaw and Millar (1991); Marsh et al. (1997); Raphael (2000); Polakow et al. (2001).
Falkingham and Hills (1995); Daly (2000); Nyberg (2002).
See Nelson (1984, 1990); Fraser (1987); Fraser and Gordon (1994a).
Sainsbury (1996); Lewis (1997). This process has gone furthest in Australia, see Shaver (1993); O’ Connor et al. (1999).
See Hoskyns and Luckhaus (1989); Millar (1989, 1996); Maier (1991); Lister (1992, 1994c); Sohrab (1994); O’Reilly and Fagan (1998); Daly (2000).
See Groves (1991, 1992); Davies and Ward (1992); Ginn and Arber (1991, 1992; 1994a); Twine (1994); Joshi et al. (1996); Gough (2001); Ginn et al., 2001 and on fiscal welfare, Sainsbury (1999).
Lister (1992); Sainsbury (1996, 1999); Ginn et al. (2001).
Esping-Andersen (1990, p. 37). The gendered critique and development of his model includes, in addition to texts specifically referenced, Lewis (1993); Scheiwe (1994); Anttonen and Sipilä (1996); Gornick et al. (1997) and O’ Connor et al.’s (1999) study of liberal regimes. Initial feminist analysis of welfare regimes and the ‘male breadwinner’ model has since been critiqued and refined in Sainsbury (1994, 1996, 1999); Lewis (plus Commentaries) (1997); Daly (2000) and Adams and Padamsee (2001).
McLaughlin and Glendinning (1994) have put forward the same concept of ‘defamilialisation’. Subsequently Esping-Andersen (1999) has himself appropriated the term in his later work, which accords the family a key role (see also Mahon, 2001).
Orloff (1993, p. 320; 1997); O’Connor (1993, 1996); see also Hobson (1990); Bussemaker and van Kersbergen (1994); Lister (1995a) and Korpi (2000) who treats autonomy as an aspect of ‘agency inequality’.
Lewis (2001, p. 163; 2000); Pascall and Lewis (2001). The Scandinavian version of the individualised model is discussed by Sainsbury (1996, 1999); Bergqvist and Jungar (2000); Siim (2000). Plantenga (2002) discusses the Netherlands. Pfau-Effinger (2001) identifies three ‘modernisation paths of gender arrangements’.
See Einhorn (1993, 1999); Lykke et al. (1994); Matynia (1995); Pascall and Manning (2000).
Pringle and Watson (1992, pp. 70, 63); see also Dahlerup (1987); Eisenstein (1988); Cooper (1993); Curthoys (1993); Randall and Waylen (1998); Rai (1999); Squires (2000). Brown’s more critical analysis of the state as a continued instrument of male dominance, producing disciplined gendered subjects, distinguishes between the state’s juridical, capitalist, prerogative and bureaucratic facets (1995). A related issue is the role of the law, which like the state, is best understood as neither unitary nor homogeneous (Smart and Brophy, 1985). Feminist accounts of the law which are relevant to the issues pursued here include O’Donovan (1985); Dahl (1987); Holtmaat (1989); Smart (1989) and, in an EU context, Hoskyns (1996).
The implications of such transformations for gendered citizenship are discussed in Brodie (1997); Pettman (1999); Schild (2000); Crouch (2001). Lewis (1998) and Daly and Lewis (2000) analyse the implications of marketisation for care and Ginn et al. (2001) of privatisation for women’s pensions.
The importance of the’ social services state’ is underlined by Anttonen and Sipilä (1996); Sainsbury (1996); Anttonen (1998); Johansson and Jansson (1998).
Writing within the Finnish context, Silius (1995) cites as examples of the first point the tardy criminalisation of rape in marriage; the non-gender sensitive treatment of domestic violence; and the non-problematisation of pornography. Bacchi (1996) makes similar observations about Sweden where the political agenda has not reflected feminist concerns about such issues until only recently. Eduards (1997) and Gould (2001) describe how they are now taken more seriously in Sweden thanks to the feminist movement. The more general critique can be found in Leira (1992, 1993a, b); Sainsbury, (1999, pp. 94–5); Nyberg (2002).
See Williams (1989, 1995a); Shaver (1990, 1993); Anthias and Yuval-Davis (1992); Ginsburg (1992, 1994a); Boris (1995); Orloff (1996, 2002).
Mama (1992, p. 86); see also Bryan et al. (1985); Cook and Watt (1992); Nasir (1996); Douglas (1998).
See Shaver (1990); Carabine (1992, 1996); Cooper (1993); Alexander (1994); Richardson (1998). The promotion of heterosexual interests is not always to the disadvantage of lesbians and gays. Thus, for example, where homosexual partnerships are not recognised lesbian and gay couples escape the cohabitation rule applied to social security claims from heterosexuals deemed to be living as part of an unmarried couple.
See Lewis (1980); Bock and Thane (1991); Koven and Michel (1993); Frader (1996); Kornbluh (1996); Misra and Akins (1998). Lewis (1994) has, however, challenged the increasingly influential feminist interpretation of women’s early welfare activism as being inspired solely by maternalism. Rather, she suggests, it represented primarily the expression of their perceived citizenship duties.
Pederson (1990, pp. 983, 1006); with regard to the US, see Gordon (1990) and Sarvasy (1992).
In contrast, Sainsbury contends that maternalists’ ‘influence on Norwegian social policy constitutes a major source of contemporary variations among Scandinavian welfare states’, revealing ‘a much sharper gender differentiation in social entitlements’ (2001, pp. 137, 114).
Leira (1992, p. 171, 1989, p. 208). Arguments for such a concept are put also by, for instance, Knijn and Kremer (1997); Grace (1998); Sevenjuijsen (1998); McKie et al. (2001). Relevant here also are the growing demands worldwide, as expressed in the 1995 UN Platform for Action agreed at Beijing, for women’s unpaid caring work to be treated as part of gross national product for economic accounting purposes in the same way that paid caring work is (Folbre, 1995). The limits of such a strategy are, however, pointed out by Gardiner (1997).
See Luckhaus and Dickens (1991); Lister (1992, 1994c); Commission on Social Justice (1994); Daly (1996).
For a discussion of the individualisation of social security benefits see Esam and Berthoud (1991); Roll (1991); Luckhaus (1994); Sainsbury (1996, 1999). Individualisation of contributory benefits would, though, have to be introduced gradually so as not to hurt those, particularly older, women who had not built up their own contribution entitlement. I have argued elsewhere that individualisation is not appropriate in means-tested benefits on the grounds that’ short of measuring the actual flow of resources between partners (which would be unacceptably intrusive and could not, in any case, take account of the use of such resources for household or personal consumption), it is difficult to see how means-tested benefits can accurately target help on those in need, once concern shifts to the needs not of families but of the individuals that make up families’ (Lister, 1992, p. 65, 1994c). This is, in my view, a strong argument against means-tested benefits per se, although Australia has shown that partial individualisation is possible (Millar, 1998).
Kremer (1994) and Knijn and Kremer (1997); see also Balbo and Nowotny (1986); Sassoon (1991); Knijn (1994).
Germany reformed its parental leave scheme in 2000, with the aim in part to raise fathers’ take-up rate (Ostner, 2001).
Denmark introduced a two weeks father’s quota in addition to two weeks existing paternity leave in 1999 (Rostgaard et al., 1999). A proposal to extend the quota to three months fell with the change of government in 2001 (Siim, personal communication). A number of EC member states are taking steps to increase fathers’ take-up (European Commission, 2001).
Deven et al. (1998); Moss and Deven (1999); Sainsbury (1999). The New Labour British Government, which introduced parental leave in the UK, has been widely criticised for its refusal to consider payment; as a result only a tiny percentage of fathers are making use of it.
Carlsen (1993, 1995); Deven et al. (1998); Moss and Deven (1999); Kröger (2001); Björnberg (2002).
See Brannen and Moss (1991); Cockburn (1991); Richardson (1993); Martin and Collinson (1999). The impact of attitudes on the sexual division of labour is stressed by Compton and Harris (1999).
Plantenga et al. (1999, p. 100); see also Knijn and van Wel (2001a, b); Kremer (2001); Plantenga (2002).
Marsh (1991, p. 80). See also Hernes (1987); Hewitt (1993); Folbre (1994); Employment Committee (1995); Pillinger (2000); and Sirianni and Negrey (2000) who point out that a feminist approach to working time would emphasise a shorter working day, work-time flexibility and limits on un-social hours rather than a shorter working week. A working time directive was agreed by the EU in 1993, but its limitations have reduced its impact (Hantrais and Letablier, 1997).
Critical feminists include Segal (1987) and Richardson (1993). In their study of Britain and France, Gregory and Windebank (2000), on the other hand, suggest that better state provisions might reinforce the sexual division of labour by relieving men of their responsibility in the domestic sphere. My emphasis on the balance between individual and state responsibility is not to discount the importance of informal and voluntary forms of collective provision that fall between the two. Examples in the field of childcare can be found, for instance, in Norway where mothers have developed a network of informal provisions (Leira, 1992) and the UK where there is a strong voluntary childcare movement (Lovenduski and Randall, 1993; Figes, 1994; Melzer, 1994).
Moss (1988); see too Cook and Watt (1992) with respect to the differential access to childcare facilities by ‘race’.
Child care league tables suffer from problems of data comparison. These data are from the European Commission (2001) and include formal private as well as public provision. There is a growing trend in some countries to privately provided though publicly funded childcare (Lewis, 1998). For further information on childcare see O’Connor (1996); Sainsbury (1999); Deven et al. (1998); Randall (2000); Kröger (2001); Millar and Ridge (2001); Michel, Mahon (eds) (2002). Childcare is of importance not just to women but to children themselves (Daycare Trust, 2001; Polakow et al., 2001), which underlines the importance of quality (La Valle et al., 1999; Land, 2002).
he extension of parental leave in Eastern/Central Europe, for instance, is aimed at reducing spending on child care and depressing women’s labour supply (Pascall and Manning, 2000).
For more detailed information about policies in Sweden and the other Nordic welfare states see Hobson et al. (1995); Kautto et al. (1999); Moss and Deven (1999); Sainsbury (1999); Bergqvist and Jungar (2000).
The dangers are discussed in Moss and Deven (1999). Bruning and Platenga (1999) suggest that a year is the optimal length. For evidence of the long-term impact of women’s absence from the labour market, see Mertens et al. (1995); Joshi et al. (1996); McRae (1996); Rake (2000). The point still applies, albeit less so, even in those countries, such as Sweden, where those on parental leave are defined as in employment.
Information about child care allowances can be found in Leira (1998); Lewis (1998); Moss and Deven (1999). Their introduction in Sweden was shortlived (Bergqvist and Jungar, 2000). In an assessment of the debates in Finland and France around the relative merits of such allowances and formal child care, Heinen and Martiskainen Koenigswarter conclude that the outcome will ‘dramatically affect... the shape of women’s citizenship’ (2001, p. 176).
Ungerson (1995, 1997) makes the point that the growing incidence of paid volunteering and the diversification of modes of payment for care (in which she includes symbolic informal payments to kin, friends and neighbours) serves to undermine the dichotomy that she and others had previously drawn between formal and informal forms of care. More detailed information about payments for caring can be found in cross-national studies by Glendinning and McLaughlin (1993a, b); Evers et al. (1994), updated by Pijl (1995) and Lewis (1998). For a more general discussion of citizenship and the provision of care for frail elderly people, see Baldock and Evers (1991).
McLaughlin and Glendinning (1994). Until a ruling by the European Court of Justice, married/cohabiting women were excluded from entitlement on the grounds that ‘they might be at home in any event’.
See Ungerson (1992, 1997); Glendinning and McLaughlin (1993b); Evers et al. (1994). Ungerson (2000) warns that, in the UK, the domiciliary care labour market is beginning to bifurcate into one part, offering very low wages and poor working conditions and the other, more skilled, not quite as low paid, work under better conditions. This mirrors growing inequalities between women in the labour market more generally.
The position of and policies for working carers are discussed by Jani-Le Bris (1993); Parker and Lawton (1994); Arber and Ginn, (1995); Evers et al. (1994, p. 38); Phillips J. (1995, 1996); Schunk (2000); Howard (2001).
Arber and Ginn (1995). The other two arguments can be found in McLaughlin and Glendinning (1994) and Ungerson (1993) respectively.
For a fuller discussion of the arguments for and against each of these positions see, for instance, Evers et al. (1994); Bransbury (1995); Ungerson (1995); Shakespeare (2000); Howard (2001); Daly (2002). A number of European countries are going down the road of payment to the care-user. Legislation to introduce direct payments was introduced in the UK in 1996. Ungerson suggests that ‘these developments constitute the sharp end of commodified care and marketized intimacy’ (1997, p. 170; 1999). The relationship that such payments set up between recipients and the state has been described as possibly heralding ‘a new type of welfare citizenship’ (Daly and Lewis, 1998, p. 4).
Ungerson (1993, pp. 144, 150, 1995, 1997). The importance of such a public framework is emphasised also in Hooyman and Gonyea’s feminist model for family care, elaborated in the US context (1995).
Jordan (1989, p. 124). Among other writers who have advocated Citizen’s or Basic Income (as it is also called) with reference to the principles of citizenship are Offe (1993), Vilrokx (1993); Twine (1994); Faulks (2000); McKay and VanEvery (2000). Roche (1992) also provides a critically sympathetic account. Williams (1992a) suggests that it could help to resolve the tension in social policy between universality and diversity but does not go into detail. The definition is taken from the Citizen’s Income Bulletin (now Newsletter), published by the Citizen’s Income Trust (www.citizensincome.org). The position of non-citizen residents under it is not clear.
Atkinson (1993); see also White (2000); Oppenheim (2001). As the Commission on Social Justice acknowledged, the definition of such a condition would need detailed consideration. Its own suggestion is that it would include all ‘residents in employment or self-employment, those unable to work because of sickness, injury or disability, those unemployed but available for work, those in approved education or training, and those caring for young, elderly or disabled dependants’ (1994, p. 264). Atkinson’s formulation included, in addition, those engaged in voluntary work. Jordan et al., however, doubt ‘the ability of legislators to translate the notion of “participation” into a system which is both morally defensible and politically feasible’ (2000, p. 68).
See Amott (1990); Meucci (1992); King (1995); Roberts (1995); Naples (1997); Mink (1998); Link and Bibus (2000); Clarke and Fox Piven (2001); Millar and Ridge (2001); Waldfogel et al. (2001); Wiseman (2001).
Gilder (1986, p. 39 cited in Roche, 1992). Elsewhere, Gilder (1987) explicitly condemns the position of Novak et al. (1987).
See Duncan and Edwards (1997); Lewis (1997); Kiernan et al. (1998); Millar and Rowlingson (2001).
Knijn and van Wel (2001a, b). Feminists have been divided in their responses to this policy shift. Some are in favour because they see it as opening up facilities and opportunities to lone mothers which would not be available so long as they are on social assistance; while others see it as an erosion of lone mothers’ social rights.
For discussion of the UK see Millar and Rowlingson (2001); Gray (2001); Lister, (2002c). According to a study of OECD countries, the only other countries that do not require lone parents to seek work until their youngest child is aged (at least) 16 are Ireland, Australia and New Zealand (Eardley et al., 1996). See also Bradshaw et al. (1996). In Australia pressure to enter the labour market is growing and a requirement on lone parents to demonstrate some form of social or economic participation, broadly defined to include voluntary work, as a condition of receipt of social assistance is under consideration (Hancock, 2002; Saunders, 2002).
Kilkey and Bradshaw (1999, 2001); Pedersen et al. (2000); Chambaz (2001); Millar and Ridge (2001) provide information on lone mothers’ poverty rates.
Waldfogel et al. (2001, p. 59). See also Duncan and Edwards (1997); Christopher (2001a); Polit et al. (2001); Verber (2001). In the context of the UK New Deal, the importance of sustainable employment and support from personal advisers for lone parents once in work is stressed by the National Council for One Parent Families (2001).
See, for instance, Duncan and Edwards (1997); Lewis (1997); Kiernan et al. (1998); Pedersen et al. (2000), Millar and Rowlingson (2001). Information about lone mothers own preferences and needs, in the UK context, can be found in Kemmer et al. (2001); Millar and Ridge (2001); National Council for One Parent Families (2001). Paid time off to care for sick children is of particular importance given the high incidence of ill health among children in lone parent families (Millar and Ridge, 2001).
The impact of education on lone mothers’ economic situation is emphasised by Knijn and van Wel (2001a); Millar and Rowlingson (2001); Polakow et al. (2001).
See Knijn and van Wel (2001a, b) and also van Drenth et al. (1999). Black lone mothers in the UK are more likely to see the financial rewards from and example set by paid work as part of their moral responsibilities towards their children (Duncan and Edwards, 1999; Reynolds, 2001).
The stronger the expectation that lone mothers are in paid work, the more unreasonable is the competing expectation of their involvement in their children’s schooling (Standing, 1999).
Hobson (1994, p. 171). See also Lewis (1997). However, a small qualitative study in Denmark warns that lone mothers ‘readily fall through the ever-widening holes of a universalistic society which has failed to recognize the specific life-world obstacles of such families’ and in which the failure of social citizenship rights ‘to take account of the unique position of lone-mother families’ leaves them ‘diminished and impaired’ (Polakow et al.) (2001, pp. 2–3).
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© 2003 Ruth Lister
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Lister, R. (2003). Women’s Social Citizenship: Earning and Caring. In: Campling, J. (eds) Citizenship: Feminist Perspectives. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-80253-7_8
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