Abstract
Originally part of the private domain of families, care of the older people is now the concern of public policy. Yet, in the European context of cost containment, it is not easy to make a case for increasing public support and the caring function of families remains prominent in social policy. In this paper, the authors question public policies around care of the older people in relation to both the needs of old people, but also those of adult children, mainly women, who work and provide care for their old parents. We investigate the interactions between public support in long-term care and the caring function of families. The paper presents some results of a comparative research study based on the identification of the policy measures which have been implemented in different European countries in the sector of care of the older people, and on the detailed analysis of care arrangements set up by a sample of 86 family carers in these various national contexts. We argue that in a context of cost containment, whatever the usual patterns of care and the role given to the family and public authorities, the policy measures which have been introduced since the 90s aim to support family carers in various ways with the common objective of giving them the flexibility they need in the organisation of care arrangements, combining various resources (formal professional care, unpaid informal care, semi-formal care). Different patterns of flexibility can be identified according to the regulation of the policy measures.
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Notes
The Woups (Workers under Pressure and Social care) Research was financed by the French National Research Agency (ANR) and the MIRE (Research cell of the French ministry of Social Affairs). The members of the international research team were: Barbara Da Roit, Trudie Knijn and Ellen Grootegoed for the Netherlands; Chiara Saraceno, Wolfgang Keck, Christina Klenner, Sabine Neukirch and Ute Klammer for Germany; Ulla Björnberg, Sofia Engstrom, Hans Ekbrand for Sweden; Karin Wall, Sanda Samitca, Sonia Vladimira Correia, Susana Atalaia and Mafaldo Leitao for Portugal; Manuela Naldini, Barbara Da Roit and Elisabetta Donati for Italy and Arnaud Campéon, Blanche Le Bihan and Claude Martin for France.
Institutional care was not excluded from the samples, but the focus was on the care trajectory which led to the institution.
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Responsible Editors: T. Rostgaard and M. Zechner (Guest Editors) and H.-W. Wahl.
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Le Bihan, B., Martin, C. Diversification of care policy measures supporting older people: towards greater flexibility for carers?. Eur J Ageing 9, 141–150 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10433-012-0228-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10433-012-0228-6