Family Policy and the Organisation of Childcare

Abstract

This book is a wonderful exploration of the process by which families negotiate the patchworks of policies, provision and (im)possibilities that form local landscapes of child care. Borbála Kovács has provided an empirically rich and conceptually insightful study that testifies to the way in which ideas and ideals of care inspire and inform parental choice making." -John Clarke, Professor Emeritus, Open University, UK "In this book, Borbála Kovács innovatively applies the care ideals framework to Romania, one of the least studied welfare states in Europe. With the help of 79 interviews with mothers and fathers of different ethnic and socio-economic background she guides the reader through the daily negotiations of families with small children about care arrangements within the opportunities and limitations of the changing Romanian family policy landscape. A highly recommendable read for scholars interested in welfare states, family policies and gender beyond the conventional West-centred perspective." -Dorottya Szikra, Senior Research Fellow, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary "This innovative new book provides fascinating insights into the granular reality of life with young children and the process of parents' decision-making about their care. The setting is today's Romania, but the dilemmas and debates will be recognised by all. The author skilfully describes how the hierarchy of care ideals that parents have in mind combines with the policy provisions in place, and parents' own circumstances, to result in the patchwork of practical everyday routines of young children's care. This rich forensic investigation widens the lens beyond mothers' employment and, by focusing instead on the moral aspect of decisions about children's care, helps us to a better understanding of the interplay of culture, experience and policies in this most personal yet public area of everyday life." -Fran Bennett, Senior Research and Teaching Fellow, University of Oxford, UK "This is an exciting new book that analyses how and why parents choose different types of childcare arrangements. The author provides a rich, detailed account of how parents of young children create different patterns of childcare arrangements in the context of cultural ideals of childcare, childcare policies Family Policy and the Organisation of Childcare and intra-household negotiations. The book is an excellent piece of work that makes a distinct contribution to knowledge and thinking in the field." -

Alapvető anyaság : Az anyai szerep felértékelődése középosztálybeli magyar nők körében az első Covid19-lezárások idején

“…Az individualizmus ideológiája mellett hasonlóan erős a familizmus a közép-és kelet-európai társadalmakban, az ellentmondás azonban csak látszólagos. A familizmus vagy "re-familiarizáció" nem csak a család normatív felértékelődését jelenti, hanem azt a központi szerepet is, amelyet a család (más intézmények helyett) az egyén boldogulásában játszik (Dupcsik-Tóth 2008, Dohotariu 2015, Kovács 2018, Saxonberg 2013. A "domesztikált neoliberális gender rezsim" körülményei között viszont a nők körében általánosnak mondható a konszenzus, hogy a gondoskodás az ő dolguk, (nagyobb) részvételt pedig sem az államtól, sem a férfiaktól nem várnak el (Gregor-Kováts 2019).…”

When a crisis undermines quality public service provision: Romanian early childhood education and care through the SARS-Cov-2 epidemic

“…Not surprisingly, early years childcare is dominated by women's familial care: maternal care in less educated, less well-to-do, most rural families; and grandmaternal or paid informal care in better educated, highincome, especially urban families. With the exception of working families in large urban settings, formal ECEC is but a complement to familial care during the early years (Kovács, 2018).…”

“…Decision-makers were, thus, also hinting at what remains but a myth of early years childcare in Romania: most grandparents' proximity to and near-universal routine involvement with young children. The myth of the retired grandparent caring for her grandchildren remains culturally widely shared despite recent research suggesting the opposite (Kovács, 2016(Kovács, , 2018.…”

“…In short, the policy decisions concerning ECEC services in Romania make for an excellent study of several different processes. First, the article shows how and why a policy environment long characterised by implicit and explicit familialism (Kovács, 2018) relied on a similar policy response in a crisis, reinforcing further selectiveness, fragmentation and inadequate benefit and service provision. In more general terms, this article spells out how and why economic crises act as catalysts for notable shifts in mixed economies of care, in familialist family policy environments enhancing familialism rather than unravelling it.…”

Different, Yet the Same: Three Decades of Family Policy Change in Hungary, Lithuania and Romania

“…Gal and Kligman, 2000;Haney, 2002;Pascall and Kwak, 2005;Saxonberg, 2014). By comparison, the ways in which (changing) family policy architectures may have contributed to socio-economic inequalities among families has attracted less attention (for partial exceptions see Haney, 1999Haney, , 2002Gábos, 2000;Ferge, 2001;Fodor et al, 2002;Szalai, 2012;Inglot et al, 2012;Kovács et al, 2017;Kovács, 2018;Szikra, 2018).…”