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A Theoretical Synthesis of Gender, Migration and Care Regimes
The mapping and documentation of domestic work, and its relation to migration
and/or globalisation, has received increased scholarly attention over the last
decade, especially by feminist sociologists, geographers and international
relations scholars (Kofman et al 2000, Parrenas 2001, Anderson 2000, Ehrenreich
and Hochschild 2002, Lutz, 2002). Such studies have been extremely important
in exposing the oppressive nature of such work and the ways in which migration
rules and regimes contribute to this. They reveal how domestic and care work are
expanding job areas that are increasingly being filled by undocumented female
migrants as opposed to homestate women, re-inscribing this work with postcolonial gendered inequalities. This study seeks to view this development from a
different perspective by examining the role that migrant domestic/care workers
play in the changing welfare regimes of Europe.
Migrant workers make two important contributions to welfare services: (i) as
doctors, teacher, nurses, care assistants in the public and private health,
education and social care, and (ii) as privately employed workers in the home, as
well as through tax contributions. This study will take the first into account but
will be more concerned with the second group where there is little cross-national
research analysing the relationship between changing welfare/ care regimes and
the employment of private and domestic workers (but see Yeandle and Ungerson,
2002; Ungerson, 2003; Williams, 2004; Gavanas, Tobio and Williams, 2006). The
significance of this relationship can be exemplified through recent moves in
European welfare states from the male breadwinner model to the so-called ‘adult
worker’ model, where both women and men are expected to work (Lewis, 2001).
As part of this there has also been, in some areas, a change in the way care
provision is subsidised, in particular, from providing care services (or no services)
to providing cash payments to buy in care. There are two main types of policy
development that are important here: first, the provision of cash payments, tax
credits or tax incentives to pay child minders, relatives or domestic workers, for
their services. In relation to child related care, for example, the UK and Spain,
Finland and France have all introduced some form of cash provision to buy in
help. Second, there forms of ‘direct payments’ which allow older people or
disabled people to buy in support and assistance, for example, in the UK,
Netherlands, Italy and Austria. Both of these types of provision encourage the
development of a particular form of home-based, low-paid commodified care or
domestic help, generally accessed privately through the market. There is thus,
directly or indirectly, a relationship between the development of such policies and
the employment of migrant women as domestic/care workers. However, having
established this link, the reality is quite complex. Empirical work based on
Sweden, Spain and the UK currently in progress by the applicant with the
Gavanas (see Swedish individual project) is beginning to reveal considerable
differences across countries, not only in the nationalities of migrant workers but
in the relationship between their employment and the existing forms of public
care provision (the ‘care regime’ -Daly, 2002; Leitner, 2003). Furthermore,
strategies around using ‘substitute’ or ‘personal’ care are also influenced by
dominant national and local cultural discourses on what constitutes appropriate
child care, or elder /disabled support, in other words, the ‘care culture’ (Kremer,
2002, Williams 2004, Gavanas and Williams, 2003 Pfau-Effinger, 2005; Haas,
2005).
This poses an interesting theoretical problem as to how to analyse the different
ways these three sets of dynamics interlock in different countries: those
associated with migration regimes, with ‘care policy regimes’ and with ‘care
cultures’. The aims of this study will therefore be
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To map, compare and analyse these three dynamics in the six
‘employment’ countries involved in the collaborative study.
To develop a theoretical understanding to provide an analysis of welfare
restructuring in Europe within an international, post-colonial and gendered
context.
To develop, with reference to the partner studies, common conceptual
frameworks and reference points for cross-national work.
To contribute to policy recommendations for care and support and the
rights of workers in this field.