Caring Time Policies in Western Europe: Trends and Implications

One trend in family policy across Western Europe in recent years has been the expansion of caring time policies – maternity, paternity and parental leaves, as well as part-time work possibilities. This trend reflects economic and demographic motivations as policy-makers seek to combat unemployment, ‘activate’ female labor through flexible forms of work and combat declining birth rates. It also reflects political pressures on governments to help parents balance work and family. In meeting these aims, policy-makers have devised policies that restructure women's time rather than that of men, encouraging temporary or part-time homemaking by women combined with interrupted or part-time work. Lacking are policies that more successfully challenge the gender division of labor in the home, reflecting limits to feminist influence over these policies. Such initiatives can be traced to various factors, including demographic anxieties, the desire for greater economic flexibility and the demands of working parents for more help, and demonstrate the limited influence of feminists in policy design.