Fourteen Working fathers as providers and carers: towards a new conceptualisation of fatherhood
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Alison Smith
Abstract
This chapter is a welcome counterbalance to the assumption that combining working and family life are women’s concerns. It draws on an ESRC-funded study on how working fathers are reconceptualising fatherhood as being about combining economic provision and caring, usefully taking the theoretical debate on fatherhood beyond issues of breadwinner versus carer. This analysis of working time and paternal time shows that there is a distinct class basis to the quality and quantity of time that fathers spend with their children; perhaps counterintuitively, it is the fathers who work the hardest in the economic arena and who work the hardest in the caring arena. In sum, fathers who earn more care more for their children. The findings in this chapter have important implications on the perception about developing theory and policy around fathering, caring and working, as well as the implication it has on mothering, caring and working and gender relations within families and societies.
Abstract
This chapter is a welcome counterbalance to the assumption that combining working and family life are women’s concerns. It draws on an ESRC-funded study on how working fathers are reconceptualising fatherhood as being about combining economic provision and caring, usefully taking the theoretical debate on fatherhood beyond issues of breadwinner versus carer. This analysis of working time and paternal time shows that there is a distinct class basis to the quality and quantity of time that fathers spend with their children; perhaps counterintuitively, it is the fathers who work the hardest in the economic arena and who work the hardest in the caring arena. In sum, fathers who earn more care more for their children. The findings in this chapter have important implications on the perception about developing theory and policy around fathering, caring and working, as well as the implication it has on mothering, caring and working and gender relations within families and societies.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents iii
- List of tables and boxes v
- List of abbreviations vi
- Notes on contributors viii
- Introduction 1
-
Current developments
- A year of transition in post-compulsory education and training 11
- Planning for infrastructure and housing – is sustainable development a dream? 35
- Towards a new pension settlement? Recent pension reform in the UK 51
- Climate change and climate change policy in the UK 2006–07 69
- Policy for older people in Wales 93
-
Current debates
- Flexibility or flexploitation? Problems with work–life balance in a low-income neighbourhood 113
- The role of confidence and identity in civic participation: exploring ethnic group differences 133
- The problem of riches: is philanthropy a solution or part of the problem? 151
- Policy from the pitch? Soccer and young refugee women in a shifting policy climate 173
- Social citizenship in post-liberal Britain and post-corporatist Germany: curtailed, fragmented, streamlined, but still on the agenda 191
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Engendering policy and politics
- Gender and New Labour: after the male breadwinner model? 215
- A review of engendering policy in the EU 241
- Forming Australian families: gender ideologies and policy settings 263
- Working fathers as providers and carers: towards a new conceptualisation of fatherhood 279
- Index 297
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents iii
- List of tables and boxes v
- List of abbreviations vi
- Notes on contributors viii
- Introduction 1
-
Current developments
- A year of transition in post-compulsory education and training 11
- Planning for infrastructure and housing – is sustainable development a dream? 35
- Towards a new pension settlement? Recent pension reform in the UK 51
- Climate change and climate change policy in the UK 2006–07 69
- Policy for older people in Wales 93
-
Current debates
- Flexibility or flexploitation? Problems with work–life balance in a low-income neighbourhood 113
- The role of confidence and identity in civic participation: exploring ethnic group differences 133
- The problem of riches: is philanthropy a solution or part of the problem? 151
- Policy from the pitch? Soccer and young refugee women in a shifting policy climate 173
- Social citizenship in post-liberal Britain and post-corporatist Germany: curtailed, fragmented, streamlined, but still on the agenda 191
-
Engendering policy and politics
- Gender and New Labour: after the male breadwinner model? 215
- A review of engendering policy in the EU 241
- Forming Australian families: gender ideologies and policy settings 263
- Working fathers as providers and carers: towards a new conceptualisation of fatherhood 279
- Index 297
