The Politicization of Parenthood

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xii

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2. Introduction

   • Sabine Andresen, Martina Richter

   Pages 1-10

3. Families and the Welfare State: The Understanding of Responsibility

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 11-11

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4. Families and the Welfare State: the Understanding of Responsibility

   1. Family Policy and the Politics of Parenting: From Function to Competence

      • Val Gillies

      Pages 13-26

   2. Families, Professionals, and Responsibility

      • Nadia Kutscher

      Pages 27-37

   3. Nordic Politicization of Parenthood: Unfolding Hybridization?

      • Anne Lise Ellingsæter

      Pages 39-53

   4. Can a Crisis Become an Opportunity? Gender and Care in Contemporary Ireland

      • Brid Featherstone

      Pages 55-68

   5. Parent–School Relations in England and the USA: Partnership, Problematized

      • Kristen D. Nawrotzki

      Pages 69-83

   6. Family and Welfare State Change: Challenges for Education

      • Andreas Lange

      Pages 85-99

   7. The Redistribution of Responsibility Between State and Parents: Family in the Context of Post-Welfare-State Transformation

      • Nina Oelkers

      Pages 101-110

5. Child Rearing Between Family Care and Institutional Provisions

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 111-111

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   2. Early Childhood Education and Social Inequality: Parental Models of a “Good” Childhood

      • Tanja Betz

      Pages 113-126

   3. Child Well-Being in the UK: Children’s Views of Families

      • Colette McAuley

      Pages 127-138

   4. The Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes

      • Carol Vincent, Nicola Rollock, Stephen Ball, David Gillborn

      Pages 139-152

   5. Significance of Family and School, Educational Standards, and Social Reproduction in Education

      • Jutta Ecarius

      Pages 153-163

   6. Studying at Home: With Whom and in Which Way? Homework Practices and Conflicts in the Family

      • Elke Wild, Sittipan Yotyodying

      Pages 165-180

   7. “Having to Keep Silent”: A Capabilities Perspective on Growing Up and the “Education Process” in a Migration Family

      • Christine Hunner-Kreisel

      Pages 181-194

6. Meeting Parents’ and Children’s Needs: Professionals in Schools

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 195-195

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7. Meeting Parents' and Children's Needs: Professionals in Schools

   1. Pushing Parents Away: The Role of District Bureaucracy in an Urban School

      • Erin McNamara Horvat

      Pages 197-212

   2. Symbolic Constructions, Pedagogical Practices, and the Legitimation of All-Day Schooling from a Professional Perspective: Tendencies Towards Familialization in All-Day Schools

      • Till-Sebastian Idel, Kerstin Rabenstein, Sabine Reh

      Pages 213-220

Currently, families are being subjected to increasing public attention. Interest is focussing on their potential strengths and weaknesses in determining how well children do at school. Alongside such human-development oriented expectations, families are also becoming a focus of attention as a resource for human capital in times of economic crises and criticism of the welfare state. In many European countries, parents and children are at the forefront of the welfare state and socio-educational activities in current programs and policies. The current transformation processes in the welfare state are making the relationship between families and the state more dynamic in general, and they are structuring the discourses on the childrearing, education, and child care services in the fields of both public and private responsibility. The introduction of all-day schooling in Germany also has to be viewed in this context. This is gradually changing the traditional half-day structure of German schools and shifting the borders of public and private responsibility on the levels of education, child care, and childrearing institutions. The attention given to parental childrearing and educational responsibility within the context of current national and international debates clearly underlines the fact that issues in private life are increasingly entering the public discourse and becoming subject to attempts at socio-political control. This raises the assumption of an increasing politicization of parenthood in the (post) welfare state that is focusing more and more attention on the structural conditions of gainful employment and child care as well as on the current relations between the genders. This context particularly emphasizes the time and care regimes that decisively determine the practices in daily family life and the utilization of all-day education settings.

• Politicalisation of parenthood
• all-day schools
• child care
• child rearing
• education
• family research
• social policy
• socio-educational activities
• welfare state

• , Institute forSocial Work, Education and, University of Vechta, Vechta, Germany

  Martina Richter

• Fak. Erziehungswissenschaft, Universität Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany

  Sabine Andresen

Currently, families are being subjected to increasing public attention with interest focusing on their potential strengths and weaknesses in determining how well children do at school. Parents and children are at the forefront of the welfare state and socio-educational activities in current programs and policies. This book examines the resulting changes in the relationship between families and the state, and the shifting borders of public and private responsibility in education, child care, and childrearing. It discusses the practice of all-day schooling in Germany within this context. It considers international and national debates that underline the fact that issues in private life are increasingly entering the public discourse and becoming subject to attempts at socio-political control. Finally, it discusses the growing politicization of parenthood in the (post) welfare state and the increasing attention being paid to the structural conditions of gainful employment and child care as well as to the current relations between the genders.

Policies and ethics